Latest Posts by hurlyburlytopsyturvy - Page 2

someone reboot botboy, also aradia ayo-

its time

upd8 got that delirious 3AM sleepover bestie vibes, where you’re borderline hallucinating tv ad jingles while professing your deepest, most entrenched thoughts and fears

anyway, yes they had a half-ass spa day, yes they made a fort, and yeah they’re gunna do alien ouija yeehaw

A doggy dog Christmas

Have you ever stumbled upon a homestuck fic so old it doesn’t even have the trolls involved?

I don’t remember which one it was, but it held a fun specific to that era of hs. Where the fics were riddled with feel-good-best-friends-just-kids-fucking-around-and-figuring-out-shit. Heavy analysis and expansive study of characters are so intrinsically linked with hs now that it gives me whiplash to see work without it. Don’t get me wrong, I love the analysis, but there is something so charming about hs fandom and fic in the very past. Made me nostalgic for an era I wasn’t even there for. Made me want to paint this, just a bunch of goobers fucking around in some overgrown lot. Simpler times, I guess.

Breath as Influence and John in the Epilogues

Breath is probably one of the better understood aspects. “What is it?” someone asks – and the whole fandom is like, “Oh, Breath is about freedom and wind and detachment.” Which I don't disagree with. But I think most people miss a key piece of it – Breath as influence.

I'm no seasoned classpector, but I am a Mage of Breath, so I feel like I have a deep and personal understanding of Breath, particularly because of how it has manifested in my life. Yeah, I know, claiming I'm an authority on the subject because of my self-imposed alignment within a fake typology system makes me sound like an asshole. But I'll have to ask you to trust me, because if I start talking about my own experiences, I'll sound like even more of an asshole.

Anyway, let's kick this off with the official description of Breath, per the Extended Zodiac:

In summary: the Breath-bound are flexible, driven, detached, and maybe a little self-centered. Also, other people tend to get caught up in their personal development, which tends to make them good leaders. But the most important thing here for the point I'm making is this:

others ... feel inspired by them.

This word, inspired, has been rolling around in my brain for the past few weeks, because of its connection to Breath. Hey, did you know that “inspire” comes from Latin spirare, meaning "breathe"? And if we include the Latin prefix in-, it becomes "breathe into."

The Breath-bound have an ability to breathe into, or inspire others. They're not aware of it – after all, they are just living their lives for themselves. But wherever they go, they are inspiring people. Or, more accurately, they are influencing people. Actually, the influence of Breath goes beyond just people. I could even get meta with it (and I will. I apologize in advance). But let's start small for now.

Tavros Nitram

So, Tavros. Page of Breath. Pretty much all of Tavros's contributions to Homestuck as a story happen as a result of someone doing something to him. Vriska paralyzes him, which kickstarts the whole FLARP cycle of revenge arc. And again when the truce is broken in Act 5 Act 2, it is because Vriska kills Tavros. If this doesn't sound like influence to you, you're right. Tavros has very little influence. He's a Page, after all, and if there's one thing I know about Pages, it's that they're weak as shit until they reach their "true potential," which is pretty much always something stupidly overpowered. Y'know, like Jake overpowering Jade's first guardian powers. That was pretty batshit, I'd say.

But Tavros's contributions don't end there. He actually does reach his true Page-y potential right at the very end of Homestuck, when he gathers an army of ghosts – honestly, probably every single ghost in the furthest ring – by just talking to them. Was this something of a punchline to a very long joke? Probably. But it is also a pretty good example of the kinds of things Breath players typically do.

On a meta level, though, this argument kind of falls apart, because... As far as I can tell, the army of ghosts doesn't really do anything. Nothing important, anyway. Lord English's defeat is pretty much entirely at the hands of John, Dave, Davepetasprite^2, and alt!Calliope in the body of Jade, as described in the Epilogues. The ghost army just isn't relevant, in the end.

But you know what is relevant? Vriska.

Half the people reading this just groaned, I can feel it. Why are we talking about Vriska, a Light player, on a post about Breath?? I hear your question and I raise you this: Why the fuck is Vriska so obsessed with Breath players???? Personally, I think it's because she has an innate sense for their passive ability to decide what's relevant.

