I think thighfriend got a bit too big for their britches
There has been some super great thighfungus art lately! Here’s one by Iisjah and another by Sarumayne… super cute, guys XD
Now that we’re starting to see more, there will be more bonus stuff for $5 Patreon folks to look at too (as long as it’s not too spoilery). Future animals, relationship advice, etc~ I’m excited, I’d kinda like to do a little field guide at some point because I have a lot of material sitting around. As it is, we’re pretty close to hitting the wallpaper goal, so there’s that to look forward to too :3
I’ve also been streaming for Patrons lately, have been doing Meek pages up until now but the next one will probably be for MI instead cuz I haven’t done one of these yet.
Today’s bonus art: some early ass scribbles from 2013, back when I had no idea what I was going for yet. Some stuff got moved around.
Another page on Friday! See you then.
131 Comments
AHAHAHAAAA NOPE. NOPE TO THIS ENTIRE PAGE.
It’s fine… NOPE is if that red stuff is spores that he’s breathing in and several fungi are about to explode from his mouth and nostrils… or ears… tear ducts? *shudder*
It’s just the sand, thank goodness
Was still operating under the theory that thighfungus was a hallucination of pain. But… thinking that less and less now…
I was considering that explanation too, but the previous page and especially this one have convinced me that poor Mike is very much conscious but perhaps wishing he were not.
Maybe this whole thing is just his final hallucination as he dies slowly under a pile of rocks.
…or while he’s hanging from the ceiling in the habitat. Or as a form of escapism in his childhood.
So many options.
“Ugh, I swear, Captain Kirk didn’t have to put up with this whenever an alien wanted to get into his pants!”
AngularFungus; Friend??
I think Mommy-Fungus is mad at Mike, that’s _never_ good.
Having thighfungus retreat back into his leg and bulge the skin/flesh like that has got to be excruciating. Even if it’s above the flesh layer and just in his suit that kind of action would be felt viscerally. I had previously been leaning towards shock and distraction by the bizarre events as to why Mike was not exclusively screaming in agony. Now, however, I’m starting to think our thighfungus friend has either co-opted, consumed, or completely numbed the nerves in that delicious leg.
He’s bulging the space suit. Hopefully it’s all above the skin, well, provided he can feel that area at all anymore.
could totally have a pain neutralizer for the host or something
I dunno if it would be able to do that, since it would need a pretty specific-looking chemical to properly block pain, and that would be pretty unlikely considering this is an alien that has definitely never had contact with any kind of earth organism before. If it’s dulling pain then maybe that’s because it’s just like… completely destroyed all the nerves in his leg. Parasites (if thighfungi are even normally parasites) don’t put the hosts they’re MEANT to infect in serious danger–how can they survive if they keep kill the host, after all–but they can be very dangerous when they end up in something they aren’t supposed to. Like Mike.
He can’t just sit here for the rest of the comic with a fucked up leg so thighfungus has gotta be doing something what will allow him to explore the cavern, but if that’s the case I think it must be doing something more helpful than just numbing his leg. Maybe it’s got a root system under his skin that’s strong enough to hold his femur together? That means he still has to have it excised eventually, but it’s a good thing for now.
That delicious, delicious thigh.
I hope Angular Fungus doesn’t want into Mike’s pants as well … that would be cramped.
It’ll be a party in Mike’s pants! A horrible, terrifying FUNGUS PANTS PARTY
8D
And that ladies and gentlemen is why you always need to wash your undies.
Y’know I think they might wanna cancel that whole colonization thing while there’s still indigenous life THAT LIVES IN PEOPLE’S THIGHS
Who knows what other parts it could live in.
I wish to voice my disapproval of the blog joke. That is all.
huehuehue
Woah god damn is the whole red around him tainted with his blood ?
—
Anyway, don’t worry Michael, most men shrinks in the face of Fear.
(sorry)
(not sorry)
Nope, that would be the water of the Interanal Sea.
