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I remember when the drawing of the roller coaster ultrasound showed up in the Weird DeviantArt Stuff thread. I didn't suspect that there was a whole epic saga to go along with it. I agree whole-heartedly with the observation made early on that plot points that are kind of boring and rote in a werewolf story become downright magical when they are instead found in a tale about a guy who turns into a psychotic carnivorous roller coaster car. I'd go ahead and say the same thing applies to all these Original Characters (Do Not Steal). If they were just another round of recolored wolves or dragons with angsty dark mysterious pasts and super-special powers that kick in as the plot demands and who were destined to save the world, it'd be boring. Seeing sapient theme park rides with such traits is at least a new one. Speaking of special powers, we know both coasters and bumper cars can manipulate electricity, and on top of that, coasters appear to be apex predator of the (involuntary cringe) Amusement Park Between, with fangs and claws and blah. So what, if anything, can carousel animals do? (Chalk me up as another reader who imagined Merrylegs' running as more along the lines of the carousel horses in "Mary Poppins".) E: Iced Cocoa posted:There was one other carousel horse that is a Oh, Christ, she's not a zebra, is she? 
Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 22:51 on Apr 8, 2013 |
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Mar 29, 2013 21:54
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There's something about Railrunner's behavior, the "broody dude learns he's really a super-awesome magical creature" plot, how little the author seems to care about the other ride characters, and especially the design of the roller-coasters and their powers that make me wonder if maybe Ms. Leeks used to be just another crazy dragon person on DeviantArt. Then one day, very likely due to Internet Drama, she decided, "Well, now my dragons are ALSO roller-coasters! Because I need to be more different and special than YOU!" By the way, I can't be the only one who initially read the roller coasters' first pairs of seats as their eyes. I also like how she doesn't even bother to mention anywhere in the text that Merrylegs is a unicorn, not just a horse.
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Apr 1, 2013 01:03
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Dreggon posted:Holy poo poo, look at the left side of that picture. I was only looking at the dressing gown-clad coaster on the right but he's reading a loving book. He's reading a loving book while awkwardly stretching his hand towards us just so we can see his wheel-fingers. That's the kind of illustration mistakes I made back in tenth grade. JosephWongKS posted:The obvious answer is that were-roller-coasters also have the power to retract their arms into their bodies whenever they wish to. My money is on yet another case of "I don't always draw Rainbowfarts McDragonwolf with wings cause
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Apr 4, 2013 13:59
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"And yet, I feel so invincible, like nothing can stop me, even though that is true." Mother of God...  E: attackbunny posted:This book is a horror story about a domestic abuser with superpowers. That'd actually be interesting and kind of unique, so I'm betting Miranda doesn't take the story in that direction. Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 19:45 on Apr 6, 2013 |
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Apr 6, 2013 17:27
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Dreggon posted:
Well, I had the good luck (for an extremely specific definition of that phrase) to have the picture load for me (I am using the Awful app right now) and, well... Why does she have boobs? She is a friggin' rollercoaster-dragon thing, WHY does she have huge boobs?!? Why is she flopping around on the floor like a porn star? Why is she flopping around on the floor like a human porn star if she's a several-meter long dragon-thing with multiple arms and legs?!? How does Miranda not understand, even at her young age, even based upon everyday observation that a long-bodied animal with many short limbs is going to move in a way that is very, very different from a short-bodied animal with four long limbs?!? But most importantly, and this is the thing that kills me: If were-rollercoaster-dragon-things are the most awesome creatures around; if they are bloodthirsty killing machines that can manipulate the elements, heal from any wound, redefine common phrases, and (enter new power as the plot demands here), why is Shadowtrack "nothing" without her boyfriend?!?!? That isn't just a heartbreaking reminder of how ingrained the "female characters can't be interesting" thing is, even for female writers, it simply does not make any loving sense in the world of this story!?! 
Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 23:30 on Apr 8, 2013 |
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Apr 8, 2013 23:23
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Why does he have a navel?!? JosephWongKS posted:Thunderbark, shut up for a moment because I need to say something. Lunatics. The "Ancient Aliens" guy, people who apparently thought "V" was a documentary, Young Earth creationists. Probably the last group in particular since they will look at something like this:  And say that it (alone among the other images of fanciful animals on the very same temple) is proof positive that humans and dinosaurs coexisted. Because it looks like a stegosaurus, you see. Well, if your only reference for what a stegosaurus must have looked like in life is the marshmallow shape in this cereal rather than, say, this. They'd probably say Railruiner's image on that pendant thing is meant to be a tyrannosaurus, known for their giant heads and... wheels... Anyway, everything in these past two chapters has been the most wonderful thing in the world. But especially this: SSNeoman posted:A whole new wooooorrrrrlllld...  This is exactly what I deserve for trying to give Railrunner more reasonable anatomy. There was no saving Clare. Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 01:09 on Apr 15, 2013 |
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Apr 14, 2013 19:07
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my dad posted:OK, I'll admit it, I was flat-out wrong. Even someone who can draw can't make this werecoaster thing work. I really love your depiction of Clare, though. Aw, thanks!  There are some things wrong with this drawing (but mostly the fact that it's depicting an utter doormat who is riding in her murderous boyfriend who is a were-rollercoaster/dragon/personification of DeviantArt throwing up all over itself), since I wasn't keen on putting much  into... not-a-fan art?E: Well, for shits and giggles, I went to look at the other art in the Miranda's Magic website and... Rahonavis posted:There's something about Railrunner's behavior, the "broody dude learns he's really a super-awesome magical creature" plot, how little the author seems to care about the other ride characters, and especially the design of the roller-coasters and their powers that make me wonder if maybe Ms. Leeks used to be just another crazy dragon person on DeviantArt. Then one day, very likely due to Internet Drama, she decided, "Well, now my dragons are ALSO roller-coasters! Because I need to be more different and special than YOU!" Seems I may have at least been right about the dragon obsession. What's crazy is her rendering skills are pretty good throughout and that she has pages of animal anatomy studies. And it's kind of depressing when a few of the pieces look like this:   But then most of them look like this:   E: SSNeoman posted:To be fair, those dinosaur things are alright. It looks close enough to the dinosaur species that eventually evolved into birds. Have you... have you ever seen a bird? Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 18:05 on Apr 16, 2013 |
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Apr 16, 2013 00:38
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in your signature made me laugh way too much.
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JosephWongKS posted:
 Oh my God, it's been a rough few days (Greater Boston resident) and I have to thank you for this. I am hyperventilating over here! And the "concussion beam" (totally different from dragon-breath I guess). This whole recap is a thing of beauty.  E: my dad posted:So, despite going against impossible odds, detective Black comes up with an amazing plan that results in the capture of the magical Werecoastermcdickdragonmarysueeequalsmcsquare? And he did stuff like this before? Badass. I'd missed that before. Detective Black seems to know a lot about were-whatevers. Now unless he is ALSO from Amusement Park Between, I want to know more about what he's been up to before this rollercoaster of hate adventure began... Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 20:11 on Apr 17, 2013 |
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Apr 17, 2013 18:50
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John Lee posted:Man, if I discovered I could move people's bodies with a thought, my first thought would not be to test a creature to destruction, just to see if I could. Like, this is getting seriously messed up. I was willing to give a pass on the multiple murders, because... hey, rage, UNSTOPPABLE ROLLERCOASTER POWERS, etc. It was poorly done, but one could make the excuse. But there's no excuse for "Whoa, I can move this mouse! *CRUNCH SNAP* AND I can break it's bones! Neato!" To be fair, the way Bloodbending (which this "manipulate the miniscule amounts of metal within a living creature's body" power essentially is, just totally different and original you guys cause this version is based on Earthbending instead of Waterbending) is introduced in "Avatar", we see the person who figured out the technique starting out by doing unpleasant things to little animals while she was imprisoned, then moving on to her captors. She doesn't kill any of them; just the act of controlling people against their will is worse. In any case, endless font of creativity, thy name is Leeks. Should note that "Avatar: The Last Airbender" and it's sequel-series "Legend of Korra" are both incredibly awesome, so please do not skip them just because they are referenced in this huge clusterfuck of a novel.
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Apr 21, 2013 01:44
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JosephWongKS posted:These guys have blood-bending, metal-bending, fire-bending, lightning-bending, super-strength, super-agility, immunity to bullets and healing factor. I really, really don’t understand why they are so afraid of being discovered by humans or why they spend so much time and effort trying to hide their existence. And really, all it would take for an explanation is, "We don't trust humans because (pick one) if you learned about our powers you'd find some way to exploit them / you tend not to react sensibly when you encounter something really unusual or shocking, so we just don't want to have to deal with your reaction to real live With these lists of new-powers-as-the-plot-demands, I almost want to go over to the DeviantArt thread and round up the most (unintentionally) hilarious dragonlike OCs to see how they compare with Railrunner and the gang...
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Apr 21, 2013 19:48
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Iced Cocoa posted:Spoilers! Twisted is officially the place where the laws of physics go to die. Anyway, have some fanart of Moonhoof. I worked wicked hard on it, I hope everybody likes it: 
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Apr 29, 2013 18:27
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Kjoery posted:As a rule of thumb furry characters function identically to Fixed that for you. Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 14:13 on May 1, 2013 |
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May 1, 2013 01:18
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Iced Cocoa posted:And here's the image from one of the future chapters. Just so you can see Freakshow in all her glory. It's worth to note she has only been illustrated twice. Also, it is worth to note that Ironwheel has never been illustrated.  Well, I was going to have "The Rollercoasters are also pirates" on my list of things too stupid to happen in this book but I guess all bets are off...
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May 4, 2013 19:00
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horriblePencilist posted:That's one of Miranda's problems, she prides herself so much on being original that she fails to feel the need for improvement and humility. She thinks she has already hit her peak, and that it doesn't get any better than this. My guess is that Twisted is a Katamari of poo poo, starting out very small at the age of 14, only to pick up more and more awful ideas and inspirations from superior stories without ever cutting anything for the sake of decency so eventually it grows into this cobbled mess of a book. This aspect of Twisted kind of reminds me of the Eragon series (also written by a teenager, also basically a messy amalgamation of everything that teenager thought was cool - as a teenager...) except the kid who wrote that at least had the sense to let his mom read it first.
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May 7, 2013 23:03
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Iced Cocoa posted:And since you neglected to show the image at chapter 25, allow me. "I just HAVE to show the entire length of his body! But how???"
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May 10, 2013 14:47
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Iced Cocoa posted:However I don't know what happens when a ride is put in permanent storage, then later on gets destroyed. Nor do I know what happens when a ride is drastically altered, for instance the Test Track becoming the Cars Land Ride or whatever those two were called. Test Track in Walt Disney World was altered pretty significantly but not into a Cars ride (though the Cars ride Radiator Spring Racers in Disneyland uses a similar ride system). Of course, now I'm wondering if the original World of Motion ride is in Amusement Park Between? Or do Disney rides get their own magical land or something?
