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Hey all, the Octopus Pie books are back in the store for a limited time! And I'm doing a little sale - spend at least $50 and use the code "FALLS4YOU" to save 10% on the whole order! This offer applies to original art, too.
I'm also selling copies of Secret Coders Volumes 1 and 2 by my husband Mike Holmes and writer Gene Yang! I can't recommend these books enough if you wanna get some kids in your life interested in coding. Delightful art, great energetic characters, concise examples. Mike will sign your book, too!
As far as schedule: sorry these weeks have been quiet. September was a pretty lousy month on a personal level, and comics productivity has suffered. But I'm working double-time to catch up, and October should be rich with pages in the coming weeks. Mark me words!!
36 thoughts on “#944 – so breathtaking”
streever
Next issue:
Close up of a pot on the stove
Wide shot of dining room from table top up, plates at every place
Wide shot of lower dining room, showing all 4 laying on the ground, looking peaceful
Then, an all black panel just like the ending of the Sopranos
No words: the audience will always wonder if they survived the poisoning, if it was accidental or intentional. What does Marigold do? Marek? Park? That's for you to imagine.
Sorry for the massive spoiler.
j-prime
LOL (and upvoted!), but…
…morels are one of the easiest mushroom to pick safely. They're really distinct looking, they come up in the spring before most other shrooms (not the summer – so error by Meredith there), and they're hollow inside like a weird wrinkly ballon – no stem going up through the middle.
All the 'false morels' really don't look all that much like true morels (squooshed and goey looking instead) and they have fibrous stems attached to the top of the cap – like an umbrella.
Jillian
I carried Hillary and Bill Clinton's drinks from a couch to their table once.
So majestic. So iconic. So breathtaking.
Alexis
Oh ho, thinking about nests, are we, Hannah?
The kind of nests traditionally filled with small eggs that eventually hatch into small squeaky leathery babies, hmm?
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm?
Spiritoftherain
Oh no, eagles are Hanna's version of a biological clock?!
Eagles are beautiful but ruthless birdies. My parents once watched one crack open an oyster shell by flying it high into the air and dropping it on a rock, over and over again.
Sam
Makes sense. Oysters are delicious.
Alex
I don't think they're just talking about fungi…
Faye
daaaaaaaaaamn.
kbode
Flying free + a nest = having it all
Lules
Shit, I related so badly with Hanna's "bitch has it all"…
Also, Eve's face on second panel is the CUTEST THING EVER
macc_08
Nest and "bitch has it all". Is this an allusion to the fact that Hannah and Marek broke up because of different positions regarding having kids?
Is she changing her mind? Is Marek making a come up for some kind of closure? Is Hannah now realizing she might want to have kids in contrast with her own personality, now that she is settling in a more "mature" line of work somehow?
That would be good and bad, I guess. Not all women need to want kids, but maybe it is a remarkable change in her development. I don't know anymore, this comic is crushing me.
Alexis
"That would be good and bad, I guess. Not all women need to want kids, but maybe it is a remarkable change in her development. I don't know anymore, this comic is crushing me. "
It's okay to want one thing. It's okay to want the other. It's okay to change your mind.
It doesn't have to be a statement on what women should need to want, you know?
macc_08
Bro, that's not what I meant at all. Is just that, a lot of characters fall under confusing development due to what's expected of their genders. Of course we know OctoPie is beyond this kind of stupidity, but still, it is confusing to understand where this is going, and I just want the outcome, whatever it is, to be properly written.
Of course, again, OctoPie always delivers, so consider this some kind of rambling or just ideas, I didn't mean to state anything, calm down.
laharrisb
I think I get what you're saying. I felt this way when April on Parks and Rec ended up having kids. It made me really sad because it didn't feel like character growth so much as "this is what she is supposed to be doing because she is a woman." I also agree with the idea that OP is sophisticated enough that Hannah wouldn't change her mind for any reason other than she has changed as a person.
macc_08
"It made me really sad because it didn't feel like character growth so much as "this is what she is supposed to be doing because she is a woman.""
Exatly that, thanks! 😀 I meant it as a fear of tropes that tend to happen to female characters, not as an expression of my own desires over the characters behavior.
And I indeed believe OctoPie's writting is way beyond that and that even if Hannah comes to want kids (or heck, even have then (although I do believe the story might end way before that)) this outcome will be well explained through her development.
Thanks for helping me illustrate this, friend! I'm not an english native speaker, so sometimes I struggle to convey ideas that I'm used to talk about in portuguese
Ceceoh
Morel mushrooms! So delicious! So identifiable! Thanks for the childhood flashback, Meredith.