If that was a typo, it was surely blessed.
lol, good lord
*looks*
*blanches
*pokerface*
Sorry.
As if this page needed to be any more disturbing.
Yeah, I was wondering about the red stuff as well… Spores? Another part of the healing that fixed his internal injuries or something? At least I presume it’s healing since he’s still alive and appears to be moving his leg without even wincing in pain.
…I wonder if they can heal the mind
Thighfungus found Mike to be in perfect health except for all those nasty oxygen-carrying molecules in his bloodstream, so he’s been kindly pumping it out whlie Mike was asleep. What a pal!
*shudder*
It looks like he extended then bent back his leg.
Good.
That mean he can run.
RUN MICHAEL RUN
This just keeps getting better and better. :D
I was so afraid of this happening and really didn’t want it to happen and oh god it happened make it stop–
AUGH
It retracted! And I knew it, I knew it. Aliens!
Is Mike in some sort of glistening substance? Pollen? Spores maybe?
My theory is he’s sitting in sand coated in bioluminescent microorganisms, which produce faint red light when he moves. Which explains why the light is always brightest close to him.
Thats an excellent theory. They’d have to be very sensitive though. Or else the sand is easily shifted when he moves and causes the organisms to light up. In my experience with bioluminescent micro-organisms it took quite a bit to get them to spark. Such as being tumbled in waves or else stomping on the sand around them. And even then they weren’t very bright for very long.
Hmm, rather than on movement, it would make more sense to me that it’d react chemically (provided, again, that it isn’t his blood) to the CO2 Michael produces.
Possibly Michael’s heat but the spacesuit is supposed to block most of that.
………no
Ok so, how many thigh friends does it take to get to the tootsie roll center of a tootsie Mike?
Oh gosh.
Well let’s find out: A one, A two… Turn in next week for continuing thigh-friend count.
Let’s see. A one. A two. A three!
Defensive withdrawal in the presence of a possible predator. Run, Mike. Trust your parasite. Run, Mike, RUN!
Also I would like to point out that A.T. is hiding inside his trousers and I find that adorable.
The fact that he has a prey-organism in his pants may be the reason the predator is potentially after him in the first place.
That just sounds funny…
You’re under arrest for housing a known, wanted criminal in your undergarments! Hold your crotch up where I can see it, and take off your pants
^ that’s not script for a wierd porno, I swear ^
I wouldn’t be surprised- it is quite a sexy thighfriend. Pity about the human though
I think maybe that it instead retreated into his… leg rather than his pants
I certainly hope not.
My wishful reasoning is that the skin on the thighs is surely not elastic enough to allow entry to a whole amorous thighfish. Not without further *shudder* tearing.
Sure it is! Skin is VERY stretchy (one of its main distinguishing structural features in fact), & fungus are very porous in structure, ergo their potential variation in volume is substantial.
Nature is all about fitting into a tight squeeze, when there’s delicious nutrients there.
I… What… How? WHAT IS THAT THING. Get it ooouuut of his leg.
NO THANK YOU TO THIGHFRIEND
i had to light up the image in photoshop to understand that the right two pieces are part of the whole… line or antenna, or proboscis or whatever it is and not a contour of a square. (my first impression was a square (most of which is not seen) holding that soft thing as an axe. i cannot see that again now.)
Same here! Thought it was a giant block for a bit.
I think the light source is his helmet which he threw to his right when he first dragged his arse out of the water.
Oh man, this is just FRIGGEN. AWESOME. I read this and went “dafaq?”
in before that new one is attached to Bex’s FACE
DON’T EVEN JOKE OH GOD
Thinking about the slimy? pink puddle thing around Mike and getting really creeped out by the possibilities.
mike fisher and the terrible horrible no good very bad day
Zzziip
I bet ThighFungi give off distress pheromones when they notice a ~feel~ and the distress pheromones summon ThighFungiMomma.
Or possibly predators in search of injured ThighFungi.
Congratulations, Mike, you’re part of the ecosystem!
