Monday 26 May 2014

Nick Percival - Megacity Meltdown!

Breaking Dredd

Hell yeah! Nick Percival is back on interiors in the prog after nearly twenty years away and the results are, quite literally, mind blowing! In the highly anticipated Trauma Town by Mike Carroll, we see Megacity-One's top lawman begin to loose his mind. Has dementia finally set in or are there more sinister forces at work? Over to Nick to tell us more... 
The plan was to create a different take on the generic Dredd head shot that’s been done many times before and also give a hint about the tone and mood of the series, Trauma Town. Since the story causes Dredd to doubt his own sanity and there’s a whole bunch of pretty weird stuff about to go on in the Mega City, I chose to do half of Dredd breaking away and dissolving   -  an abstract image that hopefully looks a bit different to what’s usually on a 2000AD cover."

Nick's last Dredd was the classic 'Goodnight Kiss' in July 1995 which saw Dredd face off against The Brotherhood of Marshals and the deadly hit-man Jonni Kiss...

 Dredd struggles with some particularly sticky synth-taffy

"Get up... It's only pain!"

"It’s been great to return to painting Dredd interiors after a long time away. I’ve kind of got back into illustrating Dredd with various covers for IDW and 2000AD but never could find a decent amount of time to commit to a multi-part storyline for inside the Prog. After chatting with writer Mike Carroll about what sort of thing I’d like to do, he came up with a cracking idea and great script that’s been a blast to illustrate. I’ve had a cool experience working with Mike and hope we can do a follow up tale."

Nick has had a lot of fun with the tale, recently having a competition on his Facebook page to include readers into the story, suffering horrible deaths at the bristles of Nick's paintbrush of course! I can't wait to see those!

"It was important to me that I fully paint the whole strip in keeping with the style of art used on my covers which is a lot of work but it’s been great fun. I really hope the fans like it  - be gentle with me!!!"

Hmmm, here's a panel from the strip, somehow I don't think the fans will be more than gentle, except the one's he kills of course!

Under his grumpy exterior, Dredd is a sweetheart really

And here's the cover as it appears at your local corner shop, fab!
Judge Dent?

 Huuuuge thanks to Nick! I'm so excited to see him back in the prog and this, along with Greg Staples' Judge Death strip, are the two tales I've been looking forward to most this year. Thrillpower overload imminent!!!

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