Haven’t flagged an Empowered example of the oft-mentioned Mysteriously Intermittent Post-Millennial Torso Glitch in quite some time—but, oy, this one is a doozy, as Emp’s waist and hips  are wacky as hell. Now, this wouldn’t be something I would complain about if 2006-Era Me had drawn this way entirely on purpose, if I were deliberately trying for a hyperstylized, “wasp-waisted” riff along the lines of how Bruce Timm or Shane Glines depict their cartoony ladies. Iwas  not, after all, attempting anything even remotely close to the artistic “realism” that some comics fans so selectively claim to appreciate. Ah, but I wasn’t consciously drawing a Shane Glines-y Emp, here, which is the real problem with the Intermittent Torso Glitch—that it would pop into my work at random, without me noticing its sudden manifestation. 

The Glitch is history, now, having disappeared from my work as mysteriously as it once appeared. In fact, now I struggle with almost the opposite problem as, nowadays, I consciously draw Emp a bit, uh, softer and fuller-figured to theoretically differentiate her physique from the bodies of athletic Ninjette or magically sculpted Sistah Spooky. Problem is, occasionally I overshoot Emp’s intended level of “fleshiness,” to the point that I sometimes have to go back and nip in her waist a little as an art correction—or, when I bungle her proportions right into Robert-Crumb-worthy territory, redraw her figure entirely. “It’s always something,” if I might quote the late Gilda Radner.

-Adam Warren