THIS BLOG IS NOW AN ARCHIVE. You can find me on my new main: tinyfrenchowlOutlander and a lot of random stuff. Art/personal sideblog to ofbrochtuarach, I'm also a mod at picturethefrasers. blog est. August 1st, 2017
Something that’s forever hysterical to me: how all the clever and subtle English-name symbolism in FMA becomes so wallopingly in-your-face once you translate the whole series into English
“Ah yes, Riza Hawkeye. The sharp shooter. With eyes so sharp, we’ve taken to calling her ‘the Hawk’s eyes’ on account of this. Riza “The Hawk’s Eyes” Hawkeye. The similarity is coincidence ignore that.”
“Alex Armstrong. With arms so strong we call him the Strong Arm alchemist. Alex ‘Strong Arm’ Armstrong. What were the odds of this.”
“King Bradley, first name King. The Fuhrer, leader, ruler, president. ‘Fuhrer King Bradley’. ‘King King’ if you will. Why our military is full of coincidences.”
Thing #2 that’s forever hysterical: how the English symbolism becomes SO wallopingly literal that at least half the English-speaking fandom never realizes “King” is Bradley’s corny af first name
And i have always thought this is why Roy Mustang is called Roy Mustang. Cause it sounds a lot like “ford mustang” which this car is with the flames on it. Y'know like the flame alchemist?
Like, the fun helps, sure, but the three strongest motivators of the human race are “it was there,” “hold my beer,” and “they all said I couldn’t… so I did”.
And that’s probably pretty damn close to a perfect summary, here…
I know it's a controversial thing, but I don't believe Goku was as instrumental in Vegeta’s development as people say.
As far as we know, the two only met a dozen times before the Buu Saga. Meanwhile, he lived with Bulma for years and had a child with her whom he later at least trained (meaning he spent time with him). We also see Gohan showing up at the CC and Vegeta acting like it's a common occurrence.
And Vegeta is almost as distraught about Gohan's death in Buu Saga as he is about his wife and son.
Goku may have been a push in the right direction for Vegeta, but I'm certain that Bulma, Trunks and Gohan were much more important in his redemption.
I don't usually talk about Goku but I feel like my little silly hours post has fallen into Media Analysis Territory, and I love me a Media Analysis, so I'm gonna talk about Goku (based on how Toriyama wrote him) under the cut, but the TL;DR is:
Goku (the way Toriyama has always written him) is just here to have a good time getting good, and the credit for his very potent (and distinctly passive) influence over people is squarely, "This Man Showed Up and Was Strange In A Way I Didn't Know People Were Allowed To Be" and That's It. That's Goku's Influence. Being a Freak on Main. Because sometimes that's all someone needs to start questioning their whole worldview.
Toei's Goku is "This beautiful man reshaped my life with his bare hands and I think about him every day"
Toriyama's Goku is "I was giving this guy a ride home and while we were waiting in a taco bell drive thru he said something so whimsical and unhinged that after I dropped him off I stayed up all night thinking about it and ended up watching the sunrise for the first time since I was like six years old and now I might take a roadtrip and get a tattoo"
anyway, MUCH longer analysis under the cut for interested parties (again, citing the manga specifically) because I love talking about storytelling
1) Yep! Piccolo credits Gohan for his change of heart
2) Yep! Krillin is credited for the androids redemption, by most of the cast and both 17 & 18 themselves
3) Meeting Goku is generally written as an Event that changes the course of someone's life because he is Distinctly Strange as a person. Vegeta said that Goku's influence made him Softer, and Piccolo said that Vegeta's growth is a result of having met Goku, which changed him. Both are Factually True Statements, as Vegeta would still be out and about doing space gangster shit if he'd not met Goku.
4) To that point, Goku's influence on people is extremely passive, not active. It's a running gag throughout all three titles that Goku is Largely Unaware that his non-combat actions affect other people (until he is told about it, is either confused or earnestly apologizes, and then does it again). He is constantly doing whatever he wants with little, if any, consideration for the consequences, and it's something he gets called out on in all three titles.
5) Goku's influence on Vegeta specifically is just existing as a living testament to how everything Vegeta's ever known is a Lie, including but not limited to the Super Saiyan legend (Goku's power and personality being so out of line with what Vegeta's been told about the Legendary Saiyan is what makes him start questioning the truth of it).
