Joe Madureira

the beauty of my relationship to mr jeff lobe is that i don't actually need to know all the details anyway i just think that generally i think it's a fair criticism of jeff lobe that historically has not been sensitive to portrayals of asians in media and has generally likened them to uh ninjas and karate men

Yeah, we do have pencils here from the amazing Joe Mad with inks by the also amazing Tim Townsend.

See, okay, this is where we get into interesting parts about your and my relationships through the work because you like Joe Mad way more than I do.

Well, Joe Matt is very talented, but I think historically on this show, I've liked his work better than you.

On this show and

I saw the special thank you on the art page.

And all I could think is, I wonder how he feels about that now.

Because that looks, I can see the value in some of Joe Mad's art in here.

So I did find a new artist that is very...

Joe Mad-esque, and I do like his work quite a bit.

And I had contacted him before about needing cover work.

And at the time I was like, I really do have like far too much right now.

So anime was very part, very much part of like my diet growing up.

And when I started reading like X-Men comics, Joe Madureira was the artist.

He was a very heavily anime influenced, uh, artist.

So, so that kind of stuff has always been fine with me.

Pizza Hut and Marvel collaboration featuring the X-Men from 1992 and 1993, where they had like cups and like boxes that had the X-Men on it.

And it's like drawn by Joe Madureira.

And you're like, I need to know who these characters are because they seem really cool.

And sometimes it's like the most random things that hook us.

What was your first Shi'ar experience and do you love these characters?

Probably 90s X-Men, probably Scott Lobdell, Joe Madureira.

I vividly remember this beautiful shot of the She-R, Lalandra in particular, drawn by Joe Madureira.

I can't give the issue or the exact era, but...

I always thought their design was so striking, particularly how their hair turns into these like, you know, triangular like feather like shapes.

[laughs]

The art style of this game is like, I don't know if it was literally using him as an inspiration, but it feel, very, feels very much like Joe Madureira.

I don't know if you remember his run on the X-Men.

No.

... uh, 'cause I did find, uh, this, but it's not the same thing.

This is actually Joe Madureira.

Oh, that's the Pizza thing.

And here's the Pizza Hut thing, so just 'cause we were talking about it, I got it.

Uh, it popped up.

Um, so maybe it was on one of these cups or something, or in one of these promo materials, or those VHSs I was talking about.

But this is Joe Madureira, who at, by the way, at this point, is, like, 16 years old, or se- maybe 17 years old wh- when he drew-

Wow

And kind of that era of Avengers and JLA, JSA is, I think, some of the best work he's done where he has just this incredible weight but dynamism.

And with Jesus Merino's inks, there's just a real nice refinement and grace to his lines, whereas when he was on X-Men with Art Thibert it was a little bit more, like, harsher hatching, very much '90s, kind of like, uh, Tim Townsend, Joe Mad lines.

But when he moves with Jesus Merino into stuff, it just looks absolutely incredible and there's a grace and finesse that I don't think, um, was ever really as strong in his work as it was during this moment, and especially with this book.

Yeah.