cognitive dissonance!!!!!!!! march 2021-onward

content warnings: discussion of abuse, substance abuse and addiction, child neglect, parental death (in childbirth), pedophilia and grooming; mentions of rape and incest; use of the r word.

cognitive dissonance has been in the works since march of 2021- 5 years now! i started this comic during a particularly bad time in my life. i didn't know what i wanted o do with the story until 2023. it actually started off as a paranormal story, but i realized it was going nowhere, so i decided to go with a more 'slice of life' approach, which stuck very well. some of the very first comics i ever sketched for it are still part of development!! cd has been there for me in a lot of rough patches, it will always be the project closest to my heart.

since i was about 8 years old, i have had great interest in comics. my first major comics that i stuck with (cd, 'ghosts realm', and 'your law is within my heart') were created, however, when i was bout 12. my interest in making comics- particularly a webcomic- was emphasized and brought to action by my interest in the webcomic by the name of 'ghost eyes'. anyone who knows it probably feels fear struck directly into their heart at the mention of it, particularly if you were ever in the fandom, especially in 2020 and onwards. i really, honestly, could not reccomend this comic, but to say it hasn't inspired a very large group of artists my age and even a bit older would be simply untrue.

many of the main characters in cd are, unfortunately, inspired by ghosts eyes main cast (alastor-rudy, fionn-bennet, (original concept of) cody-tobias), but they have developed much farther and taken on more inspiration from other characters, but most importantly real people i know in real life. alastor has been based off of 2 of my best friends from childhood (and to this day), ren has taken on a major inspiration from my girlfriend, chin-sun is an indirect insert of an ex, mikael inspired by a short-term ex girlfriend and dear friend of mine, so on and so forth.

many of the characters also take a lot of inspiration from me and my own life. primarily, fionn started as a manifestation of my worst traits. aggresive, posessive, controlling, overemotional. he has always been an abusive person, but the ways in which have changed over time; particularly as i experienced abuse myself, and abused others, foolishly. i imagine him as my worst potential. anyways, all of these characters are meant to feel human; i want them to seem like real people you could know, or people you do. specific and diverse representation has always been my ultimate goal with this story.

cd has a cast of 30+ characters, which is obscene, but they aren't all relevant to the story, although relevant enough to exist. at it's conclusion, it will probably have a lot of spin-off style substories, due to the large cast. that being said, allow me to start introducing them! this illustration specifically is a bit old but is the most accurate lineup i have.

let's go from left to right!

(lennox) fionn schulz (he/it/they, 18): alastors boyfriend of multiple years. german-born, visiting them in california only to be a nuisance. abrasive and largely disliked, only defended by his adoring girlfriend.

alastor lucille simone (he/she, 17): the main character!! a problematically anti-confrontational young 'lady' who loves all things pink. struggles with a fear of change and refusal to accept much needed help. the first character designed, ever, though her design has changed quite possibly the most.

ren adachi (they/any, 18): alastors best friend since childhood. affected greatly by a flat affect, but not at all lacking in opinons. just wants the best for her. extremely nerdy and smart, but usually pretty unassuming, flies under the radar to most.

chin-sun yoon (she/any, 20): a now minor character, but plays a huge role in rens backstory. is entirely missing from the main narrative. it wasn't always this way, but ya know, stuff changes.

kalice petrova (she/her, 17): another major character; best friend of mingmei! a young trans woman whos family would never accept or help her. pitiful and sad, like a puppy in a soggy box on the porch in the rain; willing to let people walk all over her, much to her detriment. loving, adoring, and deeply cares for others. a very sweet young lady.

mingmei xu (she/her, 17): kalices best friend since middle school. despite being raised with a total ignorance to queerness, shes aggresively accepting of kalice, and loves her to pieces. very pleasant when she's in a good mood, but... that's rare. seems to be struggling with her own self and identity. a chinese immigrant, sent to live with her grandparents, across the world from the rest of her family.

jacklynn (jacky) dunn (she/they, 16): a very minor character. close friends with alastor and mika, and has a dubious relationship with pearl. a rambunctious young woman, only daughter of columbian immigrants, eager to contribute to the local scene. she is, however, often hindered by the perspectives she's adopted from her parents...

pearl kovacik (they/them, 16): another minor character, but important to alastors back story; ex-homoerotic-middleschool-situationship-thing. after immigrating from the baltic with their dubious older brother, they were eager to break away from the restrictions set upon them by their parents. hangs around jacky, mika, and some other characters (introduced later).

mikael katz (he/any, 19): a major character and my personal favorite from the cast, only competed with by alastor. a young man struggling with generational addiction and abuse cycles. takes care of various younger siblings and cousins (introduced later).

daisy "envy" rez (she/her, 18): a severely unstable runaway, coincidentally also from the baltics, but with no affiliation (pearl thinks this is so cool but daisy couldn't care less). volatile, impulsive, selfish, self-centered. rancid woman, but she's beautiful, knows how to "act good".

the following characters are not very important to the story (though dear to my heart) so pardon their scarce bios...

sherlynn himura: (she/any, 19): a mild-mannered trans woman of an immigrant family. not super important to the core story, but helps ren a lot later. popular amongst the theater troupes and helps out at the highschool theater, since she was VAPA pres before graduating.

