CE: Abandonment

... What have I done.

I knew there was a reason why I never watched SAINW again after the first viewing. I knew there was a reason why I always avoided thinking more deeply into it. I knew there was a reason why my instincts were like "hold on, do you really want to go there again?" when I began typing it into Youtube, so then why did I just...

Oh shell. My feels.

The physical pain, that's right.

That was the reason.

This is for the SAINW contest being held at -- It's their last day, and I thought it would be fun to join, but hnng, owowowww, re-watching the episode to get some ideas and then watching an awesome fan-animation on Youtube (www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCvE-M… - Please watch it. It's amazing and it totally KO'ed my feels, especially the ending) really did a number on me. It was meant to be fun, but instead it actually hurt to make because this is so sad.

Just-- urgh-- too many feels and I can literally feel my heart breaking the more I think about this.

I'll endure the pain for a little longer to tell you some things, though. The theme for the contest had been "Abandonment" and at first, I really wanted to do a picture with Donnie and Leo. But after re-watching the episode, I realised that it was Mikey who actually voiced out his feelings of "abandonment" and therefore, I figured it was more fitting for him to be in this picture.

I'd like to think that in the end of SAINW, Mikey didn't die alone (like Raph and Leo didn't die alone--in a way). So after Donnie beat Shredder, he knelt by Mikey and was with him in his final breaths.

Actually, the first picture I had in mind was a "Just Desserts" kind of picture--it was going to have Donnie just broken/shocked/in tears as he knelt behind one of his brothers' body, with the overall theme of: "I abandoned you; you're now abandoning me; this is justice; this is fair" and just leaving him shattered. But I couldn't do that to him, because his brothers didn't abandon him out of spite like it would've felt like if I'd drawn it with that intention.

So instead, in this picture, Mikey never intended to abandon Donnie--just like Donnie never intended to abandon them. But he did, despite having no control over it, and Mikey's situation is the same (along with his brothers): he's abandoning Donnie, but not by his own choice.

...

SAINW universe: I hate you. You make my heart break.

Anyway, good luck to all the other entrants! I'm going to mend my heart by drawing cute, lively turtle tots now.

PS: I tried to make Mikey's smile reminiscent of the old days--of his old smile. And that's a bucket full of symbolism on its own and I can't take the feels punch right now. Ouuuch.