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Latest Medusa Comic

Close Your Eyes

by Paul Taylor on March 31, 2011 at 12:00 am
Story: Wapsi-Archive
Characters: Bud, Stinky
Location: Sand Bar

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Discussion (86) ¬

  1. MoonShad0w
    March 31, 2011, 12:05 am | # | Reply

    So cute!

    Not just the giant squid, mind.

  2. shamaniaq
    March 31, 2011, 12:05 am | # | Reply

    Go lo-o-ong!

    • ChrisHerself
      March 31, 2011, 10:31 am | # | Reply

      A corgi at the park brought his ball back to me instead of his owner…. so I go to chuck the ball and my atrophied 12-hour-days-of-painting-for-work arm SHAMED ME.

      It went 5 feet. I think Paul is laughing at me with today’s comic 😀

      • SoWhyMe
        March 31, 2011, 6:53 pm | #

        It’s ok, you’re a girl. It’s expected and you get a pass. A guy would be totally humilated.

      • Rycr
        May 28, 2011, 8:49 pm | #

        Ouch. Sadly probably true, but still…ouch.

      • GreyWolf
        February 21, 2012, 6:15 am | #

        I had to read that twice to realize you meant that you had expected the corgi to return the ball to its owner.

        On first pass I thought you meant you had expected the corgi to return its owner to *you*. Shook my head and wondered how big the corgi was …

      • Enigman
        March 26, 2017, 7:16 pm | #

        I’ll go with Dogzilla sized!!

  3. Kargoneth
    March 31, 2011, 12:12 am | # | Reply

    A girl and her pet. Cute.

  4. nerf-dweller
    March 31, 2011, 12:26 am | # | Reply

    Just an average girl, tossing a 2000 lbs anchor a couple of miles for… Abrupt change of thought stream. Stinky understood Bud when she told him(her? it?) to close his eyes and do this one by sound. Stinky is a whole lot smarter than a typical pet? And..wait..Natural Creature? O_o

    There’s more than one? What the heck IS Stink?

    • NOTDilbert
      March 31, 2011, 1:25 am | # | Reply

      Well there’s a species out there called the Colossal Squid – and Stinky isn’t NEAR as big as some of them get. They fight with sperm whales – and the winner eats the looser.

      • Simon
        April 3, 2011, 5:43 am | #

        Untrue, I’m afraid. Colossal Squid are indeed huge, but not as big as you think – and they don’t eat whales (though the reverse is certainly true).

        Largest known example is about 10m, and while that’s pretty big, it’s also tiny compared to this. No, Stinky here is almost certainly a kraken, your common mythological devourer of ships…

      • Valkeiper
        April 20, 2020, 9:45 am | #

        actually, the largest know corpse had 10 meter tentacles (the rest was too degraded to measure).

        scars of sperm whales have shown the whales had battled much, much bigger.

    • Paula
      March 31, 2011, 1:43 am | # | Reply

      it just looks like an octopus to me.
      from what i gather they grow like trees – to the size of their environment.
      There must be ‘some’ large pctopi out there but either they would have been killed by terrified humans or are in hiding and avoiding humans like you would if you knew the plague was in town 🙂

      • CJhaacke
        April 1, 2011, 10:47 pm | #

        Kraken comes to mind.

    • throopw
      March 31, 2011, 3:31 am | # | Reply

      “Does he understand?” / “I think so. His is not an ordinary brain, and he has had many many more years than even the lifetime of a man to learn understanding.” (Hasan and Conrad, re: Bortan (“… for his eyes are glowing coals and his teeth are buzzsaws, his head is as high off the ground as a tall man’s, a quarter ton of dog, my Bortan”))

      • Wyvern
        March 31, 2011, 4:26 am | #

        Not only does Stinky understand, he seems to speak English. Of course, Pablo may be translating for the audience. Quite a clever squid in any case.

      • Vorlonagent
        March 31, 2011, 11:52 am | #

        Roger Zelazny for the win.

        I always liked “This Immortal.”

    • Fatuncle
      March 31, 2011, 4:54 am | # | Reply

      I do assure you, that anchor weighs more than 2000 lbs. Not a problem for a gal that boosted the crushed remnants of the calendar machine out of the atmosphere at an appreciable percentage of the speed of light!

