Adam Warren
Encyclopedia
Adam Warren is an American
comic book writer and artist who is most famous for his adaptation of the characters known as Dirty Pair
into an American comic book
, and for being one of the first American commercial illustrators to be influenced by the general manga
style. He has also contributed to several Gen¹³
comics, worked as writer and character designer for the Marvel Comics
series Livewires, and done numerous freelance works. His two latest projects are Iron Man
: Hypervelocity and Empowered
.
, Warren reportedly gave up a promising job in the field of corporal vessel internment facility lawn care to attend The Kubert School in Dover, New Jersey
. Starting school in 1985 Warren became unsure about his future in graphic art after less than a year of attendance. Over the Christmas break of his first year he chanced upon manga
and anime
, some of which was the original Dirty Pair
, and this renewed his drive to become an artist. After a year of attempting to acquire the rights to produce a comic based on the series he was finally able to make inroads with Toren Smith
and Studio Proteus
. Warren put together a portfolio of Dirty Pair–related work which Smith then took to Sunrise Studios
, but they were unimpressed with the work and negotiations went nowhere. Smith then contacted Takachiho Haruka, the creator of the Dirty Pair, who was much more impressed with Warren's art and Smith's ideas and agreed to license the characters for an American comic. The only requirement was that the character designs be somewhat different from the anime versions to avoid copyright issues with Sunrise. This directly resulted in Warren's first major work, Dirty Pair
: Biohazards, which he co-wrote with Toren Smith and published through Studio Proteus and Eclipse Comics
in 1989. The next two Dirty Pair works would be co-written with Smith but starting with the fourth book, Sim Hell, it became a solo project.
, a four part Bubblegum Crisis
series called Grand Mal as well as cover, pin-up and other "freelance" art. During this time he provided numerous cover illustrations, most notably covers for the X-Men
, Star Wars
, Fantastic Four
(while he was also penning a few stories), and Appleseed series, as well as some trading card
art, and even in-house Christmas card
s for Studio Proteus. Between Dirty Pair works he also penned a three part Terminator
series called Hunters and Killers in 1992. Towards the end of the '90s and into early the 2000s he was one of the main writers, and to a lesser extent artist, for the Gen¹³
series from Wildstorm
comics. He has done art commission work for Spin Magazine and PSM magazine. His PlayStation comics usually relate to their major featured article and are found on the back page of the magazine. His art has also been featured in their swimsuit edition. He has also been known to do some translation and scripting work, Seraphic Feather and Cannon God Exaxxion
being two of the only known credited examples.
, like character design, kinetic line work, and vignettes with no dialogue where feelings are expressed only with the expression of faces and backgrounds. However, his style retained characteristics of American comics.
Warren makes very tight pencil layouts of the pages before they are inked, toned and colored. According to Warren himself, everyone who saw the layouts said, to his chagrin, that they liked them better than the final colored pages. On Empowered he tried a new style, the pages are greyscale reproductions of pencil "layouts", and they are neither inked nor toned. The layouts that he uses are cleaner and more tightened versions of his layouts for previous works.
This pencil layout style is also seen on several of his Dirty Pair short stories, and in a pair of pages of Gen13 Magical Drama Queen Roxy, a Gen¹³
miniseries, where one of the characters starts a deconstructing
/poststructuralist
device that deconstructs the comic through all the stages of production: color, color guides, inked page, tight pencil layout, rough pencil layout and script.
: Hypervelocity. There have also been rumors of another Dirty Pair
series in the works (as of 2005). Although Warren had promised several times in the past to continue work with the Lovely Angels, it has been several years since his last major Dirty Pair
work. To date at least two planned DP related series have failed to come to market; the first a side-story meant to follow the character Shasti and the second a DP
/Superman
cross-over. Warren also created several pictures based on the video game SSX 3
of the SSX
series.
Warren's latest work, which he is be both writing and drawing, is a series of original graphic novels called Empowered
. He describes the series as "an episodic 'sexy superhero comedy', mixing a twisted take on costumed crime-fighting, romance, and absurdist workplace humor with a strong dose of that 'manga flava'... and just a dash of the kinky." The first trade paper back was published by Dark Horse Comics in March 2007 after a slight delay, Volume Two was released in September 2007, Volume Three in March 2008 and Volume Four was released towards the end of October 2008 after a delay of about a month or so. Volume Five was released in late June 2009. Volume Six was released on September 21st, 2010. Unusually, the series is neither inked nor colored, but rather sourced directly from pencil drawing, something which Warren has not done for a complete series before and is not the norm in the American comic book industry.
People of the United States
The people of the United States, also known as simply Americans or American people, are the inhabitants or citizens of the United States. The United States is a multi-ethnic nation, home to people of different ethnic and national backgrounds...
comic book writer and artist who is most famous for his adaptation of the characters known as Dirty Pair
Dirty Pair
is a series of sci-fi comedy light novels written by Haruka Takachiho and illustrated by Yoshikazu Yasuhiko that was later adapted into anime and manga versions....
into an American comic book
The Dirty Pair
The Dirty Pair is an original English-language manga written and illustrated by Adam Warren, based on the Dirty Pair characters created by Haruka Takachiho....
, and for being one of the first American commercial illustrators to be influenced by the general manga
Manga
Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...
style. He has also contributed to several Gen¹³
Gen¹³
Gen¹³ is a fictional superhero team and comic book series originally written by Jim Lee and Brandon Choi and illustrated by J. Scott Campbell. It was originally published by Image Comics under the banner Wildstorm, which went on to become an imprint for DC Comics, who continued publishing the Gen¹³...
comics, worked as writer and character designer for the Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics
Marvel Worldwide, Inc., commonly referred to as Marvel Comics and formerly Marvel Publishing, Inc. and Marvel Comics Group, is an American company that publishes comic books and related media...
series Livewires, and done numerous freelance works. His two latest projects are Iron Man
Iron Man
Iron Man is a fictional character, a superhero in the . The character was created by writer-editor Stan Lee, developed by scripter Larry Lieber, and designed by artists Don Heck and Jack Kirby, first appearing in Tales of Suspense #39 .A billionaire playboy, industrialist and ingenious engineer,...
: Hypervelocity and Empowered
Empowered
Empowered is an original English-language manga written and illustrated by Adam Warren. Described by Warren as a “sexy superhero comedy", Empowered began to take shape in 2004 with a series of commissioned sketches of a damsel in distress; these illustrations became the basis for short comic...
.
Early career
Born in New HampshireNew Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state was named after the southern English county of Hampshire. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Canadian...
, Warren reportedly gave up a promising job in the field of corporal vessel internment facility lawn care to attend The Kubert School in Dover, New Jersey
Dover, New Jersey
Dover is a town in Morris County, New Jersey on the Rockaway River. Dover is west of New York City and west of Newark, New Jersey. As of the United States Census, 2000, the town's population was 18,188.-Geography:...
. Starting school in 1985 Warren became unsure about his future in graphic art after less than a year of attendance. Over the Christmas break of his first year he chanced upon manga
Manga
Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...
and anime
Anime
is the Japanese abbreviated pronunciation of "animation". The definition sometimes changes depending on the context. In English-speaking countries, the term most commonly refers to Japanese animated cartoons....
, some of which was the original Dirty Pair
Dirty Pair
is a series of sci-fi comedy light novels written by Haruka Takachiho and illustrated by Yoshikazu Yasuhiko that was later adapted into anime and manga versions....
, and this renewed his drive to become an artist. After a year of attempting to acquire the rights to produce a comic based on the series he was finally able to make inroads with Toren Smith
Toren Smith
Toren Smith is a manga translator and founder of Studio Proteus. He was born in Alberta, Canada, learned to read by the age of four, and by the age of 12 had won his first award for writing from the Calgary Stampede and Exhibition. By thirteen he had sold his first magazine article, an...
and Studio Proteus
Studio Proteus
Studio Proteus is a Japanese manga import, translation and lettering company, founded in 1986 by Toren Smith and based in San Francisco. Other staff included translators Dana Lewis and Frederik Schodt, letterer Tom Orzechowski and translator/letterer Tomoko Saito...
. Warren put together a portfolio of Dirty Pair–related work which Smith then took to Sunrise Studios
Sunrise (company)
is a Japanese animation studio and production enterprise. It is a subsidiary of Namco Bandai Holdings. Its former name was Nippon Sunrise, and prior to that, Sunrise Studios...
, but they were unimpressed with the work and negotiations went nowhere. Smith then contacted Takachiho Haruka, the creator of the Dirty Pair, who was much more impressed with Warren's art and Smith's ideas and agreed to license the characters for an American comic. The only requirement was that the character designs be somewhat different from the anime versions to avoid copyright issues with Sunrise. This directly resulted in Warren's first major work, Dirty Pair
The Dirty Pair
The Dirty Pair is an original English-language manga written and illustrated by Adam Warren, based on the Dirty Pair characters created by Haruka Takachiho....
