Death Favours the Enemy

Panel that I’ve had done for a bit, from that Mech thing I’ve had going on. Later on, there’s going to be all sorts of crazy HUD Holograms glowing white & floating around the whole cockpit to really give it that sensory overload sensation. Show there’s more data being thrown at her than a modern human can handle, what with this being the future & all.

Originally, those big dial looking things were actually mist emitters that spray a cloud of water vapor molecules to give the holographic light something to bounce off of. But then I started questioning how all that would all work in the zero gravity of this mech she’s piloting. Then I started wondering if I should just make all the holograms she’s seeing projections from mental augmenting implants, because there’s going to be one that follows her around most of the story, even outside the mech anyway. Then, I started wondering why the fuck I read so much goddamn Shirow as a little kid & care that much about all this shit that would kind of all just be a given in other people’s stuff. But whatever. Those are where the holograms are getting projected from in the robot.

Poison Thrower

One of those situations where I started doing a warm up sketch & it got crazy & I went overboard. Bowie the Poison Thrower (and Zazu) from James Stokoe‘s Orc Stain. It’s really the one comic coming out regularly enough these days I really give a shit about. The book always looked good, but Issue 6 ends on a beat that made me actually g0 “oh shit” audibly out of visceral reaction. First thing in a long while to get me to do that.

I started this as a warm up yesterday on a whim that she seemed like a neat character to draw. I had half of Zazu filled in (& probably went too poofy) before cursing ligne claire on twitter & realizing I hadn’t even started on the stuff I was intending to do at that point. So I got to work, but went back to it a couple of times between panels & finished it just now, while still being able to pencil a page & a half more of TransModo. More of that soonish.

ProtoModo Eins

Over on Void, I started this new 22 pg comic project called TransModo. I dig it. I plan to turn it into something pretty cool. But I’m committed to bust out a short 22pg version for the site first in two chunks. This was the first chunk. And ultimately, I only got an idea of what I wanted to do with this a day or two before the first round’s deadline. So consider this a WIP prototype for what may become a long format story down the road.

And not that it really means anything to the story so far, I started writing ahead & got so wrapped up in shit I made a goddamn glossary. I blame reading so much Shirow as a kid, with his damn appendices & such.

More on this soon.

Only Worth a Piano?

Right. I know. I kick off this daily sketch thing, miss a day right off the bat, post for like a second, & then it’s radio silence. Well here. I have been drawing but I’ve been really slow to get them scanned. Anywhere here’s the last couple days, as well as a quicky I’m going to count for today.

Firstly, Yoon Tae-Goo, the eponymous Weird from the Korean Western “The Good, The Bad, & The Weird.” Guy’s a badass & one of the most underrated characters in cinema within the past decade, if not longer. Can’t translate what he’s saying but I’m sure it’s akin to “freeze” or “get down” or something as such. I took a screencap & figured I’d throw that in as well for shits & giggles.

Secondly, I found this pretty cool picture of Gogol Bordello’s Eugene Hutz riding a drum out into the crowd of one of his shows. The image was so cool I decided to sketch it up. Kind of stopped caring by the time I got to the hands but I like how it turned out. I don’t usually sketch too many musicians. I really dig Gogol Bordello, but they’re not among my all-time favorites. Just such a cool image mostly.

Thirdly, this is a rough I did of a possible character idea I’ve been kicking around for Entervoid.com. Basically, A-ko meets Whitey Action; the superpowered daughter of two world renowned superheroes, who instead of following in their footsteps would rather just be a raucous party girl. But on account of her powers & shitty disposition, she breaks a lot of stuff. I’m thinking I might call her Alina. Drew up some thumbs & started developing back story & a supporting cast but it started getting a little nuts. Now I don’t know if I want to use her for Void, or just do something a little more grandiose with her. But I figured I’d do a quick look of her.

And Lastly, this was a ten minute sketch I did of a very generic man from a very generic eastern european country who just happens to be a part of a very generic gentlemen’s organization. I was mostly just trying to draw something a little cartoony, in a looser, quicker style than the stuff I normally do. The Kano-esque facial hair configuration given to him on a whim lead me to an occupation that just seemed to fit. He might show up in something again at some point, but don’t hold your breath.

While I have you, I just wanted to thank David Brothers for the link & kind words about the Tetsuo sketch this past week. Sorry I didn’t get to thank you until now, but I really appreciate it!

Ok. Going to go back to work on my comic pages a little more before going to bed. Later.

Fish is Practically a Vegetable

Didn’t forget about dailies. I just got a bit lazy about posting these right away. I’ve got two for you here.

Firstly, I know every time I start this up I’ve got to draw some sort of Tetsuo, so that obligation’s met. Here I was aiming for towards the end, just before the final blobby freak out sequence where he gets all nuts & giant baby like. Really liked the look of the white spikes & the random tactical vest he pulled off some dead soldier. I was entertaining the thought of drawing some fighter jets going down in the background but it was getting late. I know the proportions are a little fucked. But whatever I was happy with it for how fast I did it. And speeding up’s part of the plan here.

Unfortunately I didn’t get much of a chance to work on my comic last night, but that was more from the fact I was visiting with my dad earlier in the evening & he’s moving to Atlanta. I could kind of do this in the background & not actively think about what I was doing, while still bonding over some of those horrible pawn-themed reality shows that have seemed to sweep cable before he leaves. When I got home I figured I’d just do another sketch to get today’s out the way. And while I usually get super slow at likenesses, this one just seemed to fly, taking only about a half hour.

Okay, so it’s not perfect, but it was fast. Parks & Rec’s Ron Swanson. And yes, if you are familiar with the show, he is wearing his Tiger Woods reds. I almost went with the Bobby Knight ensemble from the recent episode where he coaches a youth basketball league or even the Duke Silver get-up. But the Tiger Woods is like Ron Swanson Classic. I tried drawing him before, on account of both his greatness & how weirdly intense his face is. This ended up turning out much better, I think. If you’re not familiar, just let this helpful diagram give you a pretty thorough introduction, or even better, a handy explanation of this diagram.

Also, I know I said I was going to try it out & give it a week in the last post, but I took my ugly mug down off the header, because really, who the fuck needs that looking back at them? You poor souls. I’m sorry for even entertaining the idea. Today I have to do some work related stuff & then make some calls, but hopefully before this afternoon I can sit back at the drawing table & get some more work done on my main project.

Why God? Why?

So I needed a break from the page I was working on & decided to do a sketch for today. But I couldn’t think of anything to do, so I took an old photo of myself & went the self portrait route. Lame.

There’s some beard embellishment going on. And I may look too Asian rather than Squinty Mick but whatever. All I can do is assure you that I’m not in a Japanese Doomsday Cult & let’s all just  move on. Might add this to the banner up top, as I always thought that left side of the header looked too empty. Going to try it for the week, see what I think. Now back to drawing mech pilots.

Deeply Rooted Masochism

So things on my end have been nuts lately, yourselves? (Can’t hear you, but if felt polite to ask) After a series of nutty events the past few months, things are leveling back out. Not getting better, just leveling out. And with this lull in the madness I’ve been threatening to reboot the daily sketches. Why? D’fuck should I know? My guess is also the title of this very post. But I’ve decided the daily thing’s what’s going to happen.

In all seriousness, I’m vowing not to kill myself over it if I miss days like I used to. And generally, I’m not looking to put the same time into them like I did some of the other sketches before, which ended up taking a while sometimes. I need to speed up, but mostly I need to discipline myself more. So that’s what this is going to be about this time. And even though I say this every time I set out to do this, this time I SWEAR IT.

Ok, let’s get to this particular sketch. In theory, I’m not officially counting this, but I feel weird sometimes posting on what’s supposed to be a “sketchblog” without some kind of art. This wasn’t today. It’s old. From months ago, actually. A concept from a webcomic idea Sean Witzke & I were kicking around about a team of science students. Instead of the type of team leader you usually find in regular comics, we were opting for more of a short plucky lesbian that knew karate. When you first see her, she’s dressed like this, but then she picks out some patriotic lab attire & the science stuff was to happen. Anyway, we’re both working on other things now, so who knows if we’ll come back to it, but it was a fun little idea.

