December 29th, 2017
29 Dec 2017 · page 759 of 1306
Last update of 2017! Hope you had a good holiday, I certainly did! The christmas filler I did is over here on Tumblr for future reference, since I'm going to delete it from the archives now to keep the story flow. Have a great new year!
Cast: Benjamin Thackerey, Heinrich Wolfe, Sidney Malik, Verity Cunningham
Comments (46)
Events
ThoughtBubble
14 Nov 2026 – 15 Nov 2026
Harrogate Convention Centre
Manchester Megacon
31 Jul 2027 – 1 Aug 2027
Manchester Central
Ben and Wolfe both obviously don't really believe it was "not important" and now is not a good time to stop listening to those instincts. Sidney is, as always, both adorable and brilliant and I love him. And I adore both Sidney and Verity's faces in the last panel.
I love Sid's face in the third panel, it reminds me of the Sid I immediately fell in love with when I first discovered Widdershins...
Hey, Magpie is back!
Fairly sure it never left, hehe, but suppose it is getting active again.
I love Ben's glance in the pahel 2!
He's concerned about Wolfe's little side jaunt, as he well should be.
Mr Malik should be more concerned about a certain young lady friend of his, who he just helped escape from gaol.
Well, yes, but he doesn't yet know that she's escaped, so he wouldn't be concerned about her at the moment. [https://www.widdershinscomi...](https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/november-1st-2016/ "https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/november-1st-2016/")
I’m sure there will be a touching reunion very soon - preferably involving a hug just as Ms Harriet walks into the room...
Good thing Harry's otherwise occupied at the moment!
Good point. Greed and the magpie -- he may be worried, but he's dealt with them before and can deal with them again. Lei -- not so much.
I like the way the faint pink overlay vanishes while the green for Greed does a gradual fade-in in the background in the last three panels. Yes, Sid is right to worry about the Magpie... this part of the story may be where he has to either free himself from its greedy little attentions, or gain some control over what it does.
I hope that Ben can help there. His assets: He did experience what Mal's sight was like, and his diligent grasp of the academic side of wizardry may come into play. It would be good for his self-esteem if this lets him aid his new friend Sid.
Hmm. OK, Sid, so you have a familiar which randomly steals things from other people. I wonder if that spirit could be related to Greed in any way.
Nah, of course not...
Seems more like mischief than greed. But regardless, Sid isn't greedy even if the magpie is. I'm trying to think of a twist where the magpie takes something that will actually weaken Greed....
Could be, although my take is that the magpie isn't as much about causing (harmless) trouble as it is about taking things.
Now that I think about it, we already know that the magpie interacts with Greed: the first time we meet it -- what, less than twenty strips into the comic? -- it steals the Mark of Thieves itself.
The magpie can take smth harmless (Vee's spanner or comb, Ben's wallet or smth else), but as the Greed's influence grows, they will get angry, getting themselves to Greed.
Look at Vee's face just now! One step to (rightful) indignation: It's mine! From Grandad!
I still stand by the magpie seeming to take shiny things, regardless of value. Coins, keys, grenade pins, etc.
someone made a connection that the magpie doesn't go for monetary value but rather for personal value (I think the discussion is on the page where sydney aquired the heart from grandpa barber)
this page is actually the first which throws a spanner (pun intended) in that theory because it would seem weird if the hairpin was the item that verity most valued (unless of course it was a gift from someone close)
I've also thought about what other emotion the magpie might be except for some subset of greed (then again nobody could guess which emotion the yellow monkey of panic accuratly represente back then)
I've always felt that the Magpie's rules for taking stuff were to take things that are shiny and interesting, unless there is something powerfully magic (or something that once was, like the Liar's Heart) or something that will help the human it's attached to stay alive.
As for which emotion It could be, I kinda like the idea of it being Longing.
well here's the thing
wallets aren't shiny, they're also likely the most important thing that a person would carry around in that day and age
and yet the magpie kept on bringing that to sid
it has also to date stolen at least 2 powerfull artifacts of which sidney didn't have any knowledge so he couldn't have longed for it
in my opinion: if it was longing then the magpie would have stolen sid's child teddybear or some hot coco instead of what it actually came up with
My new head canon is that the spanner was a present from Captain Barber which Vee treasures as memento of their time together.
well, why just that?, it could be a memento from her grandfather as a sign that outside of a wizard he was also brilliant at mechanics which could have been given to a certain granddaughter who didn't have his magical talent as the only one (that we know of so far) of his grand-children but has so far proven to be at least knowledgeable around mechanics
No reason at all. My story is just more romantic, so I'm picking it until it is proven otherwise.
I don't necessarily agree with that, but that might just be me being biased
a gift from a lover is just that, a gift from a lover, I've personally kept all of them so far but they mean nothing to me, if they'd burn in a fire then I'd moarn what I'd lost but ultimatly it'd just save me throwing them out if I had no more room
however a gift from a grandfather, showing to a non-magical person that the thing that made him stand out wasn't the magic but the machines he build and thus showing that despite their lack of magic they did have the capacity for greatness in them, to me that's romantic
Verity says, "It's grandad's, one of the first I got!" in Q&A: [https://www.widdershinscomi...](https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/character-q-and-a-2-march-2017/ "https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/character-q-and-a-2-march-2017/")
== who didn't have his magical talent as the only one (that we know of so far) of his grand-children ==
Three of his grand-children (Tekkereys) have magical talent, and Ben's is considered as rather humble one, in comparison with his grand siblings', the twins'.
