SC Comicon 2026 Is Did

A good time was had. The con was very, very populated both days, and people did buy. Business was proportionate to the current economy, which is not a surprise. Everyone I spoke to who crewed a table said sales were slow. It happens. There are swings. The year after the COVID shutdown brought a windfall to everyone; folks bought and bought. I'm content with my sales and grateful as always. Folks at my table bought a little of everything -- comics, prints, face cards, and original art. That's always good.

I started working conventions 16 years ago, and this year felt like I didn't have to frantically prove I belonged. Imposter syndrome was just not happening. I am relieved. I enjoyed myself more than in previous years. I also had my son for company for the third year, and he's a good hang. We were fans and goofs together, and we ate steaks and donuts. 

HeroesCon is in two months, and I have some new art to make, even with color. I'm looking forward to it. 

SC Comicon 2026 Is This Weekend

Assuming we're all still here this weekend, the SC Comicon is back! Yea! Weary sigh!

I have new art and a new Hellboy print, coincidentally the same year Ron Perlman will appear. Crazy.

I have a really good table spot (519 in Artist Alley), right down the aisle from the main entrance, so walk right up and say hi. I have more color drawings this year, and I hope to do your fun commissions.

 

 

Still Here

 I am on page 180 of the graphic novel, with about another 80 to go. I haven't vanished. Just been busy.

I did manage to take time to draw my Old Gods of Appalachia RPG character, Zacchaeus Turnipseed, a combination of Andy Griffith, Lil Abner, and Shazam.

 

 

HeroesCon 25 Commissions Open

 

 

Grab yourself some custom art at the convention. Orders open now through my store at Big Cartel.

 

SC Comicon 25 is on the way!

Come see me April 5-6 at the SC Comicon at Table 622! A corner table! My peripheral vision will be unlimited! Assassins will be foiled all weekend!

 

 

Doctor Doom 2024

I needed a break from doing graphic novel pages, and I asked my son what I could draw for him. Doctor Doom, he said. OK. I can do that. I worked up some sketches, as usual all on one sheet, and then lightboxed the subsequent pencils for clean inks. I like Kirby dots. I like them a lot.

HeroesCon 2024 Auction Piece

One of the best parts of HeroesCon is the Saturday night art auction. It runs for hours and hours and benefits charities and the convention itself. Artists of every stripe donate original works for the event, some made well before the show, some made at the tables during the day. The auction is especially good for me as I spend all my cons behind the table alone, and this is my best chance to mingle and meet folks.

I made a piece back in 2012 of a notion I thought was clever: Magik and Amethyst going toe-to-toe. They have quite a lot in common and debuted within months of each other. 

Now I was talking about the Saturday night auction, but there's a second on Sunday on the convention floor. This auction is for the smaller pieces by less prominent artists, and that makes sense. The Saturday event is geared toward big spenders with big bucks, and the pieces most likely to get that cash get the Saturday limelight. My piece above was sold on Sunday. Good news: It was bought. Nice! And no it couldn't have made the Saturday auction. It's too simple. It doesn't have the polish (and frankly the pedigree) the Saturday crowd expects. But I wanted to get into that crowd one day.

This year, I decided to give it a crack, and I had the time in the weeks before the con. I initially wanted to donate a Savage Rogue, but I saw Bridgit Connell had made one, and she has the polish and pedigree. If I'm picking auction pieces, hers would make the cut. No contest. 

So I let my considerations percolate in the back of my mind. Then I caught some of Avengers Endgame on basic cable, and I saw Thor. I love Thor's arc from Ragnarok to Endgame. When you consider that his Ragnarok to Infinity War is basically a week long, his spiral in Endgame and desperation to prove himself hit hard. So let me make a token of my appreciation for that guy. It started with sketches.

 

I worked up some pencils at 11x17 and then transferred them to another board to lightbox, ink, and color.

Then I stabbed at it with some markers, working first with the face. If that didn't work, there was no need to work up the rest of the piece on that board. I would need to start over.

