#hilda stone forest

[airborneice]

VERY late to the party but here’s my piece for @hilda-appreciation-week Day 2 - Favourite Episode - STONE FOREST BABEYY

hmm I was gonna talk a little about why I love this episode so much but it got kind of long so that’s going under a cut lol

ok so this would’ve been a really tough one for me to choose, if it weren’t for the fact that Stone Forest has had a very special place in my heart right from the moment I picked up the comic in 2018 and spent the next 2 yrs hoping I’d see it in the show. since that was pretty much my introduction to the comics and it was a hilda story that was yet to feature in the show it was just. so much fun. the art style of the comic is wonderful and a joy to look at and I would argue that pre-Mountain King it was the first comic to show a bit more dimension to Johanna and really have her along for the adventure, and I love it for that so much

I was so hyped to see this episode when season 2 dropped, and imo they adapted the story perfectly. I admire how the writers adjusted the story of the comic to fit into the show with all the changes they’d made, making the same conflict work with a slightly different Hilda-Johanna dynamic in the show, and how they made room in the story for the supporting characters who aren’t in the comic so much (even if that meant they got rid of my boy the stray sod to have hilda’s friends there instead 🥲 it's fine I snuck him into the bg of this drawing bc he’s still there. in my heart). Anyway I love this ep, I loved seeing how my fave comic moments made it onto the screen while also getting the completely new B plot with Frida, David, Gerda etc. I also really really love that the story being animated meant they had room to expand on some smaller moments in the comic and make them more emotional and nuanced (the part where they try to sleep behind a rock and Johanna thinks about reaching out to Hilda before giving up comes to mind…love little additions like that which take advantage of the medium!!!) also they had Johanna do cool stuff like tell a troll to get lost to its face so in conclusion this episode was made for me specifically and I just think it’s such a treat :D

[thesealanterns]

I thought it be funny

[blaithnne]

I’ve put off posting this for months because I wanted to find my comics so I could talk about how she fits into this one story wise, but I’ve officially given up on that so AT LONG LAST here’s Lauren in The Midnight Giant!

Comic Lauren is younger and a little less mature than her show counterpart, she has less of a parental role towards Hilda and enjoys messing with her. She’s considered a lot less…reliable by her mother. But she genuinely tries, she does everything she can to help her family and prove to her Mum that she’s capable, but that’s a little hard when Johanna’s focus is on Hilda’s shenanigans so often…

Some individual drawings!

[remked]

Does Johanna knew?

Source: Hilda and The Stone Forest (2016)

[straybardart]

Hilda fanart done when Season 1 came out. This series was very wholesome ^u^

~ Kofi, Comics, and Commissions - Twitter - Instagram - InkBlotArt - Twitch - YouTube - Portfolio and Blog ~

My main blog @straybard My art Blog is @straybardart

[thathartleykat]

He follows you... everywhere...

Have you ever noticed the dirt creature in The Stone Forest's comic panels hiding in the background, following Hilda throughout the entire comic?

The same detail isn't in the series due to Alfur becoming Hilda's savior instead of that creature, so Season 2 Episode 1 is the first and only time we see it. Unless it still follows Hilda off-camera and will show up in Season 3...

[great-raven-parade]

What is your opinion of Trylla?

*deep sigh* I keep getting asked this. So like. She's a really controversial character in the fandom. My own opinion is that I don't hate her, I want to like her, even, but I don't think she was written well. Especially in the way the movie adapted her. Hilda and Johanna have a rockier relationship in the graphic novels and Hilda has less friends and attachments to Trolberg. Trylla picks up on this, and the changeling spell is sort of a 'what do you mean you don't want what you said you wanted' device for Hilda. There are even a few scenes in the middle where Hilda seems to genuinely enjoy being a troll- for the exact reasons Trylla perceived. We see that the emotions here are complicated. The format of a graphic novel also has a looser pacing and leaves more things up to interpretation (such as tone) so it's easier to read between the lines. In this version, I read Trylla as an interesting character that had good intentions, but that made a huge mistake by meddling and heavily regretted it. The problem is, In the animated version of Stone Forest, Johanna and Hilda pretty much make up by the point they even meet Trylla, and even more-so by the end of the episode. And over the course of Mountain King movie, Hilda repeatedly expresses that she misses home and her friends, interspersed with scenes of everyone looking for her. Which makes the changeling situation extremely sad, and Trylla's observations that lead her to do the spell in the first place (that Hilda doesn't get along with her mother, and doesn't quite fit in in Trolberg) flat-out incorrect. Overall in this version, Trylla's actions seem unreasonable, and her viewpoint becomes hard to sympathize with- Leading lots of people to hate her.

