VivziePop
| Name: | Vivienne Medrano |
| Also Known As: | VivziePop, Vivzmind, Vivzie |
| Occupation: | Artist, Animator, Writer |
| Medium: | Animation |
| Works: | Hazbin Hotel, Helluva Boss, Zoophobia |
| Official Website(s): | YouTube, Twitter |
| Fan Website(s): | |
| On Fanlore: | Related pages |
Vivienne Medrano, known by her online pseudonym VivziePop (or previously as Vivzmind), is a popular artist and animator. She is best known for her webcomic Zoophobia and her animations Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss. She has been a long time member of DeviantART, and at a young age grew popular through there with her pseud Vivzmind, but has been inactive on DeviantART for some time now.
Medrano's projects are largely funded through Patreon and her commissions through social media sites such as Twitter go for a lot of money.
Viv studied at the School of Visual Arts and graduated in 2014. In 2012, she started a furry webcomic called Zoophobia which gained a large cult following. It is currently in indefinite hiatus since November 2016. In 2014 she uploaded her Die Young music video to YouTube, starting the character JayJay.
As well as animation, Viv provided the voice of "Sara with an H" on "Too Loud" among other additional voices replacing cartoonist Julie Vickerman when the production of Twelve Forever made recording for a show a scheduling conflict.[1]
Influence
Vivzie first began her popularity through DeviantART on her profile Vivzmind. Before she began animating or branching out, she was well liked for her "edgy" cartoon-y style, which held some similarities to Invader Zim. She mainly focused on a handful of original characters, such as a cat named Vanexa, a fox named Spam, a kangaroo named Kayla, and a chimera named Zillion. She expanded her cast and in 2012 began her webcomic Zoophobia. Zoophobia had a small cult following and was Vivzie's first work to gain major popularity. The webcomic has been on hiatus since 2016, but Viv still displays the characters on her social media.
During her education she released a number of short animations on Youtube. Her Die Young video featuring the original character JayJay was the most well received and earned her a spike in fans in 2014. The animation was smooth and matched the music well. This is arguably the most popular of her Youtube animations before Hazbin Hotel.
In 2019 Vivzie released Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss, with the former being better-known at the time. Hazbin Hotel was a pilot pitch rather than an actual episode of the show, produced with a full team of experienced animators and artists. The pilot was praised for its smooth animating, professional-sounding voice acting, and music. Hazbin Hotel gained more of a fandom following than any of her other works at the time. The large fan following included more critical attention, both pertaining to the quality/content of Hazbin and to various accusations and controversies about Vivzie.
Since then, Helluva Boss seems to have gained the largest fandom, in part likely because the series has had multiple episodes as opposed to Hazbin's single pilot. Kesha appears in the finale of the first season, Vivzie having created a popular furry based fan animation of her song Die Young several years earlier.
Controversy
VivziePop has been the subject of numerous controversies and accusations, most of them coming from a period of her life when she was in college and was just coming into a new wave of popularity due to her animated music videos on Youtube. She has been accused of drawing zoophilia, drawing underage sex, stealing/copying character designs, and supporting content creators who have done blackface and made transphobic jokes. Many of these accusations resurfaced when she had a new wave of popularity and attention due to Hazbin Hotel. Because she regularly gains new fans who are unaware of her history, some older ex-fans or others in the know have made an effort to try and ward off new fans by presenting them with these accusations.
Some of her new and ongoing fans point out that many of the "controversial" works offered as examples are years old, and Vivz has both grown as a person and changed her online habits - she no longer creates or ships the same kinds of characters she did ten years ago.
Zoophobia Art
One of the accusations was that Vivzie drew pedophilia and bestiality. This is in reference to an older artwork in which she drew a character from her Zoophobia webcomic (named Addison) naked in a bath of snakes. Fans debate whether this actually happened and whether or not Addison was even underage. While the Zoophobia Wiki says Addison is 18,[2] for a long time the page listed him as 17[3]; his age was changed 2019 because "viv has gone on record saying he is 18. the wiki wasnt updated." This can still be seen in the page's history. The zoophilia accusation comes from him seemingly being sexual with the snakes. The snakes may have also been a reference to another character of Vivzie who was an adult and based on a snake.[4][5] Fans have attempted to de-bunk this accusation by implying that the old artwork may not have even been drawn by Vivzie and could have been forged. Another character, who was an adult, was drawn drooling over a minor, with Vivzie tagging the art with "and Mirage would absolutly loooooooooove Krestral, in her sick pedo way XD."[6] Vivzie directly comments on the drawings of Addison with the snakes and the 19-year-old teacher. Though she was abhorred by her old "cringey" work, she didn't totally decry it, claiming that when she drew the 17-year-old and 19-year-old together, she herself was 19 and didn't "break the the law."