But before we get into Vriska, let's talk about John.

John Egbert

John, Heir of Breath. The protagonist of the story. In the context of my thesis of "Breath as influence," isn't it interesting that the protagonist is a hero of Breath? And even beyond that, he's an Heir, a class typically interpreted as "becoming" their Aspect, or "inheriting" it. If you find my argument compelling, you could even say John is the influence that drives the story. Which is exactly what a protagonist does - after all, what is a story without a protagonist?

This question is actually addressed in Homestuck, kind of. At some point in Act 4, Terezi manipulates John into visiting his denizen early, which gets him killed. The story is left without its protagonist, and progress grinds to a screeching halt. Jade doesn't enter the Medium and presumably dies. The reckoning never happens. Dave and Rose are trapped in a doomed timeline. They lose contact with the trolls. For what is a world without the breeze, without air, but a place of complete standstill? The story needs John to continue. Okay, it needs Rose and Dave and Jade just as much. But it's interesting that the story makes a point of John's death being the turning point that makes this particular timeline doomed.

Okay, sorry for the wait. It’s Vriska time. Vriska's driving motivation is to be relevant. She does everything in her power to steal the spotlight, which may or may not be related to the fact that she's a Thief of Light. Again, I'm not an experienced classpecter. I only really have a surface level understanding of Light. But I'm getting off topic here.

In Act 5 Act 2, Vriska starts talking to John. Why? Well, partially because she wants to compete with Terezi, who is talking to Dave. But there's also the fact that she wants to be the force responsible for Bec Noir. And also for John reaching god tier. And everything relevant really??? She's really fucking good at being relevant, I'll give her that. Or at least presenting the illusion of relevance, but that's a big topic that I think I should save for another day. Another essay, maybe. The point here is, John has a tremendous amount of influence over Things That Happen just by existing, and Vriska knows it. Maybe she torments Tavros because she senses the same sort of potential in him, but that's probably a stretch.

In any case, this is baby shit. There's better evidence than this. Let’s talk retcon powers.

You could argue that the retcon powers are separate from John's abilities related to his classpect, and on some level you'd be right. But in a game that "knows" everything that is going to happen, I have to question if extraneous powers like this are taken into consideration when Sburb "decides" what classpect it gives a player. I feel similarly about Jade's First Guardian powers. Teleportation is a pretty space-y power, in my opinion. And definitely one that... "breaks rules," I guess. Among all the other things First Guardians get to do. Once again, I'm no classpector. But Jade getting access to First Guardian powers upon reaching God Tier strikes me as very Witch of Space-y. I feel similarly about John's retcon powers - they strike me as very Heir of Breath-y.

And not just because I view Breath as influence, though that is definitely the most obvious way the retcon powers could be interpreted as Breath-y. Even on a surface level, they're pretty Breath-y. When John first talks to Roxy, he gives a whole spiel about everything he's been to up until this point, most of which is obscured by "blah blah blah." But little phrases come through occasionally, and when he starts talking about his brand new retcon powers, he uses the phrase "UNSTUCK FROM CANON." Which sounds a lot to me like "freedom from the narrative." But maybe more telling is the fact that John's quest as an Heir of Breath requires that he use his retcon powers. Getting rid of the oil, freeing the fireflies - his quest as established at the very beginning was always intended (in universe at least; I can't speak for Hussie's intentions) to be solved by his retcon powers.

So retcon powers are at the very least Breath-adjacent. What’s that got to do with Breath as influence? I’m sure you see where I’m going with this. Retcon powers are basically the ability to do whatever the fuck you want to any point of any timeline. I’d call this influence but I’d sound silly, actually. It goes way beyond influence. It’s way less subtle. I guess you could call direct intervention like this influence at its most powerful. Well, almost. There’s one step above this that John never really taps into. Which brings us to...