While mulling the daily sketch thing, I actually have been working on a comic that I’ve been threatening to work on forever. Basicially, I stopped procrastinating & just forced myself to sit down & just fucking do it already. And it’s been ok. Things are finally clicking, & despite a few external setbacks, I’m making progress. Hopefully, I’ll have some sneak peeks of that to show soon. But yeah, people. I miss the sketch thing. I usually do a little something each day, but whenever I aim to do a full, postable thing each day, I feel like I start to get into a zone. Hopefully if I can manage it right & make time for both, I’ll be able to be in that zone while finally getting shit done. Fingers crossed.

Eaglehead

Sloane Leong is a chaotic tornado of both comics creation & resource. Not only does she post her own amazing comic work, she’s one of the founders of Escape from Suicide Wolf Forest, a great collective blog that tries to cover all aspects of sequential art & its creation. She also started one of the better inspiration Tumblrs out there, for my money. Anyway, Sloane rocks.

On her sketch Tumblr, she’s been having this character duo pop up lately. The girl’s named Salatis, but the fluffy, multi-eyed parasite scarf thing’s called Manus. I thought it was an awesome idea & wanted to take  a shot drawing the two characters. So here they are. I realized I kind of glazed over the hands. Otherwise, I think it’s ok-ish.

And yeah, after that General Treister picture I did a little bit ago, I wanted to try more Kirby dots for space. This time I tried it digitally. Didn’t like the result as much so I guess I have to practice with it more.

In other news, the series of articles Sean Witzke & I are doing rolls on. This time, we talked about one of my artist picks with Seth Fisher. You can read it at his site, which you can get to by clicking this link. Fisher’s one of those artists that has a small, but crazy influential body of work. I’ve always really liked his art. Unfortunately though, if you do a search for his name, most of what you find are dated news articles on his untimely passing, rather than people appreciating his stuff. When Sean proposed this whole exchange, talking about artists who don’t get talked about enough, Fisher popped right out at me. So go check it out, won’tcha?

There Will Be A Reckoning

Hey actual comics! These are a bit old. I did them originally on Void but then finished them for an anthology that never seemed to happen, the theme to which was just “water”. It’s going on two years at this point so I’m just going to post these as it wasn’t anything I was doing for pay anyway.

The story’s pretty basic. To the point of just being really silly actually. Really the only thing I wanted to focus on with this was the storytelling itself. I practiced a lot with trying to lead the eye about the page. Some pages might be a little busy for it but whatever.  Oh & since this was originally formatted for print, some of the pages are double page spreads, while most are just facing pages. It just seemed cleaner to post it like this. The double pagers were done on 11×14 sheets of bristol, while the single pages are obviously half that. It’s small, sure but the anthology was originally at 5.5×7.5. And yes, it’s ridiculous.

EDIT – So Photobucket decided to be an Asshole & just randomly delete one of my images without any sort of notification as it somehow violated their terms or some bullshit. Anyway, I’ve reloaded the image & thus, the “update.” Sorry.

See? I actually do comics. Sometimes.

I did recently try my hand at talking about them with Sean Witzke, in a series we’re doing about artists we don’t think are getting the credit they’re due much online. We started off with Art Adams here. Check it out, will ya?

30 Characters: The Whole Second Half

Hey again. Here I am, back to arbitrarily post some more stuff I’ve been sitting on since November. A lot of life got in the way, but I’ve got absolutely nothing to do at the moment (given the hour) & figured, what the hell? We were up to the halfway point, & instead of drawing this out, I’m just going to do them all at once. Sorry to hit you with a mega post. Now’s your chance to opt out. Otherwise, let’s get on with it.

Not only is he among the highest paid actors in Asia, Ghalib Freshness, 67, found he’s not quite like other bollywood actors. This is because Ghalib’s singing voice can effect the resonance of the very strings that control subatomic particles. What does that mean? Well, whenever Ghalib sings, he can change reality to bend to his whim. Whatever Ghalib wants, Ghalib gets. That is at least until the song ends. Then things very abruptly revert back to the way they were.

To some of my friends, this guy was their favorite of my 30. Probably on name alone, which admittedly, I am fond of. At the time, I had started watching an Indian entertainment magazine at my girlfriend’s & the sheer infectious enthusiasm of Bollywood musicals inspired this guy. Also, God bless any film industry where superstar actors get their own pre-movie title cards like production houses. Next up…

Inspired by Rhino Jockey by Amon Tobin, I’ve always liked the idea that the title of that song gave me. So here’s a girl that rides the vast plains on the back of a huge rhino.

Why a rhino?

Because no one messes with a rhino.

Probably on account of it being a friggin’ rhino.

This one ended up being one of my favorites of the 30 personally. And though I vowed I wouldn’t do them, I still might go back & color this one at some point just cause.

I do overuse the static shots a lot, I know. And I was really happy with how the charge ended up looking, especially since I’ve never really attempted to draw a rhino before ever. I don’t know how clear it is, but the thing on either side is a bundle of javelins strapped to the rhino’s back. Now, the next two are kind of part of the same kernel of a story.

Every group needs a funny guy. And that was Hideo when it came to the rest of the gang. After years & years of service, he’s only officially reached the rank of big brother. And only because he’s funny. In fact, in every other regard, Hideo was pretty much a screw up. He’s lucky to have lasted as long as he have among the ranks, with as many fingers as he still has. But luckily, he’s laid low enough to keep the blade away from his belly. Funny & lucky. That was Hideo. At least until one day, when that luck seemingly ran out.

There was a raid. Tokyo police clamped down & arrested every high ranking member of the family. In the commotion, Hideo started to run. He made his way to an alley, only to lead police on a back street chase. For his trouble, he received two gunshot wounds: one to the gut & one to the side of the head. He died. He remembered it happening.

So imagine his surprise when he woke up, with gaping wounds & permanently red eyes (like his retinas detached). He should be dead, but he’s not & he doesn’t know how or why. And while he’s not the head of the family, his standing among the remaining family is now substantially higher. And they’re looking to hold down their remaining territory from their violent rivals & possibly spring their captive comrades. If that wasn’t stressful enough, some mysterious young girl is after him. Every time he turns around, there she is. Worst yet, despite her innocuous appearance, she’s apparently an unstoppable killing machine. And he’s her main target. He doesn’t know what’s going on, but he’s received this second chance & he’s not going to give it up without a fight.

This one, I fucked up on. It was bad. I did some photoshop work to get legs semi passable, but the missing pinky is intentional. Still, let’s just move on to the aforementioned unstoppable killing machine, if that’s cool.

Mikan-chan was always a bright & chipper girl. She had good grades, came from a good family & everything was great. But that was until she was dumped by the boy of her dreams. Broken hearted, the girl with the sunny disposition didn’t know how to cope. She ran away from home. Her destination? Aokigahara, the sea of trees, also known as the Suicide Forest.

Her family tracked her down. A week had passed since she had left & they feared the worst. But she was sitting there, at the edge of the parking lot, seemingly safe & sound, but not quite herself. She’s colder, emotionless, much more robotic. And lately, she’s been coming & going at all hours. Her family has no idea what to make of it.

That’s because she’s been on the prowl. Watching the movements of Yakuza in the nastier part of town. Definitely an environment much rougher than she’s used to. But she’s unphased. Her motives are unclear. But her objective’s pretty apparent: collecting the head of Ikegami Hideo.

Like I mentioned there too after, I probably drew her a little too stout & emotive. Also she doesn’t look very Japanese, but I like how the rest of it turned out. She basically is just trying to murder this random yakuza guy because they’re both possessed, & she has this huge arsenal of traditional Japanese weapons.

Yeah. Ok. Enough with Japan already. Here’s another duo.

Milo used to be scared of the monsters in his closet & under his bed. But Milo was a smart kid with resources. He knows a little thing or two about computers & cameras & surveillance methods. That’s how he came across the dirt he came across. You see, a monster by the name of Saul the Goronge used to mortify young Milo. Then one night, after their typical interaction, Milo used his computer to follow Saul’s movements, which were into Milo’s Mom’s closet & into her underwear drawer. Apparently Saul likes to play dress up.

Now, holding a manila envelope labeled “compromising images,” Milo’s reluctantly come to an understanding with Saul. Saul’s now gone rogue. He wards off other monsters in Milo & sometimes even other kids’ closets too. He even got Saul to start taking care of the day to day issues he runs into, like bullies & math homework. Yeah, everything is coming up Milo, for now.

Now I’ll be honest. I never saw Monster’s Inc. And while all the Pixar fanboys & animation lovers gasp, I really believe it’s my hatred of Billy Crystal that overrid my need to see it. But shortly after creating these guys, I was a little concerned I might but ripping them off if even covering similar territory (like Dreamworks for the longest time). Ideally though, I wanted to do something that was close to that all ages level, but not treat it so squeaky clean. I hated when things tried to do that with me as a kid. Chances are that this might still be just a little too much. But anyway, on to the monster.

A monster’s no better than a man. Sometimes, a monster has needs. And Saul’s no different.

Sometimes, Saul likes to dress up. That’s not a crime. But he’s worried about what other people might think. Now there’s some jerkweed kid that’s got some “Compromising Images” of Saul. For now, the brat’s trying his patience, extorting him into doing menial tasks for him. Meanwhile, he’s trying his best to snag the incriminating material & get on with his life. Or maybe he could just come to terms with being exposed for what he is. It might be a weight off his shoulders. But until that day, it’s beating up bullies & monsters, & doing math homework (poorly).

He might be a little too Slaughterface-y, but he’s based on a monster I had in a pretty vivid nightmare once as a little kid. Only that one had more chains & no vestigal looking bat wings. And wasn’t much of a crossdresser, but it did bite off my left foot in that dream. Yeah. Next!

Yeah. I went there.

Parker Peters is a teenage wunderkind. At age 16, he was on his way to MIT. But thanks to a paperwork foul up, he’s going to have to spend his first semester at a crappy nearby community college in the interim. The only thing on his schedule that looked remotely interesting was Theoretical Sciences. And little does he know how much that class will change his life.

From science story I was working on with Sean Witzke around the time of the 30characters. Basically college aged Challengers of the Unknown. But we were both also pretty big proponents for the “Donald Glover as the Next Spider-man” Campaign, & it was pretty much a no-brainer to make him the “nerdy guy”. That & he was just pretty easy to crank out quickly.

In the future, robots do most of the menial tasks humans used to do. And as time goes on, robots replace more obsolete models. Their indentured servitude over, the robots are free to do what they want. Most end up in robotic ghettos, isolated from humanity, but gathered amongst themselves & watching each others’ backs.

EPOX 1.7.2 is one such robot. That was until one day, when a gang of young humans came & started to beat the robots to the point of deactivation. After destroying some more helpless models, they turned their bats on EPOX. At one point, a hit in the right spot, caused EPOX to override the program that kept him from harming organic beings. And so he fought back, & when the dust settled, EPOX had survived.

His programming parameters do not give EPOX emotion, so revenge didn’t figure into the equation. But now as a robot capable of fighting back, EPOX is now the hero to the helpless robots. At least as long as he can keep himself going.

Shortly after posting this, I plugged it on twitter. The ever-awesome David Brothers responded with something that totally made this guy easily 30,000 times more interesting.

@hermanos: @kurohux “Keep himself going”–does he cannibalize deactivated bots for parts or is he just worn down?

Savior & predator wrapped up in one. That’s brilliant. Anyway, thanks David, for going above & beyond & totally outdoing me with two seconds of your time. With style.

You know. It’s cool.

(It actually is very though, right?! Okay, though, let’s keep this thing a-movin’, this time with a trio. Probably the most lackluster of the 30 in my opinion.)

So I kept having this idea for a comic that was inspired by real life events. You see, I donated blood to the local blood bank. So my number was on their mailing list. But then, every couple of months, I’d get this call telling me there was going to be a blood drive at such & such place. Problem was, no one would ever introduce them self or say where they were from. So I’d have these strangers calling up & wanting my blood. The premise for this comic morphed into something where there was this extremely unsuccessful blood drive & the nurses go crazy, deciding to go out & take blood rather than wait for those to give. Because who in a mall on a Wednesday afternoon really needs their blood that badly? But it was never much more than a premise. So now I’m trying to flesh out the characters for real, so I can do this story at some point.

So this is the first of three in a series of nurses out for blood. This is Gwen. Of the three, she is the reluctant one. So instead of carting around weapons like the other two, she follows them around with a shop vac. A shop vac for all the blood. Was trying to make her look a little short & rounder to have more variety in the shapes I’ve been drawing. Although she starts out going along with the other two, she’s probably the ultimate hero of the story.

It’s a silly idea. The quality of these isn’t so hot because I was rushing. Yeah I’m not thrilled with these. Though “ShopVac for Blood” got some good reaction from friends.

Another Blood Bank Nurse. An exchange nurse from “the old country.” She is over her on a blood bank nurse culture exchange program. There, if they can’t make their blood quota, they take it. She mentions this & plants the seed of the idea. This of course was embellishment. But she’s too cold & aloof to stop her gung ho comrade. Still her aim is quite impressive from her mandated time in the military. This is also where it is said she lost an eye. But she is also the most well versed in military weaponry, & knows how to get a hold of a vast array.

Only one more of these.

If you could sum up Anna Boydkin (or Boyhair to her friends for obvious reasons) in one word, it would be Emphatic.

Vegan. Feminist. Environmentalist. Pro-Choice. These are all causes Boyhair’s willing to die for. But her day job is a nurse at a blood bank. And the apathy of the people she deals with on a daily basis is really starting to urk her. When her fellow nurse made an offhanded remark about taking blood, Boyhair’s wheels started turning. They left the mall blood drive only to come back with heavy artillery & a shop vac. They’re out for blood.

Yeah I don’t know. Ultimately, I was mostly happy with all of my entries except these three. They’re really subpar for me. Not up to the level of everything else. Anyway, let’s move on, shall we?

Being stricken by illness has never stood in his way. The Infirm is mysterious & not widely known out of the circles of his business, but he is a gentleman assassin. For someone on the verge of it himself, he knows death well.

However, given his own condition, who is he to say who should live or who should die? It seems cruel to him in theory. Having your life snuffed out by a man so close to death himself. So instead of just murdering his target like every other assassin, he challenges them to a duel. A fighting chance.

He is, of course, undefeated though.

Basically, with this thing coming to an end, I wanted to cover all the bases & the only category I’ve been missing out on is Steampunk. This wasn’t the first steampunk character I started, however he’s the first one I ended up finishing.

Just wanted an imposing steampunk kind of character that would make for a good villain in a story. Not that I really have one in mind for him yet.

Everyone always portrays demure & peaceful dryads, as they’re supposed to be serene & peaceful like the trees they’re apart of/represent. But what if one gets mean? This is Meliai. She hates any living thing that isn’t vegetation. Instead of making her weapon out of sticks, she’s used bones. I always wanted to draw a dryad but never did. And for some reason, while people usually give the hair a leafy feel, I wondered how a root structure would look.

Really, I’ve always really liked the dryad in Secret of Mana & the Tim Sale Poison Ivy with the lilac stalks for hair. Really I just always wanted to do something along these lines, but since I’m not really a fantasy guy, I never really had any place for it. in anything. So I figured it would a be a pretty good start for a character. Onto the next.

After leaving Earth, humanity lost its way. Some people have been spread across the universe to distant galaxies. But the call is to bring everyone back home.

