#ibmweek

And here we are--the last of the IBM reference sheets. This one’s for Satou’s IBM, also known in the fandom as blep because of his insistence on sticking out his tongue all the damn time.

Blep has a pretty standard build (clawed nails on feet and hands, normal sized arms and torso, etc) with two really unique features which I’m going to ramble on about in depth.

First, the head. Several people have noted that Satou’s IBM’s head is shaped kind of similar to Satou’s many, many hats. It’s also been described as an upside down shoe, and a variety of other ways.

Personally I’m more interested by what is inside the hat/shoe.

First, the tongue. The tongue is pretty similar to a snakes, although forked at the end. That said, it’s not quite a snakes--it’s almost definitely intended to be a Gila Monster.

Gila Monsters range through the southwestern United States, including, wouldn’t you know it, California, where Satou grew up.

I couldn’t quite decide on the teeth. Something like a crocodile or alligator sort of makes sense, but the shape is different, so it might be totally original.

It’s also just interesting in that Satou’s IBM actually produces saliva. You can see it dripping, and it’s got a full throat that extends down into its body, rather then dead-ending like Tanaka’s does.

It also has a VERY prominent adam’s apple.

There is one other feature that often gets missed but has some pretty interesting story significance:

See that thing I’ve badly circled in red? It’s a part of the body known as a glottis. Humans have them, but the specific way it’s designed--a small tube at the back of the mouth--shows up in snakes.

The glottis, you see, is used to swallow things whole. A snake’s glottis is movable, and while the snake swallows something even bigger than its body, the glottis extends out the side of its mouth to ensure it can continue reading. So basically, what I’m saying is that Blep is built for vore.

Onto the other prominent feature: The hands.

At first glance the hands seem pretty normal, and this is probably the IBM trait I see most missed. Here are two panels showing it off. One, here’s Kei’s IBM punching Satou’s IBM:

And here it is holding a gun:

Satou’s IBM actually has postaxial polydactyly, which means it has six fingers rather than five. Rather than four fingers and a thumb, Satou’s IBM has five fingers and a thumb, laid out so neatly that almost no one notices.

This trait shows up a lot in fiction, but there’s a pretty obvious reference in here: Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs has this exact variety of postaxial polydactyly, where the character in question has a duplicated middle finger. It’s worth noting that Hannibal Lecter only has this on their left hand (Satou’s IBM has it on both), but considering the fact that Blep’s eaten humans combined with the references to Silence of the Lambs, I really doubt this wasn’t the intended reference.