The three last panels - the color of the backgroung slowly drifts from dark blue-violet via blue to greenish-blue.
The rainbow gradient permets us to expect in the next page the background to become bluish-green, green and... greenish-yellow!
Beware, crew, watch your steps! Greed is near!
Sid, Greed was cordial because you set it free, you forgot to mention that part, yeah? :)
The departure of 2017 means it's been approximately a year since I discovered Widdershins, and I can't imagine not having it in my life. It's become one of the fictional worlds that stays constantly in my head and shapes my mental landscape, with characters I know and love as friends - Mal and Wolfe, Ben and Vee, Harry and Sid, and all the rest. I found myself hearing Mal in my head ("'Ere, it's working! It's bloody well working!") when a complicated knitting experiment was successful, and the cousins got me through a very long, hot walk ("If we give up, if we look for an easier way...Sloth wins." "Which is why we won't!"). They're all very real people to me, and I'd know them anywhere.
And then there's the community here in the comments section - all the people who love analyzing details, speculating about plot twists, and delving into the characters' personalities every bit as much as I do. As far as I'm aware I don't know anyone in real life who reads Widdershins, but I suspect that even if I did, it wouldn't be half as satisfying as discussing things with everyone here!
Thank you, Kate, for creating this amazing comic, and for your friendly presence in the comments as well. I hope I get to meet you someday and say all these things to you in person, but in the meantime I'll wait eagerly for every new update!
It's true! Same here. Although I'm still going to keep trying to convince my siblings to read it as well...
I'd also like to put in a plug for Darken here. I didn't read it until much more recently because whenever I tried to start it, I was really put off by the artwork at the beginning. However, if you can get past the first few chapters, the artwork improves steadily throughout the course of the comic and it's really almost worth reading just to see that. But the characters and story are so fun, it's absolutely not to be missed. Kate A. may have had sorta rough beginnings as an artist, but it's clear she's always been a masterful storyteller. So do check out Darken if you haven't yet!
Haha thank you too! Yeah, the early art in Darken is super duper rough! I'm forever grateful to it though, since I got a lot of beginner's mistakes out of the way by the time I started Widdershins. Comics are a journey, I guess :)
Speaking of which, when is Darken vol. 2 coming out?
I confess that I loved the characters in Darken so much -- who wouldn't? They're so wonderfully awful! -- that the art never mattered to me.
Definitely a journey... however by the end of Darken I was really amazed by the journey. The way in which the art changes throughout is well worth seeing, in my opinion.
Of course, if you buy the book (hard copy or ebook), you’ll find that all the early chapters have been redrawn. I should be on commission...
True! I redrew/adjusted the first few chapters to make them a little easier on the eyes, smoothed out the script a little too, since my character voice was kinda lacking for a while there. [https://gumroad.com/l/UjZC](https://gumroad.com/l/UjZC "https://gumroad.com/l/UjZC")
Oh my gosh, thank you for such a sweet comment! The whole comic thing can be a bit of a trial sometimes, a few times this year I've sat there wondering what on earth I'm playing at, drawing silly wizard comics when there's such important issues at hand in the world, in general.. But this kind of comment really means everything to me, just knowing I've made people a little happier, that's all I want to do, and the idea that I've managed that in any way is completely fulfilling.
Thank you again, and thanks to the entire wonderful comment section- I can't believe I lucked out so much by getting the nicest, most engaging, smart and respectful readers.
You are also showing an example of how diverse people can figure out ways to get along, which is an example that we need with all the important issues at hand in the world.
With important issues at hand in the world and the circle of light seeming to shrink a little every day, ‘silly wizard comics(TM)’ are exactly what we need to help us get through the day.
With so much wrong in the world, what is everyone fighting for, what is there to hope for, if not to live in a world where we can all read silly, brilliant, lovely wizard comics? Never apologize for doing something that makes so many people happy.
Not to mention, your stories provide valuable lessons and inspiration in that very fight.
And thus we go full Circle. Has anyone commented about the "Magpie-like Spirit" that is the supposed root of Sydney's Magical Thievery?
I don't know why Greed is an issue. Everything already belongs to it, people are merely minding its valuables. Think Incan gold; yes, it ends up everywhere, but people still refer to it as Incan gold. Valuables are, by extension, belongings of Greed.
If only Greed realized the strength of legacy...
...And does greed for knowledge count? Does the erudite have need to fear from Greed?
re the erudite: I wouldn't think so, unless the person does something greedy to get the knowledge (like steal a book, or hurt someone else in their pursuit of knowledge). Like everything, it is a matter of degree.
Innocently
Or try to kill smb for learn what does become with the human's spirit after that...
Greed for knowledge would imply wanting to have that knowledge exclusively to themselves. The essence of greed is not wanting to share, in other words.
Now, lust or desire for knowledge, on the other hand...
While re-reading Vanishing Act recently, I noticed that Verity seems to have gotten new glasses between then and now. The ones she's wearing in this chapter look to be gold-rimmed, while her old ones were clearly rimless: [https://www.widdershinscomi...](https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/december-19th-2012/ "https://www.widdershinscomic.com/wdshn/december-19th-2012/")
Yep! Part of the reason for that is because I switched to digital linework partway through Vanishing Act, so now I can do things like gold-rimmed glasses much easier by just filling the lines in a different colour :) But also I imagine she has a LOT of outfits/accessories!