Karate Kid vs. Psylocke by Rick Mays

I think that the first time I saw Rick Mays' art was in New Titans and I thought it was quite good. A little later he drew an Arsenal miniseries and his art had progressed to very awesome in my eyes. I became a fan and I have bought almost every comic that he's drawn since then. Rick was one of the first artists that came to mind when I made my list for these Karate Kid commissions and though it's taken a while to get it, I think this commission is well worth the wait. I've been a big fan of Psylocke since I read Uncanny X-Men #213 and I loved how Chris Claremont evolved her as warrior until he had her physically transformed in that Acts of Vengeance story that Jim Lee drew. She then started using martial arts, psychic blades, and eventually physical blades as well. Anyway, I had seen Rck draw Psylocke before and figured he would be perfect for this matchup. I love the movement in this piece, the setting, the angle, the way Val's eyes are following Betsy's leap, everything about this commission, really. Big thanks again to Rick for doing this for me!

Psylocke's main advantage here will be that she can read Val's mind and therefore know his attacks before he executes them. And that will help her at first. But Val has dealt with telepaths before and can fight without thinking when he has to, fighting solely on instincts that have been trained over the years. But he'll have to take her out quickly, because if Psylocke sees that she isn't going to win she can telepathically attacky him and that would be bad news for Karate Kid.

If you like this piece then go buy some books featuring Rick's art.