Every artist has their inspirations

My obsessions as a kid have remained a building block for how I am the way I am (for better or for worse.)

• Powerpuff Girls is my primary thought. Bubbles in particular spoke to my sensitive, crybaby self.
• Pokemon is prominent to this very day- despite my mixed feelings on recent generations, it remains as one of my favorite ip's of all time.
• Fullmetal Alchemist was more an influence in my teenage years, but it's such a rock solid show that ages so, so well for the most part.

  I was a cartoon network kid despite watching the big three in the 00's. Nick and Disney were also important to me, but I think the shows that left the biggest impact on me have been on CN. Hate the network and their business practices, but I'll always cherish shows like Ed Edd n' Eddy and Billy and Mandy. Honorable mentions go to Code Lyoko and Robotboy. Robotboy especially gained a resurgence in my adulthood when episodes were being uploaded for free on Youtube. I have my gripes with the show, but the art style is charming as all hell, and I blame it and My Life as a Teenage Robot for creating a total obsession with robot characters in high school.

  I forgot about Megaman, dear god Megaman did some weird things to my brain when I was introduced to it in sophomore year of high school. Raen had sent me a playlist of songs written by musical artist Hyadain, and if it's gay, I'm going to climb over it and hiss at anyone trying to remove me. I'm fucking terrible at the games, but the designs are so charming and clever, and I developed the worlds biggest crushes on Skullman and Shademan, I was OBSESSED FOR SO LONG. I carry so much love in my heart for animation and character design, and my life would be completely unimaginable without incredible shows to show me what joy can feel like.

  As for comic books, I don't think I started reading those until I had a better grasp on my literacy in the latter half of elementary school. I did have my own collection of sunday funnies from the newspaper that I would reread endlessly, and I would check out (and forget to return) so many Nancy Drew books. It was questionable if I even understood what was happening half the time, but I found it fascinating to have that medium be possible and just as engaging as cartoons.

  Everything shifted, though, by the time I was introduced to manga. It was this limitless new section of art that I had never seen before, and it changed the course of my life forever. I know I'm being dramatic sounding, but you need to consider the fact that adolescence is the most influential parts of a young person's life. Anything that happens can shape how they view the world forever. Art takes up so much of my time and energy because I can never stop thinking about it. I would not be myself if I could not engage with art anymore. I basically shaped my entire identity surrounding it, to the point that when I have a hard time with art, I question my value as a human being.

  There have been periods of my life where I would make some kind of project happen every single day, I would animate or paint or write, post it to the Internet to show what I'm proud of, look at others work online, feel this need to continue adding to the endless stream of artistic expression, make friends (even if I suck at keeping them,) keep discovering and learning- Lord knows just how many of my files from back in the day have been lost to time, made with the sheer force of a 12 year old wanting to keep honing his craft. It was such a great means of escape from the home life I was rotting away in, left to my devices because every mistake I made never went unpunished.

  But anyway, I was somehow introduced to the graphically violent comic, JOHNNY THE HOMOCIDAL MANIAC.

  

  im trying to embed a picture of the fucker but it wont work.

  NEVERMIND IT UPDATED WHEN I WASNT LOOKING ANYWAY

  It was lent to me at the tender age of 14, and my already edgy interests had accrewed another member to its collection. Oh god, oh fuck, the weird things this book did to my little pubescent BRAINMEAT.

  I didn't watch much Invader Zim at that point, but I could see the resemblance clear as day. I was utterly fascinated with this darker media that my parents would fucking kill me if they found out I'd been reading it. Having grown up in a very Christian household, anything taboo like sex and violence stirred my brain like a terrible, meaty slushy. This was like finding a treasure chest full of chum. I. Loved it. It was a miracle I even managed to return it to the owner considering how long and how frequently I was grounded, and honestly, with them being about 4-5 years older than me, I don't think it was responsible at all for them to lend it to me (and definitely not great that they also suggested the manga Loveless which is a really gross manga, don't look it up) but at the same time, it felt so cathartic so see a character like Nny experience these violent tendencies towards judgemental people. I felt validated in a way for feeling so viscerally when someone is unnecessarily cruel to me or other people. Also he kills a pedopohile, so Nny is really cool in my book.

  My point in all this is just about the fact that even though I don't think I had the best of influences, it's also important to let art like this exist. So much of my life, I've suffered with severe mental illness that did not go addressed until I was already an adult and the damage to my self image and social skills had been done. And while I still experience these terrible aches inside my mind, I think I would still be hurting far worse if I didn't have the proper outlets to express the sadness and fury that continually haunts me. I'm not going to go into detail why or how I feel the way I do. But it's been good to just acknowledge that I feel like shit.

  I can't think of a way to conclude this, maybe I'll add more about my inspirations as an adult, I don't fucking know.