I Guess I now have to add that any cringey art I drew is from 2012 when I was 19. It was legal then, it's legal now (it was also tagged as being an inside joke? even back THEN). Do I think it's strange? YEAH it's cringey and I don't like it anymore than you guys do, I was a dumb kid figuring my self out, but I have never drawn explicit nsfw or broken the law then or now. fucking stop, please.
Conflict with Dollcreep
Vivzie has been accusing of stealing or copying the original character designs of the artist Dollcreep. Multiple instances of similarities between Vivzie and Dollcreep's art have been pointed out;[8] the instance that garnered the most discourse was surrounding a character named JayJay or JiJi. This is likely because Dollcreep was very vocal about and public about his accusations,[note 1] beginning after Vivzie posted her popular Die Young music video with the character.
Dollcreep ("Jo") was upset because, though Vivzie said she legally bought the character JiJi from them, Vivzie did not give Dollcreep credit for the design in her Die Young video. Vivzie said in a DeviantART note that the reason she did not give Dollcreep credit was because Dollcreep had been acting rude and disrespectful to her, so she just gave them a a special thanks in her music video instead. She also claimed that Dollcreep got JiJi's design from another artist altogether, so that the design wasn't actually Dollcreep's to claim.[9] A lot of drama between the two ensued, particularly on Tumblr.
...i don’t attack CRITICS IN GENERAL ,NOR MY FANS, i don’t take credit for all the good things,no one hates me in the real world cause i’m an actual honest charm, and if i ever did anything with HER characters she sold me, id fucking CREDIT HER as the DESIGNER. EVEN AFTER ALL THIS, I WOULD. Cause you know why? i am grown up. i don’t let drama fuck with my professional life. it is, no matter what, professional to credit who made what. and that is EXACTLY what she promised me Before i gave her my characters,i made it EXTREAMMMLLYYY CLEAR, i want credit.
i am grown up, she unfortunately, is not.
In the end Vivzie's response was to call out Dollcreep for abusive behavior on a seperate blog[11][12] and re-design JiJi. She renamed JiJi to JayJay and gave her different colors, though arguably the design remained mostly the same.[13] Modernly, it appears the fued between the two has died down, as Dollcreep's Tumblr remains rather quiet other than the occasional art piece. Vivzie commented on many of her old accusations in a 2018 Tumblr post (see VivziePop's Response), including the issue with Dollcreep.
From the moment, I sent the message and blocked him, he began posting about me nonstop. About everything, he’d screencap things from my blog and complain about them, he’d complain about Die Young, complain about Jiji, complain about things he knew I liked, complain about the music I posted, spew all his opinions of me. How I am “so obsessed” with him, how I idolize his work so much. How Die Young was his idea and it was owed to him, how he was robbed of credit (despite still being in the credits).Vivz on Dollcreep's behavior, 2015[12]
...That person was abusive and after we fell out he tried to post a false contract proving I had to credit them in everything I used the design I LEGALLY obtained. I posted the final contract proving this years back, I have since retired the character design and created something original from the concept I originated. It’s done, it was years ago. It was personal artist drama that got dragged into the public by a bitter abusive person.
Support of Controversial Content Creators
The accusation about Vivzie supporting content creators who have done blackface or made transphobic jokes comes from a time when she made fanart and gave public support to creators Blaire White and shoe0nhead.[15] Vivzie did not deny the time she made fanart for these creators. She went on to say that she had been unaware of the type of thing they posted on Twitter, having only seen a little bit of their content, and that she had actually disagreed with their remarks but found their ability to speak their mind admirable.
Third- the one most enraging to see. That I am transphobic/racist because TWO YEARS AGO I drew quick doodle fanart for a few controversial youtubers-one of which made a tasteless joke on their twitter. Two years ago I was in the worst place in my entire life, it was a very intense political time for our country as well and I was finding comfort in hearing perspectives from all sides because I wanted to really see all sides to create my own opinions, I don’t believe in living in a bubble and I feel to make a stronger argument for your own opinions you must attempt to understand the opposing side so you can properly try to combat it, and I also admired the fact that two women were owning their own beliefs and speaking their mind-even if I disagreed at the time that was just very admirable to me AS a woman. I had only ever seen certain bits of content from them and thought they were pretty so I doodled them.