The Epilogues

For better or for worse, I fucking love the Epilogues. I think Candy, on its own, is a fantastic and surreal deep dive into a mind high on depression. And as for Meat, I’m an absolute sucker for metafiction and narrative fuckery. I eat that shit right up. My favorite anime is Princess Tutu, etc., etc. This is your warning: Yes, this section will contain evidence toward my claim that Breath is influence. It also doubles as an Epilogues analysis. It kind of turns into one at the end. Sorry, but I needed to get it out of my system.

So, in case you missed it, the step above retcon powers that John never taps into is direct narrative control, like we see Dirk engaging in throughout the Meat side of the Epilogues. The fact that Dirk is revealed to be the narrator of Meat begs the question: who is narrating Candy? It’s never outright stated, but it’s probably alt!Calliope. Unlike Dirk, alt!Calliope doesn’t have an agenda, as far as we’re aware. So why is Candy so fucked up and weird? Why is everyone out of character? I know this comes as a shock, but: it’s probably John’s passive influence over the narrative.

Before the Epilogues even begin, John’s been wasting away in his house all day, every day. He’s depressed as hell. Sort of dissatisfied with how artificial and "perfect" Earth C is. Some have suggested he also feels disconnected from the post-retcon versions of his friends, and I think this holds some merit. It would explain why he feels disconnected from reality in Candy.

(Candy, 11)

Depression colors your view of reality. It darkens some parts, brightens others. People who look happy will appear so to an unsettling degree. Fucked up things will appear even more fucked up. Depression ups the contrast, if you will. And that’s pretty much what happens in Candy. Jane’s pretty bad in Meat, but she’s like a billion times worse in Candy. Jade causes some awkward moments in Meat, but she is pretty much a sex pest in Candy. The positive parallels are a bit harder to find, since Meat pretty much sucks too, but you could speculate that John perceives Rosemary to be happier together than they actually are, so they’re, like, uber happy together in Candy and raising a daughter and shit. It is John’s warped perception of reality that in turn warps it beyond recognition.

This isn’t just me theorizing, by the way. There’s pretty compelling evidence to suggest that this idea is accurate to what is happening. It’s pretty clear in a conversation between (Vriska), who has just arrived on Earth C via the black hole in the furthest ring and her descendant/clone Vriska (aka Vrissy in HS:BC). The two of them stare up at the sky, pointing out clouds and what they are shaped like, when (Vriska) has a realization.

(Candy, 37)

John’s influence over the reality is so absolute, even the clouds bend to his will. I think Vriska only notices it because she’s a new arrival to Johntown. It isn’t long before she’s absorbed into the John-ness of the timeline. And then, she goes on to say exactly what I’ve been saying this whole time. Remember earlier, when I said Vriska knew that John had an incredible amount of influence over Things That Happen?

(Candy, 37)

Yeah. That wasn’t speculation.

The last thing she says, though, that he’d be relevant even if he was dead, is actually a reference to Meat. So let’s talk about it!

As we know, Meat is narrated by Dirk. Dirk’s narrative style is a lot of fun for me, personally. He’s sassy, kind of an asshole, and has no time for bullshit. The second John puts that meat in his mouth, he gets to work, pulling the strings of his little puppet show.

(Meat, 1)

He wastes no time putting words in John’s mouth, writing him out of the story of Earth C as quickly as possible. It’s almost with a sense of urgency that he pushes John to complete his mission. Which is probably necessary, seeing as the sanctity of canon relies on him going back to tie up the loose end that is Lord English. But I think Dirk has ulterior motives. I don’t think Dirk has the ability to impose his will so overbearingly with John around, because for some reason, John’s power of passive influence prevents him from doing so. Is John more powerful than Dirk, even after his ascension to Ultimate Selfhood? Maybe. I certainly think so.

But John’s pretty gullible. He’s easily influenced. He doesn’t have the same safeguard around his own mind, for some reason. Or maybe he does, and it’s just taken Dirk this long to crack him? This is speculation at this point. Not important.

