#also I did use for reference a lot of her illustrations for the colors and clothes specifically

[kaiiscottage]

ε a bit late but happy birthday Mafuyu :]!! ♡ з

[chubsonthemoon]

Happy Binderary 2024!! Kicking things off with the fantastic Never understood a single word he said by dear friend @aboxthecolourofheartache. I had the best time beta'ing this for Box and just had to have it on my shelf! More pics and process info under the cut:

had an absolute blast packing as many easter eggs as I could into this one! it's a roadtrip gone wrong fic heh, so I went for a scrapbook/collage cover made of the same kraft paper I usually use for paperbacks, but left the hinge + spine exposed. I tore each piece from a different sheet of scrapbook paper, so the resulting texture is really fun:

I also went to town with references to some of the events in the story, particularly on the back of the cover. the postcard is probably my favorite element; here are my few first practice runs on scratch paper (along with some of my colored pencil testings for the markings on the map) before I went for it on the real cover!

I repurposed the ribbon graphics I originally drew for another bind (@feralrookie's right where I should be ❤️). the music notes on the first page notate the rhythm of the opening lines of the song the fic is based on, Three Dog Night's "Joy to the World," which I had on loop while I was typesetting this! ("Jeremiah was a bullfrog/Was a good friend of mine.") Box's taste in trigun-themed country and blues is impeccable, and I have a whole spotify playlist made almost entirely of her recs ehe :3

the blank/empty ribbon appears between chapter 1 and the epilogue for story reasons ehe; really wanted to convey the feeling of "where did the music go?", because I also listened to American Pie a lot while making this lolol.

also added little camera graphic at the end, which reminded me of meryl's occupation as a journalist, but the hands/lack of a face holding the camera also gives me the uncanny feeling of being watched/photographed (also plot relevant heh). camera graphic and the house graphic at the beginning are both sourced from Heritage Type's free vintage illustrations, from a series of packs called "Hands Holding Stuff."

the hand holding the house on the title page gave me wolfwood's confessional-on-the-go vibes, BUT it was originally held straight like this:

so I decided to tilt it to give it more of that feeling of instability and "oh shit my entire world is being turned upside down rn god the exits WHERE ARE THE EXITS (there are no exits)" feeling present in the fic :D so I guess it's more of a knives reference?? still, the kind of "what is even going on here?" reaction I had when I first saw it fits well with the title, so I went with it!

and that's it for now!! I'll be out of town for the next week or so, but I have a bunch more projects I'm really excited to share this month, along with some long-overdue author copies that I'm excited to get mailed to their rightful homes!

finally, thank you SO much for letting me bind your work, Box!!! it's always such a pleasure <333

[answer2jeff]

not a lot, just forever.

carmen's opening up, but he wishes you'd do the same.

warnings: fluff + angst. fem!reader who is also a big reader (mostly poetry) and occasionally journals. unestablished relationship (friends to lovers, mutual pinning.) very touchy-feely. writing is overly detailed and so painfully poetic you might vomit.

word count : 2.4k

hey. i think i left my book at ur place. 11:15pm.

sorry, just got home. i can bring it over now 11:36pm.

oh yeah that'd be great! thank you. (sorry for the inconvenience) 11:38pm.

no worries 11:41pm.

lmk when ur here. xx 11:45pm.

Carmen had some idea of what that meant: xx. He knew what it meant when girls signed notes with xoxo in replacement of red kiss marks and strokes of long acrylic nails through their secret lovers hair—not that he ever received one, no. But your occasional visits practically felt just as intoxicating. If the order was x-o-x-o, and the worded statement being hugs-and-kisses, then xx must've been hugs, right? Two hugs. Like the one you shared the first time you met at Natalie's baby shower. He smelled like authentic Italian cologne with a hint of cigarette smoke diluted by dish soap and warm water. His grasp was hesitant, but ever-all-consuming once his shoulders relaxed. It was like metamorphosis. The way he wrapped his arms underneath while you tossed yours up around his neck, his gold chain feeling cold and hard against your skin, unlike the rest of him.

He was an under-hugger. He kept the ones he cared for unsuspectingly close to him. Such physical touch felt familiar. Maybe you'd just remembered stories and inside jokes about him through Natalie so well his tenderness and anxious nature was fitting to the idea of him you had in your head.

That was almost 6 months ago. And surprisingly, you'd become pretty good friends. Not that either of you really did friends at your age...but somehow it worked. You'd come to realize that he was so much kinder than anyone painted him out to be. And yet, you never really talked about yourselves.

Not in a way that really mattered, anyway.

The articles you'd written, the interviews you conducted with snobby assholes, the dozens of freelancing jobs with horrific schedules you had before, what you loved about writing and what you hated about the world around you—those were topics of discussion. Carmen's favorite restaurants he ever expanded his career with, the odd relationship he had with his sister that flipped like a rusty switch after highschool, candle scents he loved and bought over and over again despite their poor quality wicks, the first time he got drunk and how he swore he'd never let another drop of alcohol touch his tongue—those were normal methods of late night conversations.

But what about your dream to publish a novel? Or the memoir you read that completely changed your views on love as a whole. What about Carmen's uncle being his only friend his entire life? Oh, how he would've become a starving, broken artist if he ever believed he had enough talent for it. Hell, what about the girl you met in middle school who mysteriously moved away and shared all her secrets on the true meaning of life, death, and everything in between? Why didn't you ever talk about those things? Maybe it was too close, too personal. If he knew you too well, maybe he'd see you as you saw yourself.

Carmen had been thinking about those colored pencils you bought him for his birthday and can't get himself to tell you he uses them every day. Not just to illustrate his dishes...but you, sometimes. Your hair, your smile. He used that photo you begged him to snap of you staring out your window melodramatically with a bowl of pasta carbonara and a glass of bubbling champagne in front of you as reference. How could he ever show you the endless amount of pages containing the essence of your existence in that goddamn sketch book?

Questions. Questions. Questions.

Thoughts of potential ate away at your patience with every pacing step you took around your bedroom.

Answers. Answers. Answers.

—

"Do people even have deep conversations over pasta and wine anymore?" You trace the pad of your middle finger against the rim of your glass, your elbow propped up on the counter so your chin can rest in your hand.

Carmen draws his eyebrows together, the little crinkle in his forehead showing. You glance up at it and struggle to stifle a growing smile. He cocks his head before barring his bottom lip behind his teeth, picking at the skin with the tips of his fingers. That signature pose; where his left arm is crossed against his chest and his hand holds the elbow of his right arm. It's a habit you almost immediately picked up on. It told you time and time again that he was nervous.

Thinking. Contemplating.

"Is that, like—" he breaths a chuckle, but it comes out more as an accidental huff than anything. Smug bastard, he is. Especially when he drags his gold chain across his neck as it loops around the finger that once picked at the dry skin of his mouth.

"Your way of..asking me for a deep conversation over wine and pasta?"

Ah. He's called you out. The one thing he couldn't shake was his annoyance when you were so completely and utterly vague about your wants, your needs, your desires. Hell, Carmen Berzatto would wrap a lasso around the moon, or any planet you put your claim on, and drag it down so it could be yours and only yours. Only if it meant you'd stop feeling so complacent. You knew this. At least to some extent. His little favors buttered you up until you a mushy mess of adoration. What really scratched at your urges and your patience was how blissfully unaware he was of his show of affection toward you. Part of you feared that if you ever told him how much it caressed that bruised, fruit fly infested, rotted spot of your heart so gently it felt like a kiss, despite the sting, he'd stop.

"Y'know what? Yeah. I'm asking."

You shrug your shoulders and stare down at your nearly finished bowl of penne with vodka sauce. Stabbing a stack of pasta onto your fork and the clinking sound of the metal banging against the ceramic bowl seemed to fill the silence before Carmen finally spoke again, though with much hesitation.

"Okay," he barely whispers, nodding his head and fumbling to take a seat in the barstool underneath the counter. Sitting across from you gives him the constant justification to just look at you.

Starting off this session with a question was quite a kicker.

"Y'know Sade Zabala? Author of that book you brought back for me."

Carmen blinks slowly. He pretends to dig deep in his memory to identify the name, wondering if you'd ever mentioned her. But he fails, pulling his lips taught, so as to say 'I've got nothin.' The sound of your dramatic sigh and the 'tsk' sound of your lips separating makes his palms sweat.

"She's a wonderful writer. A poet. I mean, really, her book Coffee and Cigarettes was one of the most gut-wrenchingly beautiful and altruistic collections of.. of love, pain, rejuvenation—all of it."

If he was completely honest, he doesn't have a clear image of what those words meant. But it doesn't seem to matter what comes out of your mouth or how you phrase it. Your use of specific language fascinates him. There is nothing else he can do in this moment but nod and allow the corners of his lips to curl into a smile strong enough to make the apples of his cheeks go pink.

"I'll tell you one line of one of the greatest poems she had ever written in that book. In the humble opinion of yours truly, of course."

"Sure," he assures you. "Of course, of course."

"Tell me every terrible thing you ever did, and let me love you anyway."

Saliva pools in your mouth as you speak the quote, the taste of every vowel washing down your throat as if you dedicate them to Carmen himself. Which, in bare and naked truth, you do. The only thing you could ever ask of Carmen was to let himself tear himself open with the hope and belief that you would crawl into his fears and convert them into profound discoveries. And the trust that you would not stitch him up with your own hands, but rather clasp your fists around the circumference of his wrists as he carefully closes the wound his trajectory of life has created.

"Wow." Carmen's eyes go another centimeter wider, the language still processing in his mind. He interprets it over and over again.

"I know. And—" you set your fork down so you can have complete focus as you recite your following question, "I was just wondering what you'd say if someone told you that, y'know? What would you tell them?"

Vulnerability, he thinks. Fuck.

"I mean...fuck that's—that's a good question. Um.." he chews on the flesh of his bottom lip once again, looking above at the warm glow of the light that hangs over your island counter as if he'll find the answer up there.

"I don't even like the good stuff about me, so. I'm not sure how to, like, articulate that? Is that the word?"

