#stuff like craig of the creek and ok ko

[chaifootsteps]

Something that confuses and disgusts me about Spindlehorse is how POSSESSIVE they apparently are of some of their animators…specifically the screenshots of viv asking people not to hire anyone working on her projects, and the studio talking shit about other animated projects like far fetched and Lackadaisy….b/c literally how we get more wonderful animation is when creators mentor and support the people on their staff!!!

Here’s the whole “Thurop Van Orman/Flapjack Family of Cartoons” as an example:

https://www.reddit.com/r/gravityfalls/comments/nwizfg/the_flapjack_family_of_cartoons/

Imagine if Orman had told other companies not to hire Pendleton Ward or JG Quintel. We wouldn’t have adventure time, which means we wouldn’t have Steven universe, or over the garden wall, or OK, KO!, or GRAVITY FALLS!!

And because we wouldn’t have gotten THOSE shows we also wouldn’t have got Craig of the Creek, The Owl House, Amphibia, Infinity Train, and more!!!

I hope that those screenshots of Viv asking other higher ups not to hire Spindlehorse employees and stuff are older, and I hope that she’s changed…but I doubt it.

I wonder what other opportunities she’s taken from her animators out of pettiness, jealousy, and spite???

(In particular, I specifically hope that Ashley Nichol’s show succeeds and does well. She, Michael, and Ed did so much for Viv’s shows, and she seems to resent them so so much for it and I can’t understand why? I try to give everyone as much benefit of the doubt as I can, but when I see ALL the people she used to be associated with and then burned??? Michael, Ashley, Erin, Kyra, and who knows who else…I just don’t understand)

Absolutely. There's zero excuse for a creator going behind their employees' backs and asking other creators not to hire them, especially when freelance animators frequently have to juggle multiple jobs to make ends meet.

You want to keep as many of your employees as possible, Viv? Pay them the wage we all know goddamn well you can afford.

#Anonymous #vivziepop critical #viv stuff #actual blog post

[ankle-beez]

I don't know if you guys remember but. There was a certain period where su crits would go after ANY show that had even a single su member working on it but they would quickly abandon it because they didn't get any traction from it like they did with su because they were just harmless kids shows. But for a bit we had stuff like "ok ko is the spawn of Satan because the female characters look like that" (debatable, to each their own) and "craig of the creek is racist because Bernard has a white girlfriend" (what)

#angel.post

[skenisasleb]

Heya Tumblr doomscrollers!!

Here’s some stuff about me you should know. :>

South Park Multishipper Alert 😇

Socials:

Second Tumblr account for my OCs: @southparkthenewkids

YouTube: lilypad

Identification:

Gender: Agender!

I can be called whatever you prefer me to be. You can use any pronouns for me. Including Bingus. Especially Bingus./j

Sexuality: Bisexual and Asexual!

I lean more towards feminine traits or women. :)

Age: 16; which means I am a MINOR. DNI pedos.

Mental ailments (😔): Neurodivergent; ADHD and autism

Though my ADHD is much more apparent, so sorry if I make no sense sometimes LMAO

Interests:

My interests change way too fast. Sorry if anyone follows me for a specific thing; I will most likely bail on that thing eventually 😭😭 (hyperfixations go brr)

Toilet Bound Hanako-kun

South Park

Raggedy Ann & Andy

FNAF

Evil Dead

Camp Camp

Invader Zim

Bravest Warriors

Rick and Morty

Moral Orel

Adventure Time

Over the Garden Wall

Smiling Friends

Ok Ko

Scott Pilgrim

Steven Universe

Good Omens

Popee the Performer

The Fifth Element

Craig of the Creek

Bluey

Kick Buttowski (guilty pleasure show fr LMFAO)

The Amazing Digital Circus

Haminations

Lackadaisy

Ranboo Generation Loss

Cuptoast

Music:

Green Day

LINKIN PARK

Lovejoy (Not a DSMP fan; just like the sound nor do I condone Wilbur’s actions in any sort of way)

Kings of Leon

TV Girl

The Killers

Arctic Monkeys

Paramore

The Proles

Vacations

The Strokes

Fwango

See my profile description for current hyperfixations and current status on art requests!!

Also, you can ship my OCs, canon or not, as long as its not sexual since most of them are 9-10 year olds 💀

I ALSO HAVE THE RIGHT TO DECLINE CERTAIN ART REQUESTS, WHETHER BECAUSE IT’S INAPPROPRIATE OR SIMPLY BECAUSE I AM NOT INTERESTED. These are art requests, not commissions.

(I will add anything new to this if I feel the need to add more!)

#intro #intro post #pin #pinned

[agere-fandom]

i’m a bit late and don’t know your fandoms but if u want: 🤫, 🪀, 🥰, ❤️‍🩹, 🎈, 🪶, 🙋‍♂️, 😀 for the agere headcanons game ? (feel free to leave some out if that’s too many)

KHFBGKDSBJF- EEEEE- I'll do spiderverse!! And Miles because he's my sweet boy :> 🤫- Write about a secret they share with their stuffie - I feel like Miles would share "secrets", like how he accidentally pushed over his legos or something, but he thinks their secrets anyway lamo- and he's like 'shhh!! you can't share this!!" (also i think he would have a lizard plush, because i hc little Miles having a big interest in reptiles :) ) 🪀- Do they like to do activities they did as a kid? What feels nostalgic to them - Definitely watching movies/tv shows he liked as a kid or would like now. Static Shock, Spidey and his Amazing Friends, OK KO, Craig of the Creek, TMNT and Danny Phantom are the shows he would watch the most while he's regressed 🥰- What type of relationship do they have with their caregivers outside of regressing? Is it romantic, platonic, familial? - Ooooh, I think he has pretty close relationships to his friends or whoever takes care of him while regressed. Mostly Peter B (since he's Miles' top caregiver), but I think with those who also regress along with him (Gwen, Hobie, Pav, ect) also love to be around him!! ❤️‍🩹- It's been a hard day, how does the caregiver recover with their little one? - I think for anything, Peter knows exactly how to take care of Miles mostly in this state the best out of anyone. It would mostly be after a mission or when he's thinkin about uncle Aaron again or somethin and he's all saddd :( Peter, having the fatherly instincts he does, would usually set up a movie and be like 'wanna watch somethin and make a pillow fort?' and Miles will feel better (and mostly because he can cuddle) and boom idk- xD 🎈- Do they have any toys? Is there a specific type of toys that they like to own? - Action figures!! He loves them so much. He usually doesn't play with the more vintage figures and leaves them in their boxes, but from that, he still has a bunch to play with! Mostly TMNT or (coincidentally) Spider-Man figurines! He'll play ninjas or superheroes with Gwen's Barbies! (and it ends in them fighting who's got the best figurines/dolls xD) 🪶- Do they have a specific connection to what they regress to? If so what is their connection - I don't think Miles would regress for trauma per say, I feel like he would've missed his childhood and been like 'hm, i miss being a kid, i wonder how i could do that and not just watch old tv shows' and then one day he finds Pav regressed and Hobie caring for him and he's like 'oh, this is a usual thing you can do to cope take it as you please' and then it just happened, i guess (i'm not so sure for the ending lamo) 🙋- Why do they regress? - Like I said before, mostly because he missed being a kid and wanted to be in that nostalgic set of mind. He's still embarrassed about regressing and actually opening up around people about it, but still. He'll usually do it alone or with Peter B or Gwen mostly. 😀- Write about their first regression experience - Okay, so like, it was after a mission and Pav kinda rushed away for some reason and Hobie went after him. Miles was like '???' because he didn't think of Pav being so anxious, but oh well. Then Miles came to check on him later on, because he's a concerned person around his friends, and gave Pav a scare from just coming out of nowhere. And Hobie was then explaining about what age regression is and trying to calm down Pav, and Miles was like 'ohh, that explains why Pavi sometimes acts more like a kid' and then started to think about doing this regression stuff and then he kinda just went into a fuzzy state and the rest is history, i guess?? thanks for asking! 🕸️

#agere ask #agere fandom #agere headcanons #fandom agere #fandom headcanons #spiderverse agere #hes just a little guyyyy #he deserves to be cared for #anyways i love him sm

[mdhwrites]

Reccomendations for cartoons to watch include: Gravity Falls, Adventure Time, Regular Show, the later seasons of MLP Friendship is Magic (for the sake of completing it and being able to properly evaluate the show), Steven Universe, DuckTales 2017, OK KO, Big City Greens, Star vs the Forces of Evil, Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, Kim Possible, Hilda, Helluva Boss, Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated, She Ra 2018, and the Ben 10 franchise.

I actually still have another ask that is mostly this same list but I think Hilda and Helluva Boss are new. Mostly responding because something I find interesting about myself given how ruthless I can be with TOH is that, well...

I probably will never truly be able to be some big reviewer because when I start disliking something, I drop it. That's actually the big reason I'm responding is because there is NO WAY I am watching the like 4+ seasons of MLP:FiM that I didn't watch because I just can't engage with stuff I dislike. I find no joy in it and while I can rant for a couple episodes, it just loses my interest.

I never seek things out because I think I'll dislike them. I just don't think life is enjoyable that way. It's why I have no plans to return to Helluva Boss. I absolutely believe people would potentially send me asks about it with how polarizing it is but I got to the episode when Moxie and Blitzo are interrogated, went "Ah, I see, the two characters I hate the most and don't even find funny (Stolas and Blitzo) are the actual main characters and the pilot was potentially kind of a lie for what the real focus of the show is. I'm out." And I haven't watched an episode since. My brain struggles to click with media after all so why would I bother with media I actively know I dislike already?

I'll comment on a couple others that I have at least had experience with on the list in a minute but since Amphibia, I've watched the first season of Craig of the Creek and think that show is just AMAZING. There's at least one episode I keep wanting to do a blog on just because it exemplifies how much the show understands the wonder of fantasy and childhood without actually being fantastical. I've also seen S1 of SpyxFamily and some of S2 but right now the only streaming service I have consistent access to is Hulu (the Disney+ I was borrowing cancelled theirs to swap to Hulu) and they only have S1 dubbed of SpyxFamily.

I'm hoping to sometime soon actually watch Over the Garden Wall finally and just have been kind of a mess as of late as for why I haven't yet. I've heard only good things, and shockingly few spoilers, and it's about time I gave it a proper shot.

ANYWAYS:

Steven Universe: Watched the first episode and only really liked Greg so just didn't bother watching more. Steven was fine but I actively hated all three of the gems because of how brain dead they were in both segments of the episode. As far as pilots go, I think SU might genuinely have one of the worst I've ever seen for convincing you to like a main cast.

Gravity Falls: I rewatched the first episode recently and went "This is oooookay." Something about Dipper's VA just bothers me. Not like they're doing a bad job but that it falls into an uncanny valley my brain doesn't love. I really wish I could better explain why that show refuses to properly click for me.

Regular Show: I forget why but I've seen a few episodes. It's not bad but I don't think it's really for me. I find Rigby and Mordecai annoying more than anything else. Not awful but I think without it feeling like they're actually meant to be learning something, they fall into the trap Randy and Howard from Randy Cunningham fell into eventually for me where I was like "Okay, assholes can be fun for a while but if that's all you're ever going to be, I don't care."

Adventure Time: I have seen as many episodes where Fiona and Cake show up in that show than I have Finn and Jake. XD I have genuinely liked what I've seen and just for some reason never sought it out. Maybe someday.

Star Vs: I need to give S2 a chance but MAN when I got told they break up Marco and Jackie for NO REASON I lost a lot of interest in the show. I like Marco more than Star, and I've only seen S1, and thought Marco and Jackie's relationship was genuinely really nice and kind of unique. Also knowing it's most people's cartoon punching bag doesn't exactly fill me with enthusiasm for it.

Kim Possible: I remember rewatching the pilot a couple years ago and being shocked by how much I didn't care for Kim. I think the fact that Bonnie is the only one who gives her shit but she's actually just genuinely amazing at everything and liked by most make her just not compelling to me which is a shame because I have REALLY fond memories of the show. I'd probably commit to a rewatch of Danny Phantom first though since it has been just as long since I watched that.

(Weird fact: I was looking at Hulu's unfortunately limited amount of cartoons and saw they had Kick Buttowski of all things which is WILD to me.)

She-Ra: I've seen literally one episode, thought it was good, and definitely is one of the ones I keep telling myself to watch because everything about it seems like it'd be up my alley. These are also my thoughts on Voltron though with how much... less divisive that last season of Voltron is, it's definitely below watching Princesses of Power.

Ben 10: Loved the original series as a kid, tried the first two spin offs that came out and didn't really jive with either but I thought Julie, the tennis girl Ben gets with, was super cute. I know a friend who would LOVE to see me get into Ben 10 and do some reviews of it.

And just as an anime shout out, a part of me is still tempted to give Little Witch Academia another try. Not only is it just an obvious next show for me to watch but it's one I REALLY want to like because I like a lot about it... I just absolutely despise Akko from the like four episodes I watched a good number of years ago now. I thought almost all of the supporting characters were great though.