Now, I think Hilda is generally a very well-written show, and Mountain King is a good movie! But with the differences between the graphic novels and the series adding up over time, the plot of Mountain King needed to be rewritten just a bit more to fit them. Trylla becoming a character that the plot wants the audience to sympathize with but comes up short on reasons why they should do so is one of the biggest symptoms of the pieces not quite fitting together. I would have liked to see the movie acknowledge this issue with an extra scene or two with Trylla explaining her point of view, apologizing, or more explicitly promising to help Hilda and make things right.

[hyperpsychomaniac]

If there’s any singular reason why Gerda will be a 1000% better leader than Ahlberg it’s this.

That tiny almost imperceptible shoulder slump of disappointment.

Kids don’t trust the authorities? Gerda’s response - Clearly the authorities inclusive of herself need to do better.

[waddles-ex-machina]

woke up at 4am, made this & went back to sleep

side note hilda is one of my favourite shows of all time and has a wonderful consistency to the quality of storytelling and themes across episodes so in my heart these are all at #1 ok. except stone forest which is even higher

[artificerstimetable]

So uhhh hilda ocs yo

[the-hilda-librarians-wife]

I was rewatching The Stone Forest and I really like to think that Hilda had to pass by the Bell Keeper’s outpost on her way out of the city limits. I like to think that idiot looked at what was happening, shrugged, and said ‘eh, she’s the scariest thing out there’

[wildflowers-of-trolberg]

The Runaway Hilda AU

(amazing cover art done for me by @blagzdeath)

The Runaway Hilda AU is an alternate universe, diverging from the end of Hilda Season 2 - in this timeline, Hilda isn't caught by her mum at the start of The Stone Forest, and instead escapes to Frida's, only to come home to Johanna even more upset, causing their biggest argument yet.

As a result, Hilda decides her mum would be better off without her, and runs away from home to live in the wilderness. Johanna, desperate to find her missing daughter, joins the Safety Patrol, and ultimately becomes deputy leader. Hilda finally comes home after a year away, only to find out that a lot has changed in her absence, and things can't go back to how they were before she left. For a more detailed summary, see here.

The fics of the Runaway AU are written to stand alone, and can be read on their own or in any order. But, here is the timeline as it stands, covering every fic written by me and my amazing little sibling @ultimate-kaisa-simp for this series:

To The Hills (the night Hilda ran away - replaces The Stone Forest)

The 5 + 1 Runaway Hilda AU, Chapter 1  (1 week after Hilda ran away)

The 5 + 1 Runaway Hilda AU, Chapter 2 (3 months after Hilda ran away)

The 5 + 1 Runaway Hilda AU, Chapter 3 (Sonstansil Eve - 6 months after Hilda ran away)

Room For One More, Chapter 1 (Sonstansil Eve - immediately after #4)

Full Disclosure (3 days after Sonstansil Eve)

Room For One More, Chapter 2 (1 week after Sonstansil Eve)

Room For One More, Chapters 3 & 4 (~3 weeks after Sonstansil Eve)

The 5 + 1 Runaway Hilda AU, Chapter 4 (8 months after Hilda ran away)

Two Girls In A Bus Stop Shelter (8 months after Hilda ran away)

Everything’s Changed & Nothing’s The Same (concurrent - Hilda’s 11th Birthday - 9 months after Hilda ran away)

The 5 + 1 Runaway Hilda AU, Chapter 5 (11 months after Hilda ran away)

The House On The Sand (12 months after Hilda ran away)

One Runaway To Another (~4 days after #13)

The 5 + 1 Runaway Hilda AU, Chapters 6 & 7 (1 day after #14)

The Ones Left Behind (1 day after #15)

With You, Always (~1 week after #16)

[bloobluebloo]

Can you rank the ganons in terms of intellect?

