YMMV / Dr. Crafty

• Adorkable: For many, Pepper serves as the single most adorable thing on the show. She is quite soft-spoken, with a voice as sweet and gentle as her heart. Her mind occasionally wanders to cooking or eating, and she loves to gorge herself. If the ocean is the topic of discussion, she's overcome with emotion and starts to daydream. She tends to be flummoxed by the show's eccentricities, but Pepper tries her best in her every appearance. Whenever she can contribute, she giggles at her additions even if the others don't find them funny. These awkward traits—combined with her soft, cuddly appearance—have endeared her to the audience significantly, just as Crafty himself predicts in "New Season, New Friends," Pepper's debut.
• Alternate Character Interpretation: The two-faced Jekyll/Hyde character designed in "Hyde and Shriek" is defined by her split personality, with each half having a distinctly different manner of speech. There's nothing suggesting exactly which voice comes from which half, so fans have taken to the idea of her monstrous side being the sweetheart, while her cutesy side is the cruel one with the demonic voice.
• Awesome Art: Crafty uses strong cel-shading, expressions, and exaggeration through his artwork to create something appealing in its simplicity. He's also capable of drawing a variety of different character designs, from humanoid to robotic, to cartoony, or to beastly. The guest artwork that shows up across different episodes is equally great for their own reasons, especially SkittlezJuice's thumbnail artwork, which takes the Dr. Crafty style and adds a softness to it.
• Base-Breaking Character: Without a doubt, Messibelle is the most divisive character on the show. The fanbase's outlook on her evolved over the course of her first two seasons:
  • Her Season 2 appearances were the most mixed, skewing towards a negative reception. To some, Messi's ribaldry severely clashes with the show's overall sense of humor. Up until her debut, racier jokes tended to be rare, but now that she's here, much of them are relegated to her, making Messi feel fairly flat and repetitive. In contrast, others appreciate Messi for diversifying the show's humor with her unique contributions and are enthralled by her clever design and other character qualities whenever they're highlighted.
  • Season 3 addresses the criticisms levied on Messi during Season 2 through her Character Development, which focuses on her more eccentric sense of humor, her father-daughter relationship with Crafty, and her matured outlook on her sexuality, all while deriving a healthy balance of humor from all those traits. Thanks to this growth, Messi managed to win over some of her detractors, and her overall reception is much more positive, with pre-existing fans of the character also enjoying the direction that Messi's character takes. Others feel the changes are too little, too late, as the circumstances behind why she's disliked are still fundamental to her character, even with her growth.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: Sombra suddenly shows up in the shadow realm in the last part of "The Foreshadow Game," only to disappear when the Crafty Crew questions how she got here and requests her help. It's purely a gag that has no bearing on the special's plot, and the Crew thankfully escapes without her assistance.
• Broken Base:
  • The Boogieman's segment in "A Song of Ice and Fire" lacks any sort of commentary, relying strictly on the creepy instrumental music and visual effects to help introduce Fiona Frightening's main antagonist. For the fandom, the execution is either a fitting introduction to the character, or a bore to sit through since, without commentary, the scene takes away what makes Dr. Crafty unique among speed-art.
  • With the commissioners' own original characters making appearances on the show, there is the possibility of them getting some digs thrown at them by Dr. Crafty. It can be viewed being unnecessary and hurtful because a person paid for them to be drawn. Others would think that it is all fair and in good humor to help keep with the comedy of the show, especially since the riffs are quite light.
  • While most fans love the show's story elements and their dramatic presentation, some feel they don't actually mesh with the show itself. While the intention is to be jarring next to the slapstick and puns, some find it emotional and hard-hitting, while others find it hard to take seriously. Naturally, this has only increased as the show's story has developed and darkened.
  • The fact that Dr. Crafty uses pre-existing characters within its storyline is a contentious narrative choice. Either it's perfectly fine and a good way to better connect the show to each art piece, or makes the story even harder to take seriously and come off as a Self-Insert Fic.
  • The announcement that storyline segments after Season 3 will be separate videos and not part of the main show itself has been divisive. Some fans like that the two will now be separate, while others feel like the segments were fine where they were, or at the very least, this makes having them seem pointless. When the production crew reverted to the original format, the mild controversy died down.
• Catharsis Factor: Seeing Crafty verbally tear Katsuki Bakugou a new one during "I Need A Hero Academia" Part 4 is hugely cathartic for anyone who was a victim of bullying, especially since Bakugo's behavior is glorified by certain circles of his source material's fandom.
• Creepy Cute: Throughout Seasons 1 and 2, the mysterious goddess Sasha is foreshadowed through Crafty's flashbacks in an almost horror-movie-like manner. The scenes place special emphasis on her countless, summonable eyes and many tentacles, all while using their presentation to render her intentions around Crafty deeply ambiguous. However, the flashback of "Legend of Lonk" reveals that she is a deeply benevolent figure and Crafty's first real friend, turning a somewhat creepy character into a simultaneously endearing and sympathetic one going forward. Even after the reveal of her good heart, the show doesn't lose sight of what can make her scary, with episodes like "Titans! Reboot" and "We're Back! A Crafty Story" hinting at and exploring the ramifications that she and her species, the Infinia, have had on the show's universe.