My thought is that it was very possibly all of Mike’s screaming that attracted this curious provider of rectilinear terror.
So that thing reacted on vibrations, hmm.
…Fisher has summoned a big one.
Well, since Mike’s from earth and Crazy Angle Fungus is from Mars, they can’ t eat each other. Right? Right?!
If abiogenesis occurred on only one planet and was spread to the other via ballistic contamination, their biology could definitely be similar enough to allow one to gain useful nutrients from the other.
If that’s the case, though, it’s also likely that each now incorporates substances that’s toxic to the other (you could eat gangrene bacteria, but would you want to?), but Mike will probably at least pass as food long enough to be chewed on/skewered/diced/whatever it is that CrazyAngle Fungus do.
Nobody else said thighanemone so I just wanted to say thighanemone.
Why are you all calling it the thighfungi? If anything it should be called …the funthigh
yyyYYYYYEES
I guess so, seeing as this is turning out to be a thighence fiction comic
Even Mike says “Ow” at that one…
I fail to grathp the humour in your thatemenths.
Oooooooh you!
Queue narrative reading of The Pit and the Pendulum by Poe.
Aaaah! I just finished binge-reading the comic and I’m now on the edge of my seat on what happens next! :D
Moaaar!
I am sure its bad thoughts but my first thoughts of this whole ordeal was that Michael needed the emperor’s mercy followed by kill it, kill it with fire as nothing good comes of aliens bursting out of bodies.
I no longer believe Michael will be the main character beyond this chapter. That dude is toast.
The main character will be Thighfungus, of course:
[MARE] Fri 8PM – Duster wanders above the surface and discovers an abandoned human suit. Hijinks ensue as he learns to operate it while being chased by his cranky old nemesis, AngleFungus, but our hero soon discovers *this* suit has a mind of its own… and it’s not friendly! Laugh and cry along with your favorite thighfriend as he discovers the true meaning of symbiotic parasitism! [2h, TV-MA]
I laughed, I cried, I feeled
*applause*
“Why r u yelling at my baby”
this is like when ur at a grocery store and some kid just grabs onto your leg and you look at the Mom and go “excuse me m’am is this yours”
Are we naming leg creature yet? Can I suggest “Walker?”
“Desirable Anglefungus”
The size of that bulge beneath the spacesuit’s fabric makes me distinctly uncomfortable.
That said, I wonder if it’s just hiding from the newly appeared plant-thing.
The new Deluxe Body Horror™ now folds up into a convinient travel size, now you can Bring the Horror Home™!
Yaaaaaaaay!
(internal screaming– no. no, that’s external screaming)
A wild Chevron Chomper appeared!
Damn. Now i’m even more curious what will happen to the poor guy.
Well Michael, I hope you weren’t too attached to that leg.
(get it ? GET IT ?)
I think this will be fixed soon.
And yes, got it :-)
He’s not the only one attached to that leg, apparently.
This comic just gets cooler and cooler
Note: don’t drink coffee while reading MI.
:)
That smile face worries me
Smiley can be creepy. ;D
My reaction was pretty much the one of the first posting by Metrophor. Just … with Coffee.
Oh happy news. No need to kill yourself now.
Yay ?
This seems to be some sort of predator (since Mr Flapflap is afraid of it), so I assume this is the point where things get messy.
Wacky Arrow Alien: “Sup”.
Yeah, it seems to be just hanging there and trying to ~sense~ what’s new in its cave.
Does anyone else think that new creature in the last panel looks suspiciously like a giant blade…
RUN MIKE, RUUUUUN!
lmao at iisjah’s fanart.
Interesting, am I correct to conclude from the given clues that the compression forces of the retracted critter will realign/reset Mikes femur injury enough to allow him back some limited mobility? If so, symbiotic relationship indeed.
Uhh. Creature fix leg
OH MY GOD! Im so confsued !
