Henry Flint - Tights, Xavier, Action!

 

Ha! Tights, Xavier, Action! I think that pun is almost does justice to Henry Flint's brain bogglingly stunning cover for the special Free Comic Book Day edition of 2000AD. This is a real spectacular as, never one for slacking, Henry has done FOUR covers in one here, and what iconic covers they are!

Before I start, I'll tell you a little about the FCBD edition of 2000AD; this year prog boasts a BRAND NEW Dredd story 'The Jimp Club' by John Wagner as well as part one of the new Zombo Story 'Planetronix: Mohawk of Menace!' Add to this Indigo Prime, Insurrection, the Visible Man and the wonderful DR and Quinch and I think we're set for a winner! Remember Free Comic Book Day is on May 4th 2013, so support your local comic book store!

Now then, over to everyone's favourite Henry Flint to tell us more about this truly Zarjaz cover...

'This was commissioned by Keith Richardson for 2000ad’s contribution to free comic book day. He wanted an alien reading three recognisable comic book classics. First is issue one of Superman replaced with DR and Quinch...'

 

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it a bloke in tights smashing up a car?

 

Mind the auto-mobile Marlon!

Go compare! The two covers side by side

Notes - This cover was published on April 18th 1938 and the art is by Joe Schuster. This comic is considered to be the birth of Superhero comics and is the only comic to have sold for over $2,000,000! 

Back to Henry: "Second is a classic Spider-Man cover replaced by Judge Dredd..."

      

A bit of Ditko/Kiby magic.

Mind the Law Man Marlon!

The Law and the bore...

Notes - The cover of Amazing Fantasy 15 (formerly Amazing Adult Fantasy!?!) was produced by two hacks called Steve Ditko and Jack Kirby and saw the début of everyone's favourite web slinger, Spider-Man. A near mint copy of this will go for just over $1,000,000. 

Back once again to Henry: 'Then an issue of X-Men replaced with various other 2000ad characters which appear inside.'

 

Muties, look!

 

Muties and the beast

Mutant Mayhem from Henry Flint

Notes - Giant-Size X-Men was published in 1975 with a cover by Gil Kane, Joe Cockrum and Dan Crespi. A mint version will fetch around $17,000. It has a shit title.

Henry continues: "The comics where drawn and coloured individually then dropped into the final piece."

Three iconic covers right there!

Some trademarked Henry Flint lunacy.

Ever the perfectionist, Henry wasn't totally happy with the image so he used a bit of digital help to get it just right. He says "I tried lettering the comics freehand, as you can see from the photo it looked amateurish so fiddled about with Photoshop lettering adding various filters and blurring followed by contrast to get something close to the original covers."

It was the many-eyed, no-horned, sitting, green prog reader.

 

Finally, here's the FREE comic as it will look at your comic shop on May 4th.

Whopping thanks to Henry for a real history lesson there and a genuinely spectacular cover. Is there no end to this man's talent? On a side note, Henry recently had an Ablation procedure on his heart. According to the artist, it's 'nothing to worry about' and was indeed 'a great adventure!' Hope all is ticketyboo with the ticker now Henry!