More importantly, all of the things Vegeta grew up understanding as weaknesses, Goku casually and consistently proves are strengths (love, trust, empathy, etc), which Gohan is not as influential about early on, because (as Vegeta points out) Gohan cannot access that strength yet except when he is consumed with fury, while Goku can do it with his Soft nature intact. Observing someone else be open hearted, while still managing to be secure and strong, often gives the observer permission to open up to that experiences as well, which is what eventually happened to Vegeta (and that observation is not only of Goku, of course, but seeing another Saiyan doing it was important when it came to Vegeta, who regularly used his heritage and rank as an excuse to not take the softer road. Vegeta undermines Goku's lineage with his soft Earth upbringing, but it doesn't change how strong he (or Gohan, or Trunks) is as a Saiyan, which puts Vegeta in a corner and forces him to either bite the bullet and start giving a shit on main or admit that it's not a Saiyan Thing or a Power Thing and he's just afraid to be attached to the people he's kicking and screaming about definitely not being attached to).
That's what the influence is, and why it matters. It's not Goku personally scratching his enemy's chin and giving them a cookie every time they opt out of murder. It's the simple act of being Happily and Unwaveringly Himself in plain view of people who didn't know that way of life was a viable option. And now that they do, they may or may not be willing to risk trying out for themselves, given the chance (which Vegeta did when Bulma offered him that choice, and ended up liking it so much that it freaked him out, because Goku is only an influence, not an instruction manual for how to live like that. That's the joke about him being the tool itself, and not the muscle or the mind to make it mean anything).
6) Goku doesn't just spare his enemies. It's worse than that. With rare exceptions, he actively works to avoid killing enemies, with the verbal purpose of wanting them to get stronger, so they can fight again, because he enjoys it. That always throws a Big Bad off, because it is an absolutely insane thing to say to someone who wants to kill you. Goku is usually upset when he has to kill someone -- but not because murder is Wrong, or that he's morally opposed at all -- it's because he thinks it's a waste of a fun rival.
The difference between sparing someone who hurt you out of moral superiority and sparing someone because you had a good time almost dying just now is very important to how unhinged Goku looks to his enemies (and his allies).
Additionally: Sparing someone's life is a pretty important factor in how those characters continue to live when they expected not to, which is a very influential life event, for better or worse.
7) Most of the credit Goku gets for changing the ways of his enemies (in the manga) are from Dragon Ball, in which it was a very young Goku's spirit and determination that inspired his antagonists to live more like him (because Goku is and always has been very simple in his worldview, and doesn't hold a grudge. If you're a bad guy, stop doing that. You should try eating something instead. If you stop killing people we can fight more and it'll be more fun if neither of us dies. And he's still like that, and it's still confusing to everyone around him, because DB is a comedy at heart).
Krillin convinces Bulma in the Android saga to not destroying the androids early, because it gives them a common goal with Vegeta, since having a common goal is how everyone there became friends. He credits having to work together as the thing that changes enemies to allies (which was his experience with Vegeta on Namek, and his experience with Piccolo against the Saiyans), and just acknowledges that all of them met through Goku, which they did.
Roshi also does this in Dragon Ball, crediting Kami for the entire adventure and the fact that everyone became friends, because without the Dragon Balls, Goku and Bulma would have just stayed home that day and none of it would've ever happened.
8) Goku actively rejects credit in Super's manga (probably because the anime and the movies kept insisting he is superman doing Good and Just and Right in the world), as, again, he doesn't do any of it with the intention of Doing Good. And, again, the running gag throughout all three titles is Goku being Blissfully Unaware that his choices affect other people.
9) If Goku gets undue credit, it's largely from Toei and from fans of the anime/older movies, which constantly revised dialogue and added filler to give Goku credit for things Toriyama wrote him having nothing to do with.
Because the shows follow the manga's plot while still making it their mission to frame Goku as a Leading Man Action Hero, it adds up to a lot of weird plot gibberish, excessive padding, and nonsensical storytelling in order to frame Goku as Irrefutably Good, where he absolutely lacks any rigid sense of justice and morality in the manga. He's just out here having fun, and he gets mad when you play the game wrong (and hurt people he likes).
tl;dr part 2: Goku's influence over villains can be summarized by the vine of the guy in a mcdonalds pointing at a couple and going 'is this allowed??' but instead of a couple it's just Goku genuinely and truly having a wonderful time while being in extreme danger and it's mind-bending that someone like that can not only exist but also thrive
writing advice for characters with a missing eye: dear God does losing an eyes function fuck up your neck. Ever since mine crapped out I've been slowly and unconsciously shifting towards holding my head at an angle to put the good eye closer to the center. and human necks. are not meant to accommodate that sorta thing.
other things I'm bitching about but which could still be useful as writing advice for 1 eyed characters:
2. they're going to favor their sighted side, obviously, but it doesn't always manifest in the way you think. when I walk down a hall I walk much closer to the wall on my sighted side than on my blind side. which is the opposite of how it might seem logical to do that bc it means the world at large is on your bad side, but the reason is I can't fucking See the wall if it's right next to me in the blind side and I end up knocking into it.