Now the quickening pace has started.

"And what do you think the good stuff about you is?"

Probing questions like this are somewhat too-close-for-comfort inquiries for friends. But Carmen would be stupid to mind it. He relishes in it, actually. With much guilt. But it's tainted with the secret pleasure of being cared for by someone he so deeply valued the opinions and thoughts of.

Since the first day you met, Carmen knew he would never go to anyone else for some piece of mind. For some sanity. Or even just for someone to explain the method to his madness. You understood it—what he believed.

"I care a lot, I think. But that's not always practical. It hardly ever is now that I think about it."

"You do. You care so much." You soften your tone, hesitantly reaching for Carmen's tattooed hand that rests on the cold marble counter.

"Sometimes it freaks me out."

"Like, this whole thing, the—the restaurant, where my life is right now, it makes me crazy. But it also keeps me..."

"Human," you finish.

"Yeah, human."

Though it takes him a couple seconds for his digits to not second guess themselves, he gently takes your hand in his. The slow pace in which he intertwines his fingers with yours is enough to kill you.

"Can I tell you something?" Carmen asks.

"Anything."

"You take good care of me. Of everyone, really." . His thumb gently rubs your warm skin, the rough and calloused mounds over his fingerprints soothing you. A deep breath moves in and out from his lungs as he meets your eyes again. This time, he won't look away.

"It's like you were made to just be good."

You smile, but you're not convinced you're certain on what he means. "Thank you, Carm. But—good?"

"I don't know. You're warm. I'm—I'm not like that. I'm not warm."

This, this is where truths as bare as untraveled paws of loyal dogs that roamed the streets in search of security uncover themselves.

"What? Of course you are." You lean forward, feeling your heart pound so hard it could leap out of your body.

"I don't think I am."

To think—no, to know that Carmen Berzatto cannot share at least one feature of his layered soul he genuinely likes. God, that pains you. You could write a million sonnets listing every little thing you adored about your friend.

"Carmen, you—" you sigh, your head dropping for a fraction of a second. "You have such a big heart. You're not cold or...or out of reach, or anything like that, okay?"

Even with Carmen's tendency for rage and his tattoos that displayed yet another callback to his culinary career—his way of speaking: so gentle and unsupported, you're certain that he is something so much greater than just a chef. He took care of people too. His staff, his clientele, his family—of you. Whether it was home cooked meals when you were sick, or when you needed to complain about Natalie. Carmen listened. Not as her brother, but as your friend. You don't really remember when you started to regularly see each other during his leisure. Either at the restaurant, or a coffee shop next door to your complex, and eventually his living room.

"This is so fucking selfish, but—"

No, Carmen. You could never be selfish.

But you let him be hungry. You want him to be hungry. Starving for reassurance. Because you'll feed him until the empty space in his existence is filled.

"I just wish you'd look after yourself the way you take care of me. Like, fuck, hearing you look at yourself and point out all this shit that nobody notices—which I wish they fucking would—because I notice them and I still love those things about you is..."

Oh, what a beautiful mind you've always had. He'll always store all the love you can't have for yourself in his own heart. Your wit, your intelligence, your smile, even down to the way you have to readjust the grip of your fountain pen as you inscribe your thoughts into your journal

"Wrong." He completed his thought with just one word. "I don't like it. It makes me sad," he says again.

That breaks you. So much that a tear sure to be followed by many more wells up in your waterline. The glisten of the salty liquid in your eyes startles the wonderful man across you. You can see the immediate guilt in his face, his blue eyes filled with concern and regret. But you shake your head, holding onto his forearm as he raises his hand to your cheek to catch the falling tear. Fuck being friends. Fuck small talk. Fuck jokes and laughs and cigarettes and poor communication that just ended in silence.

This was here and now. There was no going back.

With that, you cupped Carmen's own cheek, leaning closer and closer to his lips before he desperately kissed you. His free hand anchored itself on your shoulder blade while yours crawled to the back of his head to burry itself in his golden curls. Your taste was everything. Salty with pasta with a sweet aftertaste that echoed from your fruity lip balm, followed by a final twinge of bitterness from your glass of red wine. He tasted of comfort, of acceptance, something you'd never felt against your tastebuds from the previous years of the dating pool. With every separation of your lips to swallow gasps of air, the further the two of you hovered over the counter in a needy attempt to get closer.

You didn't need answers. Not a lot from him either. Just him. Forever.

tags: @lemmejustpulloutmylightsaber @sexyyounglatinoboy @febris-amatoria @diorrfairy

[luketaluketa]

i was organizing some files and found all the wip stuff from the previous secret samol for @/seamonsterart (go check out their work!), and these are two of my favorite illustrations ever, so here's some insight into how i made these!

for starters i already had a pretty much finished design for pickman that i had first drawn back in 2021

she has a completely wrong gun in this version because i did not remember how it was supposed to look like and couldn't find a description of it anywhere. she's wearing a hat because i forgot it was supposed to be a helm and so i ended up giving her the large hat just because the long horns coming through it are a fun image, though today i cannot imagine her wearing anything else. she already has the sword she takes from the lake skeletons, also. her armor is based on the armor the torumekian soldiers and kushana wear in nausicaa of the valley of the wind, with the incredible neck guard and long cape covering their entire body

i've always loved these designs and how the plates are evocative of insects, but also how mysterious they look with covered faces and bodies. matter of fact, at this point i had no fucking idea what pickman looked like below the cape.

the second inspiration is the young man from angel's egg.

OK, STAY WITH ME. i cannot explain this other that in my head pickman and him are VERY similar characters. the image of the half pulled cape while he holds his sword-cross-thing over his shoulder and the quiet demeanor are pretty fundamental to how i try to make pickman FEEL. i actually wanted her armor to have more piping, pulling from the biomechanical appearance of his sword-cross, but it didn't feel quite right

and the third inspiration is less inspiration and more reference work, the book "arms & armor, a pictorial archive" by carol grafton

it's a compilation of illustration works sourced from several books from the 19th century. VERY cool book to take a look at historical armor. it's on the internet archive for free!

there was also a fair ammount of looking at goats and sheep, but eventually i reached this after learning i suck at drawing furry designs. big shoutout to the furry community for making so many tutorials available btw. in highlight a very important study of the character.

now that i kinda knew what pickman looked like i entered the wonderful phase of "i don't know what the fuck i'm doing" which resulted in a bunch of bad doodles now sitting in a folder dubbed "dev hell". at this point i kinda had an idea for a relaxed scene based on one of the prompts, which i developed for a while on blender but eventually gave up on.

i then moved on to the second prompt, of pickman being badass. i decided on a low angle to make pickman look incredibly tall but the low angle of a goat's head legitimately kicked my ass so i eventually made a goat head on blender and used it to generate references with the help of designdoll. here i made her design a lot more muscular and fat, also, eventually coming to her final design.

the valve on her chestplate looks WRONG to me now, but at the time i was so tired i just rolled with it. the first pass of her armor was in a completely wrong color, which i corrected later on photoshop. i added the little metal forks pulling from her 2021 design, and the idea of little musical forks for atunning to the shape was cool to me. i also corrected her gun after actually learning what the fuck it was supposed to look like. i already knew i wanted her to be standing on the field of canola flowers, and the sky in the background was the last thing i added, also the time when i decided to really make the picture tall.

i liked the final result so much i went back and started working on the first prompt again. had a horrible time drawing the horns in the second image which led to this hell cage for building the perspective. im still not confident on the horns on the side of the head. i wanted to bring the atmosphere of a cold winter or fall morning in the second one, and to make pickman seem tired but relaxed. i overall like the second picture a lot more than the first and was very happy with how it came out.

AND THAT'S HOW THE SAUSAGE IS MADE I GUESS. if you read this whole thing then thank you for your time!

[e-adlirez]

The art style of Cloud Castle is absolute ass bro why are their eyes so big

Idk man it just looks.... off

I wish they brought back the og art style like Blue Scarab Hunt because that was gorgeous

Well if you’re referring to the book's artstyle as a whole, then calm down buddy the illustrations as a whole are pretty good all things considered (believe me some of the illustrations in the later books are waaaaayyyyy iffier)

But if you are referring to Danilo Barozzi’s illustrations in the book then uhhhhh… yeah I don’t blame you, I didn’t like the big anime irises either, she didn’t cook with this one,,,

The interesting thing is Barozzi also did pieces for Secret of the Snow and those looked fine (she did well enough that I have to squint to determine which ones were done by her). My guess is either she did a lot of the illustrations for the latter half of SotS and we just got used to it, or it’s because the artstyle of special editions 2 and 3 were more… experimental? Books 4 onwards developed a very specific… look for the artstyle that adhered very closely to the main book illustrations of Spanish Dance Mission onwards, thus the illustrators had to follow suit, resulting in whatever looks off to look especially off.

(Even with this set of pictures, I’m only about 70% sure these are Barozzi’s because of how alike yet different the styles are from each other in the book. The first one could be Barozzi’s, but it could also be Giuseppe Facciotto’s, since he also did illustrations for SotS and his stylization means he sometimes puts the eyes really close to each other in a way that’s weird but still makes sense somehow.) On the contrary, books 2 and 3 (and I would probably even include book 1 there) had a more experimental look to the illustrations, which seems to be based more on (and this is just a theory of mine) Giuseppe Facciotto’s iconic work for the covers of Mouseford Academy books 2-12, 14, 15 and 17 in the English books (he did waaayyy more covers for the Italian Mouseford books— he was basically the cover guy for the Mouseford books for a WHILE) as well as the books from Spanish Dance Mission to Lost Letters. If you’re wondering why those covers go as hard as they do, then now you know why.

(These aren’t all of Facciotto’s works for the covers we know in English but you can see that he popped off <3)

But yeah as you can see with special editions 2 and 3, the art direction seems to be heavily inspired by Facciotto’s artstyle.

However, when Barbara Pellizzari’s works became the aesthetic poster child of the books’ brand, that was reflected in the illustrations and how their aesthetic changed, as seen in the main books and how they look currently, special editions 4-9, and the Treasure Seekers trilogy.