Oh, yes. The eagle's pretty, too. But you can't fry her in butter.
frogurt
Not with THAT attitude.
grimmorrigan
I'm so happy bald eagles are off the endangered species list, I almost forgot what they tasted like.
Laura E.
A beautiful comic as always, Meredith. 🙂 Life happens to the best of us, and I hope things are going better now!
This whole arc is making me wish I could take a vacation to the country for a few days.
RoboticMuffin
MORELS ARE DELICIOUS BY THE WAY THATS THE MUSHROOM THERE I AM VERY EXCITED ABOUT MUSHROOMS
Flostie
"The clever ones wear a disguise"
no no no no noup noup no way noup no shut up
Samalamadingdong
Y'all are overlooking the potentially daunting fungal allusion to Eve and Will's relationship!
schleufer
tree. dapples.
rufiangel
That's exactly what I was thinking! I mean, look at that last panel, the composition and the details on the rocks, and the crazy dappling from the trees and sunlight. <3 This arc is gorgeous.
Guest
Yup – baby clock whacking Eve & Hanna well upside the head right now.
Sherbz
I don't believe everyone should procreate (I don't even believe I should) but god damn I hope Marek puts a baby in Hanna and they live happy ever after with little Manna's and Harek's running around.
seriously?
criiiinge~
Dotcom
Happiness often needs to well-established *before* the baby. Babies are cute to visit, but have a lot of high needs and can really complicate life—and close relationships. Too many people don't *get* that (though perhaps you didn't mean it).
I would be happy with them revisiting their future together and at least starting to talk about a family. All the pot Hannah did was a major hurdle to her being a good parent—as well as her outlook on it (I seem to remember a pre-breakup strip where she discussed this with Eve). Since she no longer smokes all the time maybe she's reconsidering whether she can/wants to be a parent.
Not at all something someone should feel forced to do if they wish to be child-free, but it is something that hits many of us in our late 20s/early 30s. I think the moment it smacked me was my husband bringing up we needed to "try soon" after we got married and then being told by a doctor I "shouldn't wait anymore" (I was 31).
woahbigbooties
i almost killed my family with a bunch of false morels, once! the only foolproof way to see if they're true morels or poison is to cut the stem open and see if they're hollow. i have no idea which one is supposed to be what, though.
Gwen
I'm kind of taking Hanna's, "Bitch has it all" not in a wistful, "man, maybe I should have kids" but more in a "Man, majestic AND put together well enough for kids? She's amazing."
Personally, I don't want to have kids, one of the main reasons being that I don't think I'd be a good mother. When I see friends starting their families, jealousy is the last thing on my mind because I'm too busy flipping out and admiring the fact that they're awesome at juggling how to be amazing human beings AND how they want to pass on that awesomeness to a younger generation. So, even though I'm dead set on never wanting kids myself, I can still admire the want that other people have for it.
maybemaybemaybemaybe
I think maybe there's also an element of, Hanna previously saw a choice between having kids and being who she wants to be (which is someone who she doesn't see as being a mother, good or otherwise). But now her life has changed in ways she didn't choose (Marek left, she doesn't get high anymore, friendship group has changed, she's gone through the identity-reset that depression can bring on) and she's realising that people change, life changes, and that she won't always be facing the same set of choices. And given all that, maybe she's starting to no longer see the same dichotomy of choices that she used to (freedom to be herself vs. being mom) – that maybe having both, like the eagle, is an option – maybe even an option for her. Doesn't say she's necessarily gonna take that path, but her thinking has shifted.
Dotcom
I thought the same thing until I got until my thirties and had been very happily married about two years—and realized that pretty much anyone could be a parent (but not do it well—of course).
I found most people who believe they won't make great parents usually do if they end up having kids, because they usually have more self reflection than those who blindly jump into it and take time to plan it—thinking about how it impacts the children—not just them.
There are always exceptions. I've met many fine parents who started young or even by accident—as well as dreadful ones who didn't want kids to begin with and/or were older and had planned carefully. But it seems to be that way more than not.
gabbiana
Ca we talk about whether the "poison" refers to Hanna or (more likely, Diane isn't stupid, she knows Eve and Will are boinking, and Eve drunkenly poured her heart out to her at the fire pit) Eve? I mean, yes, the eagle and the mushroom are very nice, but. DIANE JUST CALLED EVE POISON Y'ALL.
Laura E.
Or she's referring to her own marital struggles, since that's why Hanna's mom is on the trip in the first place…
steelbright
first thought: OMG Hanna IS gonna get back together with Marek D: D: D:
KitKats
Gosh, this page is gorgeous! And, oh no, is that foreshadowing I see?