So Dirk eventually kills John. Why? Well, first of all, it’s harder to control the narrative with him around. Though I speculate that’s not very important to Dirk anymore since he fucks off to who knows where around when John comes back. I think, more likely, Dirk finds John’s influence on the narrative unsavory. I mean, just look at Candy. What an absolute disaster of a timeline. Maybe his awareness is such that he knows that letting John live will result in a similar degradation of his friends’ personalities as he knows them. I can’t really say one way or another. It’d explain why he wants John’s body on the ship with him, though. Y’know, to make sure he never gets revived. And yes, he wants him on that ship. He pretty much tells Terezi outright to captchalogue his body before convincing her to join him.

(Meat, 35)

There’s one problem, though. I don’t think John being dead even erased his influence on the narrative?

(Meat, 36)

Right there at the end:

The gentle breeze is all she can hear. It’s louder than my voice, and in some understated way, makes my case for me more persuasively.

I don’t think there’s any other way to read this than the breeze representing John. This is a literal manifestation of John’s influence. I guess it could be symbolic – like Terezi doing a “what would John do?” kind of thought process. But I dunno, Dirk doesn’t strike me as that kind of narrator. Besides... It’s a little too on the nose. Say what you will about the Epilogues, but I believe a great amount of care went into them. This certainly isn’t a throwaway line.

Conclusion

Okay, sorry. I really went off the deep end into Epilogues Analysis Land there. You may have noticed that I didn’t talk about Homestuck: Beyond Canon. That’s partly because I haven’t gotten there in my reread, but mostly because I’m not yet convinced that it has – or will have – nearly the level of plot consistency of its predecessors. We’ll see, I guess.

In any case... Breath as influence, huh? There’s probably more evidence for this hidden away somewhere. I probably could have talked about Rufioh. I didn’t want to though. I also probably could have pointed out the word inspire from the Extended Zodiac thing and called it a day, but instead I blacked out and wrote this. Weird!

If you read all, uh... *checks word count* 2.7k words of this??? Jesus fuck. If you read all this, thank you for reading. I’m open to feedback! I’d love to discuss some of this more! Especially the Epilogues stuff. I have a million thoughts. Bye!

breath, heir, candy, meat, and relevance

idk if y'all know, but I am an avid egbert enthusiast, yessiree

(I never posted my banner lmao, and I actually really liked how it turned out)

vampire girl... save me...

Not to be controversial, but I do think it's quite silly to knock on Homestuck: Beyond Canon for having references to internet memes in it, saying that this will "inevitably date it", and calling that an inherently bad thing. I understand if that's just not your personal taste, modern pop culture/online culture references is definitely something that will turn a lot of people off, but... Homestuck itself was filled to the brim with those same kinds of references. It's truly just keeping in the spirit of the original work, people only find it jarring now because they aren't experiencing it in a state of being a beloved time capsule.

Homestuck, as a piece of fiction, is fundamentally extremely derivative, referential, and reactionary, completely chock full of inside jokes and references to at-the-time modern media and memes. The level in which HS2 is engaging with current memes and media is honestly substantially lighter than Homestuck itself was. During early Homestuck in particular, it's difficult to go even one page without some kind of reference being present in it, especially considering a major point of the setting design and character writing is their relationship to other media. The posters on their walls, the games they play, the fact that Dave is living in a Saw trap, et cetera.

I find this train of criticism to be particularly fascinating, as to me it shows that, in some way, it doesn't really feel like a lot of people ever look at Homestuck as something that was ever new. The time period it was made in is almost never taken into consideration when analyzing the work. Homestuck never was, it just is. HS2 has current-day meme references because it is a current-day Homestuck story. This is exactly how things should be. This is just how Homestuck is.

I mean, windy powers just so happen to be great for utter tomfoolery and the most mischievous of antics....

you; have to understand that everyone in homestuck is a girl and everyone in homestucj is a boy. Adn also eceryone in homestuck is mnot a girl and also everyone in himestuck is not a boy and everyone is nonbinary also. you Understand. rebnlog

IM LATE,,,, BIRTHDAY TIMe!!!1!!1!

Idea: Jane wants to make everyone a bday cake because she can and would like to (this is a good timeline), but realizes it is A LOT for three birthdays coming up one after another (six technically, but yknow). So she enlists John (cuz he knows how to bake, much to his behest) who doesn't want to do that at all, but complies because it's for the bdays.

