So, since I have found a new passion for MMD again, I wanted to make something with it, that's mostly my own with using anyone else models. At first I was just going to use some really pretty Voicaloid models, and make a gag comic about Gumi and the other Voicaloids in a human AU (alternative universe) doing stuff around "town"  it was going to have kind of lucky star/ nichijou/doodling around kind of feel to it. The only problem was (beside the fact  I didn't make models my own) that since the voicaloids don't really have a set personality (it's up to anybody's own view on how they act) it was hard to actually visualize situations for them to be in (I was also worried that  some rabid fanboy/girl would come at me rant about how I got their personalities all wrong). So, after thinking for a while I finally got a somewhat good idea for a 3D comic.

The idea is (which is really girly, but hey I'm a young woman, so what ya' gonna do) the comic was going to be about this girl who likes to play dating sims and Otome games. The girl has always dreamt of finding the perfect guy like in the games, but she kind of  has social anxiety around guys never knowing the right thing to say. She finds this one that very strange dating sim and she's never really seen before, but she plays it anyways, and then gets sucked into the dating sim world. There's an NPC named Cupid that tell her the only way out of the game, its to get the best ending with one of the five guys.  Sounds easy enough, but with fact she also need to get a job in game to be able to get money to buy gifts and other items, gain skils to impress the guys, and go highschool again (since she just graduated). it's not going to be that easy....

The guys are going to have specific archetypes in the personalities one is serious, one is a gentleman, but very clumsy, one is a tsudure,  one is silly and nerdy, and one's a smooth talker-ish.

I was going to draw the first half the real-world part and the rest the game part is going to be in 3D. 

I'm also going to post it here since, the last time I try to post a comic on twitter it looked super weird it was hard to read. I'll probably just upload a screenshot of the most interesting panel and have a link that lead to here.

(probably make another page here for it also) 

Even though I still have the other comic, cupcakes and clubs, which  I would release like at least 2 pages a week, but it just the first part of that comic looks really bad, but it improves with the more recent pages and after chapter 1 but once chapter one's out I'll probably upload two page per week or at least try.

This 3D comic maybe easier since I don't have to make sketch and color in it in I can just place models in poses and objects in places, so I'll probably upload this one more frequently. The part that's probably going to take the longest it's probably the actual making of the characters, but other than that it shouldn't take too long.

I've  already started on the main character, just need to do the others

and that's all I wanted to talk about for now

Later days...

Back in 2015 Cartoon Network released a series of small shorts (or Pilots)  for potential to be a show on the network. One of these shows was "12 forever" an action/comedy/fantasy show about a childish and youthful 12 year old who wants to be a kid forever so bad that she made a world where she can run away from  impending maturity and be superhero and live out her  childish fantasies freely. The short was created by Juila Vickerman, who has worked on shows like Yo-Gabba-Gabba, 2016 PowerPuff Girls, and she has also work on smaller projects such as Dreamwork's webseries "Too Loud" voicing a character named Sarah (with an  "H") in the episode New Girl In Town.  She also wrote a couple episodes for both Yo-Gabba-Gabba and 2016 PowerPuff Girls . The shorts is now has been greenlit by Netflix, and is in development (at the time I'm typing this) and is set to release in 2019.

From what I could gather from my research Julia seem to be really fond of 80's stuff (like Jem and Holograms, Salior Moon, and Heman etc) which makes sense since she was born in 1984. She also seems to have an 80's aesthetic in her more colorful artwork and of  course 12 forever. Even her clothing style is 80s inspired, and likes play old cheesy 80s board games with her friends from time to time (as seen on her instagram) 

Not only that but it looks like she also based the main character Reggie off of the voice actress, Kelsy Abbott, who she's also best friends with in real life. Kelsy shares the same interest in 80s  memorabilia as Julia, and their friendship seem pretty strong and genuine to me. Kelsy shows up a lot in Juila's Instagram feed, even before 12 forever was in production.  I find it really cool how she's able to work on her dream show with her best friend. Kelsy was a writer for Clarence, Uncle Grandpa and also work along side with Juila on "Too Loud" as Sara (without a H) .

Okay, so that's all of background for the show and a few cool facts about Julia and Kelsy, there are a bunch of other cool people who work on the show, but if I had to list them all I would get around to talking about the short itself.  Now, on to the short..

(This post may seem a little ramble-ly and nitpick-y in some parts, I just wanted to get all my ideas out somewhere, my opinion will probably change when the show comes out, then I'll give a more well-thought out and put together post. I'm also giving my opinion as someone who has just watch a lot of  tv over my 18 years.) 

