I was thinking good!Ganon /Rehydrated ganon challenging gerudos in combat perhaps?

oh my god he drank some water..

When will gods let you rest

Did a little Ganondorf painting (it’s only 2x3 😂) so I can decorate my phone case.

self immolation

There's a meme going around to draw your comfort characters as the Steven meme.

Bowser's never been a comfort character for me, but thinking about how great an Illumination Smash Bros movie would be with these two having the dumbest greatest villain team dynamic has brought me SO much joy this year.

Seeing as the Gerudo turned on Ganon, he might not have been that much better of a ruler.

First of all, we literally have no idea, because the only ancient Gerudo that we actually get to interact with is Ganondorf himself, and he has nothing to say about his own people. The ancient Gerudo sage doesn't count btw, she doesn't have a name, we never even see her face, and she has literally nothing to say except repeating the exact same dialogue as the sages for the other races. The narrative does not treat the ancient sages as people; they are four completely interchangable weapons that are owned by the royal family.

And secondly, I don't care how Ganon ruled them; the Gerudo only get one man every century, if their king sucks, they've obviously got their own system of government to fall back on. I have no idea what kind of authority the sages had among their own people, but honestly I'd say if the four of them were in charge of their respective people, then they were just puppet rulers appointed by Rauru, given that all four of them happily agreed that to sell their entire race into servitude the second Zelda asked them. Say what you will about Ganondorf, but I fucking know that if he was told the Gerudo people existed for the sole purpose of serving the glory of Hyrule, he'd drop kick Zelda into the fucking sun.

And don't get me started on the implications of the cultural differences we see between the independent Gerudo and the annexed Gerudo. The background Gerudo characters all have their own models, and we can clearly see that the ones siding with Ganon have their own unique looks - for example, the amazing lady with the mohawk that summons the molduga swarm in that one flashback. And men are never mentioned in these flashbacks at all, which implies that the Gerudo genuinely didn't care about settling down. Ganon even speaks derisively about marriage, implying that it's very rare for Gerudo women to make serious romantic commitments with men. It implies that their culture is more along the same line as their portrayal in OOT - they are a closed culture. Men trying to force their way into their areas are arrested, and mocked for being entitled dumbasses. Outsiders are only welcome if they can prove that they respect the Gerudo as people, and aren't just there to try and pick up chicks. It's never outright said, but OOT also makes it pretty clear that the Gerudo women just aren't interested in marrying outsiders - close relationships occur with other Gerudo, Hylian men are only considered useful for making babies.

Meanwhile the Gerudo we see serving Hyrule are all trying to measure up to Hylian beauty standards, and appeal to their men. Their one goal in life is to meet a man and get married. Men are welcome in their lands, and only kept out of the town itself... and even then, there's a small army of guys trying to force their way into the town anyways, which is brushed off as just haha, boys will be boys. No men allowed isn't even about independence, it's just a silly romantic tradition.

Of course this is just a fictional culture in a game world, but it's still really fucking uncomfortable that the 'evil' Gerudo are the ones that have independence, both politically and socially, and display a unique culture that refuses to tolerate disrespect from outsiders. Meanwhile the 'good' Gerudo are the ones that canonically exist to serve a kingdom where 95% of the population is light skinned (even setting aside the unfortunate implications, just saying one race exists to serve a different one is super fucked up), they have classes on how to be more appealing to Hylian's, and their entire social structure is built around finding a Hylian man to marry, making them all inherently dependent on the goodwill of outsiders. Even their biggest value of 'women only' is treated as a joke; men trying to trespass in BOTW are just shoved back out the door, letting them keep trying all day if they want. The crowds of men plotting to force their way in are laughed off as a joke. Nobody cares that there's a guy running laps around their city walls and trying to trick women into being alone with him. I mean for fucks sake, in TOTK we find that the creepy guy trying to lure women away has taken advantage of a massive disaster to get into the town, and he's still there once things return to normal. You can't kick him out, or alert anyone to his presence. And the Gerudo just tolerate Hylians blatantly ignoring their boundaries. For fucks sake, TOTK even reveals that the seven legendary heroines they've been revering the whole time were actually completely useless and unable to achieve anything... because they needed the eighth hero, a Hylian man to teach them basic tactics and do all the heavy lifting.

TOTK does not respect the Gerudo people in the slightest. It doesn't respect anyone who isn't Hylian or Zonai.