Also Dirk doesn't want to wear a party hat cuz it fucks up his hair; thus a scheme occurs: Roxy and Dave distact so Jake can commit the felony. Rose is amused. Jade stacks party hats on Dave's head in glee.

Conclusion: I wanted to make birthday fanart for the gang, but it spiraled oops. So I'm posting the lineart/sketch so there's something near the dates this year— I'll color it in with more time because I ended up liking it so much he he.

another one of those

one sun two sun green sun yellow sun

it's a mix between their aspects and their origins (kind of), jade has the green sun and space while rose has horrorterrors (look close!) and light. tbh I just thought the two sun symbols mirroring each other would look cool lol — and I wanted to paint jade's fur and a gothic-y outfit for rose :))

dirk & jake’s relationship development

Dirk and Jake have a relationship that I’ve come to really enjoy since Homestuck’s end. I like it as a ship, of course, but the cornerstone of my interest in it has been in it as a general relationship of mutual growth: a story of two flawed characters whose problems make them terrible together, but who learn from their mistakes and then repair their dynamic. Whether it’s romantic or not, it’s a wonderful depiction of how people who mess up a relationship can figure it out if they choose to work on their problems—and how doing so makes them better people generally. So, I want to talk about the journey they go through, from when we first see them to their final scenes in the Credits.

One notable detail of their relationship, often mentioned, is we never truly see conversation between them on screen. All their conversations are in some ways mediated by some element that makes one or the other not quite themselves:

We think we get a conversation early on, but “Dirk” is revealed to be Lil Hal; this happens repeatedly, with Hal as a mediator as Jake tries and is unable to contact Dirk prior to game entry.

We get a flashback to a conversation when they were thirteen, which gives some idea of how they communicated three years ago, but this proves to be a dream bubble, with Brain Ghost Dirk as the not-quite-Dirk

We get Dirk’s needy texts on Game Entry, but these are never answered.

We get the Trickster conversation, where Jake is juju high. This is a switch from our not-quite-Dirks to a not-quite-Jake. Also, Dirk just had a breakdown and almost murdered Hal, so that probably doesn’t help.

From then on, Brain Ghost Dirk is the only Dirk we see talking to Jake.

This, of course, is emblematic of the core problem in their relationship: they are unable to communicate with each other. That inability comes from both directions, as each of them has reasons for trying to dodge a fully truthful conversation, and this tells us a lot about the ways they likely avoided direct, honest conversation when talking to each other off-screen:

While Jake tries to talk to Dirk, Dirk avoids him, claiming he’s busy. However, AR’s needling indicates that this is more about Dirk trying to set up the perfect situation for making his romantic overture. In other words, Dirk, terrified of rejection, tries to control the situation so that he can create a scene where Jake will accept him, and he obfuscates relentlessly to guard himself from being hurt.

When the situation reverses and Dirk wants to talk to Jake, Jake is the one who becomes avoidant. He needs space but doesn’t know how to tell Dirk. Just like Dirk, he’s scared: frightened of messing up their friendship in the breakup and afraid of the messy emotional conflict sure to follow. So, unable and unwilling to express himself or face the mess, Jake dodges Dirk until he is in a state where he doesn’t have to emotionally register the consequences of the conversation.

So we have two scared teenagers dealing with their first relationship. Interacting with other humans beings, either for basically the first time ever or for the first time since burning Grandma English’s corpse as a child. One responding to his fears with defensive obfuscation and controlling actions, the other responding to his fears with avoidance and dodging his emotions. When Dirk and Jake finally do talk, it is no surprise that everything explodes in messy neon colours. A crash was coming their way, candy or no.

But something very important happened for both of them as a consequence of that confrontation, because the flaws that ruined their relationship are also problems they have in general. Dirk isn’t just controlling with Jake; he thinks he knows best for all of his friends. And Jake isn’t just avoidant towards Dirk; he tries to sidestep emotional conflict with the other alphas, too. 

