Update Blog - 1/11/25

Just when I thought things could finally get back to normal after the holidays, I find myself facing a new problem that took over my week. I got sick. I caught a pretty bad cold and it drained a lot of my energy where I needed some time away that could've been for making more videos for myself and making sure that I can feel better. Safe to say that my 2025 is not starting off well. However, with whatever energy I had left during the week, I was still able to make some progress on certain projects and even starting new ones. But with this sickness, I'm also considering changing a few plans that I mentioned before. With that said, here's what I've done during the week when I was not laying down to recover.

• Created my review of Sonic the Hedgehog 3: Since I already planned that I wouldn't upload a video this week, this helped me to make some progress on my next review of Sonic the Hedgehog 3. In terms of that project, I was very lucky that most of the initial elements to make this were done before I caught my cold. The most that I needed to do during the week while I was sick was editing. And since I wasn't in a rush, I took my time to ensure that the review does meet people's expectations for an awesome review. It'll be a bit straightforward similar to what I recently did with my Mufasa review, but I added an extra twist of a few moments where I paid homage to Sonic Adventure 2, even talking about my past experience with the game. While I finished my review almost a month after the movie was released, I can assure you that the wait will be worth it when it comes out next week.

• What I've done while I'm sick: In the meantime, as I was finishing up on my Sonic 3 review and stuffing myself with medicine like a kid in a candy store, there were some projects that I was able to get through where I was storing my energy and let it all out on those so that I can still be the fun-filled AniMat that you all know, even when my body is fighting a disease. During the start of the sickness, I was still able to do an episode of AniMat's Crazy Cartoon Cast. I'll admit that I was a little rusty after coming back form a 2-week break and having a sickness in me, but I was still able to do the best I can to count down the Top 5 Animation News of 2024. A few days later, I also did a whole retrospective of the animated films of 2024 with Rachel of Rachel's Reviews and it was honestly a great highlight of my week. Even with a cold, I had a great time with talking about all the movies that came out, good and bad, and sharing our thoughts on our favorites. According to Rachel, the video will be posted possibly next Thursday, so I can't wait to show you what we collaborated on! Finally, one major thing that I did after all those was that I finally took the first steps of creating the Top 5 Best & Worst Animated Films of 2024! So far, I've only started the script, and as you can imagine, I'll need time for the writing while I'm trying to recover. However, the good news is that the production has officially begun and I'll be sure to make this my ultimate sendoff to what we've seen throughout 2024.

• Changing my Schedule: It sucks that I have to do this, but because of my cold taking a lot of my time away from making videos, I may have to change some plans from what I mentioned in the last blog. You might remember that I posted about what I've planned to release for the rest of this month, but now I'll have to make an update to that where I'll need an additional week where there's no uploads. I'll still commit to releasing the Sonic 3 review next week, but I think I'll skip the week after that, meaning that the Top 5 Best & Worst Animated Films of 2024 will be set for either the end of this month or at the start of February (if I get an early screening of Dog Man). As for my Persepolis review, I'll have to move it to February. Don't worry, that just means that there will be 2 AniMat's Classic Reviews coming in that month. Trust me, my health is not good enough to pull off that big grind that I did during the end of 2024 and I'd rather my videos come out great than to come out soon. If I need more delays to accommodate both my health and the quality of my upcoming videos, then so be it.

And that's what I've been up to while my body started my year off in a bad way. I know my sickness is far from the worst thing to happen this week (the fires in California deserve a lot more attention and help), but I'm personally making sure that I can take the right steps to become better before I truly start my 2025. Stay safe and healthy everyone, and until next time...

See ya later, dudes!