176 – Red Hood
Jason Todd is a character who serves a greater purpose when he’s dead, and I can’t think of a more useless, awful character running around the DCU for the useless and awful reasons he is. Until Grant Morrison wrote the character during his Batman and Robin run, and spent three issues pointing out what a pathetic joke the character is at the same time as making him almost likeable and badass. Plus he gave him an actual costume, instead of a just a crappy jacket. This was a well-designed, partially fleshed out character I wanted to see again.
Then he showed up, sans Morrison and reverted straight back to the leather jacket wearing, useless Mary Sue of a douchebag he is. Thanks, Judd Winnick! I’m gonna stop defending your work now.
175 – Norman Osborn
I know I recently did a Green Goblin sketch, but I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to draw his secret identity of Norman Osborn, Marvel Universe psychopath, or his crazy hair. Seriously, any ginger with that hair style should have been locked up from the get-go.
174 – Dirk the Daring
So yesterday, I accomplished a thing that I have, essentially, been waiting almost 27 years or so to do. I finally played (and beat) Dragon’s Lair. This is a game I saw all the time at the arcade, it was expensive to play, and hard to play, and my 5 year old mind couldn’t wrap itself around it, so, like most things in my life, I gave up. Well, now I’m almost 33, and I downloaded the game on the Playstation Network, and it’s still a hard game, probably more expensive than it was worth, and I still can’t wrap my mind around it. But it had some lovely animation and character design by the legendary Don Bluth and company, so I decided to draw Dirk the Daring. I thought about drawing Princess Daphne, but she was perhaps too slutty looking even for me. Eh, I still might.
Aftershock
Art by Skye Ogden.
A few months back, after the devastating earthquakes in Japan, my friend Jason Young forwarded me an email from a man named Adam Paison, a cartoonist living in Japan. Adam had decided to put together a charity book of comics from artists around the world, recounting their personal experiences with Japan or Japanese culture. At first I wasn’t going to contribute, as I have found that I don’t enjoy drawing comics, and had no real experience with Japan other than reading very little Manga, watching some Anime and eating at a Japanese restaurant once. Jason reminded me that I actually did have a slightly more personal story, one that I thought might be kind of funny, and it would be nice to help out a good cause.
The book itself is nearing the final phases. It’s ready for printing and distribution, but needs a little help first. Over at this Kickstarter page, you can donate to get the book published. All proceeds from the sale of the book goes to help the ongoing disaster relief and rebuilding in Japan, and to help the citizens hurt most by the destruction. My friend Jason has a great story in it, I have a story that makes me look like a selfish jerk, and something like 30 other artists from around the world have contributed stories, like Jeffrey Brown, Noah Van Sciver and Carrie McNinch.
Check it out, spread the word, donate, whatever you like. In addition to the Kickstarter page, you can also go to the Aftershock blog page and check out preview pages and art from the book.
173 – Ambush Bug
Another request for my League Night co-host, Joe Grunenwald. I’m actually, sadly, really unfamiliar with Ambush Bug, because if there was a character who seemingly should be right down my alley, it’s this one. He’s a funny character who is aware that he’s a comic character, and he was created by Keith Giffen, a writer/artist whose work I’ve admired for years. There’s a reason Blue Beetle is my favorite superhero, and that reason is Keith Giffen (J.M. DeMatteis and Kevin Maguire helped some, too). Giffen has such a diverse and varied career in comics, and I’m always interested in seeing what he’s doing next. OMAC is definitely in the top 5 of the New DCU Reboot books I’m looking forward to the most.
Between Giffen’s Justice League and Peter David’s first run on X-Factor (his current run ain’t no slouch, either), I learned that one could tell a comedic story without devolving into parody, and still have drama, action and depth (the Edgar Wright/Simon Pegg/Nick Frost movies Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz are also perfect examples of this). It’s something I always wanted to aspire to when I tried to write.
172 – Supergirl
Watching Justice League Unlimited for my League Night podcast, and I was reminded of how much I dug Supergirl’s costume in the beginning of that cartoon and from the Superman: The Animated Series ‘toon. So I drew her. In that costume. Why are you hassling me?!
171 – Green Goblin
Normy Osborn’s better half.
170 – Cowboy
This is actually a character from a six page comic I did some years ago for a friend. Working out a way to get it published soon, hopefully.
2021 UPDATE: 10 years later, almost to the day, it finally happened.