Samuel’s a freighter pilot with parents big on hybrid gene splicing. He never wanted to be a rabbit the choice wasn’t his. Still he soldiers on. He’s been hired to tow back a station that’s long since lost contact with civilization. The inhabitants of the station however, were left in space with limited culture. Alice in Wonderland became a religious scripture. And while he was able to bring them back, he can’t get them to stop trying to follow him. (Sorry, I posted four at once & didn’t realize I left this one hanging)

Not a furry or anthro guy at all but I figured going this route would be good for trying to branch out & try different things, much like I was trying to hit all of the available categories.

Next one was one of my favorites.

He’s a professor & inventor of an earlier age. He’s also a Tyrannosaurus Rex. I implore you to find something more anachronistic than that. He’s also got a voice box to translate his guttural growls into audible human speech, & a puppet rig that serves as a proper set of arms. I messed up the gun. But it was supposed to be a goofy fictitious gun.

Just recently, I saw Kirkman in his Image Superhero Line had a T-Rex with prosthetic arms. I don’t know how old his was, but I don’t read his books. Besides, his wasn’t steampunk. Originally I was totally thinking it was an Altered States thing gone terribly, terribly wrong. So I’m sticking with that. Also, I love the title “Rexquire”. Ok, one more.

Arkady Sidorenko or RKD-1917  or The Red Hammer.

You can’t keep a good hero down. Arkady Sidorenko is a testiment to that. Awarded “Hero of the Soviet Union” for his valor at the Battle of Anchorage, Sidorenko was not only quick to move up the ranks, but also quick to win the hearts of his nation. He was the iconic embodiment of everything the union stood for. Too bad he was a double agent.

His secret became known amongst those in power, but not the general public. Fears were that if such a prominent figure were to be exposed, the population’s morale would suffer a terrible blow. So it was decided that the hero would be “volunteering” for a highly speculative super soldier program. His “sacrifice” appeared to the public as an inspiration selfless act. And that’s when Arkady became the Red Hammer.

With his new persona, he is basically a walking super tank. Super stong, super indestructible. He’s the Union’s new secret weapon. But he’s powered by a dangerously unstable nuclear power source. The radiation is slowly eating away at his remaining organic parts. Only a special medication administered by his handlers slows the process. This insures his loyalty. But for how long? While he may’ve been designed to withstand the full force of a nuclear warhead, the Red Hammer biggest enemies seem to be time.

Drew him on 11×17. Saved him for last because I wanted to go out on it a bit, but didn’t have the adequate time to really go nuts the way I wanted to. Still I’m happy with it & of course, with this, I’ve reached 30 characters. Hot damn.

Cool. So there! My 30Characters from the 30Characters challenge. From last November. Sorry it took me forever to post them here. Thanks for all the feedback, comments, & critiques I’ve gotten since. It was fun. Not sure if I’ll be game again this year just yet. But we shall see.

While I’ve still got you:

Do yourself a favor & go check out the work David Brothers is putting in (& will keep putting in throughout February) with his Black History Month posts this year. So far he’s highlighted some incredible, & generally not well-known creators who certainly deserve a lot more recognition than they’ve gotten. But if years’ past are any indication, David’s just warming up. So keep up!

Also Witzke’s cataloging every movie he’s seeing. Yes. I know. But there’s good stuff in there too. Check out what he saw in January. Beyond that, keep an eye on him. He’s got some stuff in store.

And if that wasn’t enough, Entervoid’s kicking off this year with a brand new Heavyweight Tournament & the winner walks away with an actual title status as Champion. Like wrestling, but in comic form. Sign-ups & details are here for Void people interested.

On & speaking of Void, you’ll never know what you’ll find there. Like this disturbing photoedit by Sheldon Vella:

Good Night.

30 Characters Week 2

Still with the catch up.

So I completed the 30Character challenge, submitted them all onto their site before the deadline over a month ago, but have been sitting on the drawings, hoping to find the time to clean & color them. Well as much as I’d like to, I think time would be better spent moving on & working on proper comics projects. Sorry. Anyway, I’d like have some sort of record of them here as well, & about 20 of these things to post so I think I’ll just throw them up in chunks by the weeks I did them.

Here’s the Day 8. I called him Ol’ Rupe for lack of anything better at the time of finishing it. From the 30Characters Blog:

I had a character idea for that Entervoid site I go to a while ago, about a big, bandaged bum that’s impossible to kill & just gets into these brutal battles. But I kind of wanted to give him a chatty sidekick & in my head I kept thinking of like an old prospector from a cheesy western. Like back in the day you’d have the hero, the love interest, & the goofy old codger comedy relief guy. I designed the other character but never fleshed out the sidekick, so here he is. I imagine him to be the kind of bum that would talk your ear off, with tons of stories. And perhaps inexplicably have a cockney accent. He lives in a cardboard box with a tarp for a door. Every waking cent he gets doesn’t go into booze or drugs though, as he’s really into Gunpla.

I got really good response on this guy. I don’t know why. I liked how the coloring turned out but otherwise I think he’s a little weak in a generic way. But who am I to argue? Onto Day Nine.

Simon Swinden. Snarky music blogger extraordinaire. He would tear the recording industry apart from his solitary studio Williamsburg apartment (paid for by trust funds). His blog got thousands of hits a day. But that wasn’t enough.

He wanted to go pro. And that’s when Debase magazine came a-knocking. They had an important assignment, but didn’t want to delegate it to one of their regular staffers (unbeknownst to Simon, on account of the sheer danger). Now Simon’s got a nice new computer, an expense account, & a pretty ok-ish per diem. And all he’s got to do is follow a motley combination of very strange, very intense bands on an unofficial world tour. Can he do it? Or will he get eaten alive (literally)?

From a project with Sean Witzke. Another friend thought his particular style of dress was a point of inspiration for this guy. He went on to get mildly offended when I went on to say:

Didn’t want to veer too hipster with his look, but kind of pretentious & pseudointellectual.

He’s the last one I spent time cleaning & coloring on. All the rest were done in the red lead. The next four are all kind of related in the same group. Growing up I always really digged the Impossibles. If you don’t know, it was an old Hanna Barbera cartoon about a three piece Sixties Beat kind of band that were also superheroes on the side. But they had interesting abilities, not the generic archetypal shit you see in superhero groups today. It always stuck with me. So the basic premise going into these next four is a superpowered rock band. With that in mind, I kind of wanted to also steer away from that run-of-the-mill, generic rock band sort of thing too. So I looked at legendary Swedish punk band Refused, & their later incarnation as the (International) Noise Conspiracy. They were a punk band, but instead of studs & going out of their way to look like they didn’t care, they just kind of had this Baader-Meinhoff/RAF thing going on. Retro/Euro/Leftist Chicanery. And as the (I)NC, they were all kind of uniform with it, almost slightly militaristic. So that was the idea here. The Impossibles meet the (I)NC. And you get Mein Deutsch Herbst. With the band in mind, I started combining powers I always thought were interesting with different sections of the band, beginning with the Keyboardist.

Siebzehn is wacked. She believes she is haunted. She innocuously calls them “Dots,” but believes them to be a pack of poltergeists. Tiny orbs of light that streak about her person. They knock things over & make things happen. She can sometime get them to do her bidding. What she doesn’t know is that these “Dots” are in fact, not ghosts or spirits, but the manifestation of her own latent telekinesis abilities.

Basically a loopy girl that’s superpowerful but doesn’t know that she is, care that she is, & quite frankly, would argue that she’s not if confronted. Basically, as much as I hate the term, a shitty MPDG Dark Phoenix. The other superpowerful member was the mysterious drummer.

Always sporting a balaklava, Udarnik is down with the cause, but a complete enigma. He just showed up for band practice one day & filled the role of a drummer. No questions asked. It all just worked. No one knows where he originally came from. Only that he only speaks Russian, & he has a fairly good handle on his own innate ability: time manipulation. Faster. Slower. Pausing. Occasionally even reverse somehow. He often maintains control by maintaining a rhythm. Even when he’s not behind a drumkit, you’ll see fingers tapping or hands slapping. And with his tempo, he sets the beat, & the passage of time.