Just... Consider this my weird, rambly blog late at night about cartoons and the fact that I do wish I engaged with media better. One of the worst elements of it is that I don't engage well with scripted content well if my brain isn't already in an alright place. Like I don't go to television for distraction and cheering me up. I vastly prefer streams for that as I can actually turn my brain off during those normally. It's something I've talked about before and something I'd like to change. Heck, I even at one point had a therapy goal to watch something at least once a week since that'd still be easier than streaming or writing. Whoops. *sigh*

I do also appreciate the recommendations! The reminders are good sometimes since I don't feel like I actually stay in the loop all that well. And since I kind of assume this is the same person who sent a list before, I decided I felt like actually responding, especially because the MLP pitch is an interesting one but man... That's a LOT of Starlight Glimmer I'd have to put up with when just like six episodes of her as a good guy made me want to light both her and Twilight on fire to put them out of their, and mine, misery. That's without me getting into the fact that I just think the characters in general got worse by then, almost like series shouldn't last for that long because finding new angles on characters becomes REALLY HARD (says the dumbass with a series of his own that honestly is longer than he should reasonably plan a story for.)

Again, late night rambling while my brain deals with suddenly snapping out of a hyper focus on a game for three days and doesn't deal with that well. *sigh* Have a good night everyone, take care of yourself and see you next tale.

======+++++======

I have a public Discord for any and all who want to join!

I also have an Amazon page for all of my original works in various forms of character focused romances from cute, teenage romance to erotica series of my past. I have an Ao3 for my fanfiction projects as well if that catches your fancy instead. If you want to hang out with me, I stream from time to time and love to chat with chat.

A Twitter you can follow too

And a Kofi if you like what I do and want to help out with the fact that disability doesn’t pay much.

#Rambles

[tittysaurus]

A main post to hold place while I get an actually good looking one going lol

Hey! My name is Silas and I go by he/they.

I speak English and I am learning French and ASL

I am a stage manager/lighting person for my high schools drama program.

I like rotting in my bed thinking about all the little characters, and rambling on about them to my friends.

I am Genderfluid/non-binary and (idk)romantic Asexual.

Things I’ve Become Obsessed With:

1. LUPIN (on Netflix) (completely obsessed with Ben and Assane and I’m left sobbing by season 3)

(This is one of my main obsessions ^^)

2. BBC Merlin (AHHHHHHHH)

3. Raptor Birds (like the actual birds, yes. My favorite is the Turkey Vulture :])

4. Bobs Burgers (God I love it so so so so much comfort show fr)

5. Dead Plate + Cold Front (basically all that developers games tbh)

6. SK8 THE INFINITY

(ANOTHER MAIN OBSESSION YAY ^^ 🙄)

7. That stupid jester from Skyrim (Cicero 😔)

Other Stuff I Like (but not obsessed)

1. Adventure Time

2. Link (transition goals tbh)

3. TAWOG (<3)

4. Craig of the Creek (it’s just so adorable dude 😭)

5. Slimecicle (goo goobie)

6. Wild Kratts

7. Regular Show

8. Pokémon

9. B99

10. Writing fanfics (and books but more fanfics lol)

11. Bungo Stray Dogs

12. Hannibal

13. Good Omens

14. OK KO

15. Stardew Valley

Currently Watching/Reading

1. Jujutsu Kaisen (S1E6)

2. Seaside Stranger (Waiting to get book 2)

3. Shonen Note (Waiting to get book 2)

4. Haikyuu (S1E3)

5. Good Omens (S1E11)

My AO3 Account (no fanfics yet, too embarassed to post them right now lol)

#main post

[weedle-testaburger]

I'm so glad that you enjoyed the series finale of The Owl House. The question is right now is what's next on your watchlist of potential LGBTQ+ cartoons?

Thanks anon 💞 and that's a good question! Honestly I'd be open to people's recommendations bc I've watched most of the big ones. The main one that comes to mind for me is that the last season of Summer Camp Island will be dropping eventually and I really like that show so I'm hyped for that. Besides that I might get round to watching Adventure Time, OK KO, Craig of the Creek and some other shows with LGBTQ+ stuff I've not yet seen most of at some point.

#asks #I've seen a bit of all 3 of those but I'm way behind on them

[astraskylark]

No but this is kinda special.

Amphibia ends with this season and The Owl House won't have regular weekly broadcasts after this as the rest are specials. I'm gonna make a bet that we won't be seeing shows of this flavour for awhile considering the amount of nonsense the rat has pulled with these two.

I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say these shows have helped alot of us get through the past few years. And they're both going out with a bang, together at the height of their popularity and we're for sure gonna be talking about this particular pocket of time where we got two amazing shows for a long long time.

It's just.... these are the good times we're gonna be thinking about years down the line. These shows have paved a new way for animation and the boundaries you can cross and the representation you can have and I'm kinda rambling but the point is I'm just taking a minute to sit back and admire how cool it is that we got to see these shows with these characters and got to learn and grow with them and they're ending this year but not really because there are a bunch of budding writers watching all of this right now and coming up with ideas that have been inspired by these and the same spirit of telling stories about the characters you love will continue and it's nice to think that though the shows may end their worlds will not cause you'll find specs of them scattered everywhere, in new tales waiting to be told.

#the owl house #Amphibia #more incoherent rambling #seem to be doing a lot of it lately #starting with atla to gravity falls to steven universe to lok to infinity train to adventure time #stuff like craig of the creek and ok ko #kid cosmic and glitch techs and tdp #rwby and arcane #there's a lot to fondly remember and so much to look forward to #i love animation #animation

[exocynraku]

another ask…

what do you think was a missed opportunity in the series?

and any tv shows / movies you like? (if thats not too personal?)

hi again :> missed opportunity... hmm. its late so my brain aint workin too good but heres 2: if the erins kept dappletails first litter (featherkit and cricketkit) alive, it probably wouldve also given them a reason to not kill off snowkit (cuz featherkit is also deaf). i dont know the time gap between featherkit and snowkit but if featherkit lived until he was a warrior i bet he couldve mentored snowkit. i wish cinderpelt and brightheart interacted more. theyre sisters. they both have really bad injuries. totally couldve given them lots of sweet moments together! anyway onto movies. just gonna list a bunch lol: OK KO, steven universe, craig of the creek, fear street, demon slayer, alien (and all its other movies), the thing (both movies), like all of studio ghiblis stuff, forensic files, the list goes on.

#warrior cats #ray talk

[blackprinter]

DNI if you are

• Racist

• Xenophobic

• Sexist

• Misogynist

• Islamphobic

• Anti-Semetic

• Homophobic

• Transphobic

• Biphobic

• Panphobic

• Aphobic

• Arophobic

Stuff I like below (But might also be critical about)

Cartoons (kids and adults):

Owl House

Infinity Train

The Last Airbender

Legend of Korra

The Dragon Prince

Ok Ko: Let’s be Heroes

Ducktales

Samurai Jack

Mao Mao: Heroes of Pureheart Valley

Tales of Arcadia

Bojack Horseman

Invader Zim

Craig of the Creek

Big City Greens

The Hollow

Amphibia

She-Ra

Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts

Gravity Falls

Glitch Techs

Carmen Sandiego

Adventure Time

Hilda

We Bare Bears

Phineas and Ferb

The Amazing World of Gumball

Regular Show

Total Drama

Primal

Rick and Morty

F is for Family

Tangled the Series

Clarence

Kid Cosmic

Wander over Yonder

Pokemon

Legend of Zelda

Sonic the Hedgehog

Kingdom hearts

List will likely be updated as time goes by. Last Updated (9/3/21)

#Pinned post #decided to make one of my own #long posts

[popculturebuffet]

Top 20 Animated Episodes of 2020 Part 1 (#20-#11)

Hello Hello Hello animation fans! And welcome to something i’ve wanted to since last year. See I had the idea for a best episodes list back in 2019: rather than do a best shows list, which would be only about half of 20+ shows anyway, I thought i’d do a best episode lists: to give as many shows a possiblitiy to shine as possible while still honoring the best of the year. But my own natural foibles got the better of me: I INSISSITED on watching everything I missed.. then just kept putting THAT off until it was was spring, shows were coming back and I just threw up my hands. I’ve regretted it ever since and vowed, especially since in the interim animation went from just being something I analyized for fun to my analyzing it for fun AND profit, to get it done this year.  So I had to make a few caveats. First I gave myself at first till the 31st of the year and then due to covid and everything that happened, until the end of the first week or so of the year, i.e. today, to watch as much as I could. So several shows are missing. Some I REALLY got behind on and don’t have an excuse for (Craig of the Creek and Big City Greens), others I also really liked but my depression made it really hard to watch (F is for Family and very nearly Bojack), some I just kept putting off ever starting or forgot to start entirely (Hilda, yes even since season 1, Kipo: Age of the Wonderbeasts and It’s Pony) and some.. I gave up because as you can tell I sit on shows way too often (Ilve action wise I still need to get back to Doom Patrol), and I realized i’d rather watch stuff old and new I care about than waste time with something that I just stopped liking, i.e. Rick and Morty and Big Mouth which i’m guaranteed some flack for saying but I dont’ care. I have my reasons, and while I originally GAVE those reasons I decided to leave them out: this list is not about me bitching about why I quit certain shows. I’m a grown ass man, I can quit a show anytime, and given last year was such a craphole, I think we could use less piss and vinegar and more sugar.  So before we begin, a bit about the state of animation last year: It was in flux. WIth a new decade dawning we got great new shows like Owl House, Close Enough, which in a year full of terrible suprises not only FINALLY got released but did so with a second season order, Solar Opposities, the Midnight Gospel and Kipo: Age of Wonderbeasts. Ducktales returned for it’s best season ever. Amphibia returned for a pretty good season. Disney brought back the wonderful mickey mouse shorts towards the end of the year, FINALLY given D+ some non-movie animated content. The Casagrandes got better as it went and just barely didn’t make this list and the Loud House kept on trucking and shows no signs of stopping with a season renewal and a movie coming out. And Adventure Time staged a comeback a few years after it died and while I haven’t seen BMO yet, Obsidian was fantastic and only barely didn’t make the list. 

Not only that but we got   great new series announced for the next two years: Lumberjanes is FINALLY getting adapted and by Noelle Stevenson herself. Gendy Tarkovsky is not only returning to children’s animation but with a wonderously weird concept about immortal unicorns turned into teens> There’s a promising show about a ghost and a plucky tween coming this summer. The Rise of the TMNT movie is still happening. Craig McCracken is also coming back.  But naturally given this was 2020 the news wasn’t all good as we said goodbye to a lot of shows.. and this was after 2019 already took several from us, OK KO still being the hardest loss to this day and Star Vs very disapointing finale still leaving a bad taste in my mouth: Most gutpunchingly, the two frontrunners of animation at the time, shows that truly changed the game and probably gave other shows a chance at life they never would’ve had, including some on this list, ended. 

Steven Universe took it’s final bow after we got one last trip to beach city with the Future miniseries, with the show ending gracefully and beautifully, and having pulled off it’s third succesive possible ending for the franchise and it’s defntive ending for steven’s story. Bojack did the same not long before, ending on a bittersweet but beautiful note and with a one two punch of the series best episode and i’ts second best episode, a satsifying but bittersweet finale we’ll get to. Both shows as I said have set hte standards and tones for most animation after them, and both’s absence is felt.  She Ra suprisingly ended, though with a beautiful and wonderful finale we’ll, again, get to, and on i’ts own terms, but given it was the most likely to take up the shield from steven, it was another punch. Less peacefully was the ending of Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, a show I caught up on after it’s demise which was screwed by the network over toy sales because that’s.. still.. a thing. 

There is a light of hope, as the movie is somehow still in production and if it does well we may get season 3, but it’s dim and given the show, despite it’s flaws, had found itself and the finale, which they were given weeks to put together, was spectacular and, say it with me now “we’ll get to that”, I really hope it does. And that nick learns how to run an animation company for fuck’s sake. 

Infnity Train while not dead, is on life support despite having it’s best season in season 2 and an okay season that still tackeled racisim very well even if story wise the season faltered, at a time when we REALLY need to tackle racisim in our entertaiment period. Venture Bros meanwihle was just flat out canceled for no given reason despite both having as eason renewal order and you know, being Adult Swim’s highest rated and best show for over a decade. Like Infinity Train and Rise there’s a SCRAP of hope, both adult swim and hbo max are apparently looking into ways to bring it back so a finale movie or a season 6 comic are propable, but given the show ended on two big cliffhangers, and given 2020 already had pushed back a LOT of things I’d looked forward to for good reason, and had now just outright killed a show, it was a massive shattering blow and easily the biggest of the year.  But coming VERY close was finding out Ducktales was ending. While the finale would serve as a proper finale, I feel the show easily could’ve had more seasons.. Disney just dosen’t let shows go on forever, or sometimes not even for a reasonable amount.. or put those shows it didn’t let go on a resonable amount on Disney Plus.. and I will be bringing that last part up until Wonder Over Yonder is FINALLY put on the platform, along with MANy other shows. Figure it out.  But yeah that was ANOTHER show I thought would lead the way and like Gravity Falls lead to Ducktales, Ducktales will probably lead to more shows including HOPEFULLY a frank and matt lead Darkwing Duck.. and even that’s in jeapordy since instead it might be done by Seth Rogan’s company who while not bad people and if their working on Frakn’s reboot great.. are not the people who spent three seasons setitng up a reboot in a unvierse they already spent three seasons deftly crafting. I DOUBT Frank won’t be involved since Let’s Get Dangerous was promoted to hell and back, but again given this is disney.. it worries me and I won’t be settled on this till we get conformation of a proper reboot with frank and matt at the helm. 