This new profile thing of the girls? This was done by Pellizzari (coloring was done by Flavio Ferron), and thus it became the main reference for how the girls look in the book’s illustrations.

And it’s not just in the general direction to the artists for how to draw the Thea Sisters, but also in the direction given to the colorists. Alessandro Muscillo was the colorist for the special edition books since book 1 and the Treasure Seekers trilogy, and you can see that the direction for the style varied through books 1-3, like maybe direction was experimenting with the mood the illustrations were to convey, beginning with the cartoony and bright colors of book 1, easing into the more grounded and layered palettes of books 2 and 3

Then book 4 was when they transitioned to using digital art /j

I jest, but seriously book 4 was the debut of the coloring style we end up keeping for the rest of the special editions and for all of Treasure Seekers, which is very… bright :D

(I would show more picture examples but I manually took pictures of my physical copies for the Cloud Castle and SotS illustrations and gwuh I’m too lazy to grab my entire collection just to take pictures,,)

Bright as in like… the colors are very defined and saturated. I dunno how to describe it, but when you see it, you get what I mean. It’s very bright and pretty and colorful and it stands out. There are still variations that happen on occasion (Star Fairies in particular uses a good dose of airbrush for the lighting and shadow effects, and Crystal Fairies looks like someone had a bit of fun using sparkle brushes), but other than that, it’s very bright. I don’t hate it, but I do acknowledge that yeah, if I was introduced to the series when it had fully transitioned to the new style, I never would’ve gotten into the series in the first place, because the older books had something that didn’t make it feel specifically catered to girls. The colors were bright, but not too bright. Colorful, but unified. They weren’t that complicated, and they didn’t have to be because the colorists (plural, there were at least 3 per book once upon a time) were popping the hell off with the colors they were given. But y’know, the newer books’ consistent style did give me a good spot to practice drawing mouse furries so I’m not complaining too much about the newer style, haha.

(Tiny baby E’s (it’s literally from 2020 what’re you on about mate) her first mouse Violet drawing using Barbara Pellizzari’s artstyle in Treasure Seekers 1 as an anatomy guide!!)

With that said tho, yeah I miss the old books -m- dunno if it’d fit the aesthetic of the special editions but m a n we could’ve had it and it probably would’ve looked cool

Also the illustrations go way harder in the older books, like Prince's Emerald? I've talked about Prince's Emerald and how it goes hard before, and I still stand by it and say that it does in fact still go hard

Maybe it won't fit the uh splash of color they gave the hardcovers, but imagine they grabbed Giulia Basile's coloring work for the graphic novels and used that as sort've a basis for the coloring style of the hardcovers. Not exactly the same-- would probably still add a touch of whimsical watercolor and/or paint to the very cel-shaded style, but we could've had something pretty dope -m-

Anyway that's my ramble simultaneously defending the hardcovers' artstyle and reminiscing on what could've been haha

[dk-wren]

Week 3 - 30 Days of Buddy Daddies

Welcome back to Week 3 of me responding to the 30 Days of Buddy Daddies prompts! Thank you for all your support on the previous two weeks' posts. I've been having a lot of fun answering these prompts. Anyways, without further delay, here are my responses for days 15-21!

Day 15: Favorite Official Illustration

Massive fan of Lily's work, so here are my favorites (was gonna say top 5, but even that was hard to narrow down)

I mentioned it last week, but these two pieces of Kazuki, Rei, and Miri in kimonos are some of my favorites, so definitely gotta include them here too.

Bonus: Since it came out after the 15th, but I’m so love with it I have to include it because Rei (and Miri) finally got their cat!!!

Day 16: Character Whom You Most Identify With

Trait-wise, Kazuki is probably the character I identify with the most.

I like to make sure my friends or whoever I am with is taken care of, which has lead to me being referred to as the "mom of the group" on multiple occasions. I generally try to keep a positive external attitude, even if that's not reflective of how I actually feel. And I always try to lead with love.

Definitely not to the same severity as Kazuki, but I also have a tendency to sometimes let past memories or mistakes influence current decisions. It's those moments where I might want to do something or try a new thing, but a lingering memory just pops back into my head and I psyche myself out/decide to longer move forward.

Also, a lot of what I do for my major (and hopefully in a future career) is research-based, obviously though in terms of historical or biographical information and not how to take out someone quietly and efficiently.

Day 17: Character Whose Story You Would Like to Know More About

I would love to know more about Kyuutaro.

I really enjoyed his character and the way he kinda teetered between sides. I was asking myself, will Kyu help Kazuki and Rei or Ogino or is he gonna encourage the duo to be a family or warn them about getting too close with Miri. Things like this made me wander what is his history with the organization, let alone how he got involved with the organization.

The audience is really never shown anything about Kyu's life outside of Yadorigi, so I'm curious does he have a lifestyle outside of the cafe that's like what Rei used to have (very isolated and shut-in), did he have a past partner like Kazuki, I don't know, what is he like when away from the organization/giving out assignments.

There's a brief glimpse into when Kyu assigned Kazuki and Rei a mission together for the first time. Like, I just want to know what were his interactions with each of them beforehand and what other reasons motivated him to pair those two together. Also, the dynamic that is hinted (?) towards with Kyu telling Miri Kazuki is a comedian and Rei's a Middle Eastern Oil Baron, as well as his little smile in the finale telling Kazuki and Rei that he's no longer gonna run errands for them as he drives away, he clearly is fond of or enjoys Kazuki and Rei's company. I would've been so excited to see this side of their relationship explored more.

Again, there's a lot of mystery around Kyu so I would love to know more about him.

Day 18: Theories or Headcanons

I did a few head canons about a quarter or halfway through the series, so here's some more based on the second half of the season and epilogue!

Because Kyu will occasionally watch Miri at Yadorigi, he keeps a private stash of her favorite snacks behind the counter. Kyu even lets her create a "reserved for Miri" or "save for Miri" sign that he hangs on the draw or box where they're kept. This remains their little secret for a while, but eventually Rei or Kazuki notices the sign and asks Kyu what's behind the sign that says "reserved for Miri," which he just brushes off by saying toys/coloring supplies. Eventually, Kazuki realizes it's a secret snack stash and Miri's been having more sweets while staying with Kyu then what he allows her to take/have, prompting Kazuki to tell Kyu to stop giving Miri extra treats. If Kyu listens to Kazuki's request is up for debate though.

In ep. 11, Kazuki and Rei are shown watching one of Miri's shows that presumably she forced them to watch in the beginning, and then probably began to enjoy on their own (or they just associate that show with her). I imagine as Miri begins to grow up, they keep watching this show or another one of Miri's favorites even after she loses interest. She at first thinks they are still trying to treat her like a child or don't want her to grow up, but then realizes whenever Kazuki or Rei turn it on, they don't even refer to it as "her" show anymore or ask if she wants to watch it. This causes Miri to eventually ask why they still watch that show and if they realize she's no longer into it. Kazuki and Rei are not oblivious to the fact that she's grown up, so they share a laugh and tell her that they just enjoy watching it still.

Around Christmas, it becomes an annual tradition to go on a fun family outing to Marinoa City and go on the Ferris wheel, share a crepe, and maybe do a little holiday shopping. I don't know when or how Kazuki and Rei will tell Miri that her mother has passed, but I feel like once they do, they would take Miri to visit her grave on the same day so that it really feels for Miri like she gets to spend the day with her whole family. They'd probably start this tradition the year after the main storyline ends, but depending on when Kazuki and Rei reveal the truth to Miri, that would be incorporated into that day's plans later.

Kazuki's really good at making hand shadow puppets. Not something he intentionally set out to learn, but maybe one night Miri has a nightmare, there's a thunder storm that scares her, or a power outage, and she goes to Kazuki's room where he takes out a flashlight and begins to play around. He does really simple ones at first, but Miri is so fascinated by it, she keeps asking him to do more. So, after Miri is finally able to go back to sleep, he looks up how to do other animals for the next time Miri asks and learns that he's got a knack for it.

Still kinda a draft, but I was thinking about how Rei has very few "normal" experiences in life since he has spent basically his whole life under the eyes and rules of the organization. He's definitely street smart, but comes up a little short when it comes to book smart. So, what if Rei eventually decides to enroll in one of those online degree programs. Perhaps as Miri gets a little older and is less dependent on her papas, Rei has a bit more time on his hands (and perhaps also because Kazuki is still limiting his gaming hours per day). He does some poking around online and feels going to college/getting a degree is a fairly normal thing to do, leading him to just apply for an interesting sounding one. He would get accepted, and when Rei tells Kazuki, he breaks down crying because he's so proud of him and that he did it all on his own. Perhaps this would lead to Miri and Rei doing their work together at the dining table or going on trips to the library together so they can both work on their school work.

Day 19: What Would You Write in the Mom's Chat

A) if this is true to life, I'd probably be quietly reading all the messages in the Mom's chat, reacting to some, and occasionally typing something

B) if I were to type something into the Mom's chat though, it would probably be something along the lines of "You think Kazuki will ever let us know when he's gonna do a stand-up night? I'm dying to see him perform. Not to be cheap, but do you also think he could get us in for free?"

Day 20: Scene/Moment that You Would Have Liked to See

No idea where this would have fit in, but would have liked to see Kazuki and Rei tucking Miri in at night. Like let me see them read/act out a bedtime story, pepper her with kisses, and pull her blanket up high to make sure she's all snuggled in and nice and warm.

And like, how adorable would it be if Miri starts insisting Kazuki and Rei gotta kiss all her plushies good night too or she teaches them the smile spell, which she then makes them do for her every night.

Day 21: A Post from Kazuki's Instagram

I’ve already written about the Ferris wheel scene being the scene that caused me (the most) anguish. But the way this post broke me and just made me so sad, even without a caption, is why I’m including this one.

Angst aside, the Instagram was so fun! Always looked forward to see what part of the new episode would be featured in the post. I doubt there will be, but hope there’s little updates every now and then.