CRAZY THEORY TIME
(aka adding background that the author never intended)
Ok… so I was staring at that structure and thinking why would the amorous thigh fungus require such a frilly structure? This is typically required in situations where a lot of surface area is a good thing. In the case of an actual fungus the gills underneath provide a high density of spore containment.
Sooooo… let’s take a look at fish gills which benefit from large surface area. Googling “fish gills” here’s what I found: http://www.sphere.be/media-gallery/detail/201/3016
A few pages back we found out that in addition to our new friend the amorous thigh fish, our protagonist was suffering from distinct respiratory distress so maybe the thigh fungus allows for a higher efficiency gas exchange that would allow him to get the appropriate amount of oxygen while protecting his wimpy human breathing organs from the unfriendly gases. Keeping him alive a bit longer to heal him.
or not :P
maybe it’s just an opportunistic femur fungus o_O
Fungus Friend’s “gills” are absorbing oxygen from the air and pumping into Mike’s blood stream?
Maybe? (or I need to sleep more prior to commenting, like a mental version of breathalyzer to start a car hahaha)
But, maybe a human in an alien environment is poorly suited to survive with different gases, minerals, organic make up than the narrow window of Earth. Friendly Thigh Fungus is a symbiotic parasite that makes sure its host survives by serving as a biological translator. In exchange it slowly takes something that is beneficial but very rare in the terrifying Martian “ecology” we’re uncovering. I don’t, something like calcium, so it found affinity to the exposed bone, squiggled in there, and while keeping him alive for food is preparing him secretly for a life of osteoporosis.
And then it jumps a Martian shark. :P
Of course, if this theory is true, that means that they are, in fact, “Fish” gills…
@shingworks, you continue to deliver page after page of beautiful work. And more than a few rather uncomfortable reactions. Keep up the amazing work.
Remember kids, you may think it’s cool to get an Amorous Thighfungus now, but you may be discriminated against in the jobs market and shunned by polite society.
Assuming you live long enough, what with blood poisoning, Men in Black abduction squads and Ravenous Scythefunguses.
Ravenous Scythefungus is an excellent name!
Ravenous /Scythefungi/!
I think that the infatuated thighfungus might be going into the muscle, with the band of red around its retreat point. >_>
Ow.
What if… Neptune is holding that, rising from the water, and what primitive artists thought of as a trident is a scythe? Mind=blown
Minus the pony in the middle, this is what I imagine is going through Mike’s head:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJ0ZQzQTt6Y
Mikeplier?
Mike’s life is just a collection of increasingly what-the-fuckier what-the-fucks.
I thought some of you might be interested in something that just hit my inbox from the JPL: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=4720&utm_source=iContact&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NASAJPL&utm_content=daily20150924-1
X[______________] what could it be
No idea, but when JPL sends out this kind of advance notice, it’s not going to be anything routine.
Ooh that’s exciting. I wonder what they found?
*Life on Mars starts playing*
I love the little tendril pointing out like, “Save me, host! It’s gonna eat both of us!”
Also Mike’s reaction is 100% what mine would be as well. I agree that it was his screaming that brought out the… axe thing. I’m not good with cute names. xD
In my mind, CornerCrescent Thing is saying “Fuck!”, also.
Mike: Whaaaaa….
Crescent Fringy Thingy: WTF is this collection of bio matter?? (In Martian, of course)
Thighthingy: Daddy, u needs to makes it go way…
Next scenario-
Mike: Whaaaaaa…..
Crescent Fringy Thingy: JUNIOR! What are you doing out of bed at this hour?!
Thighthingy: Err, hi Mom! Lookit what I found! Can I keep it? Pleas, huh, please, huh?
It’s gettin’ late. Better turn in soon. Let me see what’s in my Saturday web-comics folder.
……..
Oh Crap.
Heh heh >:]
Just Binge-read from the start, amazing comic, starting all Scyphy, than coming to this.
Probably I’ll be the only one immediately recalling the Pills-Cleaning-Crescent, did it travel after Mike to bring his Meds? If so, could that stop the psychosis and hallucinations? Or are we in deeper water here ;)