Point is it was a rough year for animatoin even without covid taken into account pushing back seasons and forcing a change in work habits. But as this list attests even in the worst year in recenet memory, here’s hoping 2021 dosen’t say hold my beer, there was some damn fine animation, including some of the best i’ve ever seen and the shows that did leave or are getting ready to gave us one hell of a show. Before we get started one last bit of buisness for transparency: As I said i missed some shows and others I did watch but given despite this list’s sheer size it was still VERY tight, for the record each show got four nominees a piece, and some had even more episodes considered before widdling it down, and even at the 40 episode mark there were some tough cuts and by the end it was brutal. So here’s the show’s considered. 

Shows Watched: Steven Universe Future, Infinity Train, Close Enough, She Ra, Ducktales, Amphibia, The Loud House, The Casagrandes, Rise of the TMNT, Animaniacs, Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse, Adventure Time: Distant Lands, Solar Opposites, Bojack Horseman, The Owl House, The Midnight Gospel Shows That Did Not Make the Final List: The Loud House, The Casagrandes, Animaniacs, The Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse, Adventure Time: Distant Lands, and Solar Opposites.  Final note: all episode’s i’ve done reviews of at the time of this list will have links in the title to said reviews in case your curious So with that in mind , here’s my top 20 list, part 1.. becasue these posts are going to be long as hell so I needed to split up gang. On with the show after the cut as this is a really damn long one

20. Fragments (Steven Universe Future) “I bow to your strength.. my Diamond”  Steven Unvierse’s final act was a masterstroke. The show ended with every major conflict resolved as the Diamonds decided , if only for Steven’s sake at first, to change their ways and helped him restore the corrupted gems, while Lars made it home. Our heroes were FINALLY, after seasons and almost two in-story years, as Steven “Finally Done, Finally Us, Finally Me”, the last part being especially pogniant since, while done thanks to a horrifying action on whites part, his breif seperation PROVED there was nothing of rose left; She’s gone.  So Future uses this cleverly: With the conlfict of the movie resolved things were still very nice.. but eventually Steven started breaking down piece by piece: As the series went on it became clear what it was: A deconstuction of some of the less healthy part of the mostly fairly healthy and wonderful main show. It showed just what happen when someone whose put his identity into having some kind of destiny, someone whose felt their purpose in life is to make other people’s better and solve their problems and be a good person.. has no issues to solve. Oh sure there’s an antagonist here and there and Jasper refuses to change or admit no third great gem war is coming and that peace really has come.. but his family are finally happy with who they are, and are moving on with their lives. As someone whose had people move on without them and whose clunt to people this hits close to home.. hits close to home a lot. 

So as the season went on Steven clung to everything, taking it VERY badly when Lars and Sadie not only revealed their attempt at a relationship failed after years of build up, and never told steven because they thought it wasn’t his buisness, which is true to a point as them breaking up isn’t anything to do with him but someone should’ve told him it was amicable given the amount of shit he’s seen between you two, just saying. But it still meant a good chunk of his friends leaving town, and him, behind. Attempts to fillt his gap with tv watching or gardneing, aka what the crew amazingly dubbed “Depression Hobbies:”, a term that hits close to home, failed and then a far WORSE attempt to fill the void in his life by proposing to connie failed.. she turned him down firmly, but gently recognizing this was a terrible idea, they were too young, and he was clearly going through some stuff. As garnet put it “Your partner is your compliment, not your missing piece”. Another beautiful term to stick in my brain. 

So as if this wasn’t bad enough his body started mutatating and it turned out the pink form he’d gained was actually supposed to just be his body’s version of adrenline, but since he’d spent years in constnat struggle, his body was treating his emotinal stress like do or die situations with predictable results. We’ll get to that more in a bit but needless to say steven’s family were concerned and Greg returned from managing Sadie to TRY and help his son.. only to drive a wedge between them as Greg’s Smothering Parents seemed like the life Steven never had, instead of obnoxious people who refused to reconcile with their son even decades later despite plenty of effort on greg’s end and Greg having to raise a child alone with only marginal support from the gems at best at first. But Greg’s tragic inablity to see his son was hurting, as with everyone elses lead to him nearly getting them hurt in a car accident and thus this episode.  After getting chewed out by the gems, who tragically simply don’t realize what’s wrong with steven, can’t figure out why themselves and he refuses to tell them, Steven runs off, to the one person who would never tell the gems where he is and the last place they’d expect him to go at his lowest: Jasper. And thus we get one of the darkest and moodiest episodes of the show’s long history. 

After having lost a lot of his sense of peace of mind: his best friends are gone, his girlfriend is next, his parents and sister are constantly busy, there’s no one for him to turn to. Steven NEEDS someone like him and while his family is trying they just don’t know how to reach him and deep down he dosen’t WANT them to. Like me at times, shocker I know, he fears deeply that if they knew some of the flaws about him, some of the problems he’s had, they’d hate him. When as time would bear out for both of us, as my first stint of therapy near the end of colllege proved, it just means they understand you better and can HELP YOU. 

So instead he turns to Jasper, and he does so for good reason: He wants to control his power and emotions.. the problem is Jasper dosen’t WANT what Steven wants. Steven wants to feel godo again and feel healthy and be the person people want him to be. Jasper.. wants a fight. She wants a diamond, someone to serve, someone stronger than her who will LET her be what she feels she’s meant to be: a warrior, a destroyer, a breaker of worlds. So she slams that steven shaped peg into a round hole, and it’s horrifying and uncomfortable to see our hero turned from a loveable hero.. to a power obssed, almost vegeta-esque asshole .. in short she’s made him into the very thing he spent years fighting against, all because he’s so scared of himself he can’t face himself. It shows just how bad things have gotten: that steven’s hates himself SO MUCH, that he’d rather become something worse than face the truth and let his family help him. So convinced they don’t need him that he needs to be something ELSE. 

And so tons of training, abuse and hard labor lead to the moment Jasper and fans had been waiting for: a rematch between the two. And.. it’s easily one of the series best fights. For a series that’s at it’s core about ending the cycle of violence and often big exchanges of words and someone emotinally healing are treated as big as victories in combat.. the show has some of the best fight scenes in cartoons period, and this being the penultimate one, we’ll get to the last one next time, it’s a brutal, dbz style slugfest, something unlike the other fights in the show, with two opponents full of rage and hate going at it with everything they have.. ending in Steven, for one breif terrifying moment having BECOME what his grandmothers and mother used to be: A sadstic monster drunk on their own power “Your right jasper, I WAS holding back”

But when we next see Steven, running into the house and ingoring his rightfully concerned family..... he’s not that guy anymore. He’s back to who he was at the start of the episode: A scared teenager who deeply hates himself and who wants to be better but is ironically shutting out the only people who can help him. And one.. whose committed murder. This was a VERY bold move to make: Steven KILLED SOMEONE. Sure it was  shattering so it got past censors, but in his lowest moment.. steven did the one thing that to someone who treasures all life, is anthemia to him: he killed, did what his mother did before she changed, did what his aunts have done countless times to countless worlds. And it horrifes him, with him desperate to bring jasper back and using everything he has, his powers and his aunts essences, to try and fix his mistake.  And unlike anyone else in his postion he succeeds.. and Jasper, ignoring steven’s attempts to apologize is surprised at first at being shattered, knowing what happened.. befor bowing proudly, FINALLY getting what she was REALLY after: A diamond to serve. And steven can only gaze in horror at what he’d become and at the realization he can’t go back from this and he has no idea what to do now. An utterly grippling, utterly terrifying character piece with some of Zach Callistons best character work in the show’s storied history, with Steven shifting from being drunk on his power to utterly broken at having broken jasper. One of the series finest moments.. only topped by some things the series proper did.. and some more on this list. 

19. Perils of Peekablue (She Ra and the Princesses of Power) 

“They are my people. Which means most of them have sworn revenge against me at some point “  She Ra was easily one of the best shows of the 2010′s. While it started out excellent, and pretty gay, it ended being a masterpiece, and fabulously gay, as is befitting something related to He Man in some way. 

A masterful space opera, She Ra had some great bones in a thrilling love story, great humor, great action and wonderful characters most of them main and supporting going through some form of development. It was a wonderful, magical show and I look forward to Noelle giving Lumberjanes the series treatment, both because the series concept is frankly better built for an ongoing tv series than a monthly comic, and because after this series she has my utmost faith in whatever she does. Also her story about how she both came to terms with her sexuality and met her partner was VERY lovely.  Seriously check it out. Also her partner was the one who co wrote another entry on this list, just a fun fact. Point is this show was awesome.  But as I said part of the show’s strength was it’s character and that shines on this day in the limelight episode covering what’s going with the rebellion since She Ra shot off into space to rescue her best friend. We do get to see the best friends squad breifly, but their simply heading home: With Catra rescued and on the path to being a better person, and firmly in adora’s lap because again this show is wonderously gay and because it annoys her and Catra gets off on that, our heroes are wondering how everyone else is fairing.  So we see that, as with the Rebellion not doing so good against Horde Prime, our heroes seek the solution to their problems with the same solution homer simpson always uses:

Well okay less starting a new life and more getting the help of the mysterious prince peekablue, who I now realize is where the whole pikablue name for merril probbaly came from.. or maybe nerds making things up in the 90′s werne’t that creative. You decide!

So we get the ragtag team of Mermista, Seahawk, Scorpia and Perfuma, as the quartet try to bluff their way to the prince for help. Naturally we get Seahawk being seahawk, i.e. an awesome ham with a voice way older than he looks, Mermista being annoyed by that and being forced to admit she tried out pyromania to see what it’s like, which naturally is the most romantic thing Seahawk’s heard in his whole life.. as well as some VERY charming ship tease between Scorpia and Perfuma as Scorpia enrouages her the two bond and Scorpia finally likes someone who both likes her back and isn’t so obssed with her sorta ex and tied up in her own issues a relationship is impossible. Look I was suprised she found someone else as everyone here, but i’m happys for her. She’s the nicest person on this show and is now dating the second nicest person on this show. It’s nice okay. 2020 didn’t give me much nice, it gave me the emotoinal equilvent of being constnatly stung by hornets.

We also get a lovely musical number from Scorpia about being a spy.. and the revelation Peekablue.. is just Double Trouble. THEIR BACK BABY. It was nice for them to make a comeback for one last apperance and they do provid vallid information.. but prove to not be too useful despite this both due to their habit of being only out for themselves, hence setting up an elaborate cabaret act under the ocean.. and because Mermista got chipped by the crowd, so now our heroes are stuck in a giant coffin surronded by the thing she can manipulate. It’s only through a harrowing sacrifice by scorpia that Perfuma and Seahawk escape but with their sorta partners now brainwahsed to the other side.  To amp up the tension back home.. things are even worse as Spinerlla, whose been brainwashed for several episodes and seriously worrying her wife Netossa... has made her move and with the rest of the rebellion’s leadership gone, chipped everyone but Frosta and King Micah, who dosen’t last long, meaning not only do our two remaning heroes BARELY escape, but the horde now has, between both plot lines, four really heavy hitters, as later episodes would bear out that Spinerlla is basically the red tornado when it comes to wind powers. Point is perils is a fun, breather episode... that then turns into a still fun but also heartbreaking episode as our heroes loose and loose bad and their only hope is in our ohter heroes making it back to htem in one piece. 