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Thank you again for reading this week's responses! Another very hectic and busy week, so I really did not have a whole lot of time to edit my replies (apologies for any errors or really long sentences). But, still glad I was able to step away from my work every now and then to work on these prompts! As always, had a lot of fun this week, even if some of my answers are on the shorter side.

Not that anyone cares, but also think I'm gonna hold off on posting the next round of responses until the end of the month so that there's not one post with like 2-3 days. Could change my mind, but that is my current plan.

See you again sometime soon!

-Dakota Wren

[bvnga-aprikot]

HC designs from when i read the novel

sorry for the lack of color in the dresses, i got lazy halfway. and yes i mispelled chokers my bad for that ;-;

So i mentioned in a reblog of a post by @lithi that i wanted to show my fanon designs of Athy and Jetty after seeing her talk about how people who only read the wmmap novel must have different interpretations of the characters designs. I must admit, i’m a little biased in that aspect because i read the manhwa first so at first when reading the novel (specifically fan translations bc this was before i found out about ridibooks) for the first time i always imagine Spoon’s designs when i read them. But now having a new perspective on this i decided i wanted to make a sketch based on how i imagined these two while reading the novel a second time.

For Athanasia, i think the most obvious has to be the fact that i imagine her with darker skin due to Sioddona being inspired by the Ottoman Empire visually from the manhwa. I know, a bit weird since this is about the novel but personally that’s how i always imagined what Siodonna looked like. Another thing i like to imagine and, this is a personal headcanon for me, is that she always likes to wear a necklace that reminds her of Diana, because she never knew her and wanted some semblance of her mother to be with her every step of the way. I always wanted to know more about Diana so think of this as part of that need lol. As for Athy’s outfits, i always imagine the dresses @alicehattera03 would post about that suit Athy to be her fashion sense in the novel. Don’t get me wrong i love the dresses Spoon puts her in, but at the same time i always imagine her in more regal clothes befitting of a crown princess, and Alice always has the best imagination whenever it’s Athy related so i mostly think of her posts whenever i think of Athy aha. Also, more on that note on chokers, i think it’s safe to say that Athy has every right feeling uncomfortable around those things due to the whole hanged thing from the original novel, so while she isn’t exactly the same Athy she’d probably still find chokers a bit triggering since they remind her of her doom.

For Jennette, the biggest difference for me is that i wanted her to look a bit intimidating to the eyes without the effects of her black magic. I think to illustrate the seeping black magic from her body, she uses things like chokers and longer dresses to cover the markings. It’s a bit gross describing it now but hey, LP!Jetty did a lot of questionable things so i suppose having some symbolism about her sins isn’t too far reaching. I don’t know why, but whenever i like to imagine ladies in historical dressing, i always seem to imagine the dresses Shuli von Neuschwanstein wears, probably because i think they’re the best designed dresses in manhwa yet but that’s personal. This applied to imagining Jetty too, so i used one of Shuli’s dresses as reference. Something i like to imagine is that Jetty also has a darker color palette compared to Athy to illustrate how completely opposite they are, so in the novel i always think of her having much darker hair than she has in the manhwa, plus longer hair for the fun of it (another thing inspired by my beloved Shuli lmao). I don’t think there was any mention of Jetty having bangs, but i gave them to her in this design since they’ve become what i associate with her.

Another thing, i’m not sure if this would be accurate but imagine them being much taller in the novel than they are in the manhwa 😅. I don’t know what is with me and my thing for tall female characters, but i think because there isn’t too much descriptors for height the last time i read, i think it’s safe to assume i could go wild with that aspect in terms of the novel designs i have. Instead of being around 150-160s in centimeters, i always thought of them being more around 170ish till about 180 roughly, and the reason for that is because i like to imagine the very dramatic and foreboding scenes they’re in to be accentuated with how tall they are lmao. Probably makes sense for Athy’s case since she’s princess and all.

That’s about it for how i imagine them in the novel, i’m sure others have their own interpretations and ideas of how they’d look in the novel but so far these are mine, thanks for reading ;p

[artofrengin]

Here's a sneak peek of content that's normally not for the general public! For every illustration I made for Netherrealms, I did a write-up of how I made the piece and release that exclusively for ρatrons.

This is an illustration I’ve been looking forward to painting again with my skill having progressed after 5 years. Here’s the first version I painted back in 2016:

This was my starting point when I started figuring out a way to remake this illustration. I didn’t want to change the composition, but I did want to add a lot of things I learned about lighting, costume design and giving direction to the composition.

As usual, I started with a moodboard to gather reference for lighting, the costume etc.

I then started setting up a scene to create reference for for Than’s pose. I loved the pose in one of the reference images (the mannequin in Cersei’s dress at the top left of the ref board, for the experts) so I decided to emulate that, with some adaptations to have Than look down at us all (as she does).

Eventually, I had a scene set up, but no real idea how I was going to approach the new version of her dress. For a quick mock-up, I just made a screenshot from Blender of the scene I already had and sketched on top of that in Photoshop:

Now that I’ve got the basic shapes down, I have a little fun and recreate the dress in Marvelous Designer. I took the dress I made in Marvelous for Nergui earlier as a base and adapted that to fit Than’s frame, and looked up some really basic puffy sleeves patterns to emulate those, plus her overcoat.

(I actually understand sewing so much better after making a few of these - not that I’d actually be able to sew a dress after this though)

Since her collar would be a hard surface thing, I modeled that in Blender, imported the cloth from Marvelous and voilá, we have some reference:

Her collar didn’t have the shape I wanted exactly and the fabric of her overcoat wasn’t as thick as I wanted it to be, but this gives me a good idea of where I want to take the piece. So now I could go on to the actual drawing!

After the initial sketch I begin to lay in some colors, and make selections to fill them with the gradient tool. After a while, the painting looks like this:

I decided at this point I hadn’t taken Native’s anatomy into account enough: their necks are very elongated and their shoulders rest really low. I ended up adapting my sketch with the liquify tool to emphasise that a bit more, though I realized the collar would cover up a lot of that effect.

What I’ve also done at this point is create a design for the overcoat. To keep it consistent, I used the symmetry tool with different shapes to create designs, and clipped those to the blue square I’d created. I then made a smart object out of that whole design. That way, I could duplicate it, use it on the other side of her overcoat, and then change the design without having to redo it twice.

I used the same technique on the ribbons hanging from her collar as the rest of the patterned fabric: I created a design within a smart object, and then duplicated that smart object to fit other spaces where I wanted them to fit. I also decided at this point (after looking up some extra reference) that the gold embossing wasn’t looking like it should, so I made it a lot darker.

When I was almost finished I realized that the image was incredibly dark (in a bad way), so I upped the contrast a bit in the whole image, but also brightened up Than a bit to bring her more to the foreground.

I like to let a piece rest for a while after I’ve worked on it. Sometimes I even come back to a piece after a week with new insights. This one went through the same process. After a week of vacation I came back to the piece and made some final color adjustments and brightened everything up a bit more. And that’s how I ended up with the final piece!

I’m happy to have tackled this piece, because I now have a worthy piece to display next to Time. Now I only need a version of Tallulah where she doesn’t have her head in the clouds and I’ll have the full triptych. :)

If you found that interesting, I have about 19 more articles like this on my patreon, for just $2 a month! And with pledging, you help me create more Netherrealms to boot :)

[roryintheir90s]

Any advice you can give to someone who can only want to do pixel art, but really wants to do More non-pixel art :D (Sorry if this specific I really just need some beginner art tips since your art is amazing. :'D)

I did once did a post with little tips for art but I can definitely give more! Since, since that time I've actually learned quite a lot.

To start off, I will say the most mundane thing. You prob need reference. I myself can't do without reference even if to only take some inspiration or to use a picture as a guideline.

For example, in my latest illustration, I was using this picture from Pinterest as a guide line:

It is totally not what my illustration looked like in the end, but it help me put poses into perspective.

I often use a thick airbrush to sketch out the poses. It really helps with not overthinking or being worried that it doesn't look right, because for me at the start it doesn't needs to look right. Its basically the skeleton of the drawing that we will put flesh onto as we go:

I put layers on top of these and try to figure out how would the body look like. It's not perfect bc I sometimes also think of clothes. I've also put in faces into boxes, it helps lot more to put the face into perspective for me.

I very much color code the clothes, hair, accessories etc. It doesn't mesh all together thanks to it!

Then comes lineart and base color:

After that you just take a darker color and put in shadows in places you believe the shadow falls! When it comes to rendering and shadows I can't really say much, as there are a lot of different ways to do so, so I really recommend to watch some videos about it!

But when it comes to my silly little design characters, it's very much cartoonish and stylized. But I do the same tactic! I use a big airbrush and go over the same steps.

Tho its been very much influenced by the rubber horse art style, which is this very cartoon old style, like bendy and the ink machine.

I don't do lineart for it most of the time, instead, I use lasso fill over the sketch :D

Thought the best way I can recommend learning is by looking at and studying people's art styles. See how other people do stuff, how they color, render, and do linear, and make it your own.

For the longest time I've been observing Lavender Towne and her way of making art has taught me A LOT, yet we don't have similar art styles at all.

I've been even inspired by Wassup its E, and hell, I know for a fact E is so talented. The color theory that art brings is MWUAH. And I've learned some from looking at E's art, despite our art styles being practically opposite.

With E having those very bright, very impressive, and sharp eyes, it's pretty opposite for me. Lmao

But the best I can say is to use references and break the poses into shapes, or always helps! Or at least that's the advice I can give on top of my head. If you have anything more specific I will probably elaborate.

[chazuramen]

2, 6, 22, 25! (for those artist asks)

artist asks ough this got l o n g

2) 5 favorite works of your own?

1-2. After being in a slump for so long and not being able to finish full pieces, I'm really proud I managed to push through with my entries for Rose Magazine! I really enjoyed trying make insect themed clothing inspired by Barong tagalog (though most of it is hidden ;w;) and Baro't saya.

