Putting the Artist into Martial Artist

Okay, okay. It’s been a while since that hazmat suit joke so I guess I’m about due for another doodle. I figured I’d try for a more dynamic pose than most of the redraws attempt today. By the way, I’m a martial artist so I do know a bit about action and fighting giant monsters and stuff. (Fighting giant monsters? I do that every morning before breakfast. My alarm clock is an incredibly tenacious beast.)

Here’s what we’re starting with. We have a woman swinging a claymore (or a liberally interpreted claymore design if I want to be accurate) one-handed, her face turned upward and her gaze focused somewhere above her. Where is she looking? What is she swinging at? How on earth is her ribcage curving like that? Her lungs must be squished. Tragedy! But I hear she’s part youkai or something, so I’m sure she’ll live.

I thought the pose overall made more sense if she were looking over her shoulder. The pose looks like she could just step out and slice open the enemy at her right shoulder without getting all twisted up. As for the one-handed thing, I figured she was in the middle of bringing the pommel up and around to her other hand so that she could really let loose with a huge swing that left her mostly defenseless if she missed! That’s just how it works in manga. (Hey, I’m here to fix the art, not critique her fighting skills.)

(By the way, she does have five fingers on that free hand. I just didn’t bother finishing her index and pinkie fingers in a way that made sense. There are some other problems, too, but I’m not invested enough to fix anything here.)

Finally, here’s what I think she’s trying to kill: