My favorites: Kitty Pryde

Kitty Pryde is one of those characters that ended up surprising me, to tell the truth. When I first started reading comics, she was portrayed as a highly-irresponsible, curly-haired, bony, freak-eyed sidekick to the X-Men. She called herself Sprite or Ariel and dressed in some of the ugliest costumes this side of a drag queen convention. Before long, they added to the character and artists like Paul Smith really gave her a great visual-- the brainy girl next door that acted her age, not her stereotype.

I followed her relationship with Colossus with great interest-- it was so weird a girl so young would be romantically connected to an X-Man-- is that even legal? I always saw her interest more as a crush than anything, but enjoyed the innocent banter between them. The John Romita jr -drawn issue where Colossus and Kitty broke up after the events of Secret War devastated me as a child of what, 8?

I read the occasional Excalibur years after-- I really like Lockheed as sort of her dragon pet, and I was the only one, apparently, that thought the X-Babies were kinda fun. After all, why take everything so seriously? Have some fun from time to time.

Regarding the picture here? I made some mistakes on this one, guys-- blame the meds I'm on. I'll continue to improve, no problem at all. I still really like it, though-- also, this is the FIRST TIME I've ever drawn Lockheed, and I think I did a great job.

What do you think?


- jeremy