18. 100% No Stress Day (Close Enough) “Long story short I owe them three grand”  Close Enough.. has not had the easiest existence. It was greenlit in 2017, used it’s pitch reel as the trailer meaning everyone thought it was MUCH farther along, was meant for TBS but got shelved because the show it was to be paired with, The Cops, was created by sexual predator Louis CK. And since he came up and h’es primarily responsible for this show getting shelved for so long... Louis CK is a bastard. He harassed women, literally and metaphorically waved his dick around to show his superiority, knew he could get away with it, and ACTED contrite when caught and rightfuly punished for it by loosing everything.. then has spent the last year or so TRYING to mount a come back, with the help of Dave Chapelle who I lost ALLLLL respect for in recent years, despite not having apologized or done anything that resembles him having actually learned his fucking lesson or tells me that, could he get away with it, he wouldn’t just do it again. I’m taking time out of this unrelated thing ot make sure he does not get ANY power back, as too often preadatory or abusive assholes get away with this and get right back to doing stuff, like say Doug Walker, who I only bring up to remind people he’s a bad person who enabled worst people and abused a lot of innocent critics, and let htem lovingly euologize a man he knew was a preadator in life without telling any of them about said behavior, which he coudl’ve done without outing the victim to the world against her wishes. Because as another episode we’ll get to next time briliantly put it 

But now i’m done reminding people of assholes, I can get back to what’s really important: The fact this show is a goddamn miracle. Not only is it as good as I hoped, which let’s face it in this year it was just as likely the show would be the video equilvent of scabies, but it got RENEWED. Turns out it’s being delayed.. was a blessing in disguise as it sidestepped being part of a failed animation block, and instead go to be the first adult animated show on HBO Max with tons of promotion. And judging by the future lineup of adult animated programming.. it’s probably going to be the ONLY good one for a while as other offering includes the prince, about life with the royal family, and a show about a 12 year old whose constantlly going thorugh trauma because they apparently did not get the irony when watching moral orel and also skipped the entire third season. And possibly got some brain damage I dunno. Hopefully will lead to much better shows down the line and actually gets a second chance at life, and even if it clocks in at only two seasons, it’s still a damn miracle and I will acknolwedge it. 

So yeah as I said the show is fantastic and was one of my faviorites this year. The show treads some familiar terroitory as it does use the formula from Quintel’s “Regular Show”: Normal problems that spiral into bizzare chaos that still has it’s own effed up internal logic. The thing that honestly makes it BETTER in my opinon, is the passage of time. Quintel is no longer the brighted eyed fresh out of college and menial job guy he was: he’s married with a kid, and that fully informed this project, as instead of being about doofing around in your 20′s, it’s about the pressures of hitting your 30′s: from aging to keeping your relationship fresh to all the perils that come with parenting, to missed opportunities you deeply regret. There’s a lot of good stuff they dig into here, but it never overdies the comedy, simply ads a bit of depth to it. And regular show wasn’t LACKING that by any means, i’m not bashing the show.. i’m just saying Close Enough is starting at the level Regular Show was at at it’s best.. and could easily and handily suprasss it with time it now has. 

And I was first given a good and proper introduction via this episode, as it leaked beforehand due to a french animation festival and I couldn’t help reviewing it, as i’d waited quite some time. But honestly while I like the first episode in the all in the show proper, quilty pleasures.. I feel this is a WAY better first episode and shoudl’ve been swapped with Quilty, as it introduces things even better and lets the whole cast shine, and thus is one of two close enough episodes on this list.  The episode starts with Emily, the stable but stressed and anxious half our our main couple at the doctors office where we get a great barrage of jokes off the bat, from the laundry setting a blaze leading to one of the series best lines

Naturally this has lead to her body constnatly sleep fighting .. while she’s awake, so Josh, her husband and loveable doofus, offers to take care of errands so she dosen’t implode from the stress. This also displays one of the series best assets: While Josh and Emily are an optimistic and impulsive idiot and a stressed out, often voice of reason.. they actually LOVE each other. It’s like a far more healthy of early seasons homer and marge, where BOTH get in over their head but  both clearly love and respect each other, and while Josh CAN be irresponsible.. he still holds down a decent job (Though Emily is more of the breadwinner and her job provides the insurance), is attentive to their daughter candace, and WANTS to be repsonsible. Trust me after countless dom coms where i’ve had to restrain from yelling “GET A DIVORCE” at the screen, it’s nice the tide is turning and Bob’s Burgers has become more of the norm couple wise than the exception.  But yeah so the main group splits up: Josh takes candace and his best friend and local weirdo played by Jason Mantzokus every series needs, and easily my favoirite character, Alex to do errands while Bridgette, Alex’s ex husband, Emily’s best friend and both the bbay of the bunch and the most irresponsible one.. gets her high to help her relax. 

Both plots are really great: The boys and candace run into a ham shortage, a joke that actually plays better in the pandemic age, and stripper clowns because in the series best gag so far, Alex explains via flashback he bet them they couldn’t make a dog, and one did so.. using his dick. 

Just in case you were wondering if JG was enjoying the fact he could use adult humor now, though another part of the series charm is while it freely makes more adult jokes, it dosen’t ever get into gross or dudebro territory. It just means the censors are down and they don’t have to hide beer as soda anymore. They also have to tangle with some hamburgalers who are reselling the meat at rock bottom prices and creating the shortage.. and who deny being hamburgalers despite their tactics being backing up into houses with a large van and stealing hams. OUr heros avoid becmonig meat and naturally end up both in a car chase and then a bet for their lives in a game of Ladder World, josh’s latest game.  Meanwhile Emily blazes it and we get a great getting high montage, as it shows BRidgette’s idea does genuinely help a bit.. until they run into Timothy, the teacher at cadance’s school who I hope gets an increased roll as he’s always a delight and this is his best apperance. Depsite the understandable awkwarndess and paranoia of running into your kids teacher while high, being an open minded guy Timothy offers them wine and then weed and even takes Emily punching him when her trip takes a bad turn, giving her a stern but fair “bitch use your words!” before the next seen has him helping her through her issues with some solid advice, allowing her to arrive in home just in time to save her husband and the cave goblin who lives in her house from clown strippers and meat gangsters.. which sounds like one hell of a gay porno. All in all a solid, always hilarous, always charming ep that shows the series off at it’s best. 

17. How Santa Stole Christmas! (Ducktales)

“No, no.. Christmas is a SAD story?” 

This is my third and hopefully FINAL time talking about this one, though given it has a high chance of showing up on the series best of list, probably not. Not that I mind, this is a VERY good episode, I just don’t have anytihing new left to say. It’s a heartwarming, fresh, engaging christmas special that uses the characters perfectly and for once actually strips down the cast effectively instead of making you wonder where everyone else is, while still giving everyone an apperance. It also has Webby giving Lena (And Violet) an adorable cheek smooch when delivering her parents and I will never not find that fucking precious. Plus it’s gay as hell with plenty of gay subtext between Scrooge and Santa, a sentence I never thought i’d say but i’m so glad i’ts my job to get to type things like that, and said kiss so that helps. But even besides that it’s just REALLY damn good. Again i’m leaving this short both because i’ve talked about this twice now, once when it came out as I do regularly for ducktales and again for my best christmas specials list, but it’s really that good and made it damn high on my bet christmas specials list and is only so low here.. because despite being a terrible year in every other respect we got some REALLY good episodes this year. So yeah this one’s a classic, I love it but i’m tired of talking about it till at least next december. Moving on. 

16. Finale (E-Turtle Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Shreddy or Not,  Anatawa Hitorijanai, and Rise) Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles “Oh and Blue your leader now”  As I mentioned in the intro. Rise of the TMNT was unjustly canceled this year and even worse got it’s season order chopped in half and was given just weeks to throw together a finale. So it’s remakrable that not only was the season pretty damn good, having the series usual problems of sometimes overdipping into the boys stupidity hence the episode where everyone but Raph keeps eating poison, but also had both great character arcs in Baron Draxum’s reformation and Splinter getting more and more fleshed out and more screne time, and great laughs. Seriously Clothes Don’t Make The Turtle, aka that episode where our heroes end up trapped in an 80′s dress up montage, BARELY didn’t make the list. 

And as a longtime fan of the franchise I couldn’t be happier this fresh take, which I was aprhensive about at first because it looked like yet another dumbed down teen titans go ripoff, and given it was dumb to begin with... but instead was a fun action comedy with a lot of really unique and intresting ideas. And despite the rush to finish.. they delivered one hell of a finale and on the high chance season 3 dosen’t happen... it’s a hell of a note to go out on.  First things first: yes i’m counting multi parters as one episode. Not more seralized shows like SU Future or Infinity Train, where events can flow in and out, but stories that are clearly one big story, in pieces like the old days. Since hour long episodes of shows are fair game, I felt it only fair that multi parters around the same length as an hourlong special be given the same treatment. Not that any hourlongs made it this year, sorry fans of Obsidian and “Let’s Get Dangerous”, though both are throughly EXCELLENT episodes this was just a tight list. 

Okay good. So yeah the finale, split over four episodes, is an epic: taking plot threads from all season and series and weaving them into a well paced, emotoinal, finale. Like previous more serious episode the comedy’s downplayed.. but it doesen’t feel like an entirley diffrent show and works well, and the always great fluid animation was kicked up to 11 for this one.  So to make a long story short: in this series shredder is a demonic set of armor, but came back wrong at the end of last season when the food clan revivied him, so while the clan now has him back, they can’t really use him. And current head Foot Recurit, a spunky foot recruit whose failed to rank up despite being tough and ambitious and worthy of it, is at a loss how to reviive her master.  The turltes, naturally, end up accidently blundering into the solution as they head into Splinter’s head to find the info to beat Shredder. The show gives splinter easily one of , if not the best, backstories he’s ever had: While at the start the character was highly annoying, being a lazy asshole who didn’t train the boys and did nothing.. the show eventually give us valid reasons WHY he’s like this: he didn’t like being turned into a rat by big bad of season 1 Baron Draxum and thus has depresion over that, had quit fighting since he’d been forced to be a cage fighter by his ex for a while,  his ex being a giant spider just in case you thought this would be remotely normal an forgot what show we were talking about and genrally just had no horse in the tight training he usually does in most continuties. 

This episode adds another, heartbreaking lair: We find out back when he was Hamato Yoshi, Splinter’s mom left to ward off shredder when he was a boy.. and thus never came back and presumibly died. Understandably he had no time for the clan at that point, constantly defying his grandfather.. and why should he have time for them? They took his mom away for a thankless duty sacrificing herself to stop something he had no way of knowing was real, another reason he never trained the boys. And his grandfather rather than be AT all apologetic clearly, via his actions, thought of this as some great honor and was baffled why Yoshi would have no intrest in repeating his mother’s actions or have any sense of honor, duty or even love for a man who as far as he could tell, threw his mom to the wolves and had no regrets about it. So we see Yoshi as both a rebellious teen and as a movie star throwing out his grandpa.. we see those in reverse of course, but the later scenes give context to those showing why Yoshi was so rude.. because he lost his mom and it still hurts him.  HOwever helping her frees the shredder.. but also Karai who bizarely, in this continuity is not only an aincent ancestor of theres but a firm ally instead of either a deadly enemy or a fremeny of sorts. Or Splinter’s dang daughter, one of 2012′s best plot elements.. that was then wasted by turning her into a snek for a while because that show really went off the rails. So it quickly turns from a heartwarming and awkard family reunion.. to our heroes and karai barely escaping with their lives as shredder demolishes the lair, and Draxum, now a good guy after a season’s worth of wonderful chracter development, and Splinter stay behind, with Draxum cleverly bluffing and pretending ot be evil again.. only to try and take out shredder. 

Meanwhile we get this series take on “the turtles going to teh woods to retreat” as Raph beats himself up for being a bad leader and our heroes learn to tap into their hamato nimpo.. which basically means super magic ninja powers which allows them to bring back their classic weapons and enhances their magic, as it was never in teh weapons but in them all along. Also April gets Karai in her, phrasing, and a glowing boost to her bat.  The result.. is one of the best fights of both the year and the franchise PERIOD, which is what got me to catch up to see the finale because I saw a fan video synching it up to “Spin and Burst”.. and while not a naruto fan.. that song is fucking awesome and that video showed off an utterly marvelous fight. See for yourself

Seriously I wasn’t kidding. I’ve been a fan of this franchise since 2003. This is one of the best sequences in it’s history with or without the added soundtrack: The fighting is fast, frentic, beautfully animated and cool to watch and perfectly combines the series humor, with our heroes giving out quips and callbacks at the right times, with it’s fast paced and wonderous action. It also shows how far our heroes have come: while PART of it is them having super mystic powers unlocked.. they both had to work to reach those powers, and spirtually rather than phsycially,in the third part, but each power is merly an upgraded versoin of their old weapon powers, ablities they’ve spent the entire series mastering, paticuarlly leo who went from BARELY being able to work his portals to using teleport spam here. While they did pull a power BOOST out of their ass, it would’ve meant nothing had they not been anymore skileld than when they started and it makes the fight feel rewarding and impactful. And it ends with the hamot clan as a whole, with new ally foot recurit aka cassandra jones ina great last minute reveal that they CLEARLY didn’t have time to build up better, and smoke that bitch. Also Leo’s leader now bye. It’s just a damn good finale and I dind’t even get into all the great character stuff, including the great payoff of Casey’s face turn after seeing just how much of a monster the man she always wanted to serve is, and how he’s hurting Splinter, who ACTUALLY cares about her well being despite being an enemy. It’s just good stuff that fits the franchise like a glove but iwth the series own unique stamp on it. Nuff said. 