To be honest, I want to say that because most iterations of Ganon are the same Ganondorf from OoT that their intellect should be similar. I suppose what we can rank then is then how well he deployed his cunning in each game he found himself in. 1. ALttP: I think it was in this game that he deployed his most cunning strategy. He had understood that Hyrule had a penchant for putting heroes on a pedestal and used it to his advantage to get by the king's side, and then turn his knights and Hyrule against him. He turned his realm of imprisonment into a kingdom of his own where he could foster his armies. He was able to get his alter ego past the barrier keeping him trapped. 2. OoT: The fact that he went to each tribe seeking their stone, and then cursed them in such a way that they didn't even know he was responsible for their plight in a Hyrule that already had suspicions and racist attitudes is quite the feat. I feel like the only miscalculation he made here was making it obvious to the Deku Tree that he was responsible because he did not anticipate anyone leaving the forest to inform Hyrule at large, or that even if someone did manage to leave the forest they would not be convincing enough to implicate him. Unfortunately that person happened to be the hero fated to defeat him sooooo. In any case, he also correctly deduced that Link had the Ocarina he was chasing Zelda for and followed him so you know, man was working his sneaking skills hard to position himself in a fortunate position. 3. FSA: In a way, I feel like he stumbled into his power. The game keeps it vague, but the way I see it is that Ganondorf was probably aware that the Pyramid of Power housed a great power but had never pursued it seriously until the Gerudo put him up for execution. With no where to go he probably put all his bets there and it paid off for him. However, after that, he played it smart by using Shadow Link to lead Link to the Four Sword to release Vaati, and hiding behind Vaati since this Hyrule seems more invested in seeing Vaati as a threat. 4. TP: I have to say, he has a good grasp on emotional intelligence in the manipulative sense. He needed a body to host his power in to find his way to the light, so he knew he had to find someone who had just enough sway amongst the Twili, and just enough envy and jealousy in their heart to manipulate and he found him in Zant. From there he just had to sit back and watch Zant do the work for him. I guess his plan though did require a good measure of luck but eh, in every royal or powerful political structure you're bound to find someone bitter enough.

5. ALBW: I guess maybe most of the credit for this goes to Yuga, but basically gaining Hilda's trust and then playing along with her plan until he was in a position to take her piece is pretty cunning. I don't know if Yuga *always* held such visions or if merging with Ganon and taking the Triforce of Power caused him to develop such a vision, but in any case it must have taken a good measure of patience to wait long enough. 6. BotW: Everyone says he behaves like a force of nature but like, Calamity Ganon has intellect. He learns from his mistakes and comes back stronger each time. He hacked into the Divine Beasts and the Guardians. Calamity Ganon has the mind of an engineer go figure. 7. WW: I think his plan was kind of stupid. Really, every blond girl with pointy ears Ganondorf? Have you seen the red head and brunette Zeldas this could have gone sooooooo wrong for you my man you just got lucky. WW Ganondorf had a bit of an upper hand because his magic was strong and he had a grasp of how the gods worked so he could sort of get Link where he needed him to get the Triforce into his hands so I'll give him a bit of a pass here.

8. TotK: I don't think he's particularly stupid here, but I don't think anything he did was particularly intelligent or cunning either. I think he wanted to put on a show of force in a way to show Rauru that he was someone to not take lightly and that he would come out on top. Ganondorf was able to get the stone because of Rauru's hubris; they all knew he was bad news and let him run amuck. (Okay well he did reprogram the seized construct so I suppose this is where Calamity Ganon got his engineering brains from) 9. Zelda 1: The entire world was in chaos and Ganon found out that Hyrule had the Triforce so he took his armies to Hyrule and got the Triforce of Power. Strongman tactics that worked I guess. 10. OoS/OoA: He didn't even have a chance to think. He just woke up and found a kid with a sword attacking him so like what was he supposed to do? His brain was also so fractured he couldn't speak in full sentences. Poor guy. BONUS ROUND HW: I think he's actually pretty smart and he's self aware too. He is actually able to take good advice from his subordinates and can identify when he's letting his own ambitions take the best of him. He will pull out of a battle he's losing because there is no glory in defeat or death. I would say that I think he's a great strategist (and I mean in a Dynasty Warriors style game you have to be). And this doesn't even touch on the fact that he manipulated Cia's feelings and was able to gather the parts of his soul that were shattered and contained in different dimensions to reform his body. I mean, he's good, he is. Cadence of Hyrule: He boppin to the muuuuuuusic but I think he's average right. I found his strained relationship with Barriara as a child to be funny. Like Octavo was the main antagonist really and then he just said oh it's because Ganon is going to be the bad guy in the future so you just get a free pass to the future to beat up Ganon. Poor guy. CD-I Ganon: THROW THE BOOK AT HIM look the smartest thing he did was leave Hyrule but then they found him and beat him even faster anyways. Animal Crossing Ganon: Arguably the smartest Ganon because he said "you know what, fuck this I'm gonna go live a quiet life in a village full of cute unhinged animals" and chilled out. Intelligent guy, not throwing his life away for gods that hate him (or love him? I dunno is this what divine love looks like?) while enjoying his tooth achingly sweet coffee. SSB Ganondorf: He has all that power and is bottom tier, like dead last. Is this because he has a lack of intellect? Or maybe he just doesn't take it seriously? He also got backstabbed by Tabuu which like damn dude that's a first for you so, yeah maybe because when he stepped into ssb part of his brain went with it.