...This got a little off track, but the point I'm trying to make is, no, I don't consider the Gerudo turning on Ganon to mean anything. The entire game does not feel like the real story of what happened, it feels like the propaganda version of history meant to make Hyrule look as good as possible. I genuinely cannot believe that we're being told the real story about the Imprisoning War, because none of it feels real, and we don't get to know any details that might have made Hyrule look even slightly imperfect. We're told that Ganondorf is evil because he hates Hyrule, and he hates Hyrule because he's evil. The Gerudo people followed Ganondorf and saw him as a hero of their people, then suddenly he was their worst enemy. Hyrule is a perfect kingdom that has strong, equal alliances with the other races, but also all of the non-Hylian races exist for the sole purpose of serving Hyrule, and their leaders are expected to swear eternal loyalty and submission to the Hylian royal family. King Rauru and Queen Sonia united all of the races in peace and equality, which is why they're sitting on the world's supply of magical nuclear missiles, and every member of the Hylian royal family is allowed to walk around wearing them as cute accessories, but everyone else only gets them at the last second, and they all need to outright swear to only use that power to benefit Rauru and his descendants.

There's just so many fucked up contradictions, and so many hints of something more nuanced going on... but the story refuses to acknowledge any of it, and just keeps aggressively pushing the narrative that Hyrule is the ultimate good and couldn't possibly do anything wrong. I don't even believe that Ganon was a bad king honestly; we never hear why his people stopped following him. We also never even see if the Gerudo people turned on him at all; all we know is the ancient Gerudo sage wanted him dead, and given that she also happily sold her people into slavery, she's not exactly the most trustworthy source of information. All we know is that Ganondorf was a hero to his people, only one of his citizens is ever shown having an issue with him (and her motives are never explained), and then he lost the war and was sealed away, leaving his people open to be conquered by Zelda and annexed into Hyrule. By the time we see any Gerudo actually opposing Ganon (apart from the ancient sage), it's been ten thousand years since the war, and all anyone knows is the Hylian version of the story.

sometimes u make ur own legends of zeldas

I drew Gabon again. I was very excited about it but now I’m not sure if I like how it came out. Hmmm.

Just a girl and her hog, trying to save their dying world.

Ganondorf with Alexander the Great Syndrome, where he’s dangerously clever and fantastic at military strategy, intrigue, adapting to setbacks, and inspiring people under him to action through his energizing charisma, which along with the necessary hubris from believing he is meant to rule makes him extremely effective at the “taking things over” part of attempted world domination.

However, despite his belief he is naturally inclined to lead and therefore is the best possible person to control everything, he is also absolute dogshit at actually administering his holdings and doing the basic day-to-day business required to maintain more permanent control over the territories he invades. Unless he’s motivated to stay put and hold course by a powerful grudge, he’s often moving on to the next, more exciting challenge once he’s finished his business in a location, which often involves physically leaving and abandoning whichever poor patsies he’s appointed to look after things in his absence to fend for themselves. This is why all the kingdoms he’s ever built according to his personal vision of how the world ought to be collapse into dust immediately after he dies.

Getting this man to do paperwork will get you the same response as trying to force him to chew broken glass, which is why he will always be defeated unless he eventually develops the good sense to appoint either a whole cabinet or a single reasonably competent secretary to do all the boring stuff for him.

I have an idea in my head for a t4t Zelink AU where, upon realizing they're both trans, instead of either of them coming out, they just switch places. Like, Link becomes Princess Zelda and Zelda becomes Link, Swordman of Legend. Except, of course, Link's real bad at being a monarch and Zelda is not the best with a sword but they make it work, because Link is incredibly personable and Zelda's destructive capabilities would only be help back by a sword.

So when Ganon finally shows up in this AU he's completely taken off guard when the princess, instead of engaging in a magical duel just charges at him with whatever the closest weapon happens to be, in this case, a steel chair (aka the royal throne) and when Ganon goes "okay at least I know that Links going to sword duel me" he's in no way ready for "hey I spent a gap year becoming a ninja and also built a laser canon"

I ended up cleaning it up. Gan gives into his impulses.

Phantom Ganon lore probably

POV a cute gerudo offers you a durian

(redraw of that one hulk taco meme [Image ID: A two panel comic, with a top and bottom. The top panel has a confused young Ganon with long hair in a half ponytail wearing a cloak and voe armor, holding a durian andstanding tall over a tiny Link, who is attempting to sit up from a wooden bench and is surprised at his approach. Link is wearing protective leather armor over his tunic and large boots, and appears to be an older version, with grass and pebbles at their feet. The bottom panel shows a framed close-up of young Ganon attempting a friendly yet awkward tusked smile, with further detail on his cloak, pauldrons, armor, jewelry and collar necklace, as well as his circlet crown. His eyes are winged with eyeliner, his eyebrows bushy, his hair long and sleek with flyaways, as Ganon offers the durian to Link from his giant hand, a pinky politely extended}