Lovin The Cronch

March 31

Tumblr user @sexy-people-contests-2026 posts the first round of their tumblr sexy jester/clown poll bracket. Entries were collected via community form, in which a user submitted vtuber Gavis Bettel.

April 3

Cover Corporation (parent company of Hololive Production) announces that they are downsizing their male vtuber branch, Holostars. Company support is almost entirely pulled from their 12 Japanese talents. Fans of their 10 English talents worry that they could be next on the chopping block. A larger discussion on how these talents are marketed by the company also begins.

April 7

Bettel wins his first round against Laughing Jack and moves onto the next round. In this next match up he is put against Shadow Milk Cookie from Cookie Run Kingdom.

April 8

Gavis Bettel hits 200k subscribers on YouTube.

April 9

Twitter users are made aware of the poll. Users start coming back to their old tumblr accounts or create new ones to start voting for Bettel.

April 10

Bettel becomes aware of the poll.

He also becomes a popular pick for people who are mad at the writing decisions made in Cookie Run Kingdom.

People also start making joke ship art between Bettel and Shadow Milk (bettelmilk)

April 15

Bettel wins the second round and moves on to round three.

In this round he is put against Pomni from The Amazing Digital Circus.

He talks about the poll bracket on his Week in Review stream and admits he has never used tumblr. Viewers inform him of classic tumblr memes and stories. He also asks the social media team from Bandai Namco America (they often appear in his chat) to get on their defunct tumblr to vote for him (they can't access the account).

April 18

Bettel has an unarchieved karaoke stream to celebrate 200k subscribers, the runner of the of the polls tunes in.

April 19

The official Holostars EN twitter and Instagram accounts make ominous posts about the poll since they are unable to directly link to it due to company policy.

April 20-21

Bettel makes one last rallying cry to see if he can get people to vote for him. He receives endorsements from other vtubers including Elira Pendora, Shu Yamino, and Yu Q. Wilson.

The illustrator for his vtuber model, Senzaki Makoto, also becomes aware of the poll and says she will draw him if he wins the bracket.

April 22

With a rally of support from across the vtuber fan sphere, Bettel is able to beat Pomni.

We're inconsolable

Pain, grief, loss,

And I say this from a place of love.

Hobie is a dork.

Is he the coolest Spiderperson in the movie? Yes, by 1000%. Am I obsessed with him? Also 1000%. But he’s very, very Spider-dork. 

Punk is an extremely flexible identity/philosopohy/belief system, and living it out is very different from being perceived as “punk.” To convince others you are “punk” you have to perform it effectively. Hobie’s world is a post capitalist hellscape, an anarchist dystopia, like the garbage strike in the 1970s that birthed punk in the first place, and he’s a punk because that’s an important and necessary way to be resiliant in his own universe. 

But when he’s with the other spiders? He’s just playing. He’s funny. He’s inconsistant. He’s a goofball. He goes for obvious punchlines about Mayday. He’s just as much of a science nerd as any of them, but he lets them underestimate his scientific abilities so that he can rip shit off the wall and repurpose it while they all ignore the disruptor because that’s just Hobie, wrecking the place. 

He realizes Miguel is dangerously full of rage before anyone else in HQ and as he watches what Miles goes through he is creating and evolving his escape plan. He uses the persona to convince everyone that he’s just obstinate and stupid, but his smart little spider mind is humming away under that fabulous head of hair, breaking everything down.

He’s also extremely community minded, which isn’t part of what outsiders see as punk but is absolutely what being an effective Spider is all about. (it’s also what real world punks are like but nvm.) Even though he seems like he’s not interested in being part of the squad, he shows up to help. He gives Gwen a place to crash (and i think it was platonically). His first words to Miles are advice to empower him (”use the whole hand”) because he’s the friendly neighbourhood Spider Man still. He’s got his cool jacket and his cool guitar and his cool hair and he uses all of those to hide. He watches all of them carefully and decides in advance who is worthy of his loyalty, and then he’s all in.

Being loved is NOT a reward for being beneficial or useful in any way. You don't become less deserving of being loved if you aren't productive for a day or if you have a bad day and can't get out of bed.