Mirrasae: Sooo, Menen (a.k.a. Tall Strong Jerk). He's not so much a jerk as a very faithful servant to Crenen. He was inspired by...well, needing a right-hand man for Crenen. I thought the contrast between short li'l Key and giant Menen would be amusing, and plus Menen is just so generally mild-mannered, it was ironic. He's <i>my</i> idea of a gentle giant, rather than the typical wussy, whiny baby I've seen floating around in popular media. I won't name names, because I don't wanna be burned at the stake. (Let's just say the particular character I'm thinking starts with H and ends with Agrid. Not a fan. Nope.)

Menen is one of those stalwart characters that makes me a little sad he can't be more important, but hey, that's how it goes, and he's still there, involved throughout, so I'll take it. His stoic attitude and loyalty delight me constantly. Beyond this, I'll say nothing else for now. More on his character another time. :)

____

Miko: I don't really like drawing large men. The major problem I run into is the proportioning. Menen is very tall, and Key is short, but I like to lengthen everybody's legs. I think then, ultimately what happens is that Key looks right, but Menen ends up with reeeaaally long legs. He gets erased a lot.

Menen's face is easy to draw generally, but his hair is way too complicated. I should have taken that into account when I designed him so that both he and Key could be easy to draw. They end up in panels together a lot, so had I had just a bit more foresight these last few pages could have been a breeze.

Lastly, I love drawing Menen deformed - he is just so cute!