: Biohazards, which he co-wrote with Toren Smith and published through Studio Proteus and Eclipse Comics
Eclipse Comics
Eclipse Comics was an American comic book publisher, one of several independent publishers during the 1980s and early 1990s. In 1978, it published the first graphic novel intended for the newly created comic book specialty store market...
in 1989. The next two Dirty Pair works would be co-written with Smith but starting with the fourth book, Sim Hell, it became a solo project.
Later career
Throughout the '90s and into the 2000s Warren produced several Dirty Pair comics and trade paperbacksTrade paperback (comics)
In comics, a trade paperback is a collection of stories originally published in comic books, reprinted in book format, usually capturing one story arc from a single title or a series of stories with a connected story arc or common theme from one or more titles...
, a four part Bubblegum Crisis
Bubblegum Crisis
is a Japanese cyberpunk direct-to-video animated series. It displays strong influences from Blade Runner, also making occasional references to it.- Setting :...
series called Grand Mal as well as cover, pin-up and other "freelance" art. During this time he provided numerous cover illustrations, most notably covers for the X-Men
X-Men
The X-Men are a superhero team in the . They were created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby, and first appeared in The X-Men #1...
, Star Wars
Star Wars (comics)
Comic books based on Star Wars have been published by Marvel Comics and Dark Horse Comics.-Marvel:The Marvel published a series of Star Wars comic books from 1977 to 1986, lasting 107 issues and 3 annuals....
, Fantastic Four
Fantastic Four
The Fantastic Four is a fictional superhero team appearing in comic books published by Marvel Comics. The group debuted in The Fantastic Four #1 , which helped to usher in a new level of realism in the medium...
(while he was also penning a few stories), and Appleseed series, as well as some trading card
Trading card
A trading card is a small card, usually made out of paperboard or thick paper, which usually contains an image of a certain person, place or thing and a short description of the picture, along with other text...
art, and even in-house Christmas card
Christmas card
A Christmas card is a greeting card sent as part of the traditional celebration of Christmas in order to convey between people a range of sentiments related to the Christmas and holiday season. Christmas cards are usually exchanged during the weeks preceding Christmas Day by many people in Western...
s for Studio Proteus. Between Dirty Pair works he also penned a three part Terminator
Terminator (franchise)
The Terminator series is a science fiction franchise encompassing a series of films and other media concerning battles between Skynet's artificially intelligent machine network, and John Connor's Resistance forces and the rest of the human race....
series called Hunters and Killers in 1992. Towards the end of the '90s and into early the 2000s he was one of the main writers, and to a lesser extent artist, for the Gen¹³
Gen¹³
Gen¹³ is a fictional superhero team and comic book series originally written by Jim Lee and Brandon Choi and illustrated by J. Scott Campbell. It was originally published by Image Comics under the banner Wildstorm, which went on to become an imprint for DC Comics, who continued publishing the Gen¹³...
series from Wildstorm
Wildstorm
WildStorm Productions, or simply WildStorm, published American comic books. Originally an independent company established by Jim Lee and further expanded upon in subsequent years by other creators, WildStorm became a publishing imprint of DC Comics in 1999...
comics. He has done art commission work for Spin Magazine and PSM magazine. His PlayStation comics usually relate to their major featured article and are found on the back page of the magazine. His art has also been featured in their swimsuit edition. He has also been known to do some translation and scripting work, Seraphic Feather and Cannon God Exaxxion
Cannon God Exaxxion
is a seven volume manga by Kenichi Sonoda that deals with Earth's fight against alien colonization with the help of giant robots and super powered battle suits.-Story:...
being two of the only known credited examples.
Drawing style
Warren's drawing style is heavily influenced by Japanese mangaManga
Manga is the Japanese word for "comics" and consists of comics and print cartoons . In the West, the term "manga" has been appropriated to refer specifically to comics created in Japan, or by Japanese authors, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th...
, like character design, kinetic line work, and vignettes with no dialogue where feelings are expressed only with the expression of faces and backgrounds. However, his style retained characteristics of American comics.
Warren makes very tight pencil layouts of the pages before they are inked, toned and colored. According to Warren himself, everyone who saw the layouts said, to his chagrin, that they liked them better than the final colored pages. On Empowered he tried a new style, the pages are greyscale reproductions of pencil "layouts", and they are neither inked nor toned. The layouts that he uses are cleaner and more tightened versions of his layouts for previous works.
This pencil layout style is also seen on several of his Dirty Pair short stories, and in a pair of pages of Gen13 Magical Drama Queen Roxy, a Gen¹³
Gen¹³
Gen¹³ is a fictional superhero team and comic book series originally written by Jim Lee and Brandon Choi and illustrated by J. Scott Campbell. It was originally published by Image Comics under the banner Wildstorm, which went on to become an imprint for DC Comics, who continued publishing the Gen¹³...
miniseries, where one of the characters starts a deconstructing
Deconstruction
Deconstruction is a term introduced by French philosopher Jacques Derrida in his 1967 book Of Grammatology. Although he carefully avoided defining the term directly, he sought to apply Martin Heidegger's concept of Destruktion or Abbau, to textual reading...
/poststructuralist
Post-structuralism
Post-structuralism is a label formulated by American academics to denote the heterogeneous works of a series of French intellectuals who came to international prominence in the 1960s and '70s...
device that deconstructs the comic through all the stages of production: color, color guides, inked page, tight pencil layout, rough pencil layout and script.
Recent works
Warren's more recent works include yet more freelance art for various companies, including a long run on the back page of PSM Magazine, and his latest completed series: Livewires and Iron ManIron Man
Iron Man is a fictional character, a superhero in the . The character was created by writer-editor Stan Lee, developed by scripter Larry Lieber, and designed by artists Don Heck and Jack Kirby, first appearing in Tales of Suspense #39 .A billionaire playboy, industrialist and ingenious engineer,...
: Hypervelocity. There have also been rumors of another Dirty Pair
The Dirty Pair
The Dirty Pair is an original English-language manga written and illustrated by Adam Warren, based on the Dirty Pair characters created by Haruka Takachiho....
series in the works (as of 2005). Although Warren had promised several times in the past to continue work with the Lovely Angels, it has been several years since his last major Dirty Pair
The Dirty Pair
The Dirty Pair is an original English-language manga written and illustrated by Adam Warren, based on the Dirty Pair characters created by Haruka Takachiho....
work. To date at least two planned DP related series have failed to come to market; the first a side-story meant to follow the character Shasti and the second a DP
The Dirty Pair
The Dirty Pair is an original English-language manga written and illustrated by Adam Warren, based on the Dirty Pair characters created by Haruka Takachiho....
/Superman
Superman
Superman is a fictional comic book superhero appearing in publications by DC Comics, widely considered to be an American cultural icon. Created by American writer Jerry Siegel and Canadian-born American artist Joe Shuster in 1932 while both were living in Cleveland, Ohio, and sold to Detective...
cross-over. Warren also created several pictures based on the video game SSX 3
SSX 3
SSX 3 is a snowboarding extreme racing game published by Electronic Arts and developed by EA Sports BIG, which was released in late 2003. It is the third installment in the SSX series, and is THX approved. Like the previous installments, the game was critically acclaimed...
of the SSX
SSX (series)
SSX is a series of snowboarding and skiing videogames published by EA Sports BIG. It is an arcade-style racing game with larger-than-life courses, characters, and tricks...
series.
Warren's latest work, which he is be both writing and drawing, is a series of original graphic novels called Empowered
Empowered
Empowered is an original English-language manga written and illustrated by Adam Warren. Described by Warren as a “sexy superhero comedy", Empowered began to take shape in 2004 with a series of commissioned sketches of a damsel in distress; these illustrations became the basis for short comic...
. He describes the series as "an episodic 'sexy superhero comedy', mixing a twisted take on costumed crime-fighting, romance, and absurdist workplace humor with a strong dose of that 'manga flava'... and just a dash of the kinky." The first trade paper back was published by Dark Horse Comics in March 2007 after a slight delay, Volume Two was released in September 2007, Volume Three in March 2008 and Volume Four was released towards the end of October 2008 after a delay of about a month or so. Volume Five was released in late June 2009. Volume Six was released on September 21st, 2010. Unusually, the series is neither inked nor colored, but rather sourced directly from pencil drawing, something which Warren has not done for a complete series before and is not the norm in the American comic book industry.
External links
- Adam Warren at deviantARTDeviantArtdeviantART is an online community showcasing various forms of user-made artwork. It was first launched on August 7, 2000 by Scott Jarkoff, Matthew Stephens, Angelo Sotira and others. deviantArt, Inc...
- http://marvel.com/comic_books/browse/creator/840/adam_warren at Marvel.com
Interviews
- 2004 Interview, part 1 at Pulp-Mag.com (web archive)
- 2004 Interview, part 2 at Pulp-Mag.com (web archive)
- June 2009 Interview at DarkHorse.com