I’ve been drawing comics for a long time. PROFESSIONALLY now, for about 12 years– but I’ve been drawing comics…. doing visual storytelling… since I was about 10 years old. I can’t remember exactly WHAT it was that first sparked that desire to do panel to panel continuity even at that young age, but like most kids my age who get connected that way, I had my own share of personal characters I created that were mostly knock offs of existing Marvel and DC characters. I’ve mostly left those characters behind as I’ve grown up– and I admire someone like Erik Larsen who is dedicated to keeping those childhood dreams and characters alive as he does with his SAVAGE DRAGON universe.

So– I thought it would be fun to interpret some of my early childhood characters NOW and contrast my efforts against my original designs. So, without further ado, I’ll present my first attempt. I’ll start with the original drawings from when I was a kid. The first version of THE COSMIC AVENGER with the clunky helmet was done when I was 11. I did about 6 stories with him during that time and then put him aside in favor of other characters. But when I discovered CAPTAIN MARVEL from MARVEL COMICS, I fell in love with the character and decided to revive CA and change the design just a bit to make him look more like CAP. Note the horrible coif that COSMIC AVENGER had…!

Here’s the childhood versions:

And then the versions drawn now. Notice I STILL had trouble with the hair…..!

This was fun– I think I’ll be doing a lot more of it.

Mike