3-4. These drawings I did for this year's artfight! (Olive belongs to Maizemaze and Preston belongs to U3pxx. Used this year's AF as a way to experiment with my process a bit and really liked how these ones turned out (cleaner rendering with olive and fiddling with lighting with preston)

5. Oldie but but goldie (to me,,) this is where I really wanted to start pushing myself to do bigger illustrations.

6) Which artists inspire you right now?

Hoo boy a lot, I can think of a lot of artists with all different types of styles with all different types of reasons. I tend to lean towards artists who do character design and narrative illustration. Off the top of my head though, these are who I can think of at the moment!

Ryoko Kui

Where to begin??? Everyone knows her character design is *chefs kiss* just gorgeous, but i also love the way she draws food, dunmeshi's panels (especially anything involving Falin) and the way she draws expressions (especially Marcille's reactions to the party's shenanigans)

2. Vivian Ha (TWT/ Tumblr)

ahh man they've been such an inspiration to me for such a long time, i think i found out about them around 2016? their linework and the shapes in their work are so fluid, and their coloring is so so soft

3. Tan Jiu ( IG / Twt)

Tamen de Gushi my beloved. There's something about their colors, the way they draw their characters interact (aside from sun jing and qiu tong, I also really love sun jing and mophead's dynamic, the way they draw their expressions are so funny) and just the warmth and coziness from their illustrations with sun jing/qiu tong. fills me with utter joy

4. Lyoo_lyoo (IG / Youtube / Class101)

Lot of pretty boys in this one, I found them through one of their speedpaints on youtube and their process was very interesting to me! Their colors are so warm and tasty and i love the way they paint hair and clothes!.

5. Jarvisdean (IG)

had to screenshot this one on IG ignore the arrow ;w; One of the official illustrators for All Saints Street. The way they draw characters so SHAPED, the composition and the detail!!!

22. When is your prime time to work on your art?

Usually afternoon to evening! I've been trying to avoid staying up too late to draw but this also ends up with me drawing personal stuff at work and forgetting to do my work tasks until it's really late.

25. Based on your recent reference searches, what would the FBI assume about you?

i wouldve probably gotten away with something mild but unfortunately i have the word foot in there so nothing good

[0junemeatcleaver0]

(Re)Introduction

Clothing choices are so important in The Chronicles that Anne sometimes sounded a lot like Tara Gilesbie when describing her characters. And while cut and fabric remain fairly uniform over the series and cross-character, where the real intrigue lies is in color choice.

In this series, I will be examining the choices in wardrobe color for three of Anne's characters; Lestat, Marius, and Armand.

You may also have noticed that I did this already. The original version of this post was my return to writing meta after a very long break. I was clearly rusty, but too excited at having 'completed' a post to keep myself from posting it. This is the much improved version of this meta.

Where my last meta moved through the Chronicles in sequence, this entry will be more of a meditation on color motifs.

Marius (Redux)

He’ll wrap you in his arms

Tell you that you’ve been a good boy

He’ll rekindle all the dreams

It took you a lifetime to destroy

He’ll reach deep into the hole

Heal your shrinking soul

But there wont be a single thing that you can do.

-Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds || Red Right Hand

Like a dull blaze before me I saw his red velvet clothes, the cloak that covered him to the ground, the dark red gloved hands with which he held me. -The Vampire Lestat, p. 362

While red was a color more or less assigned to Lestat through a complex series of situations, Marius chose red for himself.

Where Lestat's personality embodies red's more rambunctious attributes, Marius embodies red's more passionate and authoritative aspects.

Red is a color of strength–which in Anne’s world means taking stoicism ‘to the max’. And there is no other character as emotionally constipated as Marius.

But that doesn’t mean that Marius doesn’t also typify the passion that red also symbolizes. In the next meta series I will be working on, I will more elaborately explain, but for now I’ll just say that Marius exhibits a pattern of denial and desire (much like another character that may get his own bonus entry in this color series).

And at the heart of this never ending denial/desire cycle are the twin traits of passion and willpower.

From color-meanings.com:

Dark red is associated with energy, willpower, rage, anger, leadership, courage, longing and evil.

The ugly side of passion, of course, is rage and anger. This is illustrated perfectly with a literal crime of passion he commits in the last installment of the Chronicles:

“That’s ridiculous!” said Marius. “I murdered another blood drinker. I broke the very rules that I’ve written as binding for all of us.” He looked from me to Gregory. “Yea gods,” he said angrily, “are we to make rules for young blood drinkers throughout the world and break those laws ourselves in moments of passion?” –Blood Communion, p. 48

Marius is a deeply, passionately emotional character, as much as he would prefer others believe to the contrary. (For more on this topic, refer to this post I made about breaking down the scene quoted above.)

Marius's love of red goes back millennia. When describing for Lestat how he was turned, he tells us he was wearing the Roman clothes he'd been abducted in: A linen tunic with gold buckles and a red cloak (TVL, p. 427)

Even though he was the illegitimate child of his father and one of his father's slaves, he still would have been considered a member of the upper classes, and so that tunica would have been white.

(A fun thing to note--that I know Anne probably wasn't aware of--is that red and white together were associated with death in ancient Rome. Very fitting for an outfit to die in.) [x]

An interesting thing to consider about color in ancient Rome is that Romans viewed color to be on a spectrum of brightness. For instance, gold was a very bright color and was described as having a lot of light in it. [x] Yellow and red shades are reminiscent of fire, and fiery (IE: bright) colors were associated with life, marriage, and death as well as being linked to divine forces. [x]

I have spoken briefly in an off the cuff post about Marius’s tenuous status in Rome. He would have technically been upper class thanks to his Paterfamilias, but thanks to his mother’s genes, he was of obvious foreign ancestry. He was demonstrably an outsider. And so it would stand to reason that Marius—self-important, taking pride in being a Roman, perhaps being treated with some trepidation by Italian-borne Romans—would choose for himself a color that signaled his significance. As though saying to those who would treat him as an outsider, “I, too, am important and my personhood is inescapable. As ubiquitous as breathing, bleeding, loving and dying.”

They wanna get my

Gold on the ceiling

I ain’t blind

Just a matter of time

Before you steal it

It’s alright

Ain’t no blood in my eye

-The Black Keys || Gold on the Ceiling

Back in the Amadeo days, gold acted as Marius’s preferred way to contrast his red clothes.

Red had been his badge of pride, red velvet–a flowing cape, and magnificently embroidered doublet, and beneath it a tunic of gold silk tissue, so very popular in those times. –TVA, pages 9-10

His connection to the color gold at first seems quite shallow. So he used it as an accessory color and had a bunch of literal gold. Was that really excuse enough to name his novel Blood and Gold? I can’t tell you, as it’s not my job to answer for Anne (thank GOD). But I can tell you that the color gold is featured in two very interesting scenes when it comes to Marius’s character development.

My Master stood in the very center of the hall. He had taken off his familiar red velvet. He wore only an open robe of gold tissue, with long bell sleeves down to his wrists, his hem just skirting his bare white feet. –TVA, page 165

According to color-meanings.com, the effects of the color gold on the psyche include enlightening, inspiring, uplifting, and influencing. And in addition to characteristics we’ll discuss in a minute, gold’s further attributes include being passionate, much like red.

If we were to do what we did with Lestat’s Wolf Killer cloak with this scene, we can read further into the meaning behind these two colors in this instance.

Here we have Marius stripping away his usual heavy red fabrics (the weightiness of being so in control and so outwardly strong) to reveal a sheer gold fabric. Here we see him showing transparency about his motivations in this scene–he’s enlightening Armand on the mysteries of immortality. He views what he’s doing here as the final step in uplifting his young paramour out of an ugly past, because of how passionately he feels about him.

I would be remiss if I didn’t also touch upon the religious implications attached to the color gold–especially from Armand’s point of view where the color gold is so important to icons.

His hair seemed to make for him a halo of yellow brilliance, hanging softly to his shoulders. -TVA, page 165

Here we see the religious aspects of gold highlighting how Marius has finally overtaken the role of God in Amadeo’s eyes.

The second time the color appears in a scene that is important to his character development comes in Prince Lestat.

When had it happened that arterial blood was not enough, and he must rip out the heart and suck it dry also? […] But he’d kept a trophy, as he so often did–not just the thousands in American dollars in drug money that the victim had been carrying, but a fine gold Patek Philippe watch. Why had he done that? -PL, page 130

I wrote a whole post as to why I found this whole chapter so shocking, so I won’t waste too much time here repeating myself.

Up until this point, the most decadent kill we’ve witnessed from Marius was him killing an entire party of men in TVA. But even then, there was an air of control exerted by Marius–hard to lose yourself to a hedonistic haze when you’re so busy discussing politics. The whole scene reads as a boast of a sort–as though he’s saying to Armand, “Witness not only what I can do, but how I choose to do it. Watch how the monster hides in plain sight–how I can kill a room full of men one by one as the survivors suspect nothing. Look at my skill, my intellect.”

From color-meanings.com:

The color gold has an alarmingly inflated ego. While confidence is admirable, smugness is unbecoming. Unfortunately, the color gold has a hard time reining in its pride. To some, the color gold is pretentious. When worn in excess, the color gold can appear ostentatious and flashing. The color gold means well, but humility certainly isn’t its strong suit.

It is interesting, then, in this scene in Brazil that Marius would have stolen an ostentatious gold watch after taking up a habit he’s barely hiding his shame and confusion about.

We indeed met Marius at a very weird time in his life in Prince Lestat.

Which brings us to…

Identity

Is the crisis

Can't you see

Identity identity

-X-Ray Spex || Identity

Care-taking is a major part of Marius’s identity.

It began in his mortal life, when he would work on writing down his ‘history of the world’. Historians, I would argue, care take the past in the same ways gardeners care take plants—nourishing what feeds them while pruning and weeding out the things that do not serve them and their versions of events.

From there, his immortal life for centuries revolved around care taking Akasha and Enkil.

But care taking for things that either cannot speak or will not speak would obviously feel hollow after a while, and so he filled his house with young boys to care for (before shifting all of his attention to Amadeo).

