Salutations Gregarious Galvanizers!

We’re here to bring you our very last newsblog for April 2022 and we wanted to end this month off with a bang! We’ve got some pretty cool sneak peeks for you for some things we’re working on, tips on some awesome entertainment you just have to experience for yourself, and a nugget of other cool stuff we’d like to share with you. We hope this month of April has treated you spectacularly and that this newsblog brings you much joy as we venture on to our next month’s set of updates to come!

1) Showing Off Some More Visual Development on Our Characters! -

From the Department of Comic Development’s Visual Development Division

We wanted to show you another sneak peek of one of our characters in our upcoming webcomic Soul Canvas. We’re pressing hard to finish writing the outline for Season 1 of our comic next month. In the meantime, Pixie is hard at work redesigning, tweaking existing designs, and designing brand-new characters. In this sneak peek, we wanted to show you some new visual development that we’ve been putting one of our supporting characters through. You all have met Terric before and, in this character sheet, we wanted to show more of the design process for him. In this sheet, we are also showing off another aspect of his character as a thief with his signature hook-blades that he uses in the streets of Fraeon for quick getaways and combat with the castle guards. These handy-dandy tools have allowed Terric to get out of some pretty intense situations in his past. They have been instrumental in helping him survive his solitary life after a horrible tragedy that happened to him long ago. Curious to learn more about Terric and his tumultuous past? Keep your eyes peeled for more of our updates to learn more and read Soul Canvas when it comes out next year to find out! Also, what do you think about his design? Please write to us at thebearandpixieblog@gmail.com to let us know what you think of her new look!

2) An Incredible Story of Swords and Survival! –

From the Department of Animated Storytelling

Pixie and I have been rewatching some of our favorite anime shows lately and one day we found ourselves binging one of the most incredible stories, in our opinion, ever produced; Sword Art Online. This a staple series in the world of anime that is a must-see. In fact, this show was the very first piece of anime entertainment that I ever watched! This show’s amazing story, massively deep characters, and a spectacularly well thought-out setting. Set within the domain of a virtual reality MMORPG (massive multiplayer online role-playing game) named after the show itself, the characters of Kirito, Asuna, and all find themselves captive within the world of the game indefinitely. The only way to get out is by beating the game by reaching the 100th floor and defeating the final boss. However, there’s a catch. If you die in the game, you die in real life. Who will survive? Will they ever beat the game? Those are the questions that hang over the entire first season of the show. For us, the first season of this fantastic anime is its best. Unfortunately, the other seasons never could match the quality of the beginning season (although they are still very good in their own right). Overall, Pixie and I would say that the show itself is an 8 out of 10 on our official Bear & Pixie rating system. The first season, on its own, is a definite 9 out of 10. We highly recommend you watch this show as it is for sure essential viewing within anime culture for its high-quality storytelling, characterization, and worldbuilding. What are you waiting for?! Go check this one out for yourself! You can find it on CrunchyRoll if you have a subscription. Click on the picture below to go watch it now! [WE ARE NOT SPONSORED BY ANY COMPANY. We are only giving you a genuine, un-sponsored recommendation.]

3) Artist Shout-Out -

From the Artist Relations Department

This week’s Artist Shout-Out was an easy pick. Once you see their work, you’ll know why it was such a no-brainer to pick them for this edition of our Artist-Shout. Without further ado, we’d like to give this week’s Artist Shout-Out that goes by the name of Geneva on Instagram. Geneva is a wonderful comic and character artist that creates the webcomic Hovergirls (published on WEBTOON). She also draws these amazing character pieces that are full of vibrant color, very clean line work, and an inherent eye for design that makes every piece of their art stand out. Below, we have the link to Geneva’s Instagram and Store for you to check out. We highly recommend you do so as their art definitely deserves a follow as well as whatever support you can give. Please go check out both links if you feel so inclined and read her webcomic Hovergirls on WEBTOON if you’re interested! [We are not sponsored by Geneva. We are only fans and genuinely wanted to give a shoutout.]

Artist’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gdbee/

Artist’s Store: https://gdbee.carrd.co

4) Saving the Planet and Creating Amazing Art All at the Same Time! -

From the Uplifting News Division

A little over a week ago, I saw this awesome article on the Good News Network about a group of volunteers who took 35 tons of recovered trash from the Oregon Coast and turned them into some amazing, massive animal sculptures. We thought this story was especially cool as it’s currently happening in our own backyard here in Oregon. It’s awesome that the Washed Ashore Project is doing some amazing work cleaning up our beautiful Oregon Coast and turning the trash left behind into wonderful works of art that gets to travel across the U.S for millions to see. Keeping our world clean and healthy is hugely important to us and it’s always inspiring to see our fellow humans do incredible things like this to help us all get one step closer to a cleaner, greener Earth! If you want to learn more about this amazing story for yourself and see the sculptures that were created with the recovered trash, please check out the link below! [We are NOT sponsored by any news organization. We are just wanting to share something cool with our incredible fans.]

Link to Article: https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/washed-ashore-makes-giant-marine-life-sculptures-with-ocean-plastic/

5) Another Hit by Robert Kirkman That Is Definitely Worth Reading! –

From the Storytelling Division of the Comics Department

It seems like once I find a group of creators that I love, I end up sticking with them for a long time! Another one of these cases is comic book creator Robert Kirkman. So far, I have told you about Invincible, an exceptional superhero comic that he created that has been turned into an amazing animated show on Amazon Prime. This week though, I wanted to highlight another one of his books that he made, with artist Lorenzo De Felici, called Oblivion Song that deserves a shout-out too. This book follows the character of Nathan Cole as he continues to clean up the mess of a trans-dimensional event that happened a decade ago in the city of Philadelphia. In that tragedy, creatures from another world came into our own and wreaked havoc and a whole part of Philadelphia was swallowed up into the other dimension in the process. Ten years after this event, Nathan continues to travel back and forth between this world of oblivion and our own, trying to recover any survivors who were taken to a horrible world full of death and a constant search for survival. It seems like no matter what he does, he cannot resist the pull of the Oblivion Song. This comic is full of what you’d expect from creator Robert Kirkman with its deep world, multi-faceted characters, and believable world. Honestly, it has been an absolute blast reading this comic. In fact, I would put it up there as one of my favorite comics of all time! I haven’t finished the story yet but, so far, I would give this comic an official 8 out of 10 Bear & Pixie rating and would highly recommend it to anyone who is looking for a great story to read in their spare time. If you are interested in reading this series, please check out the link below for an Amazon page that shows you all the volumes of this fantastic comic all in one place!

That's it for this one! Thank you for reading our newsblog. Our sponsor for this newsblog is…us! We don’t accept sponsors for our email list, and we never will. If you feel so inclined, it would mean a lot to us if you would like to support us in making our dreams and stories a reality. Ways to support us are all outlined below. Thank you so much for your time and love. Hope you have an amazing week!

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Warm hugs and happy wishes,

- Bear & Pixie