• Crosses the Line Twice: Normally, seeing such a sweet person as Pepper cry would be heartbreaking. But most of the time when she sheds some tears on the show, they're a direct result of some of her funniest moments, such as her dealing with ripped pants in "Journey to the Forbidden Water Temple," Camilla exploding in "I'MA VAMPIRE," and the fallout of Crafty's failed theme-park idea in "Magic Kingdom Mania."
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Pepper's pet sea cucumber Pickles is decently popular in the fandom, due to being a Ridiculously Cute Critter implied to be much, much smarter and snarkier than he appears.
  • Duke Crocodile is a fan-favorite minor addition to the cast from "Crafty Fan Characters." His goofy design, funny voice, interesting backstory, and generally weird demeanor helped endear him to many. Duke also has his own pose-set, a somewhat uncommon trait among the fan characters. The set was drawn by his creator, DevinQuigleyArt, and it really highlights how expressive Duke is.
  • This show's interpretation of Jedah Dohma is one of Dr. Crafty's most beloved supporting characters. Here, he's a morally questionable lawyer who shamelessly promotes his brand, his legal skills, and his evilness every chance that he gets on the show, often intentionally at the expense of the Crafty Crewmates. The chances are if Jedah appears in an episode, fans know that they're in for a great time.
• Genius Bonus: People invested in snails will quickly notice the extent of Messibelle's snail motif throughout her design and personality. In addition to wearing a snail shell bonnet and a slime dress evocative of a gastropod's foot, Messi's occupation as a maid coincides with snails' roles in providing natural sanitation for their environments. What's more, her bottomless sex drive echoes snails' extremely sexually active lives and the common belief that snail caviar is an aphrodisiac.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • At the time that its episodes were uploaded, Season 1's third monthly theme was intended to advertise Alex's concurrently developing second project: Fiona Frightening and the Wicked Wardrobe. It was also intended to assure those already invested in the game that it was still being produced. But just over a year later, Alex announced the game's cancelation; his programming team abruptly ceased contact with him without explanation, and with no other option, he didn't see a point in pursuing the project further. Soon after, he speaks for himself in character as Crafty in "Charablanca," once again confirming the game's cancellation.
  • In "New Season, New Friends," Crafty sarcastically dares Nurse to dox him on his show after she explains in depth how Crafty uses pose referencing. The gag became alarmingly prescient when, three years after that episode was uploaded, there were a few doxxing attempts targeting the show's production team throughout Season 4's airing.
• Heartwarming in Hindsight:
  • In "Smash Newcomers," Crafty expresses his heartfelt belief that Banjo-Kazooie should be playable in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Flash-forward to E3 2019 and lo and behold, the bear and bird duo collectively became the game's third DLC character!
  • Nurse's crush on Crafty becomes very heartwarming once "I Need a Hero Academia" reveals that he saved her life. All those times she swooned over him turned out to have come from a very genuine place, not just lust.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • In "I Ain't Afraid of No Ghost-Type," Crafty reveals his intense fear of witches. Ever since taking refuge in his castle, he's thrown the many witches who visit him every Halloween night into his fireplace—and those were just kids in costumes, never the real deal. Come Season 4, he's hired Stylene, a genuine witch, as the Shake-Up Salon's hostess.
  • In "It Puts Lootbox on its Legendary Skin," Crafty designs a theoretical skin for Mei themed after an ice cream server, and gives her a slightly chubbier figure to compensate for the model's hitbox. Replace "ice cream" with "bubble tea" and you've practically described Mei's "Honeydew" skin◊ from Overwatch's 2019 Anniversary event, which came out less than a year after the episode.
  • "Crafty Fan Characters" has a gag that becomes funnier by the episode's end. Despite Messi freaking out over the prospect of fan characters at the start of the episode, it turns out that her voice actress submitted her own character: Scout, who takes the number one spot on the list.
• Jerkass Woobie: Crafty is quite a childish, self-absorbed asshole in the series' first two seasons, with his coworkers—Nurse especially—often feeling overwhelmed by his behavior. However, there are hints indicating that he's trying to escape his depression, lack of self-worth, and the lingering emotional wounds from his breakup with Sasha. All of them culminate in Season 3, which sees Crafty acknowledging his escapism and obsession with the past as problems and correcting his behavior in the present. With this additional context, many audiences have found it easy to relate to him and invest themselves in his progress to becoming a better person.
• Most Wonderful Sound: The Crafty Crew's voices tend to be very pleasant to listen to, particularly during the art segments. How they deliver their lessons often helps them stick out to artists who learn from them.