      • Fairportfan
        March 31, 2011, 7:40 am | #

        Yeah – about 62% of C, if i recall correctly that it was due to hit the Sun in thirteen minutes…

    • The Origami Guy
      March 31, 2011, 5:58 am | # | Reply

      As far as intelligence, octopuses* are SCARY smart. Like, “problem-solving” smart. Impressive for no skeleton, eh?

      * – recently, I’ve been told that “octopi” is inaccurate. The plural form now is actually “octopodes”.

      • Fairportfan
        March 31, 2011, 7:37 am | #

        The plural form always was “octopod(e)s” – the root is Greek, not Latin.

      • jwhouk
        March 31, 2011, 7:51 am | #

        Squid. Octopi have more rounded heads. Stinky’s head is more pointy.

      • Fairportfan
        March 31, 2011, 9:57 am | #

        Whether Stinky is a squid or an octopus, the plural of “octopus” is “octopod(e)s”…

        Which is what i was talking about.

      • Dafydd
        March 31, 2011, 12:04 pm | #

        The root is Greek, but the word comes to us through Latin, hence the Latin ending. (Same goes with “hippopotamus”.)

      • Fairportfan
        March 31, 2011, 12:49 pm | #

        …and equally incorrect.

      • Fairportfan
        March 31, 2011, 1:01 pm | #

        Quoting the Wikipedia article on the octopus:

        The term octopus, pronounced /ˈɒktəpʊs/, is from Greek ὀκτάπους (oktapous), “eight-footed”,[32][33] with plural forms: octopuses /ˈɒktəpʊsɪz/, octopi /ˈɒktəpaɪ/, or octopodes /ɒkˈtɒpədiːz/. Currently, octopuses is the most common form in both the US and the UK; octopodes is rare, and octopi is often objectionable.[34]

        The plural form octopi is often described as a hypercorrection. The Oxford English Dictionary (2008 Draft Revision)[35] lists octopuses, octopi and octopodes (in that order); it labels octopodes “rare”, although the correct Greek plural form, and notes that octopi derives from the “apprehension” that octōpūs is a second declension Latin noun, though it is not. It is a Latinization of Greek third-declension masculine oktṓpous (ὀκτώπους, ‘eight-foot’), plural oktṓpodes (ὀκτώποδες). If the word were native to Latin, it would be octōpēs, plural octōpedes, after the pattern of pēs (‘foot’), plural pedēs, analogous to “centipede”.[36] The actual Latin word for octopus and other similar species is polypus, from Greek polýpous (πολύπους, ‘many-foot’); usually the inaccurate plural polypī is used instead of polypodēs.

    • Golux
      March 31, 2011, 11:19 am | # | Reply

      Kraken…

      • Taz
        March 31, 2011, 11:32 am | #

        I totally agree.. this here is the mythical Kraken…

      • Fairportfan
        March 31, 2011, 12:51 pm | #

        I believe that Stinky would be a bit ,miffed to hear himself referred to as “mythical”.

        Verbum sap.

      • bmonk
        March 31, 2011, 4:19 pm | #

        Can we call him “Legendary”?

      • Fairportfan
        March 31, 2011, 4:45 pm | #

        Up to you. Personally, i plan to call him “Mr Stinky, sir”…

      • G.Dupons
        March 31, 2011, 7:37 pm | #

        Should I make it a little bit more confusing? OK, as you wish! 😉

        In german, the word for an ordinary Octopus is Krake. Plural form: Kraken. For the sea monster as seen at “Pirates of the caribbean” or here at the comic they merge it with the word “Riesen” (which means giant), so it’s a Riesenkrake or, if its more than one (god beware!) Riesenkraken.

    • Fairportfan
      March 31, 2011, 12:59 pm | # | Reply

      The cephalopods in general have large brains in proportion to their size; they may very well be in the same class of intelligence as the cetaceans – or higher.

      • Wyvern
        March 31, 2011, 5:33 pm | #

        A while back I was impressed to hear about octopuses which used tools; they’re the first invertebrates to be seen doing that.

