Brutal. I know. But this is a fairy tale, after all, and I have a long tradition of brutality to live up to.
This is why I hate to hear fairy tales being dismissed as mere children’s sugary stories. It’s a great insult when someone says of a lie, “That’s a fairy tale!” Like “wishful thinking” these aren’t false categories by fault.
When politicians try to convince you they’re telling the truth they’ll say, “This is math.” or “This is science!” and yet, math and science have gotten a lot more wrong in their past than fairy tales.
Look at how that mama protects her baby from danger that your average person would cower from. That’s a fact… just ask any mother you know.
Don’t forget about my Kickstarter thingy!
You said toys were in the works, right? When do I get my Herk action figure?
Also, in fairy tales, the good guy usually meets a horrific end. Folks weren’t big on happy endings 200 years ago. Makes me wonder about where this will end up.
Even anticipating that Herk would help take out the invader, today’s installment was deeply satisfying.
Too right man. Heck if you look at a lot of the etymology of other popular phrases that mean a lot darker things, they have words for ‘fairy’ or ‘elf’ in them.
That kid… this is why it’s important to raise your kid on a healthy diet of playing, he learned an important lesson: let the bad guy talk, then hit him right in the middle of the exposition.
Wait, you turned your own argument against yourself..? “That’s a fact” sounds like politician speak to me.
Besides, I don’t trust anything that is right too often. Being wrong means trying new things and getting closer to the truth. That’s science!
Math and science are evolving processes. Fairy tales are interesting and important, but they usually refer to basic truths about human nature as opposed to deeper levels of reality that have led to our current understanding of medicine, mathematics, and technology.
Ouch! That looks like it HURT!
(The chomp first… then the stab…)
A stepmother, on the other hand…
It’s weird. Fairy tales weren’t originally for children. That’s why they had so much brutality and stuff like potential incest and impregnating sleeping princesses (the original Sleeping Beauty didn’t get woken up by a kiss; she woke up because she gave birth.)
love the colors! really captures the “scaly” feel of the monster guy! your colorist Katherine rocks.
I’m guessing that Lizzark was a good guy. A creepy, pointy weirdo with poor social skills and chicken legs for arms, but still a good guy. Maybe he was trying to warn them about something?
Err, nevermind. Forgot about that whole “I’m gonna eat you” thing a few pages back.
Poor Herk is gonna be devastated when he learns of Gullimar’s fate. Perfect crafting of emotional rollercoaster here, Doug. I see this, and I’m happy for Herk and Mom, but then I know the relief of surviving this encounter will be short when they learn about Gully. Bittersweet, for sure.
I’ve only read a few pages so far, but I’m not convinced her baby was in danger. Maybe that lizzark will luck out and not have his heart in the usual place, thus surviving his wound.
Sooo awesome!!
@someguy, If you look at page 21, you will see that the nasty dude was planning on feasting on the entire village…
The original fairy tails were gruesome, this is nothing compared to what they used to be.
This page was deeply satisfying on a very, dare I say, primal level. Just all kinds of good, tingly feelings seeing those last expressions: the “where did my plan go wrong?” the “this is for threatening my family” and the pure “WOO! We win!” (Though we only get a posture for that, it speaks quite clearly)
Welp, I was wrong. Go Herk!
Neil Postman’s book, “Technopoly” has a good discussion on how our society has come to a point where the only compelling answer to a question has become “They did a study on X”.
@Ezra Schott
Your comment goes right to the heart of Doug’s point!
“[Fairy Tales] usually refer to basic truths about human nature as opposed to deeper levels of reality that have led to our current understanding of medicine, mathematics, and technology.”
What is a “deeper level” of reality? You seem to be equating ‘basic’ with ‘shallow’, which I would be very, very reluctant to do. Is it a question of complexity? Don’t fool yourself into thinking that Fairy Tales don’t involve deep analysis of complex issues. For every tale, you can easily imagine millions of variants and ask, “Why is this variant more true than this other?”
I can think of no fundamental way that scientific study goes deeper than Fairy Tales do. It’s certainly not objectively more true. Scientific study itself is dependent on the fact that there are human persons performing the observations, and (scarier still) creatively imagining the models, telling the stories that best explain the data. It is utterly dependent on the human person to make connections between things and to envision and predict patterns.
Oddly enough, this is the role of the wise story teller – making connections, envisioning and predicting patterns… building these connections and patterns into a plot that models the truth of reality.
Fairy tale tellers attempt this with people and characters, who have the capability to be FAR more complex (and more interesting!) than atoms. This is why it’s impossible to perform any rigorous experiment with people – you just can’t control for all the possible factors. Lack of rigour is not always evidence of shallowness or sloppiness, but sometimes rather of complexity and depth.
@Doug – I might take a second look at your statement that “math and science have gotten a lot more wrong in their past than fairy tales.” There are a lot of bad stories out there. Like any scientific discipline, it takes time, experience, and a lot of eyeballs to prove which ones hold truth.
Been following your latest (is it?) creation since it launched and I was hooked right away. I love how your incredible inking word just shines through, you can almost feel the brush strokes! And your colourist Katherine’s work is so vibrant, yet subtle. Sorry, I get carried away when I see something that is just yet more proof that we work in one of the most amazing field there is!
Ok, I’ll go now and tick off another day on my calendar, how many days to go until the Archives ship? Doesn’t matter, well worth the wait AND we have Nnewts and other things to read in the meantime!
My wife would do the same.
@Doug You read a lot of Chesterton, don’t you. Your comments reflect the pages of Orthodoxy that I just read this morning.
I’m a devoted, regular, reader of Chesterton. Orthodoxy is his best, so you’re in good hands.
I’m enjoying NNewts.
Fun stuff!