 

Then I just dove in, relying on online reference pics of Thor's costume. His Infinity War and Endgame costumes are the same, but the latter is seen in such darkness during the final battle that it had virtually no color in the photos I found. I had to run out and get decent big violet markers for the clouds, and then I worked those two shades with a variety of grays. This is a mix of markers: Spectrum Noir and Azure and genuine Copics. And then I went over the whole think with brush pens and some Sharpies.

 

I hope it makes the Saturday cut. That would be a feather in my cap, a suggestion that I've improved in the last 12 years.

SC Comicon Is This Weekend!

My first con since June, SC Comicon is this weekend! I have new prints, and The Lieutenant will be my table partner! Come see us at table 328!

 

Savage Land Rogue

It's time to think about making new material for the convention circuit, and I've always shied away from cheesecake pin-ups, but baby needs a new pair of shoes. So here's Rogue from the Savage Land. I have ideas for other images for prints and original art, and I have about two months before my first full-weekend show: SC Comicon in April! So I gotta get to work.

Scarlet Witch and Darcy

The current Scarlet Witch comic pairs her with Darcy Lewis from the Thor movies and WandaVision, as they help desperate people fend off magical threats. It's a good read.

 

I Can't Go

I am out of the Beer City Comic Con with sickness, and I am crushed.

Please go and tell me how cool it was. I will be drowning my sorrows in cocktails of NyQuil and Ben & Jerry's.

Beer City ComiCon Is Approaching!

BIG NEWS! I will be a guest creator at Asheville's Beer City Comic Con Sept. 30 and Oct. 1! I will be part of my first panel! This is an ambitious new show for the area, and they are bringing in big names in comics. I will have my books and prints, and you can sign up for commissions early: https://www.robotwonderboy.com/.../beer-city-comic-con....

Show details here: https://beercitycomiccon.com/

Fire Walk With Me: The Arm

 

With my wife and child returning to school, I have the house to myself like a Victorian ghost. It means I can blast my favorite TV shows in the background at deafening volumes while I do my day job. Or, hey, for art inspiration. So I decided to go back to Twin Peaks. 

 I saw some locales when we journeyed to Seattle in June, and that was mind-blowing. I watched the pilot air in Spring 1990, and I was a diehard fan from then on. Just for novelty, I decided to watch "chronologically" and start with Fire Walk With Me. Little did I know after I drew this piece that today -- this very day -- is the 31st anniversary of the film. Wow. That in itself is so very Twin Peaks.

X-Men (Kinda) Daily Art: 217 and 218

 X-Men 217 and 218 see the new team fight Juggernaut in Scotland. Dazzler runs headlong into battle to prove herself and collapses from exhaustion. Juggernaut, who turns out to be a big fan, buries her on a hillside. The team rescues her, and they all race into battle. They defeat him before learning he was the diversion while Black Tom robs a bank. A bank robbery! In an X-Men comic! Also this is Marc Silvestri's debut as penciller, and his camera placement and linework are eye-popping.

X-Men Daily Art: X-Men 216

 

Forty issues ago, Storm was challenged to a duel to free her fellow X-Men from the Morlocks. It was to the death. Storm was the dignified outsider in the group, presented as an alien to American culture and morals. She commanded the weather and flew among the clouds. She literally had an air about her.

She won that duel by stabbing the Morlock leader in the heart. Callisto didn't die, but the fight was won. A few issues later, Storm went punk in a moment that polarized comic fans. The character was fighting to define herself and decided to live beyond her habitual emotional filters to feel more human. She needed to change.

 

The world grew darker around the team, and she became its field leader by default when Cyclops left to be a husband to Maddy Pryor. Then she lost her powers via a gizmo invented by a man she fell in love with. A robot from the future was now in their timeline to wipe them all out. Rachel stole her spirit in an effort to kill the Beyonder. Then Wolverine tried to kill Rachel, who later vanished. Then mercenaries slaughtered the Morlocks, whom she was not around to protect. In fighting them, the gentle giant Colossus killed one of them. Storm directed Wolverine to kill as many of the Marauders as he needed to. Colossus and two other teammates were left near death. 

