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Bursting into the scene and reinvigorating the look of X-men in 1994, Joe Madureira, known as Joe Mad!, 's dynamic Japanese animation style changed how we viewed the X-men for an entire generation. Not only content with giving X-men's Rogue (Masamune Shirow's Ghost in the Shell's comic) Major Kusanagi's hairstyle in the alternate story "Age of Apocalypse", his manga inspired look for X-men was not only seen in comics but in toys as well.
Just as suddenly as he shot into stardom, he left Marvel in 1997 to go to Cliffhanger! with Humberto Ramos and JScott Campbell. Creating and crafting "Battlechasers", a sword and sorcery fantasy quest adventure, it started strong but the comic slowed and soon, after 10 issues, Joe Mad! left comics to venture into developing computer games on his own. Leaving a void in all our (my) fanboy hearts....developing Darksiders with Joe Kelly.
After a decade or so, he came back to Marvel drawing "Ultimates 3" with Jeph Loeb, "Avenging Spider-man" and "Savage Wolverine" with Zeb Wells, without losing an artistic beat. After toiling in games and making a name for himself on Darksiders, he's back drawing comics, and knocking it out of the park, but will he be impacting the younger generation of readers. You could probably say, together with artists like Adam Warren, Ben Dunn, they brought the Manga style to American comics.
So when I heard Joe Mad! was coming to Singapore, my reaction was "Joe Mad! Is coming? Joe Mad! iS COMING!?" I'm going to ask him why he left us to do games,... Is it because of an undying passion... why why why….
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| why is Joe looking down?! |
Well meeting Joe Mad! We managed to get some answers that’s on everyone’s minds… arriving non-descript and dressed casually in blue jeans and a Wolverine t-shirt,Joe Mad! Looked like ONE OF US, and his laid back, easy going demeanor with his wry smile belies an energetic witty artist superstar, talk to him about comics and living the dream and he springs into action very much like his comics “an anime panel caught in mid-frame”.
First and foremost on everyone’s mind? Battlechasers? Yes, its been a decade and fans want it, and Joe said yesterday, he loves the characters and they're his characters and he will get back to finish it, one day. There you have it. In a panel discussion with Cosplayer Vampy Bit Me as Psylocke and CB Cebulski, Joe said his favorite characters were Spidey and Venom, (Vampy’s were Psylocke and Venom and CB’s were New Mutants, Nightcrawler, Kraven and Sabretooth.
“Kickstarter?!” I blurted out but Joe calmly said that financial was not an issue with Battlechasers and that he would eventually go to self publishing it. If he could, He’d like to create a simple game that you could find on an ipad and CB chipped in for comics there was instant gratification in seeing the pages you drew out.
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| Different versions of the same super-hero - robust, sexy, pectastic |
On his style, he noted that his internship at Marvel helped him to improve by being able to compare with artists’ who were present at that time like Alan Davis and to draw what fans wanted to see. His advice for budding artists was to improve your storytelling and see how to tell a story cinematically and not to do solely posed images, one could start emulating other artists like “what angle would John Byrne use for this shot” but gradually you should progress to your own style. At first,he said, “he probably started wanting to draw like Arthur Adams, Berni Wrightson and Alan Davis”, but I think he soon developed his style that was uniquely Joe Mad!
Joe’s still amazed he’s getting paid to draw, jokingly saying that he doesn’t want to draw anymore but wants to enjoy himself instead. (and how he got to hone his craft was by drawing and drawing, very much like a pro athlete, practicing and practicing and not having much of a social life when he was younger).
On what he find challenging to draw, he cited planning art sequences and finally getting to draw characters he wanted to like, Elektra and Captain America, and realizing there were some portions that he didn’t like or draw and had to fix, he also said he was enjoying himself developing 12 new characters for Inhumans that he is doing right now with Matt Fraction, with which CB and him sneakily wouldn’t tell us how many issues he’s drawing.
His final anecdote to us. He can’t really believe he’s working in comics and he’d still call his friends in the middle of the night to tell them how cool it was, describing the scene he just drew! Joe Mad! I can’t quite believe i met him and he’s so laid back, with a disarming charm, and I believe a friend (Red Dot Diva: c'est moi??) can attest to his biceps, and I can safely say he’s one of us!
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| ...or not quite. Check out the stasis field he generated around himself and The Diva |
Joe Mad! Will be at the walk of fame on Saturday and Sunday so go say hi and hope he keeps drawing comics!
Joe Mad!'s schedule on
Sat 31 Aug
Walk of Fame time 12 - 1pm
Main Stage Marvel Artists Spotlight 130 -215pm
Sun 1 Sep
Main Stage Marvel Artists Spotlight 1 -2pm
Walk of Fame time 2 - 3pm
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Article by Agent W's (writing for SGCollect.com)
Pictures and retarded captions by me
Note: It's been pointed out there's an unusual punctuation error but I decided to keep it. It's kinda fun screaming his name :3
(Red Dot Diva: JOE MAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)
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Comics have variant covers, so we also have bloggers variant.
Click here for the Top Moments of the STGCC Media Preview - Toysetc + Red Dot Diva Fan Service Variant!!
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