The character designs, color's are nice (especially ones used in party island),the party island backgrounds are colorful and well-done,  the voice acting is also good, but I think they could tone down the 80s lingo with the main chracter.  I really like witch character  and what she (could) symbolizes which is maturity. The fact that the witch has a fully-developed body, and deep voice (two major signs of maturity) they really do some neat stuff with this character.The main characters will they are nice, and that's all I have to say about them though.  For such an colorful,  and detailed place like Party Island is Reggie herself isn't that much of an interesting character. One my favorite show creators Craigc Mccraken said when making a show it's always good to think about the characters first and that's thing you focus on first, once you made a interesting character you can now put that character in any situation anywhere, it will always be interesting because of them, not because of the world around them.   There is not much that separates her from characters like Star, from Star Vs. The Forces Of Evil which alot of people compare the show too. There's not much that makes Reggie's friend different from Marco, (whose also from Star Vs.). This something I hope they work on in the series which looks like they have  because Shane has been replaced by two other characters name Esther and Todd.

Another thing the kind of the a problem in the show is that the world while it is beautiful it feels a little empty, I think it's because while the characters were running through the island there were no other background characters around that the audience could see beside the strawberry bug thing, but I'm pretty sure that will be worked out in the series.

While alot of  younger people compare this to Star vs. The Forces Of Evil, I  compare it more to Foster's Home or more likely ChalkZone. Both Foster's and ChalkZone had a pretty strong cast of characters that the audience could grow to like. There were even some episodes that focus on background characters making the world feel really alive.  12 forever does show a cast of characters on Party Island, but the audience doesn't know much about them beside the fact they all love and almost worship Reggie. (which Reggie states  herself makes sense because she create them) This fact is interesting because could there be a potential where a character that Reggie makes just doesn't like her and could symbolize her start of her being a little self-conscious or self loathing (for some that advance darkness) I mean she is going through puberty  .   Alot of tweenagers get self-conscious around that time even if they don't care about being popular. 

Another thing about Reggie's character I really hope that her fear of becoming a teenager doesn't make so she can't go or to be used as an excuse for her not going through character development. I'm also kind of sick of the cliche of the quirky character always being loud and immature and anxious to those around them.  A person can be quirky and quiet or just quirky around their friends and not really around strangers. Also the fact that quiet people are said to have a really active mind, would be interesting story concept . A quiet girl who really doesn't talk much only has one or two close friends and when she feels overwhelm she and her friends escape to her mind, where she can really be free and be herself. Maybe she tries to make effort, so she can be herself in the real world too, but not loud or anxious or anything. But, I'm getting a off-topic. I hope in the series Reggie goes through some real development and it would be cool to see how the island (and maybe even it's people) changes with her.

 I don't think the pilot did a good job conveying that anything can happen at the party island (mostly with the fight scene). What makes shows like ChalkZone and Foster's work is that even from a kid's perspective, the stuff the characters do is something at also seems cool to a kid.  In ChalkZone, you can meet any chalk drawings that were eased off a chalk board, some are nice, some are mean, and some you can even fight using whatever you can think of. Foster's home, a  place where people can adopt and visit unique imaginary friends, again some of them are nice, some of them are rude, some of them are straight up dangerous. But what  12 forever showed is a world where you can be a superhero (cool, check) the inhibtans are pretty unique in the way they look, but they're all friendly expect for one (cool, check), and what does our hero fight to show us that she can use any powers and weapons she wants....a baby....... from the real world....that she can't even really fight because it's a real person, and she turns her friend into a giant women just to "defeat" it.  Seriously, I don't really know why they picked a baby I guess to have that joke at the end, where the bully whines like a baby but you could have still had that. I would have made more sense if the bully turn into a monster but like a small monster that  you could be able to hide in a locker, then use a potion they though was a cure, but turns out be the growth potion that makes the monster bigger. Reggie still couldn't be able to fight the monster, but at least the idea of fight a monster is cooler than fighting a giant baby.

One thing that people (including myself) are hoping from this show is that since it takes place in main character's mind, they could take this show to some really dark places. Like, what I mention earlier about the whole one person not like Reggie could be sign of her becoming self-conscious (or self-loathing) of herself. They could also show what the world would look like when Reggie feels down or depressed, or when she feels guilty for doing something. I feel like this be something that would be really interesting to explore, but I don't know if the creator would really want to go through something like this.  most of the shows she worked for where pretty happy-go-lucky  stuff. I still hope she tries to explore a darker side from time to time, but the show still could have a happy, fun vibe. I mean Foster's home had specials like Good Wilt Hunting, where we found how Wilt lost arm and why his eye is messed up, and how his creator is, or in Destination Imagination (one of my favorite cartoon specials of all time), where a imagery friend who lives in a toy boxes gets so lonely and neglected to the point where he tries to almost kinda of kidnap Frankie, so she can stay there  forever and ever with him and never leave. Foster's was able to handle this dark themes in a mature way, and still treat them seriously with losing it's charm, and these situations helped the characters grow.

I have a lot of hopes for 12 forever, it has the potential to be a really unique and fun show. If handled right, which I do believe that Julia Vickerman along with everyone else working on the show can make it work. There all pretty interesting people, I feel like since this was Julia's first pilot that she kind of want to show everything in such a short amount of time, but now the she finally can flesh out her world and it's people.  You can really tell that she put her heart and soul in making this short and everyone on set probably had a good time making it, but I'm pretty sure the show will turn out to be good in the end.

 3/5