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May 11, 2013 22:17
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quote:Halfcoasters... roller coasters that come to Amusement Park Between as a mix of another animal or machine. The trait comes from being themed to be something that looks anything remotely near a roller coaster in the real world So given that I think we just met our first Halfcoaster character (Bandit), we're agreeing to let this clusterfuck of an "explanation" go, I guess. (Either the humans who built the coasters "themed" them "to be" animals and machines in the actual definition of the word "theme" in an amusement ride context sense, or, given the "concentrated breathing" thing, there's supposed to be another, less nonsensical word there besides "themed".) Anyway, the Smugcoaster icon is terrific, but I think it's missing something crucial to the spirit of this novel...  There we go. Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 22:37 on May 15, 2013 |
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May 15, 2013 22:34
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Well, there's a lot to unpack in the past couple of chapters (holy poo poo "the 'I’ve got bodies in my freezer' glare" ), but first, here's something I can't believe I missed earlier:Iced Cocoa posted:As Miranda is doing a re-release of her novel, she is now changing out the illustrations in the novel. It's pretty clear that Miranda refuses to use anything other than humans as models for how her Original Character Coaster-Dragons move and pose. And this results in things like well over three-quarters of Railrunner's entire body just, like, flapping in the wind. JosephWongKS posted:
This part hurt my brain. I guess - and this is a guess based off logic and intuition. Logic and intuition which, sadly, will do a person no good when trying to interpret the world of Twisted. And this is because, as we have seen so often, Miranda flat-out does not know what certain words mean. So, anyway, I guess that by "a prehistoric creature", she means a pterosaur. She could mean anything from a shark to an Anamolocaris to a Griffinfly to a Wooly Rhinoceros, but let's assume she meant a pterosaur. And if that is the case, then a plane walking on the ground in the manner of pterosaur would look... awkward: 
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May 17, 2013 18:29
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Iced Cocoa posted:Well, my friend Coydog decided to do her own take on this "Prehistoric" thing. attackbunny posted:Do you think if we asked nicely Miranda would draw us some cute baby pictures of the innocent people Railrunner's murdered? This thread is a thing of beauty.
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May 18, 2013 00:56
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Dreggon posted:Well, the wheels are Meanwhile, I still can't help but read the first pair of seats as his "eyes".
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Jun 23, 2013 17:40
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You know that flour had to be just full of insects. Miranda Leeks posted:Merrylegs looked over to where I was occult... I mean, we've seen miracles happen through Miranda not understanding how Thesauruses are supposed to work but daaaaaaamn. JosephWongKS posted:“Restraints vibrating in anger”. I hope we never lose sight of one thing: that as excremental as this book gets, it will never not be amazing when things that would be rote and boring in a supernatural romance/guy learns he's the savior of a magical land/guy learns he's not a human but a magical being with awesome powers/werewolf/dragonkin story are applied to friggin' rollercoasters. Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 15:28 on Jun 25, 2013 |
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Jun 24, 2013 19:17
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Iced Cocoa posted:Very well, with that spoiler out of the way, I can get this out of the way. A-hahaha, holy poo poo, that cigar-chomping Ferris wheel! Yes, please post more of the sequel because I strongly doubt we'll ever convince anyone to read it once it's published.
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Jun 24, 2013 23:30
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Djeser posted:Part 1 That is stellar. E: And holy poo poo at Part Two.  And as far as the events of the last few chapters... Railrunner posted:"Yo, mentor dude whose advice I keep ignoring except for the parts where I get new powers as the plot demands. When the designated villain guy drops my girlfriend to her gory death, don't, like, help her or anything. Cuz then I can turn her into a totes awesome roller coaster which is totally a thing she wants to happen to her I think maybe!" This is just the very worst aspect of it but you know what, guys? We did it. We finally found a fictional relationship that is more deeply hosed up in every conceivable way than anything that happens in the entire Twilight series. (And no, I am not forgetting the bit where the werewolf was in love with the protagonist because he was really precognitively in love with her potential unborn children or something.) Rahonavis fucked around with this message at 00:54 on Jul 1, 2013 |
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Jul 1, 2013 00:48
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JosephWongKS posted:Now she’s just outright cribbing from the season finale of Avatar: The Last Airbender. And "The Lion King" and "Beauty and the Beast" and a few other things I don't care to associate with this tree carcass. Well, it's been, dare I say it, a hell of a ride.