[blaithnne]

Early concept sketches of Midnight Giant Lauren! You can see me figuring out the style, colours, as well as Lauren’s outfits, plus a little Hilda that I wanted to include but gave up on cause I couldn’t get her to look right.

Johanna switches outfits about 3 times in this comic, so I wanted Lauren to do the same. Also, since Johanna’s deerfox outfit in the flashback is based off one of her looks in mountain king, I wanted Lauren’s to as well! So one of these outfits will be repurposed for teenaged Show!Lauren in the deerfox later down the line, which I think is fitting because she’d be around the same age in the flashback as Comic!Lauren is here

I didn’t talk much about my design process in the original post, so I’ll make a couple notes on that under the cut!

Here’s the final product for reference-

Though Johanna changes outfits about 3 times in this comic, one of these outfit changes is just the same outfit but with trousers instead of a skirt. So I wanted one of Lauren’s outfit changes to be more subtle, keeping most of the same items of clothing but only changing the jumper!

In terms of her outfits, I tried to add a little bit of a late 2000s - early 2010s vibe, which I think makes her fit in a lot more

Whilst this style still features quite noodley characters, it allowed me to bulk up Lauren much more than the troll did, so I took advantage of that and started adding in juuuust a little muscle! But she’s still kind of twig looking, so I brought back the same trick I used in the troll and gave her a big ol’ pile of logs and a heavy axe to weild in one of the sketches just to show that she’s a strong girl. I swear I tried to think of something other than an axe but it’s surprisingly hard to think of heavy objects that a character would just be. Carrying around lol

Looking back at this design a few months later, the biggest thing I’d change is I’d make her look a bit younger. It’s a little hard to design a unique character when you only have two points of reference lol, one of which is an adult and the other of which is a child, so I think I made her look a bit too much like an adult, oh well!

One thing I kept though to help her look younger is her freckles, same as Hilda! I love freckles but I swear I never use them in character designs. This design feature disappears from Hilda in the later comics, but I wanna keep them for Lauren for as long as I can tbh…

I mentioned before that I thought it would make sense for Lauren to go through a couple different hairstyles before reaching her final one in these early comics - the designs in the show are based off the ones in stone forest, which was the most recent comic to be released at the time the show came out. The style and characters designs had changed a lot from the early comics, and one of my favourite things about reading through the series is seeing how the designs changed and progressed before reaching those “final” versions, so I’m kinda reverse engineering Lauren’s design process to get that effect here, and I think one way that’d be shown is through her hair. Here her style is getting closer to the final version, her fringe has been lifted so it no longer covers her eye, and she’s got more of a curl! But her strands fall a little differently, so we’re not quite there yet…

I struggled a LOT with colouring this one, and that’s because I got the colour count wrong! One of the most overlooked ways to emulate a style is to count how many different colours appear per character - Hilda The Series generally has 6, 2 for hair and skin, and 4 for outfits, though the number can change. I miscounted here and thought the comics had 4 outfit colours like the show, but they actually only have 3. Once I realised that it made things much easier, though I still sent a little over it with some varying shades of green in her shoes. These kinds of rules generally aren’t firm, and might not even be one’s the original artist is even aware of, but when you’re trying to emulate someone’s work these little things can make all the difference

Show!Lauren probably doesn’t play guitar, I’ve mentioned before that I think she’s decent at piano and I stand by that, but I thought it was fitting for Comic!Lauren lol

That’s everything I can think of right now!

[geekgemsspooksandtoons]

Hilda Appreciation Week Day Two

@hilda-appreciation-week #hildaappreciationweek2024

Day Two: Favorite Episode(s)

My favorite episode or episodes. This is a good question.

When I think about it. It's hard to choose. Because all of the seasons are fantastic. But I'm going to try and I've made some choices.

"The Bird Parade" is a legit favorite of mine from season 1. Likely due to Hilda and Johanna themselves throughout the episode. Even though I think the final two episodes are a fantastic finale. Season 1 is great. Even though I've watched it too many times.

"The Deerfox" is a beautiful episode and a standalone highlight of season 2. Especially when you've watched all the episodes leading up to it.

"The Stone Forest" is a fantastic finale to season 2. Including with all the lead up to it. And I feel like it makes it more complete when you play Hilda and the Mountain King afterwards. And I think it may be an issue I may view these seasons as multi chapter films. Which I shouldn't. I really don't think there's a bad episode. Even if there are things I feel critical about and there are things people dislike.

"The Fairly Isle" is just, again, I have no criticisms or anything majorly bad to say. This shit made me tear up. I still retain that this is possibly the greatest finale in a show I've watched. Even though there are many great finales. But again, such a wonderful closure to this show I've followed for years. And today, I remember thinking that it's still weird Hilda ended two months ago.

[7official7moose7]

Johanna headcanons!! Because I love her!!!

She likes hard rock/metal. Take one look at her and tell me you don't see it I dare you

Her parents were quite strict; they cared wayyy too much

Or, they didn't care enough and she was left to her own devices most of the time, I can see it going both ways

Either way she got into a lot of trouble as a kid

She wasn't a mean girl or anything, just extremely blunt and curious like Hilda

In fact, Johanna acted a lot like Hilda when she was younger, just more cautious and unsure of herself

She never really had any school/neighborhood friends, which is why she pressured Hilda to make "real" friends at first

As she grew older (around 13-16) and had more family problems, she sort of retreated into herself and became closed off

This is when her passion for art really started blooming

Eventually, sometime right after Hilda was born, she moved them into her granddad's cabin to get away from her parents and the city

(She was very close to her granddad, maybe spent the weekends up at the cabin with him and they'd go exploring outside)

Johanna is terrified of becoming her parents, and any time she does something that reminds her of what her parents would do, she gets extremely guilty and just sort of breaks down (e.g. s2 e8: "the fifty year night")

Her favorite flowers are daffodils, sunflowers, and dandelions (and if you say "they're just weeds" she'll get defensive)

She's a dog person!!!!

She probably had an old family dog that either died or she just hadn't seen since moving out

She thinks of Tontu, Alfur, Twig and Baba like her own kids (David and Frida too sometimes)

And often wonders why she keeps accidentally adopting other kids/creatures

She knits in her spare time!!!! It's not really a hc because she says so in s1 e4 but I like to think she does it primarily around christmas time :)

Johanna has social anxiety (e.g. s1 e5 "the troll rock" and s2 e13 "the stone forest", in which she feels awkward talking to other parents and Hilda says that she never gets out and has no one else to talk to; to which Johanna gets really upset)

She is bisexual (and possibly ace, but that's just the vibe I get from her)

The events of "the mountain king" gave her nightmares for weeks; she'd either not be able to sleep or wake up screaming/ having an anxiety attack

Speaking of, she's had them often for years, but won't really go through with therapy because she feels it doesn't work for her

She's an ugly mug collector. If there's an ugly mug anywhere in any store, it's going in the cupboard and there's no stopping her

Sparrow scouts was her "escape" as a kid; she felt like she belonged with them, even if all the other kids thought she was weird

She wore big chunky braces and glasses for half of her high school years and was made fun of relentlessly (but now she wears contacts)

Johanna has a tendency to cry when she's angry, even if what she's angry about isn't necessarily sad

She's easily flustered, especially around people she isn't familiar with

And lastly, she loves cheesy romance novels and totally has a sketchbook dedicated to fan art 👌🏽