He calls himself Udarnik. Of course “Udarnik” is the Russian word for Drummer.

I always kind of wanted to toy with the idea of someone whose powers were signified by something mundane. Rather than having some random body part glow in order to tell he’s doing something crazy, this guy will pound a drum or tap his fingers & voila. He started out of wanting to do something like that. Next we’ve got the lead singer.

Emil could always kind of get his way, but things really started to click once he was away at University. He used his “Charisma” to gain a following of impassioned students to march & protest school policies. He was able to work them into a fever pitch. The louder he got, the more entranced & violent his followers became. Even the most docile pacifists among them. It lead to 21 deaths & a lot of injuries. Emil was institutionalized & isolated from the general patients. Now, after two years of what amounted to solitary confinement, he’s free & he’s started a band. He has his own views on the world. And he’s looking to change it. But first, he needs to get out there. He needs his voice to be heard.

Always wanted to make a super team leader basically the least powerful member, but still have some sway. That having been said, the way I see this band, he has his superhuman hooks into the others to some extent (maybe not the drummer so much), but he’s not intentionally trying to fuck with them the way he does with the masses. Does that make sense? Whatever. One more with the band. You kind of need a guitarist, right?

Union’s got talent. He’s a classically trained musician. He’s one of the best at what he does. Too bad that the only band that will take him is Mein Deutsch Herbst. Lead by Emil, an overzealous sociopath who aspires to being a left wing criminal activist, the music industry, law enforcement, world leaders, & superhumans everywhere are starting to take notice. But Union only cares about the music.

Still, he does have another unique talent. Union was able to practice guitar for hours on end, because he can split into multiple copies of himself. Upon reforming, all of the experiences merge & become one. Each one has it’s own sentience but really, all share the same goals & opinions. There’s been no limit reached as to how many duplicates he can make, however, after the first ten, every copy starts to lose density. There’s a point where each copy starts to become almost ghost like. He (each) also has a bit of a problem focusing once he’s past five copies. But that doesn’t mean he won’t try.

Also, he can be his own rhythm section.

He’s the most direct link to the Impossibles, in that he’s pretty much Multi-Man plus. But the thing I always wondered about with multiplication guys is where does the raw matter come from? So that’s where I tried to take it a step further. So that was the band. There was only one other guy rounding out that second week then.

After opening up a dojo on Bushwick Ave, Michael Dawson did his part to help clean up the neighborhood. And he did that, gaining some notoriety in the process. But that was years ago. Now gentrification rolled through. Vegans & playgroups have replaced most of the pushers & the dealers. He’s not totally obsolete, but he’s more likely to meet a pack of roving trust fund kids than danger. So he’s gone back to trying to focus on his first love, Karate.

Originally, the forums for the site Entervoid.com had an art jam to create a superhero using a name & a power generator. I got Karate King on the name generator, & the unstoppability of the Juggernaut with the power generator (though they also called it the Rhinoceros Effect, which I really, really like). Anyway, I’m not an art jam kind of guy, but that was kind of too cool to pass up. So I finally made good on it & drew him up. I added the Bushwick bit because I was kind of thinking of Shonuff the Shogun of Harem, but also had this kind of silly idea about what happens to a street level superhero once the streets are clean & gentrification rolls in.

A lot of people on the 30Characters site did straight up superheroes the whole month. Me? I was trying to switch it up & trying to get out of my comfort zones. Otherwise it would’ve been a different chick with a katana for all 30 days of November. In some ways though, I guess me switching it up results in a lot of things that could be taken as superheroes. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I just haven’t really considered myself to be that kind of a guy. Action/Adventure shit sure. No doubt. But not straight superheroes you know? And I’m not going to pull some shit & say there’s anything wrong with that, because that was my gateway into most of this. It was something I found interesting though, because those were some tools I thought rusted over.

So there’s characters from like the second week in November for you. I’m looking to have all the rest posted by the end of the month & maybe resume some fairly regular posting schedule with the first of the month. Maybe daily (or as close to daily as I can get them) sketches again. Maybe just some quick short comics or something. We’ll see when we get there. It’s just that at this moment, things are slowing down a bit for me & I’m really hoping to have the time.

Billions of Blundering Bashi-Bazouks!

Still playing catch up with things on here. This was done for a Tintin for the Holidays thing headed up by Joe Keatinge. The idea I had for mine was to draw Tintin in a found image (here just off the Plaza Del Sol in Madrid), & add some ominous looking spy types behind him to give it the same effect you get at the end of Beck’s Devil’s Haircut video directed by Mark Romanek. I was really trying to play up the ligne claire thing but I started to really run out of time & I had to finish this roughly around the same time I had to begin moving into my new place. Also, it’s kind of small here, so a lot of details get muddled. Overall though, I kind of like how it all turned out. If you get a moment, you should definitely spend it looking at all of the Tintin for the Holidays stuff, with art by people like Andre Szymanowicz, Moritat, & Brandon Graham, & then an interview with Brandon Graham about Herge. It’s some very cool stuff. Anyway, Part One Part Two Part Three

Oh, & the title of this post is something that sounded like a Haddock-ism.

FD

Chances are, if you’re following Sean Witzke, you’ve already seen this stuff. Originally, I was just going to reload it up on here, but since it’s on Sean’s, I think I’ll just give it a link back. Anyhow, this is a 10pg pitch for an espionage thing Sean created & wrote, & I drew. It was my first time working off someone else’s script. I was all sorts of slow on it & looking back, there’s issues with the anatomy & posing (avert your eyes from the gun hands). The material really deserved better. Sean’s side is great, & being privvy to where this story goes, it really only amps up & gets greater. So in case you haven’t seen it, click away.

Steppin’ Razor

Quick Sketch of Molly Millions from Gibson’s Neuromancer. Drawn from memory of the description rather than rereading, though I have it out & will probably give it another go very shortly. Going for something that was Retro 80′s future. The jacket was intended to be asymmetrically off center but I don’t know if that comes through at the angle it’s at.

“There is one thing that might could cure me: ALIEN TECHNOLOGY!!”

Howdy, Homeslices.

So as part of Sean Witzke‘s X-Mas Present, I drew this picture of General Treister from the Venture Brothers. Skip this next bit if you hate spoilers. I’d say about until the next paragraph to be safe. But How Fucking Awesome was that Finale? For the longest time Col. Hunter Gathers was the best character on the show, which is among best shows ever in my book. And I thought the Nick Fury/Hunter Thompson Combo would in fact be impossible to beat. Then what do they do? Combine General Thunderbolt Ross with Teddy Roosevelt & give the voice duties to Toby Huss. Are you kidding me?! I will say that I was slightly dismayed to find out that he wasn’t in fact, an actual Hulk. That was really the only big disappointment of the whole finale for me. But then, to find out that it was all an elaborate rouse to make everyone think he’s crazy? This, as he’s draped in Old Glory, prepping to fire himself blindly into outer space on the outside chance an alien will grab his carcass & cure him of his testicular cancer?! Are you kidding me? No more characters need be created. Treister’s the best. Hands down. And while I don’t think he meant it entirely as a compliment, it warmed my heart to hear Witzke liken him to me. So he’s got the original as part of his X-Mas gift.

Also, this was my first time trying Kirby dots. A lot of fun, but something I could definitely lose myself in. They’re not as stark here as they ar in the original line art, but I think the effect still comes across.

So let’s see, what else has been up?

I finished the 30 Character thing. Got all 30, with a couple that were doubles even. But in order to finish, most of the final ones were just sketches. And I was really hoping to clean them up & color them before posting them here. I might still be doing that, but to be honest, I think I’d much rather get to work on other new stuff. In one form or another, they’ll be posted here at some point. In the meant time, check out this for a listing of all of them.

