A Spectrum of Wut

Pan Books "Spectrum" SF series

WUT indeed.

It's like they said "We dig the look of the Penguin books, but they go a bit too far. Let's use a readable font and make the art slightly less weird."

Or else these came first and Penguin said "Hold my pint".

The guy in the first one seems pretty blasé about tentacle eyeballs crawling up his legs. It's a spectrum of meh.

#2 gets #creepy children. Really disquieting. I guess that means it's effective?

#3 is the planet of the big-headed crazy eyed bald misfit toys. Got a guy who's had an HVAC system installed and a half-man, half... kangaroo? kangaroo rat? furry frog?

#4: Don't let the Ozymandias/Python-esque foot and the dude with the WTF head and fingers distract you from the woman with six buttocks. That damsel is for sure #SirMix material.

#5 I don't know if the guy is being thrown onto the bug by evil-doers or if this is a future rodeo sport. I award him #weird torso.

(Serious announcer voice:) We now bring you … Spectrum Four!
bum bum bum!

Spectrum 4: Faux-hawk birdman clutches his chest as he rapturously beholds the triple-callipygian. She, meanwhile, has just seen her village obliterated by the descent of the Pythonesque Foot, and she will hardly warm to his inevitable advances. Pathos!

>3 TorMented: Ha!

My first thought upon viewing Spectrum 4 was that three nudists had decided that the fastest way to escape the Plaintive Mohawked Bird-dog-man was to ride piggy-back.

It occurs to me that the multi-butted woman and the giant foot might be from Cordwainer Smith's Shayol (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Planet_Named_Shayol ) . Don't recall there being any birdmen in it.

#5: "And now for the third round of the low-gravity nude interpretive dance contest..."

>6 bam2001: Might be from a description of the story to the artist. Mostly people on Shayol grew organs for transplant, but maybe they have a great need for extra buttocks in the future. The poor woman sure couldn't sit in your average chair.

The bird-man might be from a different story in the book.

#5 must be a mixed-species contest, unless the bug is just an apparatus. Maybe it's the future version of Cretan bull-jumping.

>7 GSSex-noob: I remember one of the women on Shayol grew multiple torsos, one above the other, so why not extra booty?

>8 haydninvienna: Did all the booty have plumbing? (Eww)

Maybe the artist was told "extra torsos" and said "f'narr f'narr" only to be told "no norks, mate" and compromised.

Either that, or -- like the giant foot -- it was nicked from Python, turned into The Woman With Three (sets of) Buttocks.