For a short time, he was the one that needed taking care of by Bianca. But as soon as he was able, he was back to taking care of the Parents.

Which is much how his life would continue until Akasha’s rise and fall, until Daniel came under his care. Which would have become his driving force for a time.

But when we meet up with Marius and Daniel again in Prince Lestat, Daniel has since returned to his sense and is more or less willfully submitting himself to Marius’s care. But care taking for someone who is able to advocate for themself and doesn’t technically ‘need’ you would also be unfulfilling for someone like Marius.

He is once more a man without purpose, a man with little identity. And his wardrobe before uniting with the Coven of the Articulate (and the rest of the expanding cast of characters) reflects this.

We see him painting flowers with his nondescript pockets having been stuffed full of acrylic paint tubes (PL, p. 129). (For more of my thoughts on this scene, please refer to this post). We know these clothes are normal mortal garb, as when confronted with police telling him he can’t be painting on random walls, nothing is said about them being suspicious of his strange clothes.

Later, we see him walking the beach with Daniel in khaki, with his sandals tied to his belt (PL, p. 210).

And when he and Daniel finally make it to Trinity Gate, he arrives wearing “a dark dinner jacket and white turtleneck” (PL, p. 263)

We don’t see him returning to himself until p. 364, where he’s in one of Armand’s libraries pouring over a history book in a deep red velvet ‘cassock’.

Indeed, he is in his usual red velvet for the rest of the final two installments of the Chronicles (Realms of Atlantis, p. 216 and p. 415 and Blood Communion, p. 12 and p. 204), at which point he is care taking all of vampire kind through writing their laws and acting as Lestat’s Prime Minister.

One man on a lonely platform

One case sitting by his side

Two eyes staring cold and silent

Shows fear as he turns to hide

-Visage || Fade to Grey

A major tell for how things are going in Marius’s personal life is observing how much of the color gray he is wearing. The first instance of this is in Queen of the Damned:

The blond-haired figure in the red velvet coat read the declaration over again from his comfortable vantage point in the far corner. His eyes were almost invisible behind his dark tinted glasses and the brim of his gray hat. He wore gray suede gloves, and his arms were folded over his chest as he leaned back against the high black wainscoting, one boot heel hooked on the rung of his chair. -QotD, page 14

(Let’s save how much his body language in this scene mirrors Lestat’s for a different post.)

At this point, things could be worse. Is Lestat making an ass out of himself and potentially endangering all of vampire kind? Sure. The potential for calamity is there, but Marius still being mainly in his signature red lets us know that he’s still feeling very much in control of the world around him. Like he’s waiting to see where the chips may fall so that he might swoop in and play hero when the time comes for clean up.

Any anxiety the situation may engender is manageable.

The next time we see Marius in gray unsurprisingly also is due to Lestat’s shenanigans.

He let his snow-white hand rest on the dull satiny banister. He wore a long shapeless cloak of gray velvet, once perfectly extravagant, now downplayed with wear and rain […]. -TVA, page 7

Lestat’s in a coma. Armand is back and he’s brought two mortal children he’s immediately dumped on his door. Pandora is there, too. Did I mention Lestat is in a coma?? And that’s it’s thrown their whole social circle in turmoil? And also young vampires with boundary issues keep showing up to try to (proverbially) poke Lestat with a stick?

There’s a lot on his plate at this point, and so we get a full gray cloak instead of just gray accessories.

And of course, we have to revisit the most iconic Marius Meltdown ™, as featured first in The Vampire Armand:

He was painting furiously when I returned. He was high on a scaffold […] He wore a bedraggled gray tunic that hung down to his feet. -TVA, pages 88-89

Armand mistakes Marius’s state as being due to him being away from the palazzo for so long, when in reality its due to Marius relentlessly praying at Akasha to tell him what to do about his love for Armand and Akasha giving him nothing but silence and confusion on the matter.

We know from Blood and Gold that Marius drove himself half crazy over what to do about Armand. Throughout the book, he lies to the reader, Thorne, and himself about when he decided he was going to bring Armand into the blood when we all know damn good and well that the decision was made as soon as his eyes fell upon Andrei. Well, all of us save for Marius. I don’t know that he’d ever be able to admit that to himself.

Marius is not a man who enjoys being beholden to anyone, but he is a believer in hierarchies. He is a lover of rules. It would track that when faced with a desire he cannot compel himself to deny, he would plead his case to a being he views as more powerful than himself–the first of their kind, Akasha.

And when he’s not given what he wants (explicit permission to change the young boy he’s become obsessed with), obviously he loses his shit.

According to color-meanings.com:

While gray appreciates humor and lightheartedness, there’s a time and place for such silly matters. When dealing with the color gray, expect to take things seriously. […] It has little tolerance for immaturity and foolishness. In other words, gray can be uptight. Some would even say gray is a control freak. For those who don’t respond well to direction or rules, you’ll likely find a foe in the color gray. […] Deep shades of gray are associated with depression and loneliness. […] Dark gray is serious, solemn and inflexible. It is associated with self-denial and self-discipline. […] Stepping out of its comfort zone is something that gray would never consider. […] Every decision is accompanied by severe overthinking […] A mixture of black and white, gray is the best of both worlds. It doesn’t lead with emotions, which is why it’s unusually detached. Gray is aloof. This can sometimes come off as snobbish, but gray stays at a distance because it doesn’t know any better.

Marius in gray is symbolic of his fear of a lack of control–of feeling useless while still trying to steer whatever ship he finds himself upon.

We rarely see Marius in a mix of red and gray because the emotionalism of gray clashes so heavily with that of red. In other words, he either feels completely in control of a situation, or completely out of control of a situation. Rarely do the two ends of this spectrum meet.

Though we do see him in a mix of gray and black in one of most emotional scenes to date.

His hair was tangled from the wind and still matted with dried blood. The simple gray wool jacket and pants he had taken from the ruins of his house barely gave him any warmth. -QotD, page 264

What’s more, the above passage goes on to read:

He brought the heavy black cloak close around him, not because the night required it, but because he was still chilled and sore from the wind. -QotD, page 264

Thats right, he was wearing his most “vulnerable” color (plus black, the color of depression and loss) when he reunited with Armand.

And while standing in the shadow of the compound Marius may be feeling rageful towards all of vampire kind (understandable after the night he’s had), the moment he gets within arms reach of Armand, he completely breaks down.

He couldn’t help himself. He was weeping. -QotD, page 274

Indeed, we even get an admission that is quite shocking when you take into account Marius’s pridefulness:

How many times over the years had he dreamed of such a reunion, and he had never had the courage for it […] -QotD, page 273

So if the rare occurrence of Marius wearing mainly red with gray accessories symbolizes him feeling uncertain of but still in control of a situation, then Marius in all gray with a cloak of black signals him being at his very lowest point.

The point where admissions and tears that would otherwise be held under lock and key get their chance to slip out.

she did it too

purple with the blue

time to time

safe to [a]ssume

lost in the room with my mind

slept through the news

stars out the coupe got me high

I’ll never loose you can pay my dues

from the lies

-Boslen || Purple & Blue

There are two interesting (from a character study point of view) instances of Marius wearing colors other than red, and both occurred during the days of Venice.

The first occurs on p. 240 of TVA. The scene takes place after his and Amadeo’s return from Russia, when Amadeo refuses to return to his studies. For this, Marius wakes him with a switching.

I turned over and looked up. I was startled. He stood, holding the long switch, with his arms folded. He wore a long belted tunic of purple velvet and his hair was tied back at the base of his neck. -TVA, p. 240

Upon having turned Armand, Marius must have felt as though he owned him completely. But Armand has always been stubborn and willful, so that was never going to work out the way Marius had hoped.

Purple was perhaps the ultimate status symbol in ancient Rome. In later antiquity, it became the color of Emperors. In Marius’s time, it would have been the color magistrates wore. Magistrates in ancient Rome were one of the highest ranking government officers, and possessed both judicial and executive powers.

Marius dressing himself in purple in this scene is indicative of his need to feel ultimate control over the destiny of his young fledgling by acting as judge, jury, and executioner all in one. Placing himself in the role of the one who governs Armand’s life moving forward.

Another interesting addition to Marius’s wardrobe comes in the form of how he decided to dress himself and Amadeo the first time they visit Bianca after Amadeo has been turned.

Marius had dressed for the occasion in smart dark blue velvet, with a cloak of the same color for once, which was unusual for him, and he urged me to dress in sky blue, his favorite color for me. -TVA, p. 245

This instance was more than just a friendly visit. It was a PR move. Bianca was at Amadeo’s side as he laid on his deathbed. She saw how far gone he was.

But she also had an intuitive understanding of what was going on, at least in a vague way. She understood early on that Marius and Amadeo were lovers. She knew there was something otherworldly about Marius, even if she didn't know exactly that he was a vampire.

Dressing them in the same color (Marius in the darker, more “mature” shade and Amadeo in the lighter, “immature” shade) signals an equality of sorts—that while Marius is still Master and Amadeo apprentice, they are now both ‘cut from the same cloth’, so to speak.

It's also interesting to note here that in ancient Rome, blue was a color of mourning. Appropriate, as mortal Amadeo literally just died a scant few pages before this scene.

Conclusion

Marius is a character for whom control is greatly important. Control of his lovers, of his environment, and of his perception–both how he views himself and how others view him.

Even when showing vulnerably, his weakness shows up as shades of gray–a color still known for its own power plays.

Marius is a complex character. His Nordic looking features compliment his haughty nature to create an outward appearance of icy reservedness. All the while inside, he is constantly at war with his sense of raging desire, pride, and anger.

[sketchyletters]

⚠️Spoilers for S2 Ep.21!⚠️

Dissecting the flashback.

This includes screenshots as well as references to late-show events. It’s a bit ramble-y because I have Emotions, please bear with me. Includes things you might have missed, theories, and meta commentary.

Ok so, Eda’s flashback gave me many thoughts. On the left is Perry Porter, Gus’ dad! We already knew he was on the Oracle track, but it’s interesting seeing him included among Eda’s memory of her friends. Principal Bump is also there, clearly worrying about his trouble star student, the only one with that expression. Cute!