 

And now Storm is chased by three older, powered folk disillusioned with a world grown cold. They capture the amoral and hunt them to the death, unless they can somehow escape. But Storm can't escape them. She must stop them. And one by one she defeats the trio until she is again in a duel to the death with a knife in her hand. 

 

Comics had gotten dark. There were always violent peripheral titles. Conan, for instance. But now superheroes in colorful costumes were killing and giving in their anger. The world was less simple. Harder. Lethal. X-Men as a comic reflected that, and it left longtime readers with the same choice as the heroes: What kind of people are we rooting for? What do we hope to see them do? Is the hero just the last character standing? This is Storm's Macbeth moment, for her and us and the title.

She doesn't kill the hunter. She chooses to be better than those she fights. And as team leader, her heroes will do the same. An X-Man has a standard. They were created by Xavier to make the world better. You don't do that simply by being the last man standing. 

 

Also Wolverine, lost in his confused grief over discovering Jean is alive, was unable to save two people killed by one of those hooligans hunted by the trio. He failed as a hero because he couldn't pull himself together. That's also an important lesson for a team driven so often by angst. 

 

And this is what the issue leaves us with: Get off your ass and be better then the world around you. For the heroes in the comics and the readers following along, that's a pretty good mindset to have.

Daily X-Men Art Catch-Up

Here are my takes on moments from my 1980s X-Men reread as I try to make come comic work every day. These are from X-Men 199 - X-Men 215.

HeroesCon 2023 is Coming

I will be at table AA-918, right across from Indie Island, for this year's show. I have yet to have a bad placement any year I have been there. People mill around so well to see the vendors and art tables.

I also have a new Spiderverse print for sale. This will go up on my store after the show.

 

X-Men Daily Art: X-Men 198

 

 

 

Barry Windsor-Smith returns for X-Men 198, another story of Storm dealing with the loss of her powers. Back now in Africa, she is reeling from a bullet wound and hallucinating of her teammates. She blames Xavier for taking her from her homeland years ago. Wolverine offers to end her suffering permanently. She fights off death and keeps moving.

 

She finds a real young woman about to give birth and escorts her back to her village, where an elder encourages her to return to America and her life as a hero to reclaim her life despite her lack of powers. The elder dies to make room in the village for the newborn, and Storm feels rejuvenated, ready to move forward once more.

 

This is Claremont's second story of a heroine remaking her life after losing her powers, and his similar issue with Carol Danvers was just 30 issues prior. Windsor-Smith inks and colors his own work this time, and it is again a showcase of illustration not seen on convenience store comic racks at the time.

 

X-Men Daily Art: X-Men 197

 

In X-Men 197, we take a break from social persecution. The villain Arcade runs a vast Westworld and has apparently crossed Dr. Doom. He kidnaps Kitty and Peter to save his hide, and they do, defeating what turns out to be a Murderworld robot targeting him as part of a birthday game. Kitty and Peter go home.

 

The most important part of this is that Peter finally tells Kitty that he's sorry for hurting her after falling for an alien who died, and he admits he's confused about his feelings for the latter, thinking that moving on would insult her death. Turns out, though, that he is actually talking to a robot Kitty. The real one overhears it all, and the two return to the school on better terms -- friends and teammates once more.

X-Men Daily Art: X-Men 196

 

Life continues to throw jabs at our heroes. An ailing Xavier calls upon longtime archenemy Magneto to join the school, and the team isn't happy. Xavier also uses his telepathy to learn of a murder plot against a mutant where he is lecturing. The public is vocally embracing Nimrod as a hero against mutants. Rachel sees this present moving toward her future, and a world that hunts and kills mutants. 

 

Also she senses the presence on Earth of the Beyonder, an omnipotent alien trying to understand mortal humanity. That creature has shown such naive disregard for life that Nightcrawler questions the existence of God, falling into despair with his priest. 

 

And in a move to hammer home the metaphors, one of the murder plotters, an African-American, asks Kitty if she's a mutant, and she in turn asks if he's the n-word, and WHAT. THE. WHAT. Given that she's Jewish, this could have gone in a different rhetorical and metaphorical direction, but this was the path taken, and almost 40 years later, it's a jarring exchange, regardless of the emotional states of the characters.