15. Toadcatcher (Amphibia)  “Your not upset because you lost the fight, your upset because you lost your friend! Your upset that Anne stood up to you and things between you will never be the same again.”  Amphibia was one of the first shows I covered reguarlly and along with Ducktales one of the most popular.. so yeah it’s weird it not only is low on the list, but this is the only represtintive. But this was a high volume year for quality and while the show had other standout episodes like gravity falls tribute “Wax Museum”, Marcy’s introduction “Marcy at the Gates” and noir patische “Little Frogtown”, as this list already shows it was a really tight race. It dosen’t help that while Season 2 isn’t terrible.. it’s a bit more uneven, and unlike season 1 it’s weaker stretches of episodes weren’t as easily covered, as instead of airing every weekday, it was a weekly release. Which I prefer, as it means they aren’t being dumped out en masse and are given room to breathe and the passage of time feels more warranted when it’s spread out over a few months intead of a few weeks. It just meant the weaker episodes stood out more and drained on me more.. but it also meant the stronger ones were all the more a breath of fresh air. And nowhere was this more apparent as teh worst episode of the season, and series, thus far, Quarallers Pass.. was paired with Toadcatcher, an utterly marvelous episode and followup to ironically the series best so far, Reunion. 

This episode catches us up with Sasha, Anne’s former best friend who tried to kill her in a sword fight, one where the entirety of wartwood including her adopted grandpa was at sake and Sasha knew this and did not care. She then followed it up by letting go when Anne was depseratley holding on, with the help of her new family, to save Sashsa’s life.. and Sasha let go. I discussed the full implications in the review so I will avoid trigggering anyone, and I mean tha tin the medical sense anyone using it ironiclaly or to mock people using it as it’s intended can get fucked, but she clearly didn’t intend to make it, but Grime saved her and spirted her off.  So we catch up with both licking their wounds from the ordeal: Sasha has decided to take the Jasper route of horrible coping mechanisms and is training constnatly, readily kiling dolls of the plantars but still unable to truly hurt Anne, burying her feelings over her guilt and her best friend rightfully turning on her and then trying to save her anyway despite Sasha trying to gut her. Grime.. is binging on the wonderfully terrible teen soap Supscion Island, coming back this january on the cw, that was intorduced last season and generally not carring the king has his best men, women and nonbinary folks out for his head. 

So both issues come to a head as General Yuaan, scourge of the Sand Wars, defeater of Ragnar the Wretched, and the youngest newt to ever achieve the rank of general in the great Newtopian Army, and she’ll never miss a chance to say that, has come for Grime whose in no condition and has no will to fight back. He also finally confronts Sasha when she snaps at him for it, pointing out she’s simply burying the fact that she lost Anne, things won’t be the same, and she won’t deal with it.  The episode adds real depth to grime, going from an intresting but semeingly just evil overlord.. to someone who worked his way out of a fighting pit to be given a thankfless if cushy job by the same people who threw him in in the first place, someone who to my shock at the time.. CARES about his protege. While allowing Sasha in was simply to their mutual advantage at first.. he’s grown to genuinely care about her as his friend and offers to let Yuaan have him so she can be free. but Sasha refuses. Despite her issues.. she CARES about the old toad and together, and using Yaan’s ham against her, they beat her, and decide to rebuild their army... after Grime finishes his soaps of course. Can.. relate. A thorughly good, throughly emotinally episode that dosen’t lack the series humor but does have a depth and rhthym to it that the series has at i’ts best. 

14. Quack Pack! (Ducktales)  Jesus I was so tired when making this I nearly forgot an entry. And shame on me as this was one of the best episodes of an already amazing Season. Season 3 is easily ducktales best and i’ve been proud to cover it. It’s been my most popular feature and while not every episodes been GREAT, only one’s really not been very good, and none have been out and out bad. While it may be the end of the shows run and not without problems, they still have trouble ballancing the adults at times if not nearly as bad as before, to the point Launchpad just sorta vanishes after Let’s Get Dangerous outside of the Christmas Specail that takes place before the season anyway, and Louie is often written VERY badly.. but i’ve talked about these things all season in my reviews.

Point is those faults are overwhelmed by the strengths; The character ballance is better, several side characters have gotten tons of payoff to their arcs and more development, and the main plot is easily the best in the series history: By having essentially one main plot with two focuses, before they merge at the halfway marker, it allows the season to be far more streamlined after the really messy way season 2′s plots were handled. It just shows the show at it’s best and has produced amazing episode after amazing episode and it was really hard to widdle it down to the ones that got selected here and even then one got left out. 

But one boost I haven’t mentioned is their wilingness to take risk. While past seasons had flashback episodes and what not this one, in hindsight, has some of the more risky episodes of the series, ones you really COULDN’T do in seasons 1 and 2: a whole episode flashback to the twins, basically taking our present day kids out for the whole season, an hour long special focusing on what, to fans not familiar with darkwing duck, is simply a very engaging side character and his new sidekick.. and launchpad (The ducks aren’t OUT of the special, but they aren’t the focus and aren’t around for most of the climax). An episode with really dark emotional moments.. which isn’t unsuaul for a disney show, see next time, but for one so close to their chest it was a lot. They were settled in enough to take plenty of risks and it’s paid off. It’s not to community levels of experimentation, but it’s still nice, intresting breaks from the usual adventures. 

And one of the best and boldest of these was Quack Pack. Taking our heroes and plopping them into a TGIF sitcom. Of which this plot not only happened TWICE this year, three times if you count the entirety of beef house, which I do so let’s call it three, but both cartoon examples are on this list. But both tackle it in diffrent and intresting ways so both got on here.  IN this case.. during a stock plot about a family photo, complete with Donald having his Don Cheadle voice back, we get some great parodies of convetions of les.s. good sitcomes nad even some of the greats: there’s the constnat catcphrases (ranging from a sticomy version of Della’s “On the moon”, to Beakly’s “I’m not a spy.. which sh’es understandably inscnesed to find out is her catchphrase) ,and even the wacky neighbor with our lord and savior Goofy showing up in the roll, as a nice nod to the more sitcom side of the Disney Afternoon. We just get a lot of good gags.. until Huey becomes aware, starting to realize things are off, with his guidebook being empty and things just not adding up. We even get a great bit of him being forced to do a disney channel/that 70′s show dance transtion only to react with exesntial horror.  Naturally, given their lives,a  genie did it, Gene, played by Jaleel White in a pefect bit of casting. Having been imprisoned in his lamp since the 90′s. Gene’s a bit behind on how sticoms work, but was just granting a wish, Donald’s wish, which the family figures out by trigggiring a flashback, Goofy VERY MUCH included. where we find out it was, unsuprisngly Donald’s fault.. though in his defense, and in the best line of the episode, when confronted about wishing for a normal life “I wish for that 30 times a day. How was I supposed to know a lamp was under me this time?”

And we find out why and it’s heartbreaking: Donald just wants a normal family, where everyone’s safe and, most tellningly “No one gets lost.”. It’s the climax of a series long HATRED of going on these adventures. For everyone else it’s fun, thriling, good stuff.. to him.. it’s not only a reminder of what cost him 10 years with his sister and his adopted sons their mom for that time, but a reminder of a lot of pain and humilation. To him he just wants the normal life he used to have back, despite that not being an option and his kids to be safe and his sister not to leave again. Granted his refusal to undo the wish is selfish.. but i’ts understandable. And while the rest of them try to break the wish, and end up fighting the horrifying audience it’s GOOFY who gets donald to see all families are diffrent and that there is no normal: just what you make and enjoy. It makes donald realize that as hectic as his life is.. it’s his life, his family.. and maybe. it’s not so bad. After years of denying how much he used to love adventuering.. he realizes part of him stilld oes and no amount of turning against it will fix what he lost... he just has to enjoy NOW. It’s good solid character development for my favioriote member of the cast, and overall a fun, genre spoofing episode that pokes fun at the genre but reallyg ets how it works. 

13. Growing Pains (Steven Universe Future)

“ What do I do? How do I move on from all the stuff I've been through? How do I live life if it always feels like I'm about to die?! “ So yeah big recap of steven’s emotional well being to get into future earlier, but rewinding a bit, this one takes place with our hero at a low point. Not “oh god I comitted murder what am I now oh god” low as we got to earlier and the series itself wold get to later, these lists make time warped and space bendeble, but still pretty damn bad.  As mentioned before Steven tried proposing to connie, not helped by Ruby and Sapphire both being fully on board, as both are hopeless romantics seprate but when combined as a Garnet their shared braincell can get working properly and has settings other than “emotoinal pain, peppy (ruby), a bit distant but kind (Sapphire) and horny”. While it was as beautiful a propsal as you’d expect from Steven.. Connie gently rejected it since you know, he also wanted to be permafused and their not even legal marrying age left. He’s 17.. despite what this episode claims. She’s 15 or 16. They aren’t ready and she knew it not even ruling it out entirely, just saying “not now”.  But as this episode bears out.. Steven really isn’t an emotinal state where he could properly process that way and after shooing her away, even though she WANTED to talk it over and genuiely make sure he was okay as she damn well knew this wasn’t easy on him, but also knew it’d probably be bad to press him while he was clearly in pain. So like everyone else she made the mistake of leaving.  So Steven’s binging on junk food, and bemoaning the fact that even dogcopter is getting married.. also Dogcopter is gay. Given the show he’s a fictional character in, you THINK i’d of been less suprised but you’d be wrong. Point is steven isn’t dealing well and is going pink and with the gems gone for the weekend, and Greg unavaliable due to being busy as a manager, Steven is getting worse and his body is starting to warp. Thanfkully connie comes to check up on him and insits he see a doctor.. and since her mother’s a doctor and thankfully had a cancelation. Unthankfully it turns out, to Prianka’s understandable frustration.. Steven’s never been to a doctor. Which does make sense, Greg taking him in might’ve alreted authorties to his lack of schooling or his injuries from age 13 onward, plus he had no idea of knowing how his body would react to tests. That being said given by this point in the series Gems are well accepted and known around town and everyone loves and adores steven, Greg had no real excuse by this age especially after the second gem war.  And that’s proven by the fact it turns out steven’s body has tons of internal scars which, due to him turning out to have a wolverine style healing factor, mean h’es alive and without brain damage, but still has plenty of internal scars. It’s a godo metaphor for his mental trauma: he came out of his various happenings ALIVE.. but not mentally okay and with PLENTY of ptsd. When Prianka asks him to list his traumas.. he dosen’t even get past season 1 before she’s understandably horrified, though she’s figured out exactly what’s causing his pink mode: as mentioned before his contstant life of danger and having the threat of a fight at any moment over his head for 2 solid years, maybe 3 given the third light game shows he still had a lot of work to do before the movie and future, and honestly still does at times during both, mean his flight or fight response has been shot so the adrenline charged pink form, meant to protect him from danger.. is triggering for EMOTIONAL pain and suffering. 

Steven dosen’t take it well and keeps enlarging when pressed.. and accidently spills the beans about the proposal... and understandably, even if she was FULLY in the right can’t be around Connie: while she had every right to reject him, it dosen’t mean it hurts any less. Sometimes even when you do the absolute right thing.. it can still hurt to be on the receiving end of that. But Connie is still Connie, aka the most emotinally  stable and mature person in the main cast very much including the sentient space rocks who are centuries older than her, so she called Greg who naturally dropped everything because his son needed him. It shows the genuine conflict, one, again that I’ve grappled with: Steven is so obssed with not boterhing those he loves, he fails to see they’ll help him when he needs it without a second thought. So Greg thankfully calms him down and taks over the failed proposal with no judgement or anything just support. Sadly things go downhill from here but it’s a good episode that turns the entire series on it’s head with some damn good character work. 

12. Annhilation of Joy (The Midnight Gospel) 

“Again? How Many times is this guy gonna die?” “Until he learns”  The Midnight Gospel was a plesant suprise. Penndelton Ward’s return to animation after leaving Adventure Time, the show is a collberation between him and podcaster Duncan Trussel. It was a suprise both in how quickly it came together, and in how it’s real nature wasn’t properly expressed in the trailers: while the series does tell us the trippy adventures of Clancy, a 40 something “Spacecaster” who uses an illegal simulator to visit worlds to interview various people.. said interviews are expercts from Trusseul’s own podcast, the Duncan Trussel Family Hour, something this series has badly made me want to listen to. As such while dealing with zombie apocalypses, a quest to avenge a dead lover, being processed as meat and meeting death herself while looking for his hose, Clancy interviews his subjects, including Death herself, and talks on various subjects related to medation and spirutality, throughly fascenating interviews greatly woven into trippy visuals. Hopefully the show will be back for round 2 at some point as both Ward and Trussel are game, but for now the first season stands on it’s own as a throughly trippy, throughly wonderful blend of Trussel’s words and insight and Ward’s boundless imagination.  And the best of these, narrowly beating out the final epsiode which uses an interview with Truseel’s late mother to inform clancy’s own actions, as Clancy’s Mom is dying from cancer same as Trussels tragically did. But I like this one slightly better due to it’s great blend of the subject with the plot. Once again Clancy is ignoring his pain, and his sister’s calls, by diving into the space vagina of his simulator, taking a weird form, and easily my faviorite of his shapeshifted forms of the season: a living rainbow that wouldn’t be out of palce in a pbs kids show, complete with the fact he makes musuical chimes when touched not unlike a children’s toy and has chosen this form to enter the simulator’s jail.  It’s there he gets engagled, literally, with Bob and Jason. Bob is an angry, upset prisoner who chewed his own tounge out years ago, and Jason is his soul bird, a represntation of his pain bound to him by blue rope that Clancy got tangled in. So Clancy is taken along for the ride with them as every time Bob dies, the celestial beings in charge of the prison put him through weird emtional torment, pluck out his heard and weigh it against  a feather plucked from jason. 