  5. Atomic
    March 31, 2011, 12:27 am | # | Reply

    Long lived indeed! I remember a story last year about a whale which had an 1840s era harpoon tip embedded in it. That’s 170 years right there, and likely much more for when the whalers first chased it!

    • Frelance
      March 31, 2011, 12:34 am | # | Reply

      ayup, the natural life spans of a number of marine animals aren’t known. Blue whales and giant tortoises I recall being favorites of speculation

    • Bucc-i
      March 31, 2011, 12:42 am | # | Reply

      @Atomic
      That was Whale Shark, and they tend to live in the 100 – 150 year range.

      • W.
        March 31, 2011, 2:08 pm | #

        @Bucc-i Could’ve been a Bowhead whale.

  6. Bucc-i
    March 31, 2011, 12:43 am | # | Reply

    Lady, that thing aint natural!

    • Jayessell
      March 31, 2011, 1:27 am | # | Reply

      Maybe she meant ” living”?

      There’s the drawback to being immortal.
      Your friends die just as you’re getting to know them.

      • Kramegame
        March 31, 2011, 11:26 am | #

        unfortunately, dying, or being at someones side when they are, is the best way to get to know someone.

  7. Jay-Em
    March 31, 2011, 12:54 am | # | Reply

    The funniest is that Bud just sorta casually tossed the anchor like a blow-up beachball, and it flies off like you wouldn’t believe. It doesn’t even make Bud strain for a bit. Talk about “superstrong”

    As the She-Hulk once explained: “It’s not the weight of the elephants, but the art of balancing them that’s the hard bit of weightlifting elephants”. Goes for anchors too apparently..

    • Wyvern
      March 31, 2011, 4:30 am | # | Reply

      I don’t think we’ve ever seen any particular upper limit on the Golem Girl’s strength, physical invulnerability, or energy projection powers. Their limits may simply not yet have come up…but we do know from their history that the Lanthian priests went too far when building their excessively ultimate weapon.

      • Fatuncle
        March 31, 2011, 5:04 am | #

        “The strength of materials may have exceeded requirements.”… I gather that the priests really didn’t understand what they were doing – they were using Mayahuel’s notes, and building their monster by recipe. One of the things they ran into appears to be synergy: the whole was more powerful than they had reason to expect from the individual parts.

      • Jay-Em
        March 31, 2011, 1:23 pm | #

        Could have been part of the plan by Mayahuel.
        Make the golems and consequently the chimera, as strong as possible so the priests, when the golems escape their control would have no way of stopping it. I believe that Mayahuel hoped to use the priests blind ego-centrism and power-hunger to re-enstate the matriarchy, allthewhile financing her attemts at re-sync-ing Jin with time through the calendar-machine.

        Sadly, the plan back-fired. The Chimera and the Golems were, indeed, uncontrollable by the priests. However, the civilization-burning through uncontrollable raw emotions was the one factor not counted-in by Mayahuel.

        She also realized too late that the calendar-machine would end-up too dangerous a tool to be laying around for use by the priest-caste, and tried to destroy it…We all know how well that went.

        She manipulated one bridge too far, and all went belly-up…

        (Just read all 5 albums in one go, and that is the picture I got here)

      • Golux
        March 31, 2011, 11:18 am | #

        Being able to crush matter into diamonds in your fist puts it pretty far up the scale beyond the strength of any physical matter in the universe we’ve come across so far.

      • Cpt. Obvious
        October 21, 2016, 7:26 am | #

        Years and years past it’s prime this post still caught my eyes. And I think you are all underestimating just how strong Bud is. Crushing all kinds of carbon rich matter into diamonds or launching the remains of the calendar machine into the sun at something like 60% of the speed of light isn’t the most impressive we’ve seen her do so far.

        The most impressive feat I can remember was when she crushed the calendar machine. Look at the size of the working machine and compare it to what Bud eventually throws into the sun. There is no way to explain this using normal physics. The volume of the materials that made up the machine probably were at least a few cubic feet. To squash that into a cubic inch, or slightly less, she has to collapse the atoms themselves, much like what happens in a neutron star or a black hole. We should be happy she did this in a plane other than our own as the amount of energy released must have been immense. And she did it by hand…

        Now THAT is a demonstration of strength!