Their messy breakup forces both of them to realize exactly that truth. Dirk admits that he has been harmful towards Jake and that he has issues with the others. He then determines to do better. Jake, meanwhile, reflects on his own aversion to conflict and confronting his own emotions. We get less of his recovery verbally, but we see that first step of introspection play out.

And then, just before the Credits, we get the hint that both of them are already taking steps to do better:

Jake, awkwardly rubbing his hands together, is looking at Dirk. Rather than avoiding  Dirk, he expresses himself directly. He doesn’t try to hide from the mess: he takes it on.

And Dirk? As others have noted, Dirk does exactly what Hal said Dirk wouldn’t: Dirk holds “one tentative hand behind [his] head like a flustered asshole from an Asian cartoon.” This callback to Hal’s description of Dirk’s unwillingness to give up control when confessing to Jake lets us know that Dirk is giving up control, and his cool kid persona with it, so he can talk honestly.

That is the moment when my switch on Dirk and Jake flipped from “unsure” to “oh, this relationship can be good for them!” Because I am a sucker for a story about two people who mess up badly, learn from their mistakes, and choose to grow together. And that is what this little detail hands to us.

The Credits then give us a flashforward on how they balance their new relationship:

Both of them go to the Consort Kingdom. Dirk looks openly shocked that he gets to be happy here, while Jake is comfortable and joyful for the first time since the Trickster fiasco. And Gcatavrosprite goes with them! Because Jake made a friend and, frankly, Gcatavrosprite probably needs a kingdom of dorky, well-meaning mascot animals too.

They start wrestling again! The camera angle and the text tell us that Jake took the picture, which indicates they literally posed for the shot. The presence of robots in the scrums signal this as a reversal of Dirk’s earlier training of Jake with Brobot. While before, Dirk was controlling and pushy, with yet another not-quite-Dirk there to form a barrier of communication, now we have both of them interacting face to face and contributing as agreeing equals. And now they BOTH get robots!

Two years later, we see they hang out together as they work on mechanics. This is another marker of growth. They’re now comfortable hanging out working together, which means they worked on Jake’s complaints that Dirk is too overbearing in person: clearly, Dirk has learned to relax around Jake enough that they can just hang. Further, they’re able to cooperate on a mechanical project, calling back to Jake denying his smarts when Dirk noted that Jake’s is quite mechanically gifted: Jake is finally being honest about his less Action Hero interests.

Both of them have changed for the better, and we can see it in how they act around each other. They’re better friends. They’re better people. And to me, that’s what makes their relationship so compelling.

There's something interesting to be said about the page class in homestuck.

Of course, we have the title definiton of the page. Serving as an understudy to royalty to become great. But we could also take from Jake English’s introduction himself to consider what a page might particularly be:

There is a good SKULL at the heart of any mystery, haunting its EVERY PAGE.

A page, like an empty page in a book. Lacking in anything written on it, but by being a page, given the utmost to have anything, anything written on it. That page could be anything if you learn to harness a pen.

We could speculate that we see the potential of a page in the scratched versions, in this case The Summoner, or Grandpa Harley. This is presuming they carry the same aspects as Tavros and Jake English respectfully.

Grandpa Harley and The Summoner play incredibly influential and important roles on their respective planets by shaping the way their worlds were shaped. Grandpa Harley translated and prototyped the SBURB game for the Beta Kids, set up SKAIANET, which documented the meteors and created tech to bring SBURB to reality, as well as taking care of one of the meteor children and guiding her research to further reach their goal. The Summoners revolution against the condesce is so large, it leads to the exile of all adult trolls to outerspace and away from the planet, which shapes how the trolls that would play SGRUB think and react.

We never see it addressed all that directly other than passing, even though it plays a major part in the story because at the end of the day, a page is a medium for conveying thought, for conveying words, but a page is never the full front and center.

