Sixty Minute Monster #3

I think this one came out pretty well. This time I'd actually figured out what I wanted to do ahead of time, but when I sat down to draw I did a quick reference search and decided to do something entirely different.



Today's featured beastie is the manticore, which literally means "man-eater." Like the catoblepas, it was apparently based on reports of a real animal, in this case the tiger. Unlike the previous poisonous creatures I don't find it terribly sympathetic; the manticore eats people because it wants to, and its humanoid face makes it something of a cannibal too. When I decided to put it in a tree, I was thinking of the opening scenes of Paul Schrader's Cat People, but the end result is essentially an evil Cheshire Cat.