life at best is bittersweet

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This is the first (almost) completely original thing I've drawn digitally! Poses are really hard for me, so I'm super proud of this. No tracing, only references!

...so. Many. References.

Except for the bricks, which I'm not counting, because bricks are scary. And the chains. I used a brush. Chains are scary too.

I started July 28th, and then spent almost 40 hours across various canvases planning, experimenting, and actually working on this. It took me absolutely forever, but I regret nothing.

Except for the fact that I spent over 6 hours just shading bricks. I didn't even draw them! I took a pattern for the grooves from google and filled it with black, (rotated and edited for some variance in their cells), and then did the red lighting and some shadows you can't even really see. For 6 hours.

I tried to draw their spider brooches many times, but I could not get them to look right (especially from a side angle), so I gave up. Let's all just pretend they're there until I come back later. Eventually. Maybe. Oh, and Leo's chains. At the time of posting, I really just want to get this up and posted, so they're not shaded, but again, I might do it later.

I wanted to have this set when they're both in their separate cells, right after Viper was, uh...in the cell with Leo. So, Donnie is all stitched up and healing, while Leo is...not doing great (not certain about the timeline, because I'm paranoid about everything, but it's probably fine). But I still wanted to convey what happened to Donnie, so I drew that weird glowing spine thing to indicate some kind of mystic healing something. I don't even know.

It didn't turn out as well as I wanted it too, but I'm probably biased. Because there was so much gore on Leo's side, Donnie's looked boring. I couldn't figure out how to do the lighting. The values could be better. It could do with more time spent on the shadows. Etc, etc. I'm a perfectionist.

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Uh, in order of posting, behold!

1. Big version.

2. Big version without lighting (except on the bricks) or Japanese characters.

3. Close up of magic spine representation thing because I'm proud of it.

4. Close up of gore-covered-Leo because I'm also proud of that. I have never drawn such...messy gore before. Fun fact, the group of layers all of that was on is called "Bad Stuff".

5. Close up of Donnie's shell stitches without the spine thing, because I worked hard on those. It was also pretty tricky, because I couldn't find any references for large stitched wounds. Only open ones. If anyone knows any good places for references like that, t'would be greatly appreciated. Also, they don't usually stitch puncture wounds, because it could trap infection, but I feel like with something so deep as dragon teeth it would be necessary? So I tried to include those, but also, would they just stitch the skin in such deep wounds? Is there still a gaping hole under the skin? Do they also stitch muscles or something? I'm like, going to go to med-school just so I can draw more accurate wounds and stitches and stuff.

6. Close up on Leo without the gore because he's pretty and I'm really proud of the plastron. And the right forearm armour piece. I couldn't get the other ones to look as nice, much to my dismay.

The Japanese characters write out to Omae wa hitoribocchi da, which translates to You are alone. I think. Google Translate says it's You are all alone, but translation services that I trust slightly more, like Reverso.net and ChatGPT (the most reliable of sources, I know) just say You are alone.

Omae is the equivalent of anata, for those familiar with Anata wa hitori janai. They both mean you, but omae is more...condescending, from what I can tell. Informal and rough, often used to express disdain or superiority.

Wa indicates that anata or omae are the subject of the sentence.

Hitori is present in both, meaning alone, though from what I can see, hitoribocchi is more...desolate and painful. It's a more emotional term for being alone.

Janai kind of means is not, or are not, while da is just like...closing the sentence. A firm, declarative ending particle.

I tried to paste characters from different translation services, but Tumblr wouldn't let me. Boo. So you can all suffer with my English-Japanese. Also, don't trust anything I say. I'm learning Japanese on Duolingo, but I've only just started and it gets way more complicated. So, pretty much anything I just said could be wrong. I just did a lot of research.

If anyone does speak Japanese, and knows a better way to convey this, please tell me. I crave knowledge and accuracy.

I should get like, a personal human translator. No AI or program can truly understand a language like its people. Especially comparing Japanese and English. From what I've learned, there are a lot of words that could be translated many ways, depending on exact feel. It's complicated, and I'm scared to get further into Duolingo's course.

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If i had my way, they would have had their hug at the end of the episode where Donnie gets disintegrated. Donnie obviously would be recovering from the trauma of literally dying, and Raph, having just watched ANOTHER family member die, would probably be suffocating to Donnie and never leave him for a second like he did with Leo in s2. With all that going on, a hug seems inevitable.

The thing is, Donnie never went through the same growth. He never got those moments of support. Sure, Mikey hugs him all the time, but it was never in a situation where Donnie felt he needed it. It's clear throughout the show that this idiot is terrible at admitting when he's wrong or needs help, and so when hes in distress his natural instinct is to keep it to himself and shut down. He offers comfort to others often, and is well aware of when the people around him need help, but never calls attention to his own emotional needs, which is stupid bc his dumbahh doesn't realize he needs that support just as much as anyone else.

Additionally i thought it would make the most sense for Raph to be the one to act first and hug Donnie. Think about it: at this point in the show, I think he's been through the most emotionally, and had the most change in his attitude towards his family since the beginning of the show. Season 1 Raph would never even think of hugging Donnie because why would he want or need to? S5 Raph, on the other hand, has lived through hell and become horrifyingly aware of how quickly his loved ones could die. He's losing his edgy emotionless outer shell in favor of actually being open and honest with how he loves his brothers. Leo and Mikey both hugged him when he was in a state of total emotional ruin, and because of their support, reciprocating it to others comes more naturally to him. Obviously he's not 100% touchy-feely all the time, but theres a noticeable increase in how much he shows subtle signs of affection and encouragement to his siblings compared to before.

And then he gets disintegrated. Of course April ends up bringing him back (within like five minutes which is kinda bad writing but whatever, the writers hated for things to have permanent consequences), and it seems like such a natural next step for Raph, who's received this support and growth by now, to give it to Donnie who really needs it. It would be such a good and satisfying conclusion for Raphs subtle character arc since the first season, and simultaneously it would be great character development for Donnie, who's probably never receieved a hug from Raph in his whole life and is suddenly aware that oh my god, i actually am severely touch/affection starved. They both know that it's s not going to be easy to get over what happened, but for the first time maybe ever, Donnie feels supported by his brother, and Raph feels ready to give that support.