Skipping over to Darius now, the immediate point of notice is his eyes. Some have speculated that purple was his natural eye color, and that his eyes changed green due to his self-transformation. I think that’s possible but here’s something I noticed: In season 2 ep.15, “Them's the Breaks, Kid,” we can see Darius with green eyes.

This was the episode where Eda first met Raine. If we assume that Eda’s thought is a flashback of a specific moment, the timeline could be as follows: Darius had grey-green eyes, at some point after Eda became friends with Raine they were purple, and present-time Darius’ eyes are bright green. Since we know cosmetic illusions exist, it’s possible that he simply had his eyes changed to purple. The shade is very close to the color of abomination goo...(Maybe he did it to attract a certain abomination-obsessed someone? 👀)

Also of note, his current green is much brighter, and matches the eyes of several abominations, his own and otherwise. I eye-dropped the colors above  to illustrate. The eyes aside, we see him standing close to Alador. Both Lilith and Raine + Darius and Alador are standing in pairs, with the others standing more apart. Odalia not only has a noticeable gap between herself and Alador, it’s also the largest gap between any two character here. She’s also the only one to stand sideways, turning her head to look at Eda. Is she judging her? Jealous? Just not interested in the situation?

When the characters start to fade, Principal Bump and Odalia disappear first. Bump makes sense, as he can’t stay Eda’s teacher forever; Odalia on the other hand is one of Eda’s peers. I think this is because they were never friends in the first place - it was more like a “friend of a friend” situation. Knowing their personalities they would likely butt heads...And going beyond normal friendships, I think Odalia didn’t stick around because she couldn't use Eda. The Owl Lady has always been stubborn, hard-headed, and famously anti-authority.

Next are Perry, Darius, and Alador. The latter two make sense, as we know their friendship ended at some point. They both threw themselves into their work, eventually working with the Emperor, which didn’t mesh well with Eda being a wild witch. As for Perry, while he’s always seen wearing Emperor’s Coven colors, we don’t technically know if he’s branded. His wrists and never shown. But he does seem to report on behalf of the Emperor, even reporting on Eda’s (failed) petrifaction. It’s interesting to see him here, and I hope (and honestly expect) for him to get more screen time. Especially with everyone’s kids trapped in the human realm?!?? Let’s just say I’m looking forward to the parents joining forces to rescue their kids. 🥲🤧

Lastly, there’s Lilith and Raine. Despite having fall outs with both of them, Eda cares about them, and never forgot the good in those relationships. She reunited and reconciled with both of them.

I think this scene tells us a lot. Not just about background details, but also about Eda’s motivations. Despite all her hardships, and all that she’s lost, the well-being of others is still her main concern. She wants kids to be taken care of, families to be safe and functional. She wants people to be honest and trusting of one another, she wants everyone to have freedom, to have security.

This episode really brought the series together for me in such a beautiful way. The Owl House is about generational trauma. It’s about calling out injustice, and standing up for what you believe in-

But beyond that, it pushes the message that we don’t do these things just because it’s right, we do these things because people matter. The joy and the pain and the experience of living as people matters, and should be fiercely protected. And that, my dear reader, is what got me to cry.

[ecoamerica]

Watch the American Climate Leadership Awards 2024 now: https://youtu.be/bWiW4Rp8vF0?feature=shared

The American Climate Leadership Awards 2024 broadcast recording is now available on ecoAmerica's YouTube channel for viewers to be inspired by active climate leaders. Watch to find out which finalist received the $50,000 grand prize! Hosted by Vanessa Hauc and featuring Bill McKibben and Katharine Hayhoe!

[peaterookie]

Lupin III Chapter 49 Review

chapter 49 is the start of the white collar series, where lupin poses as a employee in various(?) office jobs and fucks things up i guess!

id also like to show the magazine cover of this chapter, just because it looks so sick. this is also one of the rare times lupin is illustrated with a yellow jacket, so that something quite noteworthy about it

i also just really like the use of primary colors and abstract vibes of the drawing pre new adventure art style isn't my favorite but im starting to find its charm of it c:

the chapter starts off with lupin running out of an office building with a suitcase. his dalmatian friend is there too it turns out that he's gotten a very important contract from a different company, and he is going to give it to his boss- apparently he works for a transport company of some sort

he doesn't steal it mind you, lupin steals most things but I think given the context that hes working as a regular exployee, he just got it through some business meeting

wow! a colored page i found on the internet! (i wish i remembered where i got it from, might be from lupin central?) you might've also seen this somewhere too, so this is the chapter where it came from.

you can see him driving away with his dog as misnames the dogs a few time and gets his ass ripped apart for it a lot of this chapter is colored, but while it does look quite nice, its not when it would end up being black and white when turned into a volume :(

as my friend puts it, refering to the this panel: "The lack of colors made it so hard to figure out what's happening that I thought something was emerging out of his ass and it was like a goop / monster / his disguise skin peeling off into a living amalgamation"

lupin comes back to his boss to present the contract to him, but he gets berated since the boss didn't need this contract despite lupin thinking it would be important he leaves the office annoyed and overhears his co-workers saying that the boss was fired lupin then rushes back to the boss to find out what happened

im not gonna fucking type out the english text because its plain confusing so ill try my best to explain it

they're under trouble since the contract lupin got was from an oil company that gave them all rights to international shipping while it seemed really good and had a lot of opportunity for them to gain money, he had to cancel it why did he have to cancel it lupin asks? because the contract required the company to ship all of the oil company's product… including the oil bomb they have. its simply too risky for them to transport something so fragile as that, so he cancels it and lupin has fucked his company up!

its so weird talking about lupin having a normal office job god

we then get lupin and jigen reflecting on their situation, its essentually just exposition dump ive just explained already jigen wonders why lupins even having this office work in the first place, and he then figures out its just a heist lupins planning

now lupin is working out a plan to find a way to transport the oil bomb efficiently without blowing up i guess the boss could uncancel it anytime?? so lupins trying to win him back again

we then get introduced to another fujiko mine, who says that shes now working with lupin as his secretary (he likes her already) she picks up the plan and we get another instance of mp having to write new panels for the volume again lol

lupin then proposes the plan to his boss, which rips it apart! saying that hes already heard of it and accuses lupin of copying the plan from another employee!!

this employee in question is a man called okite, which the story implies he may have been the one to copy lupin's plan and just proposed it first but who knows that might just be me they have the same objective, but now theyre on a race to see which one can move the oil bomb first

hmm why do i remember this story already before… (tac tics)

while lupin talks to jigen again about the situation, okite finds lupin and says that he knows what lupins motives are he also knows lupin's real identity, and that he would just steal from his plan in order to transport the bomb himself! we never really get an explanation of what lupin's motivations are but i guess he might just want to use that bomb for something bad i guess??? or he just became a office worker for fun idk that sounds like something he would do in his free time

lupin leaves okite alone, but just warns him that he might want to keep those plans of his safe…

the next day, okite shows the boss his plan, and he rips it apart!! revealing that lupin had already shown this plan to him beforehand!! get played fool.

we then switch to lupin having a simply joyous time in his bed, while fujiko enters his room, saying that she needs to use his shower, since hers is broken bro what is she plotting she also gets on the same bed with lupin, which he totally ignores the red flags and thinks that she wants to have sex with him which she DOESN'T she suspects from the rumors that lupin might be a thief and stole okite's plan, and she's gonna fucking kill him ah good lord

she reveals that she's actually okite's girlfriend and ALSO WORKING FOR ZENIGATA AHHH HES HERE

put zenigata in when they least expected it - mp 1968

lupin tries to escape, but he gets handcuffed to the bed… and zenigata says some ridiculous line here in the english version

L: Handcuffs!? Z: Damn, you're kinky Lupin. They'll love that in prison.

can someone confirm that he actually says that in the japanese version because this sounds so tokyopoppy

he then tries to arrest lupin in, but lupin then stops them and presents them a very very small bit of an oil bomb... saying that if they take him in, he'll drop it and explode the entire place down!!! oh no!!!!

ok hold on what does an oil bomb look like it doesnt say BUT HOW IS THIS AN OIL BOMB

ITS JUST SOME FUNKY MINECRAFT CUBE zenigata doesn't believe lupin either, thinking its just a bluff and shoots the bomb-

and no one would've guessed it

lupin was not bluffing.

the end!

[herefm]

🌟 Spotlight: Niege Borges

A canvas for (almost) limitless creativity, Here lets you create spaces that let you fully express yourselves. But sometimes, we need a little inspiration. Welcome to Here Spotlight, a series of interviews with some of our favorite artists and creatives out in the world.

Niege Borges is a Brazilian visual artist and graphic designer based in Brooklyn, New York. Her work is colorful, vibrant and playful. She likes to portray women, gender fluid people and explore different races and body shapes. Some of her clients include: Instagram, Apple, TikTok, Nike and Sephora.

Tell us a little bit about yourself, and how you found your footing into your career!

I was born in Brazil and studied graphic design there. I always loved art and was always creating something. I worked as graphic designer and illustrator in an agency in Brazil for a short period of time and then began freelancing full time. I moved to New York in 2015 and that helped me to see that I wanted to invest more time in my personal illustration work, which evolved and I started working on more projects that were my own visual aesthetic.

What inspires you as a creative?

Of course the internet inspires me a lot, I see a lot of fashion photoshoots and runaways online that inspire me, as well social media content. But besides that I love to get inspirations from walking around in the city, looking at art in galleries and museums, watching live performances and people watching in New York.

What makes your process unique? How do you express yourself in ways that may be different from others in your field?

I think everyone brings different references and stories that when combined can become something really unique, so I think that a lot of factors that brought me to where I am today influence the way I create and what I create.

What was a challenge that felt pivotal in your creative journey? How did you overcome it?

I had periods where I had a lot of commissions at the same time and I had to learn how to say no if I'm too busy. We are always scared to lose a client if we say no once but it is important to learn to not overwork yourself. I learned that it's ok to say no sometimes when I realized that working too much in certain periods wasn't good for my mental and physical health.

