In honor of our contest theme this week, I give you an Image Nineties costume for the creatively-named Brick. See if you can tell which one he is in this cover:
If you guessed the woman in the middle with the breasts hanging directly onto her collarbones and toothpicks for legs, you were wrong. Nor is he the Aquaman looking fellow with the sporty bandanna and perfectly round tear in his leotards.
No, Brick is the brick-colored figure in the background who has unfortunately had his entire abdomen ripped out and flung off-panel, jamming his stubby legs directly into his chest cavity. I chose this as a "bad costume", though, because of the way the big h-shaped harness studs mimic the studs on his shoulders and arms. Are those artificial studs, or thin metal coverings for bumps that actually exist on his body? I don't know about you, but I'd definitely rather he not take his clothes off to answer the question once and for all. Sometimes ignorance is bliss.
Also, I can't tell if his feet bend at the toes or not. Those might be column-feet that he staggers around on like a sawed-off satyr, but it's hard to tell. Given the treatment the other six feet on the cover receive, we may never know, but at least he didn't get the Bozo the Clown shoes Half-Skull-Man has to deal with. It's like Brick inherited the missing limb mass from the other three and just added it to his own in some kind of bizarre Image Universe Law of Conservation of Anatomy or something.
Being the intrepid reporter I am, however, I found another image that better shows his ... well, I guess "outfit" has to work, even though it's a stretch to call two twisted bits of metal that. Regardless:
Here we can see that yes, his feet do have a toe portion, though they're largely subsumed by the giant tin cans mounting them like overly amorous R2 units. I'm still not sure why he needs studded metal suspenders if he doesn't have an abdomen, but maybe the public exposure laws where he's from are particularly aggressive.
My last word on this costume is to wonder why so many beefy brick guys wander around wearing metal armor, when metal walls and tanks and buildings are constantly getting torn up around them while their invulnerable skins stays perfectly intact. If they're tougher than metal, why wear metal? And if they're not, why are they bricks in the first place?
That's me, folks, constantly on the cutting edge of thinking about comic book physics from twenty years ago. You're welcome.
(Image and characters © Image Comics.)
It’s so hard to believe that crap that like actually sold at one point in time. To be that creatively vacuous…and still make money at the same time. The shame, the shame!
Looking at the woman in the middle, i thought this was a symmetrical image for a second.
Is it just me or is the guy on the right’s leg see through? Was that supposed to be?
The more i look at this image the more i can only hate it.
Would it be a surprise to anyone to learn that Doom’s IV sprang from the fertile mind of Rob Liefeld?
No?
I didn’t think so, either.
Check out this review of the literary masterpiece that *is* Doom’s IV 1/2!!!!!!!!
http://atopfourthwall.blogspot.com/2010/03/dooms-iv-12.html
I was thinking about the concept of bricks wearing metal armor.
Perhaps it is an attempt to remain clothed at all. Metal has a better chance of surviving the destruction and general carnage in which the brick usually finds him or her self.
If it weren’t for the intervention of the Mighty Plot Contrivance Sprites the Hulk would end up “nekkid” all the time.
Just a thought.
The ankles… those tiny, delicate, fey ankles… I imagine that a stiff wind would snap their feet right off the humanish people on the cover.
MMI: I think it’s the flat-headed woman who has the transparent leg, not Aquaman with Wolvie-beard.
Brick has not only no abdomen but no pelvis, and he doesn’t seem to have knees, either. He’s extreamly top-heavy, and if you knock him over, he wouldn’t be able to get up again.
Ms Toothpicklegs is apparently doing a jumping jack, since her feet (if you can call them that) aren’t touching the ground. She has water balloons instead of breasts. Most young men would have been ashamed to admit never having seen a woman’s anatomy close up, but Liefeld was shouting it to the world.
And where are these figures in relation to each other? Bandana Guy’s leg is behind the woman, assuming her leg is the transparent one, but his arm is in front of her. If his leg is transparent, why isn’t his arm the same way? Somebody’s going to trip over somebody on this cover.
Look where Holy Knee’s right hand is. Apparantly Jumping Jack Lass doesn’t seem to mind but really, that’s not th kind of attention you’re supposed to give that area; closed fist and all.
John, have you SEEN what they’re selling as comics, today?
Yeah, Liefeld’s “characters” have no personality…
But, that’s better than what Marvel’s been doing to their own, long established characters, as of late!
Peter Parker cutting a deal with Mephisto?
Captain America giving up?
At least I could (and did) ignore Liefeld’s stuff entirely!
This… illustration is wrong… but Hellboy! Ron Perlman. You want respect for the Brick? Hellboy! Ron Perlman. Just saying. Rant, rant, rant… Kevin Nightstick… Mage… Jimmy Goggles is tougher than this wannablabber.
This Brick reminds me of Karkas from the Deviants.
http://www.comicvine.com/karkas/29-13936/
Most of Rob Liefeld’s characters remind me of somebody in other (sometimes better, sometimes maybe not!) comics. I guess it’s a feature, not a bug, judging by how much kids in the 90s liked it.