And really its sort of fitting how it comes back to the fact that pages,to quote caliborn, "HAVE TO PROVE THEY ARE WORTHY TO EXIST." Because what use is an empty page! Its just another piece of paper. You can coax and threaten all you like but the words will not appear magically on the page making it a masterpiece. A page draws its importance from whats written on it, like how a page draws its power through other people.

i think straight up one of my favorite set pieces in all of homestuck is the chamber at the core of the battlefield where the tumor sits. where there's these stone tiles on the walls demarcating the aspects and lunar sways of the players of the session. a place that might have had another vitally important purpose in a proper session maybe

Upd8 Fanart Showcase #03

)(i everyone! We're offishally back this week to shellebrate last upd8 with some fintastic fanarts! Sea for yourshellf below!

homestuckdaily.com

Upd8 Fanart Showcase #03

News, updates, art, music, videos, fanfics, webcomics, projects and articles related to Homestuck, HS2/Homestuck: Beyond Canon and Hiveswap!

artists in order of appearance: @hurlyburlytopsyturvy @insufferable-homestuck @silvermoono @spriggiestuff @grim-kitkat @visionaryparacosmos @seaverity @usernameproxy @pastelkerri @number-0y

go check them out! ^^

hi it's me again!! (elusive from homestuck daily)

just sending you another ask to follow up on my previous one! did you saw it? :o thanks again! -elusive

yeah man! I thought I answered it idk, it’s on my blog. It’s all okie dokie though, you can use my art! :B

stream

hi!! I'm elusive from the Homestuck Daily team (a Homestuck news & showcase site), we're doing a fanart showcase soon to show cool art people did about the last upd8 (we delayed it this time to wait for extra fanarts), can we feature this artwork you did?

you'll be fully credited of course, with the link on your artwork leading back to your post here (or on a different site if you want) and the link below it redirecting people on your preferred social platform (or a linktree)

thank you for your time! u-u -elusive

heya! thank you for asking, and I'd love for my upd8 art to be included! no problemo, it's awesome to be part of something like that. it would be great if you could link it back here and credit it to this tumblr blog as well.

can't wait to see the showcase and everyone else's talent too! :)

waddaya mean this didn't happen too

local egbert converses w/ amogus balls vriska in real life 4k

waddaya mean this isn't what happened

(I drew brain ghost dirk all blobby and thought it was so funny, so I just left it lmao. The puns disintegrated his spectral frame.)

on realness and the hope aspect

honestly i feel like a lot of ppl missed the point and just blindly agreed w/ vriska on the candy timeline's "fakeness". like. hmm (rambles)

this post from fefairys is a nice way of putting it: homestuck doesn't like to say things are just one way. if anything the john + vris convo is just a summary of the entire point of the epilogues: both scenarios are equally possible and equally real, bc to the ppl who live them, they r real. maybe one is the technically "right" timeline, but they both exist concretely, because what goes on in one affects the other.

vriska is partially right, but so is john. the timeline is wrong, but it's not fake.

that's the power of hope! not that sort of hope, i mean this hope. the one that has the ability to believe so hard in something, it becomes real. like an imaginary version of your ex-boyfriend. or an alternate timeline. where rage cries out against implausible things, pushing it back with force, hope imagines things so hard they warp reality around them just to exist (think adam from good omens). it doesn't have to make sense, it just has to be held up by enough people believing in it.

the characters of the candy timeline believe that they are real, and so they are. you could make the same argument for the score of doomed timelines that riddle much of regular homestuck honestly. im a bit jumbled but yea. food for thought

Homestuck

"John says he's not gay. I mean, sure, I guess he technically is "not a homosexual." But aside from that, who are we trying to kid? Everything going on here is really quite spectacularly gay. All of the trolls' involvement with the humans originates from one poorly thought-out, helplessly hate-smitten and gay overture made by a cranky teen boy. Karkat had this whole tirade bottled up inside, ready to unload, but because John is totally expecting it, and already knows Karkat well, he is able to completely disarm, flummox, and redirect all of the hostile energy. The ensuing backwards-chatting idiot spiral is a direct result of John affably and naively sabotaging Karkat's high-strung, breathlessly romantic overture. The lesson is clear: the entire Homestuck universe turns exclusively on the axis of of gay teen follies." -Andrew Hussie

It does, in fact, keep happening.