G Spotting

 

These two licensed properties overlapped at Marvel for a few months, but it was a missed opportunity not to have them cross over with each other. Maybe if Marvel had held onto the Godzilla license for a while longer, we would have gotten it. Or maybe not, if Toho or Mattel had any objections.

Men in Black

 I think most people like the yellow and black outfit for the Black Hood, but for me personally I like this design better. And I just realized while drawing this that his mask must have taken inspiration from Diabolik. On the other hand, I prefer the Fox with his yellow emblem on his chest. The all-black outfit that Red Circle used in the 1980s looked too plain.

Action Figures

 

This one’s an homage to the cover of DC’s Captain Action no. 3, but with Lady Action instead of Action Boy. Lady Action was introduced in the revived series from Moonstone Books, and I’ve drawn quite a nunber of her adventures for them. I don’t think she’s turned up anywhere else. Here’s hoping that the Captain Action family returns someday.

Elders of the Lost Ark

It would have been nice to see Ke Huy Quan reprise his role in the the last Indiana Jones film, given his resurgence in popularity around the same time as that film’s release. But, yeah, I don’t think the Indy producers were prescient enough to know that he’d be relevant again with the surprise hit Everything Everywhere All At Once.

Crazy Ex-Girlfriend

 

What is it with Batman and his attraction to women with criminal backgrounds? Catwoman, Talia, Nocturna… were there any more? It’s a wonder he didn’t fall for Poison Ivy or Harley Quinn, but maybe he draws the line at women who’ve been admitted to Arkham Asylum.

Headmen

It’s kinda interesting that Marvel nicknamed quite a few of their characters with the word “head”… like Hornhead for Daredevil, Winghead for Captain America, Buckethead for Nova, Canucklehead for Wolverine, and the two examples above.

Yeah, I think we can blame Stan Lee for that, since he was the scripter for most of the time those terms were used for the first time in Marvel’s comics.

Eye Bros

 

OMAC was my favorite among the Kirby Kreations at DC Comics when Jack Kirby decided to jump ship from Marvel. Too bad it only lasted a short while, and had an abrupt cliffhanger ending. I didn’t read the Jim Starlin stories that served as backup on Warlord, but I did read and liked the John Byrne miniseries that came years later.

The New 52 version was meh.

Blade, Gunner

 

Related to my Dragonboy Z post from a while back, I think this was the title that started that trend in the Philippine comics industry in the 1990s. Kick Fighter is an obvious pastiche of Street Fighter, but to the creators’ credit, they gave the characters original backstories that were totally unrelated to the originals they were based on.

The two guys above are Jolas Zuares, a secret agent whose look was obviously based on Ken. The other is the cyborg amnesiac son of a murdered cop named Biotrog, short for Bio Technological Roger, whose appearance is based on Vega (or Balrog if you’re from Japan). They both started in their own solo series, but after a while were teamed up in a new series called Blades and Bullets.

Out of Knowhere

 I must admit, I didn’t read the original Rocket Raccoon miniseries because I didn’t like Mike Mignola’s art back then. It took a while for me to appreciate his work. I think it was when he did a fill-in job on Byrne’s Superman reboot that made me realize how good his artwork was.

As for Rocket himself, I liked his storyarc the best among his fellow Guardians of the Galaxy in the movie trilogy.

The Lost Crusade

These guys were largely ignored in the 1980s Red Circle revival of Archie Comics’ superheroes, except for She-Fox who was introduced during that era. Three of them were in the second issue as villains, but those turned out to be artificial doubles and none were the real deal.

But in recent years Archie Comics has used them in short stories in their comics digests, usually interacting with Archie and the gang. So at least they’re not gone and forgotten.