I moved to a new place. It’s directly across the street from my old place. Ultimately, it’s not too drastic a change, but at least now, there’s no salsa music coming from the floor below, or old drunkards collapsing in the stairwell. So there’s a plus! And the sucky thing about the move was it happened over the holidays. So a big thanks to Witzke, my girlfriend Angie, my friends Shaun & Kate, & my dad for all of their help with everything.

Ok, enough diary bullshit though. This is a goddamn sketch blog. And while I don’t think daily’s going to work, I’m going to really get shit going soon. I need to! The only obstacle in my way right now is sorting out the hoarding disaster that is my still-packed up new apartment. Once things get settled, I’m going to hit things hard. Or maybe even just keep drawing, & leave the place a mess. The drawing’s a perfect excuse! Anyway, more stuff soon. I VOW IT!

X-Men Baby Stuff, Homes.

Literally, all I wrote was:

Gang enforcer. A Heavy in every sense of the word. Like Godzilla but twice as bad.

Really, this guy started off as just a name. A name I loved the shit out of, after mishearing the nickname of a death row inmate in some prison documentary. I never really did anything with it but imagined he’d be a gang leader that was one of the main villains in the story the Bandit character was from. But that was a post apocalypse kind of thing & here I was trying to catch him in more of a present day, street level setting. I started drawing this before bed one night, & woke up the next day wondering why I drew Big Pun. Despite realizing the similarity, I was kinda just like fuck it, & kept going with it. I imagine he’s built more like a Wilson Fisk though. A fat fucker that’s concealing a shitload of muscle.

Metal Machine Muay Thai

Let me quote this shit again:

A Muay Thai Prodigy, Jaidee was a star on the rise. Not only in the Martial Arts world, but nationally, as a pop icon even in her native Thailand as well. By the time she was ready to start high school, she was the star of three blockbuster films & preparing to release her debut album. That was until a plane crash during a press junket in Hong Kong. Jaidee survived, but just barely. Still her celebrity was mourned all the same, because as a result of her injuries, her left arm & both legs required amputation.

That was until a generous donation from the Korean firm Ohdaesu Motors. She was offered to be the first to try out their new line of highly functional, top of the line prosthetic limbs.

The “adaptation” stage was expected to be slow & arduous. Rejection was always a possibility. But muscle memory took over & upon her first test, Jaidee was able to complete three hours worth of Muay Thai routines with more accuracy & more grace than she was ever capable of before. In other words, she didn’t need to take to them. It was like she was upgraded.

Banned from competition for obvious reasons, she devoted herself to her films. Now she is the world’s first cyborg action star. This high profile distinction has even caught Hollywood’s attention.

In other news, I’ve always really wanted Muay Thai Trunks. And to make my own fighting game. This is ultimately where the idea for this girl came from. In Capcom terms, imagine Makoto & Sagat mixed with a much less gonzo Captain Commando. Ultimately, I wasn’t thinking of giving her a uniform as generic & as bland as this is. But what I had in mind kind of covered up the cybernetic-y bits & seeing as those are kind of the point here, I opted for this kind of a get up instead. Ultimately, this one’s pretty blah to me. But whatever. S’all cool.

Ready to be Shot into Space, Ready to Sacrifice Himself for the Greater Good

Last one for the immediate future. Maybe some more tomorrow or something. Again, let me just grab the bs I typed up on the 30Characters site for the description.

A “necessary casualty of progress” is what they called him. The space race was on after all. So after a bit of “training,” they dressed him up in a fancy little suit & strapped him into the center of a rocket. He hardly knew any better. He assumed he’d be getting a banana for his troubles. Then came launch. The noise, the vibration, the chaos. It was all a bit much. Then the floating. That wasn’t so bad. But it went on for a while. Then came the light.You see, they fired his capsule right into the path of a gamma ray burst. Just to see what would happen. The result? One spurned space Simian hopped up on all sorts of cosmic radiation. After a long, cold trip to the outer reaches of our solar system & around again, he’s back, & livid. NASA never prepared for this contingency. Who can stop this monkey menace?

This is probably my favorite of the characters out of this thing so far. Before I started drawing for this whole challenge thing, I went & jotted down a bunch of random brainstorming starts. Like El Presidente Magnifico, I mentioned started with ‘luchador in a business suit.’ Certainly nothing developed, just a good starting line. On that list, I had two different things: Atomic Ghost & Space Monkey. As cool as both sounded, for some reason, listing them so close together, I wondered what it would be like to merge the two. I’m glad I did. And while I might’ve shorted myself another character that would’ve put me ahead on the count, I’m really liking this, which usually, I don’t do with my stuff.

And the name was provided by, well the Greeks originally. But then it was suggested by Sean Witzke, who just collaborated with Matt Seneca on this pretty badass Steranko piece. Go read yourself about some comics why dontcha?

To Whom Speed Means Freedom of the Soul

Still playing catch up.

In the 60′s, a French driver tore up the European auto-racing standings; a woman named Monique DeVitesse. Some said her talent was almost unholy, as she coldly left her top competitors in the dust. That was until a tragic accident during the ’68 Monaco Grand Prix when DeVitesse’s pit crew decided to try a new grade of fuel. The flames were intense. So intense, no one thought twice when little trace of a body was found.Now there are rumors that DeVitesse (or someone… or something bearing her likeness) is back. And looking to reclaim the top of the racing ranks. Some claim that the only difference between the Monique of yesteryear, & this new, ominous one, are the retractable horns & tail. With the help of her demonic cherub pit crew that appear & disappears in puffs of acrid black smoke, the Hell on Wheels racing team is looking for a few trophies. And souls.

This is one of the couple I’ve done that I’m not necessarily happy with. Ideally, it was supposed to be a mix of Modesty Blaise, Grand Prix, & Ghost Rider; but I ended up getting a little distracted, but it’s more like a cheesecake-y, demonic Penelope Pitstop. I do kind of like the cherub pit crew that appears & disappears when needed (or not) in puffs of smoke & brimstone.

Hail to the Champ

Whereas the last one, I got carried away with the art, this one I seemed to get carried away with the back story.

Let me just cut & paste this again:

Forty one years ago, a renowned champion luchador known to the public only as El Lobo Loco was booked on his first tour north of the Rio Grande, along the border states. Leaving his native Mexico for the first time in his life, he took this tour very seriously, despite the fact that his young wife was extremely close to giving birth to their first son. So it was decided that she would come along as the young Luchador went to make a name for himself to audiences abroad.

Soon after, El Lobo found himself outside of Nogales, on the Arizona side, fighting a tyrannic trio of tiny wrestlers known as El Totem. It was there where his young wife suddenly went into labor. But the nearest hospital was hours away, & the hall was very dimly lit. Except of course, the center of the ring. And it was there that the child was born.

After the tour was finished, the new family returned home. Years past, & it became quite clear that the child was to follow in the footsteps of his father & his father’s father, & walk the mighty path of the Luchador. His training began at a very early age. The child lived, ate, & breathed Lucha Libre. It was all he knew. Upon coming of age, he was awarded his own mask & set out on his own. He started wrestling under the moniker El Lobo Loco Jr. in tribute to his old man, El Lobo Loco Sr. who at this time, was one of the preeminent wrestlers in all of Mexico, appearing not only in the ring up to five times a week, but even starring in his own film serials & endorsing a full line of toothpastes.

Nepotism was never part of El Lobo Jr’s path to glory. He fought long, & he fought hard. Cage Matches. Ladder Matches. Sudden Death Kerosene Heater Matches with thumbtacks. It was hard to say El Lobo Jr didn’t pay his dues. And finally, on that long & hard road, recognition slowly started to come his way. He worked his way up the ranks to become a headliner, selling out shows all over Mexico. A star on the rise.

This all culminated in what some deem the greatest Lucha Libre match up of all time: El Lobo Loco Jr. challenging El Lobo Loco Sr. for the World Title in Mexico City 1994. Both men shed manly tears of both pride & joy throughout the contentious match up. But at the end of the day, only one luchador could come out on top. And four hours later, that luchador was El Lobo Loco Jr. His father not only presented him with his belt personally, but promptly retired, calling it the pinnacle of his storied career. And upon his leave, announced to millions of fans that his son was no longer El Lobo Loco Jr. but the new & future El Lobo Loco!