        What’s really intriguing is why the atoms in the calendar machine’s crushed remains didn’t just expand the moment she let go of it. There can’t be enough mass in it to generate a gravity well deep enough to hold it together, so the moment the external pressure was gone it should have exploded, at least I think it should. I guess we can thank Comic physics, Rule of funny, Rule of Badassery, and Because it’s Magic! for that.

    • Jay-Em
      March 31, 2011, 12:59 pm | # | Reply

      It is the way Paul has drawn her, that relaxed way she throws the anchor, that made me giggle for a bit. It very well illustrates how incredibly strong Bud actually is.

      • Taz
        March 31, 2011, 9:14 pm | #

        I still suspect that the golem girls are indestructable, but the diamond dolls that were used to focus light in the calendar machine may be tied to the individual girl and thus may possibly be a weak point… since well Shelly was told to protect them and all.

        or they have no purpose beyond the calendar machine… only Paul probably knows….

  8. J
    March 31, 2011, 1:11 am | # | Reply

    Stinky looks like one of the fabled “Kraken”, a cute one to booth. They’re still believed to exist till today. ^_^

  9. geekoncall
    March 31, 2011, 1:36 am | # | Reply

    Jaw drops to the floor & eyes pop out !!!

  10. Paula
    March 31, 2011, 1:46 am | # | Reply

    Wonder if there are more golem-girl pets out there?
    From what Bud says in the first panel, Stinky isn’t the only one she knows personally.

  11. My2Cents
    March 31, 2011, 4:09 am | # | Reply

    Looks like an admiralty style anchor. That would mean that the GGs were active in the world less than 400 years ago.

    • Wyvern
      March 31, 2011, 4:24 am | # | Reply

      I pointed that out yesterday, although to me it looks more like a stockless – or ‘Navy’ – anchor than an Admiralty anchor that’s had a wooden stock rot away. (Read about anchors if curious, folks.) Pablo assures us that Stinky likes to carry around some toy, but it is not necessarily always the same toy.

      • Roland
        March 31, 2011, 6:19 am | #

        There are anchors from ancient rome looking very much alike modern navy anchors.

      • W.
        March 31, 2011, 8:43 am | #

        Thanks for the link Wyvern it was interesting reading about anchors. Of course it didn’t stop at anchors…

      • Fairportfan
        March 31, 2011, 9:58 am | #

        The “Navy” anchor depends more on weight than anything else for its holding power.

      • Jay-Em
        March 31, 2011, 1:34 pm | #

        That^
        Our dog always finds his “fetch” toys himself, it being an old, forgotten tennis ball, or a discarded plastic bottle (loved by all dogs due to the great sounds it makes when chewed on, I think)

  12. stephy1aq
    March 31, 2011, 4:23 am | # | Reply

    Waiter, this huge humongous calamari has an anchor in its mouth!

    • Rowan Hawthorn
      March 31, 2011, 7:31 am | # | Reply

      Well, let’s face it – to catch a “squid” that size, you’d need a reee-eea-lly big fishhook…

      • Foamer
        March 31, 2011, 8:36 am | #

        We’re going to need a bigger boat.

      • Rowan Hawthorn
        March 31, 2011, 10:09 pm | #

        Boat, hell! I ain’t goin’ after that critter with anything less than a battleship…

    • Cpt. Obvious
      October 21, 2016, 7:29 am | # | Reply

      Well then don’t just sit there. Throw it! Can’t you see it wants to play?

  13. kaibyo
    March 31, 2011, 6:20 am | # | Reply

    New species of octopode?? I’ve never really seen one with a dorsal fin or dorsal ridge before. Or heard of one who could vocalize so nicely!

    I’m just happy that Bud’s happy. Nothing can make you happy (or lower your blood pressure!) the way playing with a beloved pet can!

  14. The Old Wolf
    March 31, 2011, 7:28 am | # | Reply

    Since the OrigamiGuy has gone all erudite about “octopodes”, it’s only fair for me to state that “calamari” is, by definition, plural. The singular – even in the case of a thermonuclear squid from the old world – is “calamaro.” By the same token, the next time you go to a cafe and get a yen for an Italian sandwich, please order a “panino.” Pedants everywhere will thank you. 😛

    • bmonk
      March 31, 2011, 4:22 pm | # | Reply

      If this were a graffito on a wall, I’d applaud it!

