#elktaur

Dude has a (deserved) page on the sexyman wiki but is otherwise honestly ignored by the greater public...which, I think, is blessing and a curse.

It's a blessing cuz toxic fandom blorbo culture always hurts so more eyes would mean more toxicity; but a curse because Elktaur (and friends!) is kind of GOAT tumblr sexyman material, honestly.

He's:

Sad boi/broody boy with sad story.

No need for explanation thar; it's called an ensemble-darkhorse before the term "tumblr sexyman" came around.

+extra points for most of his misery being self-implemented. Except for the parts that aren't like when humans are centaur-racist to him.

He's both super serious and adorkable.

Either between his two halves or whole. Elktaur is adorkable, uncharacteristically "srs" centaur who acts more like a Disney lead than he does a zany-2010s baby or a basic anime protag, which is what further isolates himself from other centaurs around him AND the visiting humans sans Mysterious Woman. He's clearly the straight man of his rift working crew who don't really listen to him any more than the other humans.

The General, despite being the most disliked part of Elktaur by fans, is a stock anime lead with some grit and a friendly demeanor but still serious look at the world. Yet even he has some dork moments like when he fawns over Becky Apple's murders.

And then there's Nowhere King/the Elk who is an absolutely HORRIFIC, serious villain for the show with a song about farts-- yet even his ID (the elk Horse meets inside his head) has funny moments of just always wanting to talk about food. Yes, I know there's a fan theory/implication he's food obsessed because of what the General did to him; I think it's even funnier that without that when Nowhere King isn't 95% hate, he's 3% simp and 2% foodie.

His designs throughout the show all are peak and/or appeal to basically all kind of fan-types.

Elktaur's design is the most controversial because of how realistic he appears which isn't entirely addressed in the show so people are just baffled by how he looks. Having drawn him so much I have to admit I've gotten used to him looking the way he does. Still, doesn't mean his 'whole' look doesn't have fans cause oh lord he does. I think it needs to be said in the show exactly why he looks the way he does (it's because he's influenced by the human world and human-perspective, according to Megan). If nothing else, centaurs = animalistic monster-creatures which means Elktaur has appear in two major camps.

His design is very easy to reasemble with a simple edit:

If nothing else, centaurs = animalistic monster-creatures which means Elktaur has appear in two major camps.

General is a pretty handsome man all things considered (Wammawink agrees).

Nowhere King's design is so rad. It comprises of what's only four colors (three when his eyes aren't on), but it's still intricate and unique. As the rising popularity of creepy deer become more and more common he still stands out as his own, unique deer abomination and it's just awesome.

His voice actors are AMAZING!!

Brian Stokes Mitchel (Elktaur/Nowhere King) and Brian D'arcy James (General) are theater people. My mom and I had a bonding moment in 2021 when I explained who the character(s) was and who was voicing him/them because she'd managed to see both Brians on stage .

Brian D'archy James played Shrek in the musical (which is the real reason he tried to kill the elk; this is his swamp), Nick Bottom in Something Rotten, Next to Normal and was even King George in Hamilton a few times. Sadly he doesn't have nearly as many voice roles as Mitchel does.

Besides being Don Quixote in Man of La Mancha, Sweeney freakin Todd once, Coalhouse in Ragtime for stage, if you recognize his voice from anything it's probably being the singing voice of Jethro in The Prince of Egypt and Granpop on Vampirina if you have little kids.

He's a sexyman of color!!

And I mean, hey, we can never have enough of those with how freakin wonderbread and basic this damn site is. Also I don't just mean his VAs; I think canonically he is a centaur man/person of color as human.

He's a possible trans metaphor.

Not trans myself so I can't tell you how to feel yourself about this but apparently some trans fans REALLY like him for this so yeah why not? He and Ariel can hang out. That'd be a weeeird conversation.

He has a canonical love interest who he simps so hard for he literally broke the universe.

I don't know if it's JUST a me-thing, but a huge factor for what makes a sexyman sexyman-able is whether or not they have a deeply rooted chemistry with another character in the cast. It can be an absolute rivalry/hatred thing going on*, a friendship, family or romantic but it has to come from somewhere and that's what makes fangirls scream.

Elktaur's most horrific personal trait passed on to his two halves is also his most endearing, and that's the love he feels for the Mysterious Woman. His own self-hatred is what literally tore him apart and caused her and the rest of the world so much grief (still hate how everyone just glosses over the way nwk gaslights her upon their reunion; though it seems like he's the half that's still earnestly in love w her that is the fact of the matter), but his motivation to do so is to just BE IN THE SAME WORLD as the woman he loves, who's also the only person around him who wants to talk to/listen to him. While as the Nowhere King he only wants to die by HER hand and with HER by his side.

--The only thing worse than season 2 not giving us more Mysterious Woman scenes as she herself is a really compelling character and deserves respect, is how much lesserknownwaifus keeps rejecting my submissions of her. She's gorgeous. She's ALWAYS BEEN gorgeous even before we saw her younger-princess self. Her waifu levels are so high that she's literally the unwanted waifu of the main villain but APPARENTLY she's not lesserknownwaifu-worthy. HEATHENS! -thoughts of Nowhere King, probably.--

and most important of all:

He can be shipped with himself.

^relationship goals^ watch the scene on youtube

I saw exactly one other fanartist going this direction and it was sadly work that I can't show here on tumblr, but it bears repeating:

Unlike Oncest; which exists because tumblrfolks took the bad character development of the movie and made it into a weird-but-more-compelling thing than the movie itself, unlike Sans Undertale who, as far as we know, is ALSO only shipped with himself because of canon,

Nowhere King and General are two parts of the same person CANONICALLY and can be shipped together to your heart's content.

Peak sexyman 10/10. Cinnamon roll: to unwholesome and hatefilled for this world. Hail to the king.

Like a part of it really is to emphasize that the Elktaur and Nowhere King do have this uglier side to them that ppl kinda gloss over and it’s known as the General. They suffered entirely because of their willingness to do the same to a clone of themselves if positions were reversed so it is basically karma. Likewise you can’t condemn the General so easily while sympathizing with the Elktaur.

Especially as. While the other would’ve done the same so it’s kind of a moot point. It still stands that the General only hurt one person who intentionally threatened his happiness. Whereas the Nowhere King went out of his way to transform and murder countless humans and ravage an entire world just to get back at one guy. Like it wasn’t even for survival he just wanted the gratification of revenge. Compare that to the General prioritizing his own life over everyone else’s but at least not going out of his way to kill people who had nothing to do with it. At least you could largely call the General a reactive survivor.

This does lead to my other suggestion which is that I kinda wish the Mysterious Woman got be pissed at the Nowhere King too and not just feel torn up. After a certain point she is more angrily judgmental towards the General who fucked up one dude VS the Nowhere King who fucked up her entire world. You could argue the General started it but in the end, NK chose to escalate personal beef into a full-blown war and so he’s objectively the worse person in terms of actions on a Hydrogen Bomb VS Coughing Baby level.