Adopting his father’s persona, his stardom only grew, as he branched out & only surpassed the original Lobo’s success. But still, he only knew the life of a luchador. And over time, that life starts to take its toll.

In recent years, it had started to become apparent that El Lobo Loco was in the twilight of his career. Unlike his father, his pace was not steady & he was soon to burnout. Fans were becoming bored of him. Things weren’t looking so good. With waning interest in the one time great, Lobo’s promoters decided to play up Lobo’s dual citizenship status in a gimmick storyline where El Lobo Loco ran for President of the United States during each of their shows. And everyone was willing to play along. For a month or so, Lobo’s entrance music (which around this time had just been changed to the licensed “The Wolf is Loose” by Mastodon) was traded out for Hail to the Chief. As he walked down the ramp, he’d pass out buttons & kiss a (planted) baby or two. Since running for office requires a lot of paperwork, a stipulation to one of his matches at this time forced his defeated opponent had to fill out these extensive records in triplicate. But it was all part of the show. The gimmick had fair to middling success for most viewers & started a slow, but steady resurgence amongst Lobo’s fan base.

Time passed & wrestling storylines moved on. A year later, campaign season, this publicity stunt was nearly forgotten. But somehow, some way, without any knowledge to him, El Lobo Loco’s named appeared on the ballots across each of the 50 states. And it just so happened that this election cycle, most of the usual voters were jaded to the point of extreme apathy. And while only a fraction of the size of his fan base in Mexico, apparently polls reported very high numbers of El Lobo Loco fans, shocked & yet overjoyed that their one time hero was actually on the ballot.

As polls were closing, Lobo was in the middle 0f a brutal no-holds barred match against his long time rival Dr. Dolor for his Undisputed World Title in Guadalajara. Suddenly, the phone rang, & the message was passed up the ranks & told to the referee & the ring announcers, who hastily stopped the match & declared El Lobo Loco the new president elect of the United States. The wrestler, having only known wrestling & only wrestling all his life, was in a state of shock.

His citizenship was viciously contested by the opposition & the press. Rigged ballots & international conspiracies came into question. But everything checked out & that following January 20th, before a record crowd gathered on the lawn of the National Mall in Washington, the hapless wrestler prepared to be sworn in. It was on that day that El Lobo Loco traded in his wolf mask for the stars & stripes. The decision was heartbreaking, but fully supported by his father (who would go on to resume the mantle of El Lobo Loco). From that day forward, the child that was born in that wrestling ring in Nogales, Arizona all those years ago would be known only as El Presidente Magnifico, America’s First Luchador President!

Still, many wonder how this could ever happen. Some say El Lobo Loco Sr. is secretly behind his son’s meteoric rise into the world of politics, & may have some ulterior motives in play. No one can be sure if his schemes are nefarious or not, but nothing’s been able to be proven.

Some thought his former in-ring demeanor meant an aggressive foreign policy, but it has so far been stern, but fair. It’s become customary for other foreign dignitaries to pose with him while attempting to flex, actually. Opinion polls among the public put him in very high regard. This may be on account of his micro-management approach, where he pounds the pavement, meets people & tries to solve each of their problems on a one to one basis. Some say it’s something that couldn’t be done. Presidente responds (in Spanish of course, his English is at present, still very weak) “Perhaps for a mere man. But I am a Luchador!” And while he may in fact hold the highest position in the land, very little is known about El Presidente’s true identity.

Can I just say, I’m really kind of proud of myself for the fact that on the fly, I inadvertently mixed the notion of the luchador’s greatest enemy is a mirror image with Joseph Kennedy. It kind of just popped up in the end & I like that idea a lot. But maybe it’s just me.

Seriously though, this whole thing started as a loose idea to do a Luchador in a business suit. I based a halloween costume off that same idea. For that, I thought up Profesor Peligro, Luchador & cool professor on campus. Here, I even whipped up this goofy ass security badge as part of the get up. Not shown is the steel folding chair I lugged around with “Say Your Prayers” scrawled on it in Spanish.

As cool as that costume idea is though, I didn’t want to just reuse that for the 30Characters thing. So I thought, ‘Well, who else wears a suit? Of course!’

Originally too, in that picture, I was only going to have him fastening his cufflinks, but I drew the elbow too far out so I decided to make it a sleeper hold on some shifty bureaucrat. Or perhaps, this is the start to his patented Checks & Balances Neckbreaker.

And this really is case in point as to how I can take something as simple & innocuous as ‘luchador in a business suit,’ get it to really grow out of hand, & turn it into some monstrous epic bullshit. God I need to stop with that…

 

Forty one years ago, a renowned champion luchador known to the public only as El Lobo Loco was booked on his first tour north of the Rio Grande, along the border states. Leaving his native Mexico for the first time in his life, he took this tour very seriously, despite the fact that his young wife was extremely close to giving birth to their first son. So it was decided that she would come along as the young Luchador went to make a name for himself to audiences abroad.

Soon after, El Lobo found himself outside of Nogales, on the Arizona side, fighting a tyrannic trio of tiny wrestlers known as El Totem. It was there where his young wife suddenly went into labor. But the nearest hospital was hours away, & the hall was very dimly lit. Except of course, the center of the ring. And it was there that the child was born.

After the tour was finished, the new family returned home. Years past, & it became quite clear that the child was to follow in the footsteps of his father & his father’s father, & walk the mighty path of the Luchador. His training began at a very early age. The child lived, ate, & breathed Lucha Libre. It was all he knew. Upon coming of age, he was awarded his own mask & set out on his own. He started wrestling under the moniker El Lobo Loco Jr. in tribute to his old man, El Lobo Loco Sr. who at this time, was one of the preeminent wrestlers in all of Mexico, appearing not only in the ring up to five times a week, but even starring in his own film serials & endorsing a full line of toothpastes.

Nepotism was never part of El Lobo Jr’s path to glory. He fought long, & he fought hard. Cage Matches. Ladder Matches. Sudden Death Kerosene Heater Matches with thumbtacks. It was hard to say El Lobo Jr didn’t pay his dues. And finally, on that long & hard road, recognition slowly started to come his way. He worked his way up the ranks to become a headliner, selling out shows all over Mexico. A star on the rise.

This all culminated in what some deem the greatest Lucha Libre match up of all time: El Lobo Loco Jr. challenging El Lobo Loco Sr. for the World Title in Mexico City 1994. Both men shed manly tears of both pride & joy throughout the contentious match up. But at the end of the day, only one luchador could come out on top. And four hours later, that luchador was El Lobo Loco Jr. His father not only presented him with his belt personally, but promptly retired, calling it the pinnacle of his storied career. And upon his leave, announced to millions of fans that his son was no longer El Lobo Loco Jr. but the new & future El Lobo Loco!

Adopting his father’s persona, his stardom only grew, as he branched out & only surpassed the original Lobo’s success. But still, he only knew the life of a luchador. And over time, that life starts to take its toll.

In recent years, it had started to become apparent that El Lobo Loco was in the twilight of his career. Unlike his father, his pace was not steady & he was soon to burnout. Fans were becoming bored of him. Things weren’t looking so good. With waning interest in the one time great, Lobo’s promoters decided to play up Lobo’s dual citizenship status in a gimmick storyline where El Lobo Loco ran for President of the United States during each of their shows. And everyone was willing to play along. For a month or so, Lobo’s entrance music (which around this time had just been changed to the licensed “The Wolf is Loose” by Mastodon) was traded out for Hail to the Chief. As he walked down the ramp, he’d pass out buttons & kiss a (planted) baby or two. Since running for office requires a lot of paperwork, a stipulation to one of his matches at this time forced his defeated opponent had to fill out these extensive records in triplicate. But it was all part of the show. The gimmick had fair to middling success for most viewers & started a slow, but steady resurgence amongst Lobo’s fan base.