• She Really Can Act: Allison Seils has done a wonderful performance as Sasha, to the point where, according to her Twitter, she was actually crying while recording her dialogue for Episode 50. This truly helped to make her Despair Event Horizon moment much more impactful.
• Sophomore Slump: Season 1 set the standards for a commentated speed art channel quite high, and with hints of a larger narrative bubbling under the surface, fans were eager for what would come next. Unfortunately, for as solid as it turned out to be, especially due to the great things that it does for the series overall, some fans feel that Season 2 stumbles in a few places that its predecessor and successors do not. Tellingly, Season 3 was deliberately crafted to address the concerns raised about Season 2, allowing the latter to be viewed somewhat more positively in hindsight.
  • After introducing the show's first spin-off hostesses, Pepper and Messibelle, Season 2 keeps them segregated into their respective segments. They end up lacking interplay with Crafty and Nurse until the season's last half, and they don't quite make the best use of whatever screen time they do get. Pepper, with her endearing personality, was beloved from the start, but she doesn't receive much development as a character, with some going as far as calling her flat. Messi, meanwhile, stirred some mild controversy; some audiences found her ribaldry unsettling, overbearing, and repetitive, and thus actively dreaded her appearances. Later Season 2 episodes try addressing some of these issues, but Season 3 is where the improvements hit their stride; both Pepper and Messi, along with the newly introduced Crystelle, are given some layers.
  • Season 2 doubles down hard on its overarching theme of group conflict, and this negatively impacts Crafty and Nurse's friendship. They become more liable to get into increasingly harsh arguments, often for petty or spontaneous reasons. Crafty talks down to Nurse more frequently and deliberately provokes her, and in return, Nurse fires back in kind—not just with her words, but her fists. Narrative purpose aside, some found many of the gags surrounding their bickering too mean-spirited to be funny, to the point where it's questionable if they even share a friendship at all. The following season sees Crafty and Nurse reevaluate their relationship, and they mutually agree and commit to bettering themselves.
• Special Effects Failure:
  • The show commonly uses sets of reusable poses for each of its original characters. While versatile, these poses can be somewhat limited unless new ones are drawn for specific actions. For example, whenever a character is holding an item, it sometimes appears to be floating in front of them while their hands don't even touch it.
  • When Sasha is deposited inside Crafty's Shadow Realm prison in "The Foreshadow Game," the image of her in question is held at an angle. Thus, for a brief moment, viewers can clearly see that the image was cropped at the bottom, making for a somewhat distracting detail during the ensuing scene. Likely because of this issue, dramatic scenes in later episodes make liberal use of new artwork when the situation calls for them.
  • In "SPAAAAACE," Pepper briefly dons a Dr. Doofenshmirtz outfit that consists of his black shirt and labcoat. When she turns around to leave and switch to her work clothes, the costume doesn't follow her movements. It turns out that all iterations of it were just superimposed over her models in the production team's video-editing software, rather than being being merged into single images in the team's illustration software. Meanwhile, Pepper is also given a new expression specifically for when she first appears in the episode. It's partially unfinished, not due to Pepper herself but rather her ever-present companion, Pickles; when Pepper dons that new expression, Pickles' eyes disappear.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Stylene sadly doesn't get much chance to shine throughout Season 4, when she's introduced. She's established as a rougher foil to the other Crewmates; her outlook on life is colored heavily by her time in prison, which means it clashes with everyone else's. However, it proves valuable when it comes to making some difficult decisions, such as how she provides the Crew with transportation for their trip during the High School Month episodes, and how she breaks into Nurse's old school when left with no other option in "Schooldays of Yesterpast." While these moments build her character a bit, that's the extent of her usage in the show's story past the Premiere Month. Her one subplot about adapting to her work environment otherwise receives little meaningful development; it's clear she's warmed up to her coworkers somewhat by now, but the feeling is far from reciprocated. Crafty's the only one willing to give her a chance, whereas everyone else's soured outlook on Stylene hasn't changed since her introduction. In fact, Crafty's connection with Stylene is her only major individual relationship developed on the show, and even then, it lacks the significant changes that Crafty's other relationships demonstrated beforehand. With the show now canceled, Stylene's story is rendered incomplete, and it's uncertain if she'll be revisited during the reboot.
• The Woobie: Throughout Cartoon Month and Hero Month, Nurse Worse regains some of her traumatic memories and reunites with her abusive mother respectively after she captures her. Both of these events paint her in an extremely sympathetic light, as the flashbacks in "Socializing is Arcane" and "GEMS! Truly Outrageous" provide some context regarding her rough upbringing under Mindstein, with her facing extreme punishment for the slightest offenses—if there even were any to begin with. And throughout much of "I Need a Hero Academia," she's at Mindstein's mercy and very quickly starts losing hope about any rescue. Later, "School Days of Yesterpast" gives even further context about how restrictive Nurse's life was even outside of Mindstein's home. All of these moments end up giving her relationship with Crafty an extremely poignant edge.

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