losing my gotdamn mind

Still one of the best animations I've ever done. Took just under a week and was equal parts fun and challenging. So here are some process passes! The full version had too many colors so I had to do some compression T0T

"The hat is customizable," he said, struggling with the velcro patch on the front. "If I need it, I have an ICE one too. I pick based off the business i walk into."

"Customizable is an important hat descriptor," I said. "what can I get you?"

"You wouldn't believe how offended people get these days," he said. "And I'm supposed to do something about it if you're offended? You chose to be offended!"

"We all have hundreds of thousands of decisions everyday," I said. I thickened my accent. "That's what my stepdad always said. But I can make one easier - we have a delicious Ethiopian roast available."

"Like if I told you you have a bull ring," he said, "because bulls have rings in their noses. Is that offensive?"

I laughed. "I've heard that before."

"It's a joke, but people get offended. Maybe you're offended."

I looked at him. I smiled. "You aren't trying to offend me though, right?"

Of course he was. I was being friendly and the friendlier I was, the faster he switched topics. He was saying anything inflammatory he could think of to see if I'd take the bait. After about 20 minutes of my redirecting and deescalating, he settled into a more normal interaction. He took up too much of my time showing me a product I'd feigned mild interest in to get him to stop talking about getting accused of inappropriate behavior at work. When we finally disengaged, he spent 10 minutes trying to catch my eye again. When he failed, he left.

There's this new breed of customer who insists on trying to incite political conversation through their clothing and, when that doesnt work, their snide little comments. If I owned my own business, maybe I would have given the guy the fight he wanted. But I work for a corporation and I love paying my bills so I deescalated.

Susie had a whole thing about hiding her tail, right?

And it's clear that Susie is actually empathising with Orange with her situation.

Susie trying to reassure Orange that it's okay they aren't human or look like the others...

And this one is the most interesting, because it seems the whole thing about "pretending to have the odd one fit in" clearly upset Susie here. Normally, Susie isn't someone that would resort to back to "beating up enemies" like in Ch 1, but its clear that she didn't like the direction of how things were going that she forces the group to act in this way.

We know that Kris' whole thing is about how they feel different from the rest of the town for being the only human in a town full of monsters, right? Orange seems to be a reflection of this, yet it's SUSIE, not Kris, who empathises with Orange the most here, out of all of the 7 Flowers. They even have a whole thing about them being HUNGRY when we first meet them, and Susie has food insecurity.

The whole hiding the tail thing, humans not having tails, Susie trying to reassure Orange that it's okay to be different.

Guys. Do you not realise what this is all implying?

Could Susie have lived with humans...?

That's why Susie was triggered when they tried to pretend to be a mouse to make Orange fit in. Because that's what happened to her. Susie says that those who usually tried to be friends with her often did it as a joke.

Holy shit.

Orange is a parallel to younger Susie just like how Aqua is a parallel to younger Kris. (And note that cyan and orange as considered opposites/complimentary in UTDR with the whole "moving vs staying still" mechanics of the two.)

There's also the fact that Orange is the one who ends up becoming besties with Pink. Pink being the Kris + Player parallel... Orange and Pink is Susie and Kris. oh my god.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BOBBY BOY HAPPY BOBBY BOY DAY!!