Time passed & wrestling storylines moved on. A year later, campaign season, this publicity stunt was nearly forgotten. But somehow, some way, without any knowledge to him, El Lobo Loco’s named appeared on the ballots across each of the 50 states. And it just so happened that this election cycle, most of the usual voters were jaded to the point of extreme apathy. And while only a fraction of the size of his fan base in Mexico, apparently polls reported very high numbers of El Lobo Loco fans, shocked & yet overjoyed that their one time hero was actually on the ballot.

As polls were closing, Lobo was in the middle 0f a brutal no-holds barred match against his long time rival Dr. Dolor for his Undisputed World Title in Guadalajara. Suddenly, the phone rang, & the message was passed up the ranks & told to the referee & the ring announcers, who hastily stopped the match & declared El Lobo Loco the new president elect of the United States. The wrestler, having only known wrestling & only wrestling all his life, was in a state of shock.

His citizenship was viciously contested by the opposition & the press. Rigged ballots & international conspiracies came into question. But everything checked out & that following January 20th, before a record crowd gathered on the lawn of the National Mall in Washington, the hapless wrestler prepared to be sworn in. It was on that day that El Lobo Loco traded in his wolf mask for the stars & stripes. The decision was heartbreaking, but fully supported by his father (who would go on to resume the mantle of El Lobo Loco). From that day forward, the child that was born in that wrestling ring in Nogales, Arizona all those years ago would be known only as El Presidente Magnifico, America’s First Luchador President!

Still, many wonder how this could ever happen. Some say El Lobo Loco Sr. is secretly behind his son’s meteoric rise into the world of politics, & may have some ulterior motives in play. No one can be sure if his schemes are nefarious or not, but nothing’s been able to be proven.

Some thought his former in-ring demeanor meant an aggressive foreign policy, but it has so far been stern, but fair. It’s become customary for other foreign dignitaries to pose with him while attempting to flex, actually. Opinion polls among the public put him in very high regard. This may be on account of his micro-management approach, where he pounds the pavement, meets people & tries to solve each of their problems on a one to one basis. Some say it’s something that couldn’t be done. Presidente responds (in Spanish of course, his English is at present, still very weak) “Perhaps for a mere man. But I am a Luchador!” And while he may in fact hold the highest position in the land, very little is known about El Presidente’s true identity.

Forty one years ago, a renowned champion luchador known to the public only as El Lobo Loco was booked on his first tour north of the Rio Grande, along the border states. Leaving his native Mexico for the first time in his life, he took this tour very seriously, despite the fact that his young wife was extremely close to giving birth to their first son. So it was decided that she would come along as the young Luchador went to make a name for himself to audiences abroad.

Soon after, El Lobo found himself outside of Nogales, on the Arizona side, fighting a tyrannic trio of tiny wrestlers known as El Totem. It was there where his young wife suddenly went into labor. But the nearest hospital was hours away, & the hall was very dimly lit. Except of course, the center of the ring. And it was there that the child was born.

After the tour was finished, the new family returned home. Years past, & it became quite clear that the child was to follow in the footsteps of his father & his father’s father, & walk the mighty path of the Luchador. His training began at a very early age. The child lived, ate, & breathed Lucha Libre. It was all he knew. Upon coming of age, he was awarded his own mask & set out on his own. He started wrestling under the moniker El Lobo Loco Jr. in tribute to his old man, El Lobo Loco Sr. who at this time, was one of the preeminent wrestlers in all of Mexico, appearing not only in the ring up to five times a week, but even starring in his own film serials & endorsing a full line of toothpastes.

Nepotism was never part of El Lobo Jr’s path to glory. He fought long, & he fought hard. Cage Matches. Ladder Matches. Sudden Death Kerosene Heater Matches with thumbtacks. It was hard to say El Lobo Jr didn’t pay his dues. And finally, on that long & hard road, recognition slowly started to come his way. He worked his way up the ranks to become a headliner, selling out shows all over Mexico. A star on the rise.

This all culminated in what some deem the greatest Lucha Libre match up of all time: El Lobo Loco Jr. challenging El Lobo Loco Sr. for the World Title in Mexico City 1994. Both men shed manly tears of both pride & joy throughout the contentious match up. But at the end of the day, only one luchador could come out on top. And four hours later, that luchador was El Lobo Loco Jr. His father not only presented him with his belt personally, but promptly retired, calling it the pinnacle of his storied career. And upon his leave, announced to millions of fans that his son was no longer El Lobo Loco Jr. but the new & future El Lobo Loco!

Adopting his father’s persona, his stardom only grew, as he branched out & only surpassed the original Lobo’s success. But still, he only knew the life of a luchador. And over time, that life starts to take its toll.

In recent years, it had started to become apparent that El Lobo Loco was in the twilight of his career. Unlike his father, his pace was not steady & he was soon to burnout. Fans were becoming bored of him. Things weren’t looking so good. With waning interest in the one time great, Lobo’s promoters decided to play up Lobo’s dual citizenship status in a gimmick storyline where El Lobo Loco ran for President of the United States during each of their shows. And everyone was willing to play along. For a month or so, Lobo’s entrance music (which around this time had just been changed to the licensed “The Wolf is Loose” by Mastodon) was traded out for Hail to the Chief. As he walked down the ramp, he’d pass out buttons & kiss a (planted) baby or two. Since running for office requires a lot of paperwork, a stipulation to one of his matches at this time forced his defeated opponent had to fill out these extensive records in triplicate. But it was all part of the show. The gimmick had fair to middling success for most viewers & started a slow, but steady resurgence amongst Lobo’s fan base.

Time passed & wrestling storylines moved on. A year later, campaign season, this publicity stunt was nearly forgotten. But somehow, some way, without any knowledge to him, El Lobo Loco’s named appeared on the ballots across each of the 50 states. And it just so happened that this election cycle, most of the usual voters were jaded to the point of extreme apathy. And while only a fraction of the size of his fan base in Mexico, apparently polls reported very high numbers of El Lobo Loco fans, shocked & yet overjoyed that their one time hero was actually on the ballot.

As polls were closing, Lobo was in the middle 0f a brutal no-holds barred match against his long time rival Dr. Dolor for his Undisputed World Title in Guadalajara. Suddenly, the phone rang, & the message was passed up the ranks & told to the referee & the ring announcers, who hastily stopped the match & declared El Lobo Loco the new president elect of the United States. The wrestler, having only known wrestling & only wrestling all his life, was in a state of shock.

His citizenship was viciously contested by the opposition & the press. Rigged ballots & international conspiracies came into question. But everything checked out & that following January 20th, before a record crowd gathered on the lawn of the National Mall in Washington, the hapless wrestler prepared to be sworn in. It was on that day that El Lobo Loco traded in his wolf mask for the stars & stripes. The decision was heartbreaking, but fully supported by his father (who would go on to resume the mantle of El Lobo Loco). From that day forward, the child that was born in that wrestling ring in Nogales, Arizona all those years ago would be known only as El Presidente Magnifico, America’s First Luchador President!

Still, many wonder how this could ever happen. Some say El Lobo Loco Sr. is secretly behind his son’s meteoric rise into the world of politics, & may have some ulterior motives in play. No one can be sure if his schemes are nefarious or not, but nothing’s been able to be proven.

Some thought his former in-ring demeanor meant an aggressive foreign policy, but it has so far been stern, but fair. It’s become customary for other foreign dignitaries to pose with him while attempting to flex, actually. Opinion polls among the public put him in very high regard. This may be on account of his micro-management approach, where he pounds the pavement, meets people & tries to solve each of their problems on a one to one basis. Some say it’s something that couldn’t be done. Presidente responds (in Spanish of course, his English is at present, still very weak) “Perhaps for a mere man. But I am a Luchador!” And while he may in fact hold the highest position in the land, very little is known about El Presidente’s true identity.