Not long after
By Dylan on August 7th, 2015Posted In: News
Hello my dears!
Fun times for all as usual in this week’s page. (If you didn’t figure out the source of the blood in last week’s page, I refer you to this scene from the start of Chapter 2.)
In the cool stuff worth reading category, “Baba Yaga’s Assistant,” a young adult graphic novel with story by Marika McCoola and art by the great Emily Carroll, is out this week! This is McCoola’s publishing debut and the first full-length graphic novel for Carroll as well (her solo works are all short stories), so if you love beautiful, creepy, unusual tales, or know a 10+ year old who does, go find a copy!
I’m afraid that scene didn’t help me. I didn’t really understand it the first few times I read it. I’m normally not that stupid…
That’s okay, it’s on the subtle side – she’s just gotten her first period and has started bleeding. The wincing leading up to it is cramps.
Ahhh. I have a teenage daughter, so I don’t really have an excuse for missing that.
Thanks!
When will there be more notes? The past hundred pages or so have gotten a bit more mysterious and magical, but surely…?
All the backlogged notes will be posted when Volume 2 comes out in print later this year!
That’s what was happening in that panel at the beginning of part 2. I always thought the blood came from the wound from the thorn, but now I see that the blood was streaming down from above that point. What confuses me is why it bothers her father so much. In another panel she almost touched him and he pulled his hand away as if she was a snake. What’s up with that?
I tipped Wilson off in the top comment, but in case you’ve set an e-mail notification, I’ll answer here as well: Ariana’s just gotten her first menstruation. (She winces earlier in the scene, which is her first cramps hitting.)
As for the other scene where he recoils from her, it’s hasn’t been explained yet, but you can take the thorn scene as the start of an era where Nolte is very reluctant to touch or be touched by his daughter.
Thanks for the menstrual blood clarification, I figured that was the case in the earlier page but I was initially confused by how the blood was making it all the way down the character’s leg in either case. I guess if both characters are wearing loose-fitting breeches and if underwear wasn’t particularly a thing at the time then I get it; my usual wayward menstrual adventures involved butt/crotch stains.
This. Crotch stains are what I associate with menstruation disasters too.
I understood the first menstruation thing, but the way the blood dramatically flows out of the clothes (without staining them at all!) broke my suspension of disbelief both times (a feature that women&wolves didn’t quite manage :D).
I mention this because the comic is absolutely wonderful and engrossing in almost all other aspect, so this, being also a crucial moment of the story, stood out.
If the breeches are made of leather or canvas or some other kind of non-absorbent fabric (which I would think is likely, especially for Agata? I don’t know much about materials in this period), as well as being loose-fitting, I can see this happening.
Yup, Amy is right!
Keep in mind also that folks in the 18th century weren’t typically wearing undergarments that adhered to the crotch at all.
Women did sometimes wear leather menstrual belts to hold linen rag-pads, but a premenstrual teenage girl wearing leather or canvas breeches breeches wouldn’t be so prepared!