Thursday 13 #3: Jonboy Meyers and VS art

One of the primary appeals for me in VS is cool card art. I love me some good art, I hate me some bad art. And yes, I’m fully aware that “good” and “bad” are subjective terms when it comes to art.

For example, I’m not a fan of a lot of Arthur Suydam’s art. It tickles some folk’s fancy, and it’s definitely a good pick for all the Marvel Zombies stuff, but by and large it’s not my cup of tea.

Thus, for this Thursday Thirteen, I present in no particular order thirteen reasons why Jonboy Meyers is one of my favourite artists producing cards for the VS System trading card game.

Why Jonboy? I’m a Marvel fanboy through and through. By and large I couldn’t care less about most DC characters… or at least, I used to think like that, until I discovered Jonboy’s Manhunter art in the DGL expansion. The art alone made me want to play them as a team, and also inspired me to find out who the smeg they were.

In all cases, larger (and clearer) images can be found at Jonboy’s own site and blog. 

	1. The AtomThis art was originally done for the DSM expansion, but it’s only recently seen the light in the DCL release. I think what I like most about this one is that the magnifying glass clearly shows that you’re dealing with a teeny tiny hero here… but he still looks like he can kick yer butt. My only real experience to the character of Ray Palmer is through the much criticized The Dark Knight Strikes Again tpb, but this card is one of the pieces of VS art that makes me actually interested in finding out more about a DC character.
	2. The BeetleI *think* this was Jonboy’s first VS art. As an Iron Man fan, I’m well familiar with Beetle as a character, and I’ve snickered to myself while reading many an Iron Man comic where Beetle got his proverbial handed to him. Here, however, we have a remarkably cool piece of art. I don’t know if its the style of colouring, the pose that could as easilly be heroic as it could be villainous, or that fact that it just feels like if he gets any closer I’ll be able to see my own reflection in the faceplate… One way or another, I like it.
	3. Birds of a FeatherThis is a particularly dark card, but there’s something about the composition that I like. Scarecrow flailing, Huntress lining up a shot, Black Canary letting loose with a sonic scream… Or it could just be the scream itself, represented by the concentric circles emanating across the card. Black Canary just seems so kick-arse in this one, and it’s always cool to see the villain get what’s coming to him. Take that, you psychotic psychiarist!
	4. Down but not outThis one is a sentimental favourite for a handful of reason. It’s Spidey It’s an homage to a classic Spidey image I own the original art. Yup, I have the original pencils for this hidden away in the gdaycave… one of these days I’ll actually get it framed, but it’s still one of the prides of my collection of original art and con sketches.
	5. Fire SupportJonboy did about half a dozen Manhunter pics for the DGL expansion, and if I’d had some spare cash at the time I’d own the original art for this puppy… Before these cards I knew bupkiss about the Manhunters. After, I knew their history, I knew the different types (though UDE came up with some variants of their own for the sake of having different character cards), and to this day my Red Robot Revenge deck is still assembled and ready to be cracked out on a whim. Who wants to hazard a guess as to what he has slung over his shoulder? I best it’s groceries. Robot groceries.
	6. JuggernautThe Juggernaut’s meant to be an unstoppable force, right? Once he gets going, nothing can stop him. Okay. So how to you showcase power of that level? Have him heft a truck! Perfect! This card just screams “I’m bigger than you, madder than you, and I’ve got an itch I can’t reach. I’m ticked!”
	7. For great justice!This is a neat pic for the characters included, I think. Iron Man, Cap, Spidey, Wolvie, the once-again-popular Spider-woman, and… Iron Fist??? I’m a big fan of the current Iron Fist series, so seeing him in this card with all these heavy hitters is damn cool. Another thing I love about Jonboy is that his Wolvies are short. He’s meant to be a runt, but it’s amusing how often that gets forgotten. He’s clearly significantly shorter than Iron Fist here. Love it.
	8. Manhunter ProtectorAnother Manhunter card, I actually turned this one into a wallpaper for one of the earlier incarnations of the kamiza. I don’t know what appealed to me most about this one, maybe the fact that he’s holding a lantern. One way or another, the colourist on this one did a fantastic job representing the glow of the lantern itself across both the rock and the manhunter itself.
	9. SupermanI make no bones about the fact that I’m not a Superman fan. Seriously, I find very little about the character that interests me… … but Jonboy set him on fire! How dramatic is that??? And with Darkseid looming in the foreground, the art just has that much more oomph.
	10. TerraxJonboy did a handful of Heralds for the Coming of Galactus raid deck, and lo and behold, I was actually able to purchase the art of my favourite one – Terrax. Terrax is a bastard. He’s a jerk, a git, a smeghead… and this pic really protrays that. Even his cosmic axe thingie has blood spatter. The full pic actually has a wounded alien reaching up for mercy… but finding none.
	11. Ultra BoyJust like the Juggernaut pic, here we have Ultra Boy showing how tough he is by hefting something large and heavy. The difference here is, Ultra Boy looks like he’s having fun. The character of Ultra Boy in the current series is very entertaining to read, so it’s only fitting that the art be fun too.
	12. ValidusUnfortunately, this one resized loses much of its charm. I recommend hitting Jonboy’s site (link above) and checking it out at a larger scale. The thing with Validus is, he’s a big purple and white dude with no eyes and a see-through skullcap. Aside from him being really big, he just doesn’t seem as menacing as a lot of the other Future Foes baddies… but by golly, doesn’t this just seem like Supes is about to get his head popped?
	13. WildfireSince Wildfire isn’t in the current Legion series, I know little to nothing about him… but this card just screams “cosmic”. Convenient, since the character is a real boon for other characters with the cosmic trait. One way or another, it’s pretty darn cool.