Ms. Marvel Vol. 2 #6 Cover Art by David Mack (Marvel 2006)

As a fan of David Mack’s work, I was thrilled when I learned that he was slated to do the covers for the three Ms. Marvel Civil War crossover issues that were published in late 2006. I actually went to New York Comic-Con in February 2007, hoping to find that David had brought the original art for the Ms. Marvel covers to his table in Artist’s Alley.

As it turned out, he had already sold the cover art to issue 6, although he still had the covers for issues 7 and 8. I had my heart set on issue 6, so I resisted the temptation of the other covers, realizing that I had no shortage of other original art that I wanted to buy. Six months later, imagine my pleasure to find this cover for sale in a member's gallery on ComicArtFans.com. It was almost too good to be true. The owner was already negotiating a trade for the piece with another prospective buyer, but I managed to persuade him to sell it to me.

The cover art is lightly penciled and then painted in watercolor or ink on the back of a standard 11” x 17” Blue Line Pro comic art board. Ms. Marvel appears in front of an American flag, which is actually a color photostat of a flag that was cut perfectly to fill in the white space around her figure. It’s an interesting effect, particularly along her arms and torso where the flag essentially establishes the border that would normally be done with a black line.

The art takes up a little more than half the cover, like all the Civil War crossover covers, leaving plenty of room below for the title and indicia. I remember when I first saw the published comic that I wondered if Marvel had cropped a full figure image of Ms. Marvel in order to fit it on the half cover and, if so, how did they decide to crop her head below the mouth? As it turns out, Mack painted it so that the art cuts off below her eyes and Marvel then cropped the art for the final cover so it so that it cuts off below her mouth.

Why? I’m not sure, although I’d guess that the cutoff point is either a nod to the secret identity sub-plot of the Civil War storyline or to Ms. Marvel's unspoken misgivings about the government's stance on the Civil War. Either that or they wanted to stir up controversy. Truly a mystery for the ages....