    • bmonk
      March 31, 2011, 9:50 pm | # | Reply

      For you: Bravo! Bravo!

      For your wife: Brava! Brava!

      For your pack: Bravi! Bravi!

  15. Kit Mayer
    March 31, 2011, 7:31 am | # | Reply

    JEEZ! She’d make SHELLY look like a 82lb weakling… 😯

  16. Patricia
    March 31, 2011, 8:14 am | # | Reply

    I think there should be a strechy Skinky doll, like the Stretch Armstrong figures. Complete with anchor.

  17. txmystic
    March 31, 2011, 10:01 am | # | Reply

    I love how she makes tossing that thing look so very effortless…

  18. kingklash
    March 31, 2011, 11:11 am | # | Reply

    So, will all the main gals have pets before too long? Ol’ Stinky seems to be a match for his “Master.” (he might be one of those pets that “owns” the owner.) What would Jin and Brandi have as animal companions?

    • Kramegame
      March 31, 2011, 11:31 am | # | Reply

      Brandi has flies, M has dietzel, Amanda and Tina have cats, Kath has her goldfish, Shelly has a cop, and Jin has a little girl. Its been well established that most of the girls have a companion of some sort.

      • kermit
        March 31, 2011, 1:45 pm | #

        OK, I’ll grant you the cop, but I don’t know that Jin would consider the little girl a pet, or even an “animal companion”.

      • Kramegame
        March 31, 2011, 5:10 pm | #

        well i didn’t say a welcome companion, and besides, we have only seen her with Jin once so far, and that was scary because she forgot about personal space.

      • Wyvern
        March 31, 2011, 5:36 pm | #

        And Dietzel has the pizza girl…

  19. Golux
    March 31, 2011, 11:14 am | # | Reply

    What you get for being part of a magic construct, being able to play fetch with a Kraken. Yeesss!

  20. Kramegame
    March 31, 2011, 11:33 am | # | Reply

    How is he going to hear that?! He’ll be lucky to sneak a peak of it and actually see it!

    • Kramegame
      March 31, 2011, 11:34 am | # | Reply

      also the last frame would make a kickass wallpaper.

  21. Fairportfan
    March 31, 2011, 1:06 pm | # | Reply

    Speaking of Stinky’s intelligence (again from a Wikipedia article):

    Octopuses have also been observed in what some have described as play: repeatedly releasing bottles or toys into a circular current in their aquariums and then catching them.[12] Octopuses often break out of their aquariums and sometimes into others in search of food. They have even boarded fishing boats and opened holds to eat crabs.

    • Fairportfan
      March 31, 2011, 1:09 pm | # | Reply

      From the Wikipedia article Cephalopod iIntelligence:

      One particularly clever octopus called Otto has been known to juggle his fellow tankmates around out of boredom, as well as throwing rocks and smashing the aquarium glass. On more than one occasion he even caused short circuits by crawling out of his tank and shooting a jet of water at the overhead lamp

      I like Otto. Make him a lot gibber and you might have Stinky.

      • Fairportfan
        March 31, 2011, 1:10 pm | #

        Well, i’m making myself gibber at the typos i’m not catching before i hit “Send”…

    • bmonk
      March 31, 2011, 4:27 pm | # | Reply

      I heard/saw something like this on a Nature show on octopuses a while back–and there’s this thread.

  22. Julie
    March 31, 2011, 2:08 pm | # | Reply

    Awww….who’s a smart cephalopod? You are! 🙂

  23. NikkTemplar
    March 31, 2011, 2:20 pm | # | Reply

    Bud is quickly becoming one of my favorites.

  24. Sheik
    March 31, 2011, 8:55 pm | # | Reply

    If anyone needed proof that Bud is magic incarnate witness the fact that the recoil of throwing that anchor should have buried her at least hip deep in the sand.

  25. Centaur71
    January 16, 2024, 12:26 pm | # | Reply

    It’s all too clear Bud has been taking ANCHOR management classes!

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