Oh dear, I think I've never posted a playblast this close before an animation release, but since this scene is still not ready for rendering I might do so!
Right now all scenes are pretty much done, except for this one, which still has me tinkering with the simulation of thick slobber. This is roughly the 20th iteration of the simulation, and while it's still not quite where I'd like it, it's slowly getting there. The basic animation was already finished a couple days ago, it's mainly the fluid simulation that is taking up a lot of time, as each new calculation takes multiple hours to complete. I'm already quite satisfied with the fluid properly sticking to the walls and character, now I'm just trying to figure out how to make a bit more sticky and less drippy. I'm however hoping to figure it out by tomorrow, so I can finally advance to rendering this scene, which will be quite the undertaking in itself! Note that the scene still looks good without the fancy slobber simulation, but I feel like the inclusion of it makes it truly exceptional which is why I'm trying to make it work.
Note that these long computation times gave me at least time to polish some other scenes, this included adding small additional scenes to the post-credits part, which I think really helped its pacing a little. In terms of the release window we're probably still looking at a solid week to wrap this final scene up (it's a little longer than what's shown in this playblast). I'll make sure to make another post here with some render stills 24 hours before the release to give everyone a heads up! (: