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Emil Melmoth

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“Committed” by Beth Cavener

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He likes tea

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This was suppose to be a simple sketch--it only took me 2 hours to bang out 70% of this whole sketch

BUT THEN

it took me 6 hours to finish his face and that damn foot on the left because my ref didn't have any feet and i couldn't tolerate just leaving it

Anyway

he's reading a nonfiction book on the history of something mechanical in nature

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Been listening to Magnus Archives

Bo = Hunt

Vincent = Stranger

Lester = Spiral

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Wax anatomical model, La Specola, Florence

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Wax Dante

I've worked on this for a while.

This was a challenge to:

1) create in a more painterly style

2) do something with a background.

I'm actually pretty pleased with how it came out but I'm so happy to be done with it.

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Found ya!

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I’ve talked before about how—to give a somewhat grounded in reality explanation of how three brother can power a whole town—I imagine Ambrose as having been built as an unincorporated company town maintained by the sugar mill company

And they provided their own electricity via a mini hydro electric plant

(This actually has some basis in reality, with companies building their own source of power to cut down on cost. You can look at the “small hydro” page on wiki.)

Anyway, I’ve spent like two hours reading up on possible set ups for the plant—and it looks like a “run of the river” design coupled with a Crossflow turbine (aka Ossberger turbine) would be ideal for the job

From the crossflow turbine wiki: “…the cross-flow turbine is well suited to unattended electricity production. Its simple construction makes it easier to maintain than other turbine types….The mechanical system is simple, so repairs can be preformed by local mechanics…Another advantage is that it can often clean itself.”

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x I plead the fifth

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I’m thinking about how neither Bo nor Vincent is “the older twin”—because they would have been born via c-section.

I’m also thinking about what it must have been like to be Trudy—almost certainly doing a home birth and possibly not knowing she was having twins.

(The newspapers on the wall of the Wax Museum say “expecting first child” not children--despite Trudy being *heavily* pregnant in the photo.)

From what I can tell just from a quick google, ultrasound machines would have been pretty new technology in the early 1970’s and not widely available—certainly not available to a single doctor working independently of a hospital.

And if Victor was fool enough to preform the twins separation surgery himself, I have no doubt he was handling his wife’s pregnancy all on his lonesome. I think he did her c-section himself in the small operating room we see in the movie, although he must have had an anesthesiologist he regularly worked with on call--there's here’s no way he could have administered anesthetic and preformed the c-section at the same time.

I imagine they were originally planning your traditional "at home birth" when things went south. The anesthesiologist was originally only planning to administer an epidural, which were just gaining popularity at the time--so when Trudy began to crash badly enough, it must have been either "we operate now or risk losing her on the long drive to the hospital." Since c-sections were only used in like 10% of pregnancies at this time, with Trudy being in bad shape mentally and physically during the birth, and there only being two medical personnel on hand--I imagine they had to put Trudy all the way under for the c-section.

(I imagine typically only small surgeries that could be done under local anesthetic were preformed in Victor's office--always with a booked appointment—but they did keep the materials for general anesthetic on hand for emergency situations.)

I know Victor’s status as licensed doctor is circumspect due to Bo’s creative story telling. I think there's a kernal of truth in history but it's been hammed up because Bo is dramatique.

I've been playing with the idea of Trudy and Victor originally starting in the north, with Victor being from a wealthy family in New York state. He did loose his license—for preforming abortions under the table for women from other wealthy families. (And also at least one for his wife.) Being wealthy, he was able to avoid jail time—and when abortion was decriminalized in 1970 in New York State, he had enough influence to get his license restored and his record expunged.

Unfortunately, his reputation was in tatters. I image that his family was catholic and—while Victor wasn’t practicing—his parents were prominent members of their church. He had embarrassed them greatly, and his marriage to a poor uncouth midwestern Protestant woman (despite her converting in an effort to win their approval) know for being something of a bohemian didn’t help matters.

So, when Victor heard through the grape vine that the son of a friend of a friend was starting a new business venture in Louisiana—a sugar mill with an accompany town for the workers--and they were looking for a company doctor, well, who doesn’t like a new beginning?

So, by the time he got down to Ambrose he was fully licensed, operating a sort of dual "company doctor/private practice" roll in Ambrose, and was granted the ability to admit patients to the closest emergency hospital in Baton Rouge.

So the twins were born in their home--but pretty much immediately rushed to the hospital (along side Trudy) post birth.

It was several weeks of observation in the hospital for the twins. It ended with Victor insisting on being allowed to preform the twins' separation. He refused to give consent to allow any other surgeon to operate on them and convinced Trudy "no one else will do as good as job as I will because I'm their father."

But really it was just professional pride.

Still, Victor was good at his job and the twins were successfully separated.

Unfortunately, he was not nearly as competent a father as he was a surgeon.

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