3. door frames and poles are my enemy. If your character is smart this will not be a problem but for me it is. I am King of walking into shit I could absolutely see but couldn't tell how far away from me it was. on this note, their blind side hand is getting bashed into every jutting out thing in a 5 mile radius.
4. having 0 depth perception is less of a big deal than you'd think it is. Especially with driving. I've become a Much safer and more wary driver because I can't tell how far the other cars are from me. however I fucking suck at parking now. because I can't tell how far the lines are from me either.
5. you know how people who lose limbs get phantom pains? that happens with eyes too but like. phantom sights. for me it's like. a lot of bugs. like every so often my brain will just put something suddenly skittering beside me there. hate that.
6. it is completely possible to "get stuck" somewhere because your ability to tell how wide a space is is just Gone. shopping isles especially where bumping something or Someone is matter of embarrassment or potentially breaking something. it can be legitimately paralyzing and also irritate everyone around you because they can tell there is Plenty of space for you to get your cart through even if you can't.
7. if the eye is still in their skull it can still be the normal kind of painful. Glares off of shiny surfaces causing weird sharp pains you can't figure out the cause of are genuinely one of gods greatest tests of my patience.
Hello! Can I be incredibly selfish and ask for something from my ongoing WW2 AU fic 'Vergangenheit'? Jamie with any of his children (Faith is 17, Brianna is 14 and William is 7, going on 8) would be just wonderful and I would love to see how any of you visually represent the family that's in my head!
Hello @phoenixflames12! Yes you most definitely can! Thanks for giving me the chance to discover you’re Endless Night series!! It has so many poignant scenes, it was hard to pick one…. anyway, here’s my version of Bree and Jamie from Vergangenheit, chapter 10.
Vergangenheit and its companion pieces can ready on @phoenixflames12‘s blog and on her AO3 profile.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for this beautiful scene @tinyfrenchowl and @picturethefrasers! (I still can’t believe that someone has drawn a picture of something that until a few months ago existed solely in my head- it’s bizarre.) The details are just exquisite and I love how you’ve captured Brianna in motion in the heather!
You’re absolutely welcome @phoenixflames12 !! I’m so glad that you like it!! In your fic Bree is always moving, i just couldn’t draw her in a static pose, you know?
The heather was a last minute decision (I was always going to do hills, but they were initially more barren), but I have no regrets :)
Hello! Can I be incredibly selfish and ask for something from my ongoing WW2 AU fic 'Vergangenheit'? Jamie with any of his children (Faith is 17, Brianna is 14 and William is 7, going on 8) would be just wonderful and I would love to see how any of you visually represent the family that's in my head!
Hello @phoenixflames12! Yes you most definitely can! Thanks for giving me the chance to discover you’re Endless Night series!! It has so many poignant scenes, it was hard to pick one…. anyway, here’s my version of Bree and Jamie from Vergangenheit, chapter 10.
Vergangenheit and its companion pieces can ready on @phoenixflames12‘s blog and on her AO3 profile.
My latest art for @picturethefrasers. Man it’s been ages since I’ve actually sat down with a larger piece and taken my time about it. Maybe the first time? Feels good though.
Tomorrow The 7th is my birthday, and as I will turn one year older, I want to give a bit to others too.
Here I am with some test print of my linocuts that turned not that bad but I don’t feel to sell. It’s your chance to have them for FREE!!! I took the sending fee on me.
I will choose 3 people who will win one of the three prizes. The rules are simple. You have to follow me, like this post and reblog it!
First prize: cat skull test print on 250gr white paper + A5 Andrew Scott test print on 480gr white paper
Second prize: The Mage test print of double ink impression. One in black, on a second one above in gold ink. A5 white 250gr paper
Third prize: A test print of my fox skull on 250gr white paper. Slightly bigger than A5.
You have until the 20th May! Good luck everybody!!
got you……….again……by the april fools beepers……it was multiple birds the entire time…not just one, no egg…………they tell u they hope u have a great april first
So I haven’t quite finished the second prize yet (IRL stuff this past week put me behind) but since it will be finished by the time I do the drawing for April’s winner, here are the prizes:
Bree’s scarf from 2x13 and the lilac purple prize is going to be a knitted tote bag. I just have a few inches of the back side to finish knitting then sewing it together and adding the handles (which will be that sea foam green color).
I’ll keep posting updated pictures as I reblog reminders for this month.
Same rules:
1) each and every note counts as an entry
2) you can enter as many times as you want
3) you have until 11:59 pm EST on April 15th to get your notes in.
I’ll use a random number generator to pick a winner, then I’ll reach out via chat to let them know and get shipping details.
