Wolverine VS Captain America by Jason Pearson

Ok so this will be what I consider the crown of this year’s edition of my CAF party. The last piece and part 16.

A splendid Captain America vs Wolverine commission by the incredible Jason Pearson.

I had tons of ideas for a commission from Jason with this being my very first one from him. Funny it took so long after madly collecting his art for so long.

This actually started with a reinterpretation of the famous Captain America annual 8 cover. I love that cover and this probably Zeck’s most famous or close to.

The layout of the initial cover highlights Cap more than Wolvie (which is normal considering it was a Cap issue after all). But then I thought that I basically prefer Wolvie to Cap as a character. So the idea came to ask Jason to reverse the cover in order to showcase Wolvie more. Truth be told, I was a bit nervous as the Zeck cover was close to perfect and despite my request and my faith in Jason’s abilities, I could not picture how he would choose to interpret it.

But you will agree that my gamble paid off. I was floored when I received the scan. You can truly feel Wolvie’s ferocity and relentless attacks putting Cap in difficulty here. I also love how Jason has been drawing Wolvie for years now. Basically as small aggressive pit-bull of a man which to me is pushing the Claremont/Byrne era logic of the character to its fullest.

The technique is also incredible. Jason’s use of copics is truly amazing. The lightning effect on Cap’s shield from Wolvie’s attack alone is spectacularly rendered.

Now I’ll let Jason express his thoughts on the piece:

“Based after a Michael J Zeck cover design and nowhere near as good. Also a very bad scan.

This piece was more arduous than planned. Zeck's design looked simple but the client (Truth be told, I’m not sure I like being called a “client” even though it is obviously what I am. It feels a bit distant ;) wanted a 'opposite' view. I had to make changes to the composition to keep it dynamic. Otherwise, all you would see is the back of Captain America's shield....”

To this I will add that Jason put this commission in the small group of his own favorite commissions on his BB kickstarter campaign which is its own reward in itself considering how hard a critic he seems to be with his own art.

I could not be happier with the result, so again my thanks to MGA and Jason for this gem.

PS: thinking about what to write about the piece this week, I realized this commission could look like a swipe of Michael One minute Later theme. If you read all of the above, you will understand that his theme was not my rationale nor intent. But if apologies are needed, here they are.