With the Starlin layout, the level of detail was highest to the fore, at the bottom of the page. Aside from some loose figure work, he'd spent the most time on Void's face and left hand. It wasn't a lot, and he'd gone into greater detail on other characters in her proximity, but this was still recognizably Starlin. That's clearly a Starlin woman's face, which is where the embellishment comes in. Pablo Villalobos asked me a couple of times who this artist was, and I'm not confident he recognized Starlin's name. When I enquired about his willingness to ink a figure, he fairly promptly picked Void from Jim Lee's WildC.A.T.s, whom he knew well and did not require reference for.
I don't keep up with modern comics, especially Marvel, especially the X-Men family. I did not know of Pablo Villalobos work until I was doing last minute reference for the 2025 Eastern Rim Funny Book & Vintage Con, which I was aware existed for several years via antique mall fliers, but had never attended. I was told about the Saturday show on Thursday, and mostly went on the false hope of getting something from Kevin Nowlan. But once I saw Villalobos art, I was totally blown away. Adam Hughes is an obvious influence, but he has darker and more textured elements to his art, recalling-- I dunno, the late Nick Manabat? It's an unusual but delightful combination, as I'd never expect Higer elements mingled with the more cheesecake elements of the
Majik. I'm not sure if this Pablo Villalobos is the same guy who did some turn of the century work at Penny Farthing Productions (he didn't look old enough,) but the artist who signs as "Lobos" exploded onto the scene in the past few years with very striking cover work (that demands serious money on the aftermarket.) I figured getting him to do a modest ink job was a long shot, and was gob-smacked when he said "yes" for a relative pittance.
While the Starlin fan in me had hoped for greater fidelity to his line on one of the few characters in the piece that he'd rendered enough to actually look like a Starlin drawing, Lobos was a get who knew the character of Void and his way around a gleaming metal smokeshow way better than Jim. I love what hev did here, and I think this work will task future embellishers with living up to his example. A sweet start to this project!
Pablo Villalobos
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