The Art of Samax Amen: [Daily Sketch] One of my first original characters

I started drawing comics in elementary school.

I drew a comic with my two favorite characters at the time (Spider-Man and Nightcrawler from the X-Men). The story was epic! It was action-packed! It was four pages!

The wall-crawling heroes teamed up to fight an evil mutant who attacked New York. His name was Thunderbolt, and he wore knight's armor and he threw lightning bolts.

In the battle, Aunt May was killed. Spidey wanted to kill Thunderbolt, but Nightcrawler reminded him that heroes don't kill. I mailed the comic in to Marvel, but they never used it!

Can you believe it?!?!?

I was DEVASTATED! I decided not to make anymore stories with Marvel characters after that. Instead, I worked with other kids. Usually, they would lose interest before we could get anywhere.

It took years before I had the confidence to try to write a story of my own, with my own characters.

The first character that I created a full story for all on my own didn't come until I was in high school.

I was reminded of him this weekend and decided to draw him from memory.

Noose the Deadman was inspired by Spidey, Daredevil, Blue Devil, and other acrobatic crime-fighters I grew up reading. I was also always partial to marauding monster-heroes like Hulk, Ghost Rider, and the Ninja Turtles who were unencumbered by pesky secret identities.

Although I always had a detailed backstory in my pocket for Noose, I only dripped it out in the merest and tiniest of tastes. The few other kids who got to read the comics I created with the character always had more questions that I delighted in not really answering.

They never realized I had no intention of revealing Noose's checkered past.

I think I was doing them a favor.

Finding out more about the past of mysterious characters like Wolverine and Ghost Rider did not make them cooler.

To be continued?

After talking about Noose with some friends last week, I spent the last few days digging through my archives, and couldn't find a single drawing of Noose, who I probably haven't drawn since college.

I have pretty good recollections of the character, and set all my own characters in the same fictional metropolitan center, the Decapolis (literally "the ten cities"). I borrowed elements from Noose's rogues gallery and history for subsequent creations Dare, the Diablo, Manchild, and more.

Now I'm itching to dust off the deadman himself.

We'll see...

I'll try to whip up a proper bio sheet for you next week. Remind me if I forget!