Thus while Clancy and Jason have a spirited conversation about Buddishm and about not treaing spirutality like a game with levels and having to earn progress but as an emotinal journey, Bob goes through a buddishm inspried journey of his own, mixed with a bit of edge of tommorow. He dies, gets tourtured then resets.. but slowly learns to empathize, to let go of his anger and violence and help those around him. It’s an utterly mesmering journey to watch this angry green big headed man go from a violet convict who will gladly shoot and stab.. to a pacfisit eager to help those around him. And it’s thorughly convincing and backed wonderfully by the interview and easily a sign of what this weird and unconveintonal series can do at all cyllnders. Seriously Netflix you’ve been on a loosing streak decisionmaking wise. Make. More. Of. This. 

11. Save the Cat (She-Ra and the Princesses of Power) "C'mon Catra. You're not done. Not yet..."

God that image is unsettling. Anywho back to She-Ra, and somehow this is the second time i’ve had to rewind the progress of a season by about an episoide. Weird. Point is saved the cat is one of the most tightly packed and thrilling episodes of the series.. and the crux of Catra’s character arc.  Before this Catra had hit her lowest point, having lost ..j well everything. She pushed everyone from adora, to the nonambigiously a couple trio, to her own best friends away through her shitty behavior and inferoirty complex and somenoe she THOUGHT was her friend.. turned on her for money. Oh and as an added stomp on the tail all that betryal, all the blood spilled in her name.. was for nothing. Horde Prime made her irrelvant: she couldnt’ manipualte him because a combination of a god complex and an army of loyal drones meant he had nothing to hide and eyes everywhere. She had nothing. Eveyrthing she did every sacrifice she made every worse and worse turn she made a s a person... amounted to NOTHING.  So it was at this point she and glimmer, despite you know killing Glimmer’s mother, were forced to work together.. and Catra sacrificed herself both to get Glimmer safe and because for once.. she wanted to do something right. Her self loathing, some of it warranted, a lot of it already there from an abusive childhood, left her with one option: sacrifice herself and HOPE, something good can come of it, Apologize to Adora, hte one person she ever loved and hope she can at least surivive this.  Naturally, Adora having seen her friend/love of her life has not only REALIZED what she become, but sacrifice herself.. isn’t having this, and after an episode of repairs both on the ship and emotinally, our heroes are naturally, despite any personal hangups with her ready to save Catra. Naturally this hits snags. On Bow and Entrapta’s end, they accidently free a horde clone she mistakes for hordak and, having no other real option and with the guy being useful, Wrong Hordak is born! I love me some Wrong Hordak. What a guy, makes you cry, und I did. 

The main issue though is Adora let herslef be captured.. only to find Horde Prime is a sadstic bastard and has not only chipped Catra, but is using her newfound peace of mind to play with adora’s head, using Catra’s heartbreak from the past to manipulate Adora in the present.. and force them to fight because hey he’s a sadistic jackass with a god complex. They make their own fun.  But Adora gets through to her .. only for Prime to decide fuck it and try killing her with Adora BARELY saving her with her power, and Catra, as she fades, wondering why Adora even bothered. And the why is simple.. as a wise fictional version of a wise president once said “Dying is easy young man, living is harder”. Not the last time that quote will be relevant in this top 20 list, but the point, and it was delebrate on Noelle Stevenon’s part, was to subvert this kind of thing> The bad guy gets redemption but then dies seconds later. Instead.. Catra has to LIVE with what she did and make up for it, become a better person and work for redepmtion, instead of just getting to end in some big blaze of glory. But at the same time.. it’s the better route. The harder one sure.. but she gets to have a life and to undo the damage and maybe for once.. actually live instead of just trying to surivive. IT was the right call in a series full of them. 

But yeah the day is saved, our heroes have two new roomates and Catra weakly greats Adora.. but with genuine warmth for the first time in .. years I guess? I don’t know this series time span. Point is the healing and the ship tease for our finale can begin and this episode is a tense, well put together masterwork. The pacing really is what put it up this far, as it really ratchets up the tension, and being the last season, meant there was no guarantee anyone, including catra, was going to make it. Excellent stuff all around. 

So that’s where we leave off for now. i’ll be PUTTING PART 2 HERE WITH A LINK. once i’ts finished For now watch this space and..

#best of 2020 #2020 #best of list #Steven Universe #Steven Universe Future #She Ra and the Princesses of Power #rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #save rottmnt #ducktales #amphibia #the midnight gospel

[gem-flow]

What would a gem-human hybrid created by you look like?

Gem Hybrids

Well, If I had an hybrid Oc it would probably be the result of a human like greg and any of the gems already showed. From the top left to the bottom right here they go!:

Raimund Ferdinand Universe: Gay and proud, listens to Mariah Carey all day,inspired in RQ 2.0.

Samuel (Sami) Universe: Mexican cutie, loves tortas, a mess, inspired by Smokey.

Gregory (Greg) Jr. Universe: Handsome Latino, gay ass too, has bipolarity (sadly), wanking hurts, but he’s full of love, heterochromia.

Rudi Universe: grumpy, mom’s boi,real ok ko, his description is as short as his stature

Serafino (Safi) Universe: Scared of every living thing, quiet guy that counts backwards to 1, son of elsa, anxiety king.

Brian Santos Universo: Colombian cool guy, dyed hair, he did his dreadlocks himself, knows how to tune and build cars.

Percy Jackson Universe: Anime fan guy, creates ocs, internet troll, fan of Boku no hero academia, Her favorite character is Tsuyu Asui, has a crush on Lincoln (You probably know who), goes to art clases, loves Nepeta Cataria (nyah).

Lincoln Universe: He’s pisces (Like justin bieber), K-popper, loves Twice but also Blackpink, depressed bitch, his favorite place is his room, watches Big mouth.

Kennedy Universe: Bully, Lesbian kid, vitiligo, loves getting high, goes to boxing classes.

Steven Diamond Universe: Loves every-Ugh you already know him, well, he’s all the way around: Fastidious bitch, owner of miss keisha, never represses feelings

Narcissus (Nass) Universe: Craig of the creek, one-eyed but proud of his mother, wants to touch the sky, uncomprehended but optimist, still has no idea what puberty is.

Pinky Pie Sherman Sewell Szilveszter The first Universe: Yeah I really believe Spinel would call her son like that. Fan of MLP although it ended, has a ponysona, brony, funny kid at school (cries at home), loves cuphead and mickey mouse, does streams twice a day.

Adam Universe: Onion 2.0, will byers 2.0, 5-year-old murderer, casted for pinky and the brain, psychotic.

Eric Evergreen Universe: Queer, Handsome guy at school, does every sport, perfect, ashamed of his gem, secret fan of billie eilish, loves pirate stuff, str8 ass, big ship and ‘I'LL BLOW YOU UP TO SMITHEREENS’, would love to be a drag queen.

Zachariah Universe: Studies politics, smart guy at university/ school, A+ kid, listens to mozart, blind, ‘where’s my glasses’, favorite food: mashed potatoes, fan of Abraham Lincoln.

Tomas Universe: Basically me: yeah my name’s Tomas, my birthstone is Topaz lol, Head attached to earphones all day, loves yellow, gay ass bitch.

Rita and Tina: Siamese, argues 24/7, loves the same guy, fans of AHS: Freak show, wants to be a voice actress.

Penny Kelly Universe: Very smol, her mother was a 10 times the size of a normal pebble so don’t worry kids, has overcome cancer (I think it would be a great story to tell), nicest girl in the world.

James (Jimmy) Universe: Son of my jade, goes to free style dance classes, listens to La Rosalia, does teathre, needs a therapist, Student at little homeschool, music and dance are her passions.

Don’t be afraid to be original, I think this is one of my most important posts, I think gem hybrids around tumblr are simple and need to be more creative, this is a little help!

 Hope you like it!

#steven universe genderbend #steven universe future #gemsonas #oc #gem hybrid

[nautiscarader]

2019 in animation - very selected summary

So, I dunno if anyone’s noticed, but this year was crazy strong when it comes to animation, both in terms of amount and quality of it. No matter what type you liked - traditional...

...3D...

...cell-shaded...

...hyper-realistic...

 - oh, wait, wait, no, my mistake, that’s clearly live-action. 

Anyway, no matter what type of animation is your favourite, this year gave you something. and I’m gonna go chronologically, listing those that I have been able to see. Keep in mind, day only has 24 hours, so I couldn’t see every new season or premiere (for example, I had no interest in OK KO, or She-Ra). Some spoilers below. And Gifs. LOTS OF gifs.

In January: we were still riding on the Spiderverse bandwagon from last year,, which culminated with an Oscar in February. And though as I’ve said, the movie would have worked better imho as a, say, Netflix series, as only two of the spider-people were properly fleshed out, I have to admit, it was a well-earned prize.

Then we were hit by the finale of Steven Universe, and while some complained about the another redemption of cosmic regime, it was an incredibly satisfying ending to a great cartoon... so much so that a whole movie and an epilogue series was made.

plus, it had a segment animated by James Baxter, so it’s automatic win..

January also blessed us with a reboot of another old-forgotten property, Carmen Sandiego, with her second season arriving in October. And it proved that reboots do make sense, but only if you actually do something with it. The story was fresh, creative, and yet, similar in its serialised form to capture the imagination of viewers. Also, grappling hooks for the win.

February was the month of dragons. Not only we got the conclusion of How to Train Your Dragon franchise, but Netlfix gave us second season of The Dragon Prince. While I still consider HTTYD 1 as the best movie of the franchise, as it cleverly told the story of a conflict without any obvious villain, HTTYD 3 was a satisfying conclusion, strengthened by the Homecoming special in November. 

TDP S2 on the other hand, did everything season 1 did, except better. For once, the studio finally broke their piggy bank and bought a new graphics card, so the choppy 15FPS animation of S1 is gone. The story got darker, more mature, yet whimsical, and it only made us hungry for more. Luckily, S3 was just around the corner.

March gave us season 2 of Craig of the Creek. I have to admit, I missed out on this cartoon in 2018, and it was a humongous mistake. CotC is quite possibly the most wholesome cartoon out there, telling amazing story about a boy, his friends, and his family, glorifying the mundane adventures in the creek to truly epic proportions. The family is especially important part, I do not remember a cartoon where bonds between family members were as well written as here. Definitely a must-watch if you have missed it as well.

On 8th of March, the International Women’s day, DC Superhero Girls 2019, aka My Little Pony But Humans And With Superpowers, started, and it was a blast. Creator. Lauren Faust, has once again proven that whatever she touches turns into gold. The shorts were funny, clever, and changed just enough of the DC universe to feel familiar, yet show us new, interesting scenarios. 

 In April, Missing Link had its premiere, showing that traditional, stop motion animation not only has place in modern times, but it can deliver spectacular scenes, though of course, we expected nothing less of studio Laika.

In May, one of Disney’s long-running series, Star vs The Forces of Evil had its finale, and that brings us to the first screech of the list. Many people complained about the direction the show has taken, some claiming it has gone off-track in S3, some saying it was S4 that dropped the quality. Some, like me, saw nothing wrong with it, but the finale let people dissatisfied. If anything, it was too short, and definitely could use an epilogue movie that would tie some of the remaining plot threads in something bigger than one single pan-shot. 

Rest in piece, laser puppies

Wait, they’re alive? Well, then... rest in piece, Hekapoo and her puppies.

This month also presented a first contender for this Summer’s line-up, Twelve Forever. The cartoon took us into wild, bizarre land of imagination, and offered quite a few very mature lessons about growing up and acknowledging one’s responsibilities. It also provided much needed representation, both in terms of colour and sexuality. 

Sadly, amidst scandals with its creator, the show was canned, though it’s also Netflix’s fault for not marketing it enough.

A-and maybe the show was just a tad too... creepy....

Also somewhere in May some Games might have been lost and some Thrones burned, but no one cares about it anymore. i think it was popular for a while, though.

However, 12 Forever was just a start. June gave us Amphibia, my personal top-bingeable cartoon of the year. Disney has hit a jackpot, giving us an incredibly creative fantasy show with rich mythology and enough emotional conflict to create fantastic storytelling. The only slight complain was the scheduling, as episodes aired daily, meaning the season was over by the end of the month. But honestly, the amount of humour and adventures with Anne in the forg world we got compensates that thousandfold. Book 2, coming in 2020, can only makes thing more interesting. 

