DISCOVERY ESSAY: The Hidden WomanKing Artwork!
IMPORTANT NOTE: This is a discovery essay for the lost media CastleCastle and WomanKing by Rachel Smythe and based on my own personal guesses based on what has been found for said Lost Media on Rachel Smythe's archived Tumblr account on the WayBack Machine. CastleCastle and WomanKing are considered "PARTIALLY FOUND" (mostly lost, more than 50%).
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Hello!
I wanted to do a quick, fun, and light-hearted Lost Media Discovery Essay about a WomanKing artwork piece, more specifically, a artwork piece that was hidden in plain sight for the longest time!
The piece I'm referring to this:
The Little Mermaid by Rachel Smythe (March 2013)
Now, I know what you must be thinking:
"No... This piece is fanart for The Little Mermaid... Rachel Smythe even described it as such. Right?"
And... you would be half correct!
(Source: The 03/2013 Description of "The Little Mermaid" Post from RS’s Archived Tumblr Blog)
Like the majority of people, mostly likely everyone, who came across this piece of old Rachel Smythe artwork assumed it was The Little Mermaid fanart. It even says so in the description of the post on her archived Tumblr.
BUT, that all was thrown out the window when a RS | LO - Lost Media member @adorable-pink-cinnamon-roll showed us an archived Tumblr ask that we haven't seen before...
(Source: This 01/2014 Ask from RS’s Archived Tumblr Blog)
This one (1) note Tumblr Ask after a year the artwork was posted revealed that this Little Mermaid fanart depicted characters from RS's lost WomanKing web comic!
Now, this is follow-up question I have when I saw this ask:
What characters from WomanKing are in The Little Mermaid piece?
This is where we look at the CastleCastle and WomanKing timeline!
Afterwards, we will look at some character artwork!
Here is a quick CastleCastle and WomanKing Artwork Timeline, based on RS's Archived Tumblr on the WayBack Machine:
June 2012: Last CastleCastle Post
= GAP/NO UPDATE =
September 2012: CastleCastle Re-Write Starts, Renamed WomanKing
March 2013: The Little Mermaid/WomanKing Fanart
January 2014: The Little Mermaid/WomanKing Ask
The Little Mermaid/WomanKing piece is obviously part of the CastleCastle re-write considering the dates, so I looked in the surrounding dates for character artwork to see if any of the characters looked similar to the one's in the artwork.
Currently for WomanKing, here is what I assume are the main characters:
Tori (WomanKing Cover) by Rachel Smythe (March 2013)
The Moth Sorceress by Rachel Smythe (April 2013)
Unnamed Main Male Lead by Rachel Smythe (2013) (I could not find his proper name so I will just call him "Male Lead")
Robin by Rachel Smythe (April 2013)
Now, none of these characters look like the characters in the Little Mermaid artwork BUT there is one more piece I want to show from October 2012, when RS started the CastleCastle re-write...
Queen Eliza by Rachel Smythe (October 2013)
From what I could gather, Queen Eliza and The Moth Sorceress are the same character due to these factors:
The Third Eye
The Moth Motif
Inflicted with what RS's calls "Magic Sickness"
This early sketch of the Moth Sorceress was the only one I've found where a character had teal/turquoise hair like the mermaid character on the Little Mermaid artwork so I assume that is who it is.
Now, as for the short-haired blonde lady knight, I currently couldn't find any character artwork resembling her so I don't know who that is from the WomanKing universe. Maybe she is from the equally lost CastleCastle universe but who is to say.
Only time will tell who the mysterious blonde lady knight is!
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Hopefully you enjoyed this short little essay!
I'm still working on the "DISCOVERY ESSAY: The Doctor Pepper Show 3rd Attempt" write-up, it's just taking a while due always finding new things about it when doing deep dives on the WayBack Machine so I have to re-work my outline a bit!
Have A Great Day!
