I’ve recently been on a Bruce Timm animation spree, having taken in the entire run of Justice League: The Animated Series, Under the Red Hood, and Batman/Superman: Public Enemies, and Justice League: Doom, among others. Having never gotten into superhero team books, this was kind of a new world for me. I noticed a few things, such as how much the Avengers movie borrowed from Justice League, and how much JL borrowed from Buffy and other Whedon works. I feel like Timm, Dini and Whedon belong to a really geeky modern version of, like, the French Impressionist scene in the late 1800s, with everyone inspiring one another and egging each other on to greater heights of nerdy awesomeness. I was also astounded by the range of human experience that could be explored through the medium of people getting punched in the face. It reminded me of figure drawing class, where the goal is to express as much as possible with drawings of nudes in rooms. Seriously, the series explores quite complex moral quandaries, the ethical responsibilities of power, plus feminism, existentialism, quantum and causality, etc, all with variations on the basic super-powered fist-fight. Amazing.
Also, I’ve been reading the latest Scott Snyder comics, plus resisting the urge to download the Arkham City downloadable extras, basically cuz I really need to work. But the Batman Universe is still calling to me, so that’s what my sketchbook playground looks like these days.
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My basic take on Batman Beyond, which, for the layman, is the Spider-Man story set in the future with a super-powered bat suit instead of spider-powers.
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This is another in a series of sketches I’ve been doing, where the challenge is to reveal the superhero persona of the character without a costume.
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People pick on Robin in the Batman Universe, and I can understand why. But he’s still part of it, in all his incarnations. So our challenge in the geek world is to make him fit. This is my first attempt at Nightwing, the grown-up version of Dick Grayson.
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Batgirl always has a special place in my heart. I’m still experimenting with my brown paper sketchbook, and I think there’s some interesting stuff here, but Poor Barbara Gordon looks a little blue-ish, like she’s been taking mass amounts of colloidal silver. Not so sexy.
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And Batgirl on a scooter again, a concept I just love. Does everyone have to ride a bad-ass motorcycle?