What are some of the musicians, artists or makers that you are excited about right now? What about them spark your imagination?

I love Nadia Lee Cohen's work, I love her way of bringing us into these eccentric worlds and portraying unique people. Chiquitettas is a performer based in Brooklyn that besides being beautiful and having amazing looks, she also organizes a lot of events and I can see how she is important to the drag, trans and LatinX community despite of her young age, which is really inspiring. Luiz Moreira is an amazing Brazilian photographer and I really like the way he photographs different body shapes and also how he incorporates a lot of the Brazilian culture into his work.

What gives you hope ?

That no matter what happens there will always be people creating beautiful things that can bring joy and inspire in different ways.

Do you have any advice for someone who is just getting started in their career?

To never stop creating even if you don't feel very confident and put your work out there, someone will like what you do, even if you don't think it's perfect. I hear that a lot of illustrators are afraid of putting stuff out there because their work "is not ready" - just upload it and if you don't like that art at some point anymore remember that you can always delete things from your portfolio or Feed later.

We are in currently in the 2022 Pride month! What excites you about Pride? What are your hopes and fears for the LGBTQ+ community this year and in the future?

I love Pride and how LGBTQ+ people can be celebrated and also reflect one the progress that we had all these years thanks to the people that were brave to come out and fight for LGBTQ+ rights. I am happy to think that probably a lot of people will be coming out this month and will be celebrated or at least will be doing the first step to live life the way that they want to. I am in New York which is a safe enough city for LGBTQ+ people but I always think of my home country Brazil and how there are a lot of places there where it is not safe to be out and proud. I hope that the LGBTQ+ community can continue to inch closer towards equality, especially our trans brothers and sisters.

Check out more Spotlights from Here and try out Niege's "New York Commute" template on Here.fm!

[kaidenshenandoahknapp]

this was an absurd amount of effort for what was ultimately an offhanded-joke but i needed to procrasinate lmao

if you watched @henrykathman's "Melody of Moominvalley" stream, (hi, hello, i made the thumbnail art, that was a cool surprise to see in my sub-box lol) Kathman made a comment about being glad no one has made him into a Moomintroll (or Snorktroll, i guess) because he thinks he would look like Snork

i had two thoughts in reply to this VOD:

that's probably because i would assume most video-essayist are on the spectrum of Hemulans (oversimplification: academics) to Teety-Woo/Woodies (oversimplification: big fans, arguably obsessive). you're probably more of a Hemulan? based on how you present yourself in videos? idk, i dont know you in your personal life lmao Hemulan just seems likely considering the hobby being so analytical (and also is easier for me to look at the different styles of since Woodies seem to have less general rules towards their appearance. and Teety-Woo is the only one of its kind that i know of, idk what is Teety-Woo's species and what is Teety-Woo's individuality there. but, like, that's not nearly as fun as my bullshit quiz lmao)

fucking bet

*: assets in not-gif form below Read More

(psa: please do forgive me for misspellings. i am dyslexic and will probably edit this repeatedly for quite some time, but im tired atm so Now It Is Posted)

anyway, i whipped all these up in about 2 or 3 days? idk, my chronic health issues have been a monster lately, its hard to keep track of days rn

but i made:

comics Moomintroll/Snorktroll

90s Moomintroll/Snorktroll and Hemulan

Tales From Moominvalley inspired illustration art of Hemulan where it has those lifeless "bug eyes with tiny pupils" style i love (but that i also understand why Jansson went back and gave them bigger pupils after a certain edition, and drew with more expressive eyes after a while)

why did i do three different styles + 3 different species? because i was torn on which to do and ended up pulling a classic Kaiden-Shenandoah and going "ill do more work and let them choose which one they like best". something something anxiety, i dont know what to tell you, im trying to learn self-acceptance lmao besides, it was fun to do a quicker shuft through style changes than the usual heavier studying i make Google Images help me do

speaking of, i dont often share my references because i worry about clutter, but i want to include it today and i also used less ref than usual, so you get clutter lol

(i learned last time that Tove Jansson doesn' often draw mugs; so i did my best guesses based on the references here + the result of my references the last time i drew in Jansson' style, which was more so her later novel-illustrations, if i remember right, as opposed to today. lots of best guesses today.)

first of all, i guessed on Kathman's eye-color based on zooming in and it was too pixelated to tell for sure even with the eyedropped tool. secondly, very fun tying in the blue hair dye since 90s Snork has a pink edge to his hair and Mr Hemulan has a green edge to his. last of all: i made them with (and without) a light beard/stubble, since i saw Kathman has one now. but also that was enirely guesswork on my part: Tove Jansson drew heavy-duty moustaches/beards or completely facially-hairless characters, no in-between. so i used educated guesses on how to adapt that. and i feel a bit like i did the male version of that one Snorkmaiden lipstick comic for my efforts lmao but hey! i tried!

my only thing is idk which set to upload to instagram, bc doing all the assets of with/out facial hair feels oddly excessive and maybe goes past instagram's images-per-post limit, idk, ill upload these there someday i guess. really wish instagram would let me post a gif but idk how to do that. c'est la vie

you also may notice one of the Hemulan sets includes a magnifying glass. i just thought it was thematically appropriate for someone analytical, especially since one of my references above did have it available for me to also reference lol

as a fun detail, i did a more Police Inspector color palette for the 90s Hemulan design, and a more Moominpappa palette for the 90s Moomintroll/Snorktroll designs. hence why those colors aren't the same

and the last thing is that i made the comic assets yellow-y to reflect the aging of paper and the quality of the photo references i have. (Henry Kathman, if you want to edit them to be white for the aesthetic of something, feel totally free)

here's all the assets i made in total. the gif version felt the most succint but yeah. also, Henry Kathman, if you are reading this: same rules apply. feel free to use these in anything you want, credit would be nice. (also, very sweet that you saw my name change away from my childhood nickname, i appreciate that 🫶). credit in the future can be to either here or my instagram (which i changed to match this hyphen-less url, since tumblr terminated my last blog for unknown reasons) i hope you are not upset that i went against your wishes of gratitude that nobody had drawn you as a Moomintroll/Snorktroll, but i hope the fact that i think you don't look like Snork even as a Moomintroll/Snorktroll helps. i hope you also dont mind the Hemulan additions lmao. but yeah, i wont blame you if you prefer the more human (or arguably Mymble? idk species) style i did beforehand in the last batch and don't use these. that one has way more references with lots of drafts and this is more of me messing around and finalizing the first draft i made each time around lol but i think they came out fun! very silly distraction, thanks for the idea lmao

thanks to Henry Kathman for the fun VOD and the much-(un)needed procrastination excuse. it was a good distraction from a pretty bad flare-up in my disability and a full plte of things to do that i needed an escape from. hope youre having a great day!

[itsytinyspiders]

(Part 11)

If I’m not mistaken, the actor playing the King of Bohemia isn’t speaking during this scene. Instead, they seem to be playing a recording of Irene’s actor using their male voice. Since all the actors are have a mic, the difference would be nearly unnoticeable, especially for people watching in person.

Let’s also enjoy a bit of buffoonery from the 221B boys. John whacking Sherlock’s head for his impoliteness is gold – do as I say, not as I do.

Irene making her entrance like the Prima donna she is.

Pretty sure that’s the dress she wears on a volume cover (volume 6?) of the manga.

I’m a bit surprised that this is how they decided to show the picture Irene “stole”. For context, the “king” is telling Sherlock what kind of blackmail Irene has on him. The moment he said “the type of picture that would make the viewer think the people on it are getting married”, a bright light is shone onto Irene’s hand with the picture.

I was expecting to actually see the picture, since the production has been projecting all kinds of images onto the stage – even the reference book Sherlock consults when he told John what EgPGt stands for.

Oh, so they were doing this to emphasize how badly the “king” wants the picture back. Alright, I can roll with this.

Putting a dramatic spotlight on the “king” while he gives the initial payment and names the final price of this consultation?

All of these theatrics tell me one thing – Irene is having the time of her life, tricking these fools into playing her game!

Oh my-!

They actually did a switcheroo between the first actor playing the “king” and Irene’s actor, now in the “king” costume!

See, one thing I didn’t mention in the previous scene was that there were a lot of wall-moving in the background. You could see two of the small walls in the scene where the “king” tries to get the photo from Irene.

I originally thought the wall-moving only served to illustrate how frustrated and helpless the “king” felt in his situation, but it seems that it served a double purpose.

Well done!

Is this the Baskerville arc I spy?

For some reason, the Hound of Baskerville is the only Sherlock Holmes story/novel title I can remember. Though to be fair, I have not read a lot of the original canon.

As for Yuumori, I find this arc memorable because it shows us not only more of Fred, Louis and Moran’s character, but also the reason why Blitz Enders was chosen as the Noahtic victim. I find it fitting: the Noahtic was their first big plan together and we, as the readers, get to learn more about them as they essentially tie up loose ends.

And we switch right back to Irene!

Poor Fred barely got a few sentences out of his new client and we jump to the Woman.

Sidenote: Irene’s spotlight color is purple, which can mean a lot of things, but is mainly eyecatching because colored spotlights were previously used to represent blood/violence (red) or represent the OG Moriarty family (purple and yellow). That said, Irene’s purple is of a darker shade…

In light of how Irene’s character arc progresses later on, the use of mirrors – and Irene appearing from one mirror to the other – feels like not only a representation of her acting but also a foreshadowing of the role she will take on.

Sherlock and John are also gearing up to see her, so this will be fun!

And we’re back to the Baskerville arc!

It’s alright for them to switch between arcs, since we’re still at the ramp-up part of the introduction, but later on, they’ll have to choose which arc goes first. It’ll probably be the Baskerville arc, since that one only lasts one night. Maybe they’ll do the explosion at Irene’s house, then the Baskerville mission?

I do like this scene though. We don’t get to see much of the Morigang’s interactions that don’t include one of the Moriarthree – which is a shame because I want to learn more about these characters.