Sunday, April 27, 2014

2005 JLA art by Roy Allan Martinez

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Roy Allan Martinez is a Filipino artist who got his start at Wildstorm with the help of Whilce Portacio. I unenthusiastically read some of his early books, but didn't start paying attention to him until he was in the unenviable position of taking over Aria. This was briefly a hot book thanks to the romantic art of Jay Anacleto, and while Martinez couldn't sustain that heat, I thought he was the more interesting illustrator. Clearly born under a bad sign, his next major project was drawing Wonder Woman for a spate of issues written by the fan favorite Phil Jimenez when he couldn't handle the art chores himself. Again, Martinez's work was a lively departure, but not embraced by the Amazing Amazon's fans as readily as the seeming second coming of George Pérez. Martinez's last extended work for a major publisher was the 2006 Son of M mini-series at Marvel, but otherwise it's only been fill-ins and a little indie stuff. It's really too bad, because I find Martinez's look unique and exciting, but he never seemed to find a vehicle that could properly present it to a large audience.

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