Going for a hat-trick, in August we got the premiere of a cartoon that I was betting would be my personal favourite, Infinity Train... Until I learned of its schedule, even weirder than Amphibia’s. While Amphibia took a right turn, and gave us 20 episodes, a perfect amount for both plot and filler stories, Infinity Train... turned out to be a mini-series with just ten episodes, airing daily, two per night. And that, in my opinion, was a fatal mistake. Not only we now know that the story is not over, as Season 2 arrives in January, but the short episodes and its density gave very little time to leave an impact on us. If it was at least spaced out, then maybe I wouldn’t be so judgemental, but for me it was a blow that deflated the balloon I was clinging to since 2016 pilot. Still, there is more to come, and the story was more than interesting, so we’ll see if I get used to the pocket mini-story arcs.

September. Remember Steven Universe? That cartoon that ended? SIKE, HAVE A TV MOVIE. And by gods, old and new, what a phenomenal movie it was. A musical telling its own, contained story of betrayal, trust and finding yourself, based on Rebecca Sugar’s mis-adventure with a phone that reset itself... I have seen this movie at least ten times, and its OST is one I come back to constantly on Spotify. The songs are amazing, catchy, incredibly-well written, deep, and, as usual, send very adult messages about growing up and finding one’s identity, which SU was already famous for. Must watch.

Continuing the theme of reboots that actually make sense, Ducktales finished its second season after duck-bombs in March and May, with a heart-breaking story of Della Duck and humongous finale, extending DT’s universe to other Disney Afternoon shows. Season 3 promises even more, and DT is a golden standard of making a reboot that stays faithful to a more than half-a-century old material, while adding enough material to keep things fresh and funny for modern audience. What I’m saying is, Disney could really learn from Disney (pictured below).

But while some things start, some have to finish. October saw the end of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, a show that has taken Internet by the storm in 2010 and...

...okay, cringy brony things aside, this was a clever re-imagining of the decades-old property, and its popularity, especially amongst the people outside the target demography is a proof of its quality. The ending was perfectly serviceable, nothing that stood out, in my opinion, but it definitely didn’t disappoint either. MLP FiM will live in history as the cartoon about pastel tiny horses that made adult men cry and gave them enough passion to create years of of visual crack. And porn. Lots of porn.

November:  Just In case if one season of human and elf adventures was enough, The Dragon Prince Season 3 arrived in November, and it provided a thrilling conclusion to its first smaller story arc. Though I wish the season was longer, and it dived into the history of Elves’ and Humans’ animosities, I would be lying if I said I didn’t binge-watch it all in one sitting, gripping my chair. 

Do you like Green Eggs and Ham? Yes, yes, I do, Sam-I-am. Question: how do you take a classic poem, made purposefully of limited vocabulary, and turn it into a thirteen episode series with a beginning, middle, and end? The answer: You add bunch of weird stuff and the mother of all complicated backstories... at least by the original’s standards. And here’s the thing: this is the first Dr Seuss’ adaption where it works. Somehow the writers were able to stretch each verse of the famous poem into a surprisingly emotional story about friendship, losing and restoring hope, as well as following your dreams. Plus, it gave us Fargo-esque team of Bad Guys. Come on. 

And just in time for Christmas season, we were blessed with Klaus, a clear contender for a Christmas classic in my opinion. This STUNNINGLY beautiful traditionally animated original Netflix movie is a very, very clever reinterpretation of St. Nick’s mythos, telling a deep, and very realistic story of greed and selfishness, and how can one turn their life around by changing their life, one present at a time.

We’re about to end the year, so HOW ABOUT SOME EMOTIONAL TRAUMA, KIDS? Yes, Steven Universe Future is here, and from the looks of it, Steven’s problems are just beginning, since they mature with him. The show’s too real, man. However, it also provided much needed levity, giving us a familiar taste. Nothing more to say, as the show is still airing, and it will surely give us more emotional moments.   

And that’s a wrap for 2019. As I’ve said, it is not exhaustive by any means, and from the looks of it, 2020 is gonna be as packed as its prequel. So yeah, the world might be on fire, but at least we got some nice cartoon to binge-watch.

Happy new year everyone! At least I have time until 6th of January when the first episode of Infinity Train Season two arriWHAT DO YOU MEAN IT’S OUT ALREADY

[signor-signor]

Status of shows that debuted in the 2010s

To set the record straight, I shall now identify shows from Cartoon Network and Disney Channel/XD and their status. Those marked orange are those of which I’ve only seen some episodes or a few. Those marked red I’ve never watched.

Sim-Bionic Titan - Canceled (Genndy Tartakovsky said 10 more episodes were planned out. The main antagonist has yet to be vanquished or eradicated. It’s on Netflix if you want to boost views.)

Adventure Time - Ended (I never watched a lot of it, but I know there is a batch of new special episodes coming to HBO Max.)

Regular Show - Ended (Last few episodes were as epic and amazing as can be, and the part where 25 years go by cements the fact that J.G. Quintel got to end it his way.)

The Amazing World of Gumball - Probably ended (Apart from the unique mixture of animated characters and realistic scenery, I’m not sure what the viewers and the executives see in this one.)

Fish Hooks - Ended (Fewer people seem to acknowledge this, but it got three seasons and a satisfying end, much to Noah Z. Jones’s relief.)

Gravity Falls - Ended (Seriously, if everything got wrapped up right, why in the heck is the fandom still thriving? Do you see a campaign anywhere called SaveGF? There’s no Christmas special to be found, either. Unless a third season was planned out, I suggest you let it go.)

Wander Over Yonder - CANCELED (Totally different from ended, I cannot stress this enough, especially with the space pod cliffhanger and Lord Hater not yet fully reformed. One more season or one TV movie is all we ask for.)

Uncle Grandpa - Ended, more or less (Pete Browngardt made a substantial number of episodes and did as much as he wanted.)

Steven Universe (+ Future) - Ended (I haven’t seen the movie or the Future season, but I assume Rebecca Sugar, or as she’s probably called now, Rebecca Jones-Quartey, got to tie all loose ends.)

Clarence - Ended (Like Fish Hooks, this seemingly underrated show about a rather naive, funny-sounding, earless boy from Arizona got three seasons and an actual ending - the last episode had the words “Thank you for watching.”)

The 7D - Partially Ended - (The last episode they showed apparently implied the Glooms have run out of options. It’d be nice if we could see what the 19 episodes that were cut from S2 were.)

Penn Zero: Part-Time Hero - Ended (It left no loose ends. Ever seen the Tangled series? This show is animated pretty much the same way. Still recommend checking it out if you haven’t already.)

Star vs. the Forces of Evil - Ended... I think (Although it has four seasons, which is more than what we expect nowadays (I mean, I stopped watching after two seasons), some fans are claiming the end was not particularly exemplary.)

Mighty Magiswords - I wanna say... stopped (While there’s no cliffhanger or any indication that more adventures are on the way, I saw somewhere that Kyle A. Carrozza planned to show some newer places and the Magiclamp, which was said to make Super Teamwork Combos permanent.)

Milo Murphy’s Law - Ended maybe? (Because my trust in the Disney television executives was dwindling, I lost interest after 13 half-hours. Guess what, though, Milo Murphy was said to make a cameo appearance in the Disney+-exclusive Phineas and Ferb movie: Candace Against the Universe.)

Tangled: the Series/Rapunzel’s Tangled Adventures - Ended (This sits between the film and the short wherein Rapunzel and Eugene get married. Stopped watching for same reason mentioned above.)

Billy Dilley’s Super Duper Subterranean Summer - Ended (I didn’t see any plans for another season, and that last episode played out as a true series finale. Besides, it takes place during one season.)

OK KO! Let’s Be Heroes - Ended (When Ian Jones-Quartey was notified of cancelation during production on S3, he was able to tie all loose ends and thankfully end it his way. The one thing the show ever did wrong was call a flask a beaker (twice).)

Still in production, as far as I know: Mickey Mouse shorts, DuckTales (2017) (only saw first 3 episodes), Big Hero 6: the Series, Big City Greens, Amphibia, We Bare Bears, Craig of the Creek (only saw first episode), Apple and Onion (I think, yet to see S2), Victor and Valentino (except the pilot), Infinity Train (except the pilot).

Goodness knows it isn’t as though I’m not open-minded. I’m willing to watch what I haven’t seen, but I’m too disappointed in the TV bosses and the majority of the viewers to do so.

Oh, and let’s not forget the Netflix-exclusive DreamWorks shows that definitely ended right, including, but not limited to, All Hail King Julien, Dragons: Race to the Edge, DinoTrux, Dawn of the Croods, and Trolls: The Beat Goes On!

Better think twice before you comment on cartoons and stuff.

#2010s #Cartoon Network #Disney Channel #Disney XD #DreamWorks #Netflix #Long Reads #Too many names to tag

[fly-pow-bye]

What’s Airing On Cartoon Network? (July 2019)

The Futon Critic has updated, and has what Cartoon Network will air in July. This include Ben 10 2016, Craig of the Creek, LEGO Ninjago, OK K.O.! Let’s Be Heroes, Summer Camp Island, Teen Titans Go, Victor and Valentino, and the new series Mao Mao Heroes of Pure Heart. It’s a long post, so see you after the break!

Ben 10 2016:

Ben 10 continues his world tour. Saturdays at 12 PM, we get two Ben 10 2016 episodes in a row.

July 6th:

Big in Japan - During a tour of a robotics museum, Ben finds hero-gone-wrong Tim Buktu "trying to save" Tokyo from a Dragon. Has Tim finally turned over a new leaf, or is this just another one of his half-baked plans to play the part of hero?

Cyber Slammers - At Biggie Box Japan, Ben waits in line for the release of the latest Sumo Slammers video game, but he must soon save the store from Steam Smythe, who wants to retro-fit a massive mech with steam punk powers!

July 13th:

Big Ben 10 - When Ben and family go to London to visit the legendary Big Ben, the Bugg Brothers are there to greet them, with yet another outrageously over the top plan of course: to shrink the Big Ben bell in order to steal it!

LaGrange Muraille - Ben, Gwen, and Grandpa Max take a trek to the Great Wall, but their adventure is nearly ruined by daredevils LaGrange and Vin Ethanol trying to jump the international monument, and Ben must hop into the Rustbuggy to chase away the foes.

July 20th:

Lickety Split - When a mysterious electrical storm downs the Omni-Copter at the Equator, Team Tennyson soon discovers Solar & Polar are behind it.

The Claws of the Cat - While taking in the sights and sounds of a Rio de Janeiro music festival, Ben bristles at Gwen's suggestion that she be his new sidekick, as the festival is threaten by the supersonic sound waves of Lord Decibel.

Craig of the Creek:

Saturdays at 9:00 AM.

July 6th:

Turning the Tables - Craig dines at the restaurant where his older brother works and orders up a plate of REVENGE... and lots of breadsticks.

July 13th:

Kelsey the Author - Craig and Stacks help Kelsey become a real author turning her story into a book!

July 20th:

Council of the Creek - The circle game wreaks havoc on the Creek, so Craig forms a council to restore order.

July 27th:

Sparkle Cadet - Craig, Kelsey and JP team up with an intergalactic hero named Sparkle Cadet, hoping to save the Creek from negativity.

LEGO Ninjago: Masters of Spinjitzu:

Ninjago’s surprise return continues. Saturdays at 12:30 PM.

July 6th:

Booby-Traps, and How To Survive Them - The ninja team up with a reluctant Clutch Powers to enter a mysterious pyramid where they inadvertently unleash an ancient evil.

The News Never Sleeps! - Lil' Nelson takes a job as a paperboy, which is more difficult than it sounds in a city overrun by scorching Pyro Vipers and an evil Serpentine sorceress.

July 13th:

Ninja vs. Lava - The ninja find themselves trapped in a pyramid and must escape encroaching lava to warn NINJAGO City of a new Serpentine invasion.

Snaketastrophy - The Serpentine attack on NINJAGO City is seen from an unexpected perspective - entirely in the style of a live newscast delivered by Gayle Gossip and her cameraman.

July 20th:

Powerless - The ninja rush to the NINJAGO Museum of History to recover a dangerous scroll before it falls into the hands of the Serpentine Sorceress Aspheera.

Ancient History - While Aspheera pursues revenge on the "Treacherous Deceiver" who betrayed her, the ninja make a startling discovery.

July 27th:

Never Trust a Human - A flashback episode tells the story of Young Wu and Young Garmadon meeting Aspheera and teaching her the secrets of Spinjitzu.

Under Siege - Having learned Master Wu is the "Treacherous One," the ninja find themselves under siege at the Monastery, trying to protect Wu from the wrath of Aspheera.

Mao Mao, Heroes of Pure Heart:

Mao Mao makes his debut in July. Coming right after Teen Titans Go, these episodes will air on Mondays at 6:10 PM, with another episode coming at 6:20 PM. No commercials?

July 1st:

I Love You Mao Mao - An explosive loner and his slacker best friend are waylaid from their journey into legend, only to find that their story is just beginning.

The Perfect Adventure - When Mao Mao gets hungry for the perfect adventure, Adorabat tells a white lie.

July 8th:

No Shortcuts - After struggling to keep up, Adorabat gets a cybernetic "Mega-Mech." But can fancy new powers make up for experience?

