Micronauts, Acroyear by Pat Broderick

thats a great acroyear piece, great get on this one 

I mostly know Pat from his work on Firestorm. Great example of his amazing linework!

Love Firestorm, Captain Atom, Green Lantern and also Doom 2099! Cool Broderick!

Excellent Acroyear; I'm glad that pesky Broderick itch is now scratched!

Really nice with all the shine and polish for Acroyear all rendered out in the pen, pencil shading, and tones.  He definitely kept up the Golden look when he took over the book.

Broderick was a good fit for Micronauts after Golden.

As were Guice ending the first series and Kelley Jones in the second series.  They all pretty much followed the Golden playbook (thank goodness).

This is really beautiful, Eric.  Fantastic use of different line weights to add all that luscious texture and shading.  I'm certain it's nostalgia, but I absolutely -love- Acroyear's design (even though I'd be the first to admit that it's probably terribly impractical in a fight, with a helmet allowing a very limited range of visibility (and impressively huge helmet fins!), shoulder fins that would restrict arm movement, and ultra-wide boots that you couldn't run or dodge in without tripping... but that might be nit-picking :) ).  Broderick makes all those "items of flair" look like a million bucks here, and I feel like I'm eight or nine again, marvelling at how stinkin' cool a robot warrior dude looks once more. :) Really beautiful work by Pat, and a GREAT add, Eric - congrats!  I'd be gazing longingly at this thing for a long time!

Thanks buddy!  And I have to say that your comment really made me chuckle.  But not because it felt like a slight in any way.  It just took me back to a memory from my youth.  I still remembered seeing Iron Man for the first time and thinking, he can't fight in that!  There's just no way!  Haha!  That reaction was/is probably typical of just about every armored character that has come out since.  You would think that for a kid, it's easier to suspend disbelief.  But apparently it was the other way around.  I got over it of course.  Because the #1 rule in comics is that it just looks freaking cool.  Anyway, thanks for the comment.  And the fun flashback.

Sweet Broderick illustration! I don't know much about Micronauts but the character designs look really cool, it's one of my big gaps/holes of Marvel reading that I still haven't circle back to - I know I really should though. I first saw Broderick's work in the 90s in the Spider-Man/X-Factor 3 issue mini he did for Marvel (and that happens to be the only art of his I own also in a DPS from issue 1). Definately would like to check out more of the work he did.

Yikes!  When it comes to gaps, looks like I'm the one who's left lacking.  I didn't even know that Broderick ever drew Spidey.  And considering he's my favorite character, that's just pathetic.  Looks like even old, longtime, fan/collectors like me can still be schooled.  Appreciate the eye opening comment but of course now I'm going to be obsessed with finding a nice page (with Spidey) from those three issues.  Gee, thanks a lot Kavi!  LOL

Haha, happy to "assist" lol. Here's that DPS, posted a few years back but have owned for a lot longer (did a fresh scan of it finally). Spidey is on it ;)

Reading your description – what a turn-up for the books (as we say in the UK) because back in the late 70s and early 80s I was primarily a DC fan over being a Marvel fan but it was Pat Broderick’s art on Captain Marvel with Doug Moench  when he came onto my radar. He was helped by fantastic inks from the excellent Bruce Patterson on that title. I had a bit of a visceral thrill when I saw a cover from that run (I think it was issue 62) pinned to the wall of Max Cady’s cell in the Martin Scorsese Cape Fear from 1991 – don’t quote me on that as it is 35 years (!) since I saw that – although Marvel wouldn’t want to make a big deal of that because Cady is not exactly a role model. From there I followed PB to DC and his work on all the titles you mention plus Lords of the Ultra-Realm where he was reunited with Doug Moench. I must have picked up those Micronauts comics too and that Acroyear is really nicely rendered –  the amount of work expended on it is awesome – “The textures!”, as other CAF members are won’t to say. Congrats.

Oh man (or should I say, oh Ma)!  How could I forget about Captain Marvel.  Yes, of course.  Hard to say which was the higher profile book, considering that Broderick was following Golden on that book.  At the same time, Captain Marvel is such an iconic Marvel character.  And yes, I also thought Patterson was his best collaborator.  Thanks for the nice comment and those two great points.

Yes, the textures really make this. The lines a crisp and slick, but the range of surface techniques really make the image shine.

You know what they say about big boots? Small sword.

In all seriousness, I also had some reservations about the scale of his sword.  I mean, heck, those helmet fins are almost the same length.  Haha!  But leave it to you to make the observation in a much more entertaining way.  And yes, those boots are fricking HUGE!  LOL

My art brain says that this is the perfect representation of this character by the best person to draw it! Congrats!

I'm like you in that I first discovered Broderick's work at DC.  It wasn't until the late 1990s that I put together a complete set of the first Micronauts series, and I loved it.  This is one heckuva awesome Acroyear!