2000 AD Covers Uncovered: John McCrea on Prog 2351 – It’s Sam Vs the Lawman…
27th September 2023
Every week, 2000 AD brings you the galaxy’s greatest artwork and 2000 AD Covers Uncovered takes you behind-the-scenes with the headline artists responsible for our top cover art – join bloggers Richard Bruton and Pete Wells as they uncover the greatest covers from 2000 AD!
This week, Prog 2351 and a glorious John McCrea cover to celebrate a VERY special face-off in the pages of 2000 AD – Judge Dredd vs Robo-Hunter. That’s right, it’s Sam Slade, Brit-Cit’s finest Robo-Hunter, pitching up in Mega-City One and getting in Joe’s face – with Walter the Wobot right in the middle.
You can read the complete story from Garth Ennis and Henry Flint in the pages of 2000 AD Prog 2351, out on 27 September. It’s quite the meeting of two classics in a very special one-off tale you’re not going to forget in a hurry!
John burst on the scene as a bright young thing in 1989, with his debut in Prog 615, Fast Forward, swiftly followed by drawing Troubled Souls, a controversial and hard-hitting tale of the Troubles, penned by another debutante, Garth Ennis.
Since then, McCrea’s been a semi-regular name in 2000 AD and the Judge Dredd Megazine, but also found fame abroad with Hitman, again with Ennis, for DC Comics from 1996-2001. Since then, he’s worked at Marvel, DC, Image, Dynamite, and many more. But it’s always good to see his work both on the cover of 2000 AD and inside.
And surely you saw John’s most recent interior art in the Megazine – his stunning Darke’s Mob in the recent Battle Action crossover Megazine issue 460 and a truly magnificently unhinged Dreddworld version of a classic Battle Action character…
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But enough from us about John, time for John to tell us all about bringing two classic 2000 AD characters together…
JOHN MCCREA: I started reading 2000 AD from issue one (the space spinner went straight over the garden hedge, natch!) and have followed it ever since.
Sure there have been periods where I didn’t look at the Prog as much as I could have, but I will always have a soft spot for the characters created in the first three hundred issues or so. So it’s always a thrill when I get to draw a character I haven’t worked on before, especially when I know such a great creative team is doing the story inside.
Matt Smith said three words ‘Dredd’, ‘Sam Slade’, and ‘Walter the Wobot’ and I was in (technically that’s six words but you know what I mean). I think Garth Ennis and Henry Flint may have been mentioned but I wasn’t really listening by that point.
The image popped into my head pretty quickly and I worked up a sketch…
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Matt thought my initial sketch made Dredd look like he wanted to clobber Walter and asked for his head to be turned more towards Slade.
So I erased Dredd’s head in Photoshop, printed it out, popped it on a lightbox and on the back of the piece of paper drew a replacement Dredd head…
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I then digitally placed the new Dredd head onto the original sketch, subtly altering Dredd’s shoulder pads, stance etc to accommodate the brand new bonce...
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Inking time! I print the pencils out onto an A3 sheet of paper and then lightbox onto a sheet of Bristol board.
I use Canson Bristol. It’s smooth and has very little bleed. I ink with Mitsubishi unipin pens, usually 0.2, 0.4 and 0.8 size along with a roller ruler and French curve.
These days I find it hard to do freehand lines so I use the ruler and French curves for a lot of my work. Scribbling in the black areas afterward is quite therapeutic, I find.
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Back to the scanner. I scan the final links in at 600 DPI and then add digital tones. I use Kyle Webster brushes to do this.
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I send the finished artwork to Mike Spicer for colours. Mike knows the kind of palette I like and there is usually very little correction on my part.
You can see here I wanted a few details added and fixed. Mike puts up with my incessant demands like the true pro he is!
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Ta-da! The finished artwork ready to go to Tharg and his minions to add all the cover blurb, logo etc…
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As with everything I draw, I am wracked with self-doubt after it is done. For instance, with this cover I now wonder if it would have been better to have Dredd holding a gun and pointing it at Sam over the top of Walter’s head?
Still, I think it works pretty well and I hope it connects with readers.
Always with the doubt – these art droids are always paranoid and so self-critical when it comes to their work!
But John’s got absolutely nothing to be worried about here. He and Mike Spicer have given us something that’s going to pop from the shelves of whatever shop or newsagent you get your copy of the Galaxy’s Greatest!
You can pick up your copy of 2000 AD Prog 2351 from the web shop from 27 September. Even better, get your Thrill Power through your letter box each week with a subscription (complete with the sub-exclusive covers and free gifts that come along with it!)
For more Covers Uncovered greatness from John, be sure to have a look at these beauties… riding out with Dredd on Prog 2224 and ‘everyone’s favourite fascist’ on Prog 2328.
And now, as a special treat… the first couple of pages from Judge Dredd Vs Robo-Hunter in Prog 2351 by Garth Ennis and Henry Flint… a stunning one-off strip that you absolutely shouldn’t miss!