VivziePop's Response
She wrote a response on Tumblr in 2018 to varied opinions from readers. The response went through the accusations point by point, giving Vivzie's perspective and some explanation, though she did not directly apologize for any of the accusations, even the ones she did not deny. Instead, Vivzie's main argument was that though she regretted the things she actually did do, she blamed it on going through a dark time in her life and being young.
I’m sorry for posting about something kind of serious, I just take this kind of thing seriously. I want the past to be the past, because my past in a thing I am trying desperately to escape, it is full of abuse, darkness, deteriorating mental health, embarrassing mistakes that haunt me, I used art to cope with my own budding sexuality and doodled weird things when I was much younger -who can say they didn’t do that?
She edited the post again in 2019 with a short add-on, due to many of the accusations resurfacing again. Vivzie makes it clear in this edit that she is tired of having to constantly remind people of the reasoning behind the accusations, that she is embarrassed of her past, and that she will block anybody who continued to harass her over it when she had already spoke about the accusations several times. Her tone is much more angry in her edit, and much more firm.
I despise that people care more about a fictional character then an actual human being. If you are someone who feels it’s ok to accuse someone of being the worst thing a human being CAN BE without checking dates or acknowledging context, or ignoring that there are literally only a small selection of examples over the course of …what 12 years I’ve been online?? You are earning a block from me.Edit on the comment from Vivzie, 2019 (Archived 9/17/2020)[14]
Replies to Vivzie's Post
Fans and non-fans commented directly on VivziePop's Tumblr post. Most of the replies were negative, though many did reblog or like the post without making negative comments, implying some support.
ectoviolet said: sorry to hear that you’re a filthy pedophile homophobe transphobe and racist 😢 hope u get better! but i doubt it
@vivziepop dont let other people take away your love why you like her show and music and channel overall just because the person is very stuck in the past and had a difficulty of letting go of the very passively agressive and resentfull towards @vivziepop on anout the thing she did in the past
stahlswife said: this post is a fucking mess lol. how the fuck can you write an apology off as genuine when you’re clearly seething with rage on the keyboard like the tone is so angry and not “i’m here to actually say sorry” lmfao
muffins-cant-die said: To the haters STILL clinging onto her mistakes, you’re all MONSTERS. I haye you all and you should ALL be ashamed of yourselves. Go fuck yourselves and seek help. Please!
lightningfilledmain said: What about the pedophilia and bestiality you used to draw asshole? Wanna address that? Also your apology is half assed at best and doesn’t even begin to explain the transphobia in your stupid ass show
zombiecafe said: This is a really bad “”“”“apology”“”“”. You treat gay men as if they are vile and undeserving of basic respect, your show promotes homophobia and transphobia. People are critizing you for your current actions and none of what you are doing is taking responsiblity for your actions. You are an adult. The work that you reference you did as an adult. Grow up. Learn how to apologize and be a better person.
Fanworks
Animations
Notes and References
Notes
- ^ Editor's Note: Dollcreep has since made their personal blog private and it's difficult to find all the posts they made. There was a lot of back and forth between DC and Vivz while the discourse was happening, though. Most posts and "proof" from DC only exist as screenshots now. I used to follow DC ad stopped following him because all he would post was mean stuff about Vivz every day, all day. I unfollowed Vivz too at that point because I was tired of seeing nothing but discourse from her and DC.
References
- ^ Vivienne Medrano, Hazbin Hotel Wiki. (Accessed 7/1/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ Addison, Zoophobia Wiki (Accessed 6/28/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ Addison, Zoophobia Wiki (Accessed 6/28/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ Screenshot, Twitter/Pinterest. (Accessed 6/28/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ Screenshots, Twitter. (Accessed 6/28/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ Screenshot, Twitter/Tumblr. (Accessed 6/28/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ Vivz on her underage art, Twitter. (Accessed 6/28/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ Viviennes Alternate Versions of the Characters, Tumblr. Circa Dec 31 20?? (Accessed 6/29/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ Note from Vivz, DeviantART. (Accessed 6/29/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ My Creator Deserves Credit, Tumblr. Oct 31, 2014 (Accessed 6/29/2020) (Archived 7/31/2020)
- ^ My Experience with Dollcreep, Tumblr. Aug 3, 2015 (Accessed 6/29/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ a b My experience with Dollcreep, Wayback Machine, Tumblr. Aug 3, 2015 (Accessed 6/29/2020)
- ^ Zoophobia, Bad Webcomics Wiki (Accessed 6/29/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ a b c d I'm Only Going to Say this Once, Tumblr. Nov 2018, edited 2019 (Accessed 6/29/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)
- ^ Twitter screenshot, Twitter. (Accessed 6/29/2020) (Archived 9/17/2020)