Incredible Hulk Issue 98 (Planet Hulk Reimagined) - Aaron Lopresti after Ladrönn

I credit Aaron Lopresti with the idea for the Planet Hulk cover recreations/reinterpretations as a line of commissions. I was watching his live show sometime during the beginning of the pandemic, when nobody knew what to do with themselves and artists, businesses, and pretty much all people had to become creative to protect their livelihoods or continue enriching themselves in some way or form. Forgive me because I'm paraphrasing as this was now a few years ago (whoa...), but he was telling us a story of how DC asked him to pencil the interiors of a book and he would only accept it if he was also the cover artist. I'm sure that's a common topic, as it was predominantly the norm prior to the 2000s and another great artist, Mike Choi, whom I follow on social media, recently had a series of posts involving the same discussion. That perspective made a ton of sense to me the more I thought about it, eventually leading me to this idea. And though I plan to try to stick to having Aaron or Carlo (re)do the covers in which they also illustrated the interiors, I am also hoping to have other artists tied to these books contribute to the line.

Onto the art! Aaron did an awesome job capturing the hostility amid the mutual respect (or attraction) between Hulk and Caiera on this piece. I've always liked the femininity he portrayed in Caiera and, as the bulk of her character development and following turn from the Red Emperor's Shadow to one of the Warbound, unfolded during his issues, this was one of the early and obvious requests to this line of commissions. Huge thanks to Aaron for the original inspiration and of course this beautiful piece.