Ultraclops - Badgerclops gets huge to destroy a towering monster, but when he refuses to shrink down, the kingdom faces a new terror.

July 15th:

Mao Mao's Bike Adventure - When Mao Mao underestimates enemy and friend alike, it almost costs him the entire kingdom.

Breakup - Feeling left out, Adorabat wishes Mao Mao and Badgerclops would spend less time with each other and more time with her. When she gets what she wishes for and accidentally breaks up their friendship.

July 22nd:

Not Impressed - When a Sweetypie isn't impressed with the sheriff department's antics, our three heroes try everything to win him over.

Enemy Mime - When the sheriff's department fights a monster that copies their every move, they'll have to find a way to fight without fighting.

July 29th:

Outfoxed - When Rufus and Reg come to swindle the town, Sheriff Mao Mao teaches them a lesson in justice.

Bao Bao's Revenge - When Mao Mao's old partner threatens the kingdom, his friends will need to learn about his past in order to protect the present.

OK K.O.! Let’s Be Heroes:

OK K.O. moves to Saturdays stays on Sundays despite Futon Critic reporting otherwise at 4:30 PM this month, with two episodes in a row for each week.

July 7th:

We Are Heroes - K.O. struggles with his upgraded role as a member of the hero team.

KO, Rad, and Enid! - When confronted with their lack of a team gimmick, K.O., Rad, and Enid wonder what their group identity should be.

July 14th:

TKO Rules! - K.O. and T.K.O decide to swap places for the day.

Chip's Damage - Elodie enlists K.O. to help figure out what to do about Chip Damage.

July 21st:

K.O. vs. Fink - When Fink taunts K.O. for being a momma's boy, he grapples with newfound insecurity about it.

The K.O. Trap - K.O., Rad, and Enid are caught in an especially devious trap.

July 28th:

Whatever Happened to... Rippy Roo? - Rippy Roo visits the plaza.

Planet X - When Rad returns to his home planet, he learns a shocking truth about alien society.

Summer Camp Island:

This season of Summer Camp Island ends this month. Every Sunday at 12:00 PM, we get four episodes in a row.

July 7th:

Susie's Fantastical Scavenger Hunt - Oscar and Hedgehog must learn to exist without each other when they are put on different teams during a scavenger hunt.

Mop Forever - At Alice's dress-up party the campers are magically turned into their costumes.

Pajamas Party - When Pajamas starts to panic that Oscar will outgrow her, Oscar tries to help but things go awry.

The Soundhouse - Oscar and Hedgehog discover a new structure on the island and become friends with its caretaker.

July 14th:

Puff Paint - Oscar's painting is unpopular so he goes on a journey of self-discovery.

Susie Appreciation Day - Hedgehog and Oscar find themselves trapped in Susie's cabin and must escape undetected.

Campers Above the Bed -Hedgehog finds a city underneath her bed as she looks for her missing diary.

Midnight Quittance - Ramona invites Hedgehog and Oscar to participate in a special holiday ritual.

July 20th:

The Great Elf Invention Convention - Oscar, Max, and Hedgehog do a favor for Barb the elf in exchange for some chips.

Twelve Angry Hedgehogs - Hedgehog wants to win the Golden Science Badge but runs into some unexpected competition.

Spell Crushers - Hedgehog tries to get over a crush so she can regain her focus on magic.

The Library - The campers spend a rainy day at the library.

Teen Titans Go!:

Teen Titans Go managed to get a sixth member to join the team, and didn’t manage to send her to space. Amazing. Mondays at 6 PM.

July 1st:

Communicate Openly - Bumblebee becomes the sixth Titan and moves into the Tower but has a hard time adjusting.

July 8th:

Royal Jelly - Bumblebee offers to help Robin with his leadership skills by teaching him how to act like a queen bee.

July 15th:

Strength of a Grown Man - Needing a hero with shrinking powers, but forgetting about Bumblebee, Robin invites The Atom to join their fight against the Brain.

July 22nd:

Had to Be There - So she isn't left out of inside jokes, the Titans time travel to past adventures and insert Bumblebee into their memories.

July 29th:

Girls Night In Part 1 - The Girls Night Out Crew decide to stay in and have a slumber party but an unknown alien threat descends on Jump City.

Victor and Valentino:

Saturdays at 9:30 AM.

July 6th:

Churro Kings - When Victor and Valentino start making good money from selling churros at the taco stand, their lust for stuff makes them do dirty tricks to take out their competition.

July 13th:

Know It All - When Victor accidentally unleashes evil bats from a cave, it's up to the boys and Don to protect the town, but Victor's know-it-all attitude keeps getting in the way.

July 20th:

Fistfull of Balloons - When Victor gets double-crossed during a water balloon fight, he goes on a revenge mission to find out who was responsible.

July 27th:

Love at First Bite - Valentino crushes on a girl named Matty, who Victor is suspicious of but Valentino ignores his warnings. When Valentino goes to dinner at her house she turns into a Matlazihua and he discovers he's what's for dinner!

#summer camp island #cartoon network #fpb news #teen titans go #ben 10 #ben 10 2016 #craig of the creek #ok ko let's be heroes #mao mao heroes of pure heart #lego ninjago #victor and valentino

[sunbirddtellsstories]

What are your headcanons for Omi, Clay, and Raimundo in reference to MW? If you don't get the chance to fit everything into your story, would you consider writing one-shots to go along with it? What was your inspiration for writing MW, aside from wanting a Jack Spicer redemption? What's your writing process? How long have you been writing? Are there other fandoms you're into besides XS?

This is going to get LONG and I don’t want to split it up because internet is bad here so apologies In advance but here we go:

What are your headcanons for Omi, Clay, and Raimundo in reference to MW?

I’ll start writing them and posting them as soon as I finish answering this one. It might take a bit, but you’ll see them up in a few hours or so.

Believe it or not those headcanons help me a lot when it comes to figuring out characters. So thanks for asking! I appreciate it.

If you don't get the chance to fit everything into your story, would you consider writing one-shots to go along with it?

Hell. Yes.

There is SO much I want to do. I want to write about how each Dragon found their element. I want to write ALL OF THE SHIP FUEL for Jack x Jermaine x Timber. I want to write about them having little mini episodic breather adventures in lots of different countries and cities, I’m talking Mumbai, St Petersburg, Venice, Paris, Capetown, Aguascalientes, Melbourne, everywhere! And maybe run ins with villains, for no reason. I want to write about them teaching each other about their strengths, like Jack explaining science to Jermaine and Timber or Timber teaching them two city boys how to fish and forage for food.

Also more moments of Jermaine reigning these two natural disasters in and teaching them how to be actual people. Because that’s always fun.

I want to write little moments between characters in Team Xiaolin during their quest to track down Team Spicer and I want to write moments between Seon Yeong, Rai and Kim as a trio. I want to write post-MW! Fics between characters and how they learn and grow after the events of the story - especially Kimiko and Timber as total opposites and the only two girls on the team. And I really want to write a ‘beach episode’ where Jack, Jermaine and Timber just end up warping to a tropical area and just have fun for once.

I want to write solo fics about Jack and Jermaine and their personal struggles as they grow up with their own troubles prior to MW!

And a part of me really, really wants to start posting a mini fic about Timber’s life in Silent Harbor, to show her slow, sad descent into the troubled teen she has now become and as a build up to the events of Chapter 6 of MW! where she runs into Jack for the first time. It would be SO spoiler-y though.

There’s a lot that might not fit in MW! And I would definitely write a bunch of mini stories. I don’t know who would be interested in reading all of that, but I might do it just to brainstorm ideas and explore character interactions.

What was your inspiration for writing MW, aside from wanting a Jack Spicer redemption?

I’ve been wanting to tell a XS story since I was a kid! This show was my everything! The characters were my everything. And even now it holds a special place in my heart. So the drive to write something for this fandom has always been there.

As for MW! itself....I’ve always had a fondness for Jack Spicer. I’ve always wanted him to find some semblance of happiness and have someone there so he’s not alone. And a long time ago, that someone became Timber.

But Timber wasn’t who she is today. She was Latina, and Californian, and a bubbly pink ray of sunshine and positivity. And Jack had a crush on her and she was his bestie and she was essentially an overly competent sidekick for him and then Clay had a crush on her and she was the Dragon Of Wood and Jack was the Dragon Of Metal and he was going to sell his soul to the Heylin side to finally earn Chase’s approval and she was gonna save him from himself...well, you get the picture. And I liked her a lot, and I still miss that version of her sometimes, but...she wasn’t interesting enough. And there wasn’t really a story there. At least not much of one. What was there could have been interesting on its own, but it was pretty self indulgent and I don’t think anyone besides me would have enjoyed reading it. And that’s no fun.

Then I had the idea to somehow bind Timber, an innocent civilian girl, to Jack through magic by having her make the idiotic mistake of betting herself in a Showdown with him over a Wu that was hers and then lose, and then essentially being dragged along on all of his adventures and slowly becoming friends with him while hilarity ensues. Then I had the idea to make a game breaking Wu that just...caused trouble. And the story then became about Jack accidentally dragging a civilian girl along on a warpy portally adventure with that Wu and run into all these villains as they become friends.

But when I did this, it didn’t feel balanced. I had someone on the Heylin side and I had someone who was Neutral. So then I needed someone as a buffer between Jack and Timber so they didn’t kill each other and to represent the side of Good aka someone who was Xiaolin.

And then Jermaine came along!

And as I developed the story more, I realized I wanted to tell something serious, and have all the characters grow and play off of each other and talk about the XS universe and answer questions and give everyone this big, long journey and great trial and give Jack actual character development and actual friends/love interests and have someone from Chinese Mythology be the Xiaolin’s ultimate adversary and Jack’s final test of character. And along the way, MW! was born.

And I’m really grateful for that.

What's your writing process?

Usually first I write up a few ideas of what I want to happen, like the general flow of the chapter. Then I make a chronological skeleton of dialogue, and I tweak it until I’m satisfied. Then I write the rest of the stuff like actions and descriptions.

One of my flaws is being redundant. Another is being overly wordy. So after I write it all out, I try to trim it down and tweak it as best as I can until these flaws are no more (I sometimes skip stuff) and then I just play around with the chapter until it feels right. It has to strike an emotional chord with me and get me excited to write it before I publish it. If I don’t feel that spark, it doesn’t go up.

I had a few people in the fandom volunteer to be beta readers, but my chapters are so long...so right now it’s just a couple of my closest friends who are looking at it, the main one being my friend CVD, who also wants to be a writer. She’s got a good eye for what does and doesn’t belong and I’m forever thankful. My other two, Trinket and Papillion, look over it and help let me know how they feel about things so they’re also a big help. So shoutout to you guys!

And then after all that noise, my stuff goes up.

However, my older chapters could use one final spellcheck and revision so I’ll eventually go back and polish those up a bit. Typos man. Typos....

A lot of times I’ll also take breaks to do some research and find inspiration music. Honestly there are days where I can’t figure a character or a scene out until I find JUST the right song for inspiration. And since a lot of characters in my fic are from a different country and cultural background than mine, I’ll do plenty of research to try to stay true to who they are. I’m doing a lot of research on the Bedouin tribe and its history and looking for a lot of pretty Middle Eastern music right now, for example. YouTube is a great resource for these things! Bless the internet!

How long have you been writing?

Since forever! I’ve always been making up stories in my head! And they’d get elaborate too! I’ve built so many worlds and characters just by playing around as a little kid, I can’t even begin where to start talking about them all. As I grew, I started to write them down and now I want to get serious about it! Besides Monkey Wrench!, I want to write a fanfic for the Ducktales 2017 fandom and the Black Butler fandom, and I have two original novel ideas I want to write out and get published. It’s my dream to make stories that other people love and that inspire others to learn, write, make stuff and have adventures and stuff. Literally my dream is to make stories that get a buttload Of fanart and cosplays and fanfic and just...move the world for the better somehow. That is my highest goal rn. Being a published and famous author.

Are there other fandoms you're into besides XS?

Hell yeah! Although I do tend to have periods where I hyper fixate on one at a time. Besides Xiaolin Showdown, I also like Gravity Falls, Storm Hawks, Steven Universe, Star vs The Forces Of Evil, and Ducktales 2017. There were a lot more in the past, such as Teen Titans, King Falls AM, The Boondocks, and Samurai Champloo, but I haven’t been very active in those fandoms as of late.

I really need to get into Tangled: The Series, OK KO, Victor and Valentino, and Craig Of the Creek. They all look phenomenal, I just don’t have time to get into them all yet.

#xiaolin showdown fanfiction #xiaolin showdown monkey wrench #monkey wrench! #xs monkey wrench #xiaolin showdown monkey wrench! #sunbird answers #nneefa #thank you so much #seriously i needed an ask that traffic was awful!!! #and as always thank you for reading! #monkey wrench! spoilers #jack spicer #xiaolin showdown oc #jack spicer xiaolin showdown #xiaolin showdown jack spicer #jermaine xiaolin showdown #xiaolin showdown jermaine #timber wilde #xiaolin showdown timber