'Kreegah'

Bundolo? [link]

The fellow you see here was an attempt at creating a magma man kind of guy. I scrapped him so early that I erased the name I had given him. See if you can guess why before you read further.



OK, this guy has several inherent problems. The first is that there is nothing about him that suggests rock or cragginess, like you'd expect from a man composed of magma. He's actually quite rounded, which isn't really keeping with the theme at all.

The design is sort of vanilla; I never had a clear idea of many points of interest on this guy. "The Psychedelic Man" was similar, but he was filled with a riotous explosion of color. My magma man only had two colors.

This villain also fell into the trap of repetition. In addition to looking like a two-tone Psychedelic Man, his color scheme echoed Devil Dynamite way too much. Even altering shades didn't help, since he also shared a rounded body type.

So why does this guy get to be posted if he has so many issues? Well, I like his pose and expression. I have found that one thing I CAN do is create faces that communicate things, when I actually give my characters faces at all.

I liked the weapons a lot, too. I gave him both a spiked mace and a battle axe, and I was pleased with the results. In truth, I liked some of the maces on earlier attempts at this piece even better, but this one will do.

And lastly, this picture really pops. Even though the character sort of fails under scrutiny, the red/orange combo is a real eye-catcher.

Since rejecting this picture, I've rethought my entire approach to the story that involved him. There will likely be a lack of magma men when it finally gets told, replaced with something a little more thematically appropriate. Still, magma men are fun characters. Never say never.