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Jul 3, 2013 00:52
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Djeser posted:Like everything else, it's a concept that could actually have something creative (temple like a circus tent? all-rails inside to make it difficult for non-coasters? most holy places hidden where only roller coasters could reach? lots of ramps and slides in the interior? long rooms for roller coasters to stretch out their trains? guard-rails around the perimeter for temple guards to roll around on?) and there's no thought put into it because it's only a backdrop for Railrunner because, let's be honest, Avatar: The Last Airbender had Aang training in an airbender temple, so of course Railrunner should train in a roller coaster temple. The bold part makes this even sadder. In "Avatar", the concept artists designed elemental temples by actually considering how people capable of manipulating water or wind would build things differently. This results in things like an Air Temple that looks like an upside-down castle built right into the walls of a canyon and that can only be accessed on the back of a flying animal. Basically (and I think I said this before but it bears repeating) the "Avatar" series are awesome and you all should watch them in spite of the fact that they partially inspired... this... The latest drawings by Miranda almost make me want to try and rationalize roller coaster anatomy but I don't know if I want any more of this taking space in my sketchbook.
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Jul 31, 2013 04:00
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It's a testament to how brain-hurting the internal anatomy of these
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Aug 13, 2013 23:15
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Angrymog posted:Were they crystals that made its wheels grow long and thin? We originally discovered the world of Twisted through one of the DeviantArt threads, right? Now I'm wondering if Crying Crystal Hands guy is writing a book... Iced Cocoa posted:She also talks about tails. Tails! They do not have tails, they have a long body! I still think Miranda started as another crazy dragon person on DeviantArt, but she turned her dragons into rollercoaster-things so she could be more Different and Special. So for the sake of science, I drew Railrunner the way Miranda draws him now but as a "gently caress You I'm a Dragon" type:  (Who has the ever-growing version of ? Cause that was my face while having to draw everything from his waist down.)
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Aug 17, 2013 03:46
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Wizard of Smart posted:What part of ~*magic*~ don't you understand? The real "Miranda's Magic" is how every newly-posted illustration of hers manages to be even more rage-inducing than the last.
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Sep 6, 2013 21:52
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Iced Cocoa posted:
I don't know why it didn't hit me until this drawing, but Rairunner is a rollercoster-dragon thing with a tattoo of what looks an awful lot like a rollercoster-dragon thing on his left arm. (I mean, maybe he got it when he was a human, and Amusement Park Between resident tattoos follow medieval werewolf wound-doubling rules, but you never know with Miranda.)
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Sep 16, 2013 00:10
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That's incredible. That's eleven goddamn drawings of a pregnant rollercoaster. Honestly it'd be easier to take if we knew Miranda had one of the most staggeringly specific fetishes imaginable, since at this point she can't possibly act like that's not what's going on here. But what makes it especially mystifying is how she spins everything as very pointedly non-sexual: rollercoaster couples only "cuddle", the only pregnant coaster in a generation is pregnant because of magical reasons, pregnancy is treated as a magical "rage of emotions", and so forth. Have any of the professors at the art school she's attending seen any of this? If so, I pity them, because I can't even imagine...
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Oct 3, 2013 03:04
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Stultus Maximus posted:This is the weirdest fetish I've come across and I've been reading SA for at least a decade. I think the Marfan's Syndrome/Crystal Therapy/Always Crying/Anthropomorphic Unicorns/Realistic Warblers guy over in the Weirdest Fanart thread wins out in terms of deeply uncomfortable specificity but this is a dangerously close second.
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Oct 5, 2013 18:56
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attackbunny posted:I was thinking less 'cop three days from retirement' and more 'the bassist from Gorillaz'. Like, maybe Railrunner's just picking the guy up and whacking people with him. That's the first thing I thought of too (without the "the actual weapon is actually Murdoc" part. There's a whole subset of "edgy" DeviantArtists who are obsessed with that character. Anyhow... Every last drat one of these illustrations needs to be subtitled "This Character Is Meant to be a 25-Something Feet Long, 30,000 Pound Living Roller Coaster Car". When you get to the point where you're drawing them like this, you have to ask yourself, why are they even non-humans anymore?
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Oct 16, 2013 18:21
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Mercedes posted:What the hell is so ironic about that stupid coaster? Am I missing something here? Miranda does not understand what certain words mean.
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Nov 11, 2013 20:26
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