percy sophia nowak (any, 21): an eccentric fashionista, close friend of mikael. very strange and offputting. kind to the younger cast.

malaika okoye (she/her, 19): mysterious to the main cast, but a good friend of percy. very compassionate and mellow.

raeni facey (she/her, 18): a disabled young lady who loves fashion. very kind and loves talking with alastor about fashion when she happens to cross paths with her, usually when visiting mika with percy.

bingwen xie (she/any, 18): an east asian runaway. eccentric and submissive, with no known family besides the girls. says strange things.

now, as for characters not shown in the initial drawing, here's an old set of cast lineups.

in this image is background character ariyah lewis (she/her, 14). she is close friends with kyndal and pessi (introduced below), and one of alastors adopted freshmen. very typical baby gay egirl...

in this image, alongside already introduced chaacters, is (a crude depiction of) Spencer Blau (he/him, 17). he is a very troubled young man, chronically online, prone to screaming fits. vocalist for mikael, jacky, and pearls band, 'dermal penetration' (introduced later).

in this image is kyndal bough (he/him, 14), adopted by alastor by proxy of being friends with ariyah. super repressed trans man. can be sweet. has been depicted with a small crush on mika, just from seeing him around, but i don't think this will make it into the comic ;(.

norah guerro (any, 19) is sherlynns girlfriend with no plot relevance, an insert of somebody i used to know. andy has been scrapped. tyler smith (25, he/him) is a loser with no plot relevance, simply the groomer boyfriend of spencer that might get mentioned offhandedly once or twice, but is likely to be scrapped.

in this image, alongside daisy is areal kovacik (he/they, 20), pearls older brother. he is not very important to the main events technically, but may be part of a ren-centered subplot eventually? groomer of ren who isn't "technically" a pedophile. pearl hates him and does every extra curricular to stay out of their apartment, ever since he brought ren home one day. mars amin (she/her, 15) is an insert of my only friend in 8th grade; a very timid and sweet girl. pessi mckellar (any, 15) is friends with ariyah and kyndal, very spunky young fellow.

this image contains dual illustrations of alastor and fionns parents respectively, including a last name mixup of alastors parents. salem abrams is alastors father; abusive, neglectful, a drunk- ever since the death of her mother, lucille simone, who died giving birth to alastors sister (ariyana simone, 5, introduced later). she was also not very nice, either, controlling and dictating much of what alastor was allowed to do.

on the right is fionns mother, jennifer regina "jeena" schulz, and his estranged father. his mother is a drunk with a severely dependent personality, often behaving in ways deemed emotionally incestuous. he has never known his dad, as he had no interest in having a child, "especially not with jeena".

now, onto mikaels family, as it is largely individual sketches..

left is ivanka nadezhda katz, mikaels mother. on the right is her sister and mikaels aunt, mother of apollo and rufus (introduced later). they are part of a drug and child trafficking ring whihc mika has narrowly saved the youngest children from.

this image depicts the youngest of the children that mika takes care of. apollo (5), annie (7), and willow and willoughby (fraternal twins, 9). apollo is timid and mild-mannered, but very sensitive. annie is rambunctious and energetic and has a liking for alastor. she clings to mikael and can be bratty. the twins are rowdy, and often roughhouse with annie; they may try with apollo, but he is too scared and just gets beaten up, which "isn't as fun". they used to hang out with rufus, but as he got older, he wasn't interested anymore.

this image includes mia (11) and rufus (13). mia suffers various birth defects (due to drug abuse during pregnancy) and is "remarkably slow", but very sweet. easily confused and scared, and gets overwhelmed easily. closest with annie. rufus gets into fights often and is on the typical 13 year old emo rebellious streak, but he's also being severely neglected and abused, so it's considerably worse than a 'regular' child. fights mika often.

on the left is rebecka anderson (she/her, 25), the middle is jessicka roberta (she/her, 28) and the right is a girl named mariana (unknown). jessicka is the oldest sister of mikael, and rebecka is the middle child; mikael is the youngest, or was, before the youngest kids came around. the family lived in colorado before moving to california when mika was very young.

rebecka and jessicka were taken after a report was made by a teacher that involved police coming to the school. the rest of the family fled with nearly none of their belongings. mikael was lucky to get in contact with rebecka around the time the twins were born, and found she had moved to california, only a few hours away. she visits from time to time to bring groceries when mika is having a hard time.

mariana is a woman who was kind to mika in a situation where others had not been. he only saw her once, and has spent the rest of his live quietly hoping she would turn up again someday. she won't, though.

now onto the last 4 characters with little significance but have been drawn!

this image consists of alastors little sister, ariyana simone, at the top left. she is sweet and timid, relatively traumatized; she has been raised by alastor. on the right is cody or samuel (17 but 12 when his story means anything). he is one of the first characters designed for this story, and was initially the main character, but was scrapped within a year or two. he is now a character with only a little importance to alastors backstory. and on the bottom is valentine (17), an insert of a friend i had at 13-14 who absolutely adored fionn. i drew this not long after i think she cut ties with me so it is hateful, which i apologize for if she ever sees this. i still love this character today, because she was very important to me, and i can guess why she stopped talking to me. she is fionns ex.

this is a single doodle of a character with signifance to alastors backstory who will make a reappearance in the comics, just once though, probably. hes a dick.