Friday 19 June 2015

Tiernen Trevallion - Cross Eyed D.I.

 
Prog 1936 sports a mean and moody, two tone masterpiece by the amazing Tiernen Trevallion as the creative team behind one of 2000AD's best modern characters brings us his darkest tales yet. 'Under a False Flag' sees Harry and his team investigate a spate of grisly murders that link to the highest echelons of power and children's homes of the 1980s. Surely that kind of thing could never happen, eh?
 
Tiernen was kind enough to send a bunch of images showing his artistic process. Firstly, we get those wonderful pencils, soooo good...    
 
The long awaited Absalom/Crossed crossover event.
 
And here's the cover with every liver spot, mole, crease, thread vein and wrinkle gorgeously inked. This really is an incredible image... 


The years have not been kind...

What I've loved about all of Tiernen's covers is his restrained use of colour, each one being a beautiful contrast of two colours. Below, we see the artist's signature cold blues...

A touch of frost?

Tiernen adds a flaming cross as the link with the shady goings on of the church are made eerily explicit...

Careful Harry! You'll singe your eyebrows!

For reason's of design, it looks like the cross was moved and made less opaque, thankfully it doesn't diminish the effect in the slightest!
 

Jeez Harry, you're on the cover of the prog, you could have made a bloody effort!

And here's how the prog looks on your shelf, curmudgeonly!

Church ill?
Huge thanks to Tiernen for sending the images, they're truly amazing! If you're a fan of his and Gordon Rennie's Absalom, I'd heartily recommend Robbie Burns Witch Hunter, which is a cracking read with absolutely eye popping art! 


Saturday 13 June 2015

Karl Richardson - Green Eyed Monster!

 
Yes! Prog 1935 sees the return of Outlier by Tom Eglington and Karl Richardson. I loved this series when it debuted back in Prog  1874. For those with short memories, There's a recap of this gruesome revenge story after the main article.
 
The new story takes place six months after the events of the last series as private investigator Carcer awaits trial in a military recovery centre. Carcer is haunted by flashbacks, panic attacks and strange visions following his encounter with the Hurde weapon Caul. The human authorities are desperate to learn the secrets of the Hurde, with Carcer being the only person to have survived multiple encounters with this terrifyingly powerful race...
 
In Karl's sketch below, we see Carcer's turmoil, and a hint to a deeper link to the Hurde...
      

Yuck! Somone gobbed on Carcer!

The sketch is fleshed out, with further detail and colour tests added...
 Bollocks! Carcer had ran out of his favourite mud pack.
 
The 2000AD logo is added to play with composition and interactivity with the cover. That's the old logo Karl, get with the program Granddad!

Get your new Carcer string puppet, only from Hurdco! 

With composition nailed, Karl begins to digitally paint the cover...

 Yeuch! Carcer's finger had gone through the toilet paper AGAIN!

Most of the skin done...

 Oh no! Carcer had lost five of his new fake fingernails.
 
More gruesome details added as he painting progresses...

Ouch! Carcer knew he shouldn't have sat on that thorny patch!  

And the finished painting. Poor Carcer, that looks bloody painful!

Ooo-oh, I Hurde it through the gray vine! 

And here's how the prog looks on your shelf, terrifying!

Someone has stolen my accordion!
 
HUGE thanks to Karl for sending the images. I'm a big fan of Karl's artwork and I really hope we see some double page splashes to rival the gobsmacking ones of the last series! Thanks again Karl!
 
The ominously titled Outlier: Dark Symmetries begins in Prog 1935.
 
  Better Call Caul - Outlier, the Story So Far...
 
How!
 
One by one, the crew who served on a scavenger ship called The Outlier were being ripped apart by a killer of impossible strength and cruelty. The ship's captain, Ramona Farson, hires private eye Jared Carcer to track down the killer before she is added to his list of unfortunate victims. Carcer is augmented with optical implants that allow him to see beyond the visible spectrum, a gruesome gift given to him when he and his family were captured and tortured by an alien race known as 'The Hurde' when he was a child.
 
Carcer discovers that the killer is an ex-crewmember of the Outlier, a lowly cook named Caul. It seems the Outlier ran into a stricken Hurde vessel and ventured aboard to salvage it's valuable cargo. Caul was forced aboard the ship by Farson, who then left him and his girlfriend to die when the Hurde returned to the ship.
 
Caul was captured and tortured, being forced to watch the girl he loved being slowly ripped apart by the evil Hurde. Caul himself was eviscerated, as the Hurde studied and collected every organ in his body. The Hurde used this knowledge to turn Caul into tan unstoppable hybrid killer, hell bent on revenge...
 

Newcastle supporters at a Primark sale.
 
Farson gathers together the remaining crew of the Outlier to lure Caul into a trap. However, we discover that the duplicitous ship's captain is really working for a powerful weapons company called Falcorp, who will pay big bucks to get their hands on Hurde technology.  
 
Alright! Alright! Calm down!

Caul springs the trap, ripping apart the surviving members of Outlier's ill-fated mission. While Caul gets on with his grisly task, Falcorp are studying him, extracting the last few pieces of a mysterious script that will give them the keys to the Hurde's advanced technology. When the final fragments of data were extracted, Falcorp sent a pulse that rendered the killer immobile.
 
However, it turns out that this was simply a Hurde trap. They never wanted humanity to have access to their script and sent a modified copy of Caul to destroy humanity's knowledge base of the Hurde archives. As Caul explodes, he sends out a pulse that destroys both Farson's base and Falcorp's computers, wiping out mankind's knowledge of the Hurde's secrets.
 
Carcer manages to escape from Farson's base before it blows but is arrested for helping Falcorp with it's murderous mission. We discover that Caul was simply a cypher, created by the Hurde from their vast archive database. A database that somewhere holds copies of all their victims, including Caul, his girlfriend as well as the members of Carcer's family...

Wednesday 10 June 2015

Glenn Fabry - Firestarter!

 Dredd shoots himself. It's like the Apocalypse War all over again...
 

Here's Glenn Fabry's cover to Megazine 360, where Dredd sends another logo to RESYK! It's another trademark painted masterpiece by Glenn who is pitching a sketchbook on Kickstarter. So, if you're a fan of Glenn's work (and let's face it, who isn't!?!) be sure to check out his Kickstarter page and pledge a few quid!

Of course, this isn't the first time the logo has been aggressively retired by wayward comic characters, Slaine gave it the chop back in Prog 1199 courtesy of Mark Harrison...

Axe-idents will happen!

John Higgins was a repeat offender at painting this erm... repeat offender.

 Maybe that citizen could get some green paint and make Dredd's pads the right colour!!!

Banksy finally gets caught...
 
Cliff Robinson destroys the logo of Prog 704...
 

"I said 'Hotshot!'"

A Steve Tappin's death of Rogue sees the death of a logo too.

Rogue has had his chips!

Enough logo abuse! I say it stops now! Write to your MP and demand equal rights for 2000AD logos!

Thanks to Glenn for sending the Meg cover. Go check out his sketchbook page Earthlets!

Friday 5 June 2015

Simon Davis - Ace Warp!


A double whammy from Simon Davis this week as he produces a cover that's busting with both concentrated Thrill Power and the power of the Earth Goddess! It should come with a health warning!

The award winning painter brings us an outrageous image of the Warped One in full warp spasm as he prepares to trounce some Trojans! Simon kindly sent a slew of images of his work in progress, though Slaine didn't think it too many...

Below we see his initial watercolour sketch, zarjaz! 
 
A typical girl in Newcastle 

Next up, Simon's fairly loose pencils...

 Slaine got over excited when grape stomping!

Unfortunately, Simon spilled a cup of tea on his work, disaster!

 Slaine may want to lay off the fake tan a bit
 
However, the plucky artist carried on regardless. Note, he was off to Ikea later that day and you can see a bit of his shopping list in the top right...

Simon's Rorschach test - what do you see? 

 The painting begins to come alive as the details swim into focus...

Slane gets the hump 

And a few extra details are added...

Oh dear, Slaine shouldn't have eaten that curry...  

The lower half of Slaine begins to take shape...

 Oh no! All of Slaine's change has fallen out of his pockets!
 
And finally those trendy golden wrist gauntlets are painted...

Old One Eye 

With the image about done, Simon experiments with different light sources...


Slaine takes on Robin Hood 

And finally the finished image, oh my poor heartsies!


Jackie Stallone finally gets her own strip in 2000AD

And here's how the prog looks, screaming and howling on our newsagent's shelf! Absolutely brilliant and impossible to ignore!

Ooooh, Slaine, your eyeliner is running...
 
Thank you so much to Simon for sending the images, it's absolutely wonderful to see one of his paintings coming together. What a brilliant cover too! I've been blown away by Simon's covers for this series but this one is far and away my favourite! Such energy! It's terrifying!
 
Thanks again to this incredible artist!