Superhero of the Year Prizes

It took long enough, but I finally squared everything away and got the prizes taken care of for our Superhero of the Year contest. I appreciate all of our sponsors, but Big Shiny Robot! were huge heroes in this one, enabling us to get prizes to the top three rankings for the contest. The prizes are as follows:

Grand Prize

Ross Radke's stunning X-23 snagged him the upcoming Marvel Bishoujo 1/7 Scale X-23 Statue, courtesy of Big Shiny Robot! via Dr. Volt's Comics.

"A KOTOBUKIYA Japanese import! The popular Marvel Bishoujo collection (combining iconic superheroines and villains with traditional Japanese stylings) continues to bring you the amazing beauties of the Marvel Comics universe as you’ve never seen them before. The line returns to heroic mutants with the beautiful and lethal X-23!" - bigbadtoystore.com

Available in March, we'll be getting this to Ross as soon as she arrives at Dr. Volt's.

Courtesy of Dr. Volt's Comic Connection is X-23: Innocence Lost.

"Now it can be told. The full story behind the origin of X-23 – who she is, where she came from and the exact nature of her relationship to Wolverine. You think you know, but you have no idea! Collects X-23 #1-6." - Marvel.com

Ross' X-23 was an all-around stunner, taking the top spot in May 2011 and riding that wave throughout the Superhero of the Year contest, garnering consistently high marks, and setting a high standard for contests yet to come.

Second Place

Speaking of high standards, Daniel Heard set the bar impossibly high when he sent in his killer Robin redesign for our inaugural contest in October 2010. His redesign came back with a strong finish for Superhero of the Year, and snagged him the following, both courtesy of Big Shiny Robot! via Dr. Volt's Comics:

DC Direct knocks out some killer action figures, and their Arkham City Robin is a shining example of that.

"Yes, Batman fans… a hooded Robin! Tim Drake battles crime as The Boy Wonder, delivering punches and signature quips to aid in the Caped Crusader's mission to shut down Arkham City. Based on the highly anticipated Batman: Arkham City video game, this remarkable Robin Action Figure stands approximately 6 1/2-inches tall and comes in blister-card packaging." - EntertainmentEarth.com

Not a bad redesign itself, this version of Tim Drake shares some elements of Daniel's Damian Wayne redesign, but is wholly fitting for the dark, gritty Arkham world.

Robin: Year One details the earliest adventures of Dick Grayson at Batman's side.

"Dick Grayson, now Nightwing, whose untold earliest adventures as the Boy Wonder, sidekick to the mysterious Batman, are now revealed in ROBIN: YEAR ONE[.] Already entrenched in the Batcave and his official training complete, young Dick Grayson has a world of experience to gain, and a ton of new enemies to make, beginning with the truly insane Mad Hatter! Ultimately, over the course of YEAR ONE, Robin crosses paths with many crazed villains in Batman's Rogues Gallery and makes a new deadly enemy for himself, one whose impact will be felt in the present-day pages of NIGHTWING! ROBIN: YEAR ONE explores many facets of Dick's early days as Robin, including his struggle to live a "normal" childhood while continuing to serve not only as the Boy Wonder, but also as the ward of one of the world's most visible, richest and eligible businessmen, Bruce Wayne. Not unlike BATMAN: YEAR ONE, which became an enduring classic because of its account of a hero in the making, ROBIN: YEAR ONE will reveal how Dick became the hero he is today." - comicvine.com

Third Place Prize

Nipping right on the heels of Daniel Heard's Robin, Sally Felton's Wonder Woman soared to the top of our lists back in August 2010, where she maintained the iconography of Wonder Woman, while sensibly giving her pants. 

Courtesy of Scott's Comics and Big Shiny Robot!, Sally walked away with a $30 gift card to Scott's Comics to spend on whatever she pleases. 

Again, I'd like to thank our sponsors for their kindness and generosity in sponsoring the Superhero of the Year contest, and everyone who participated in it. I'm sorry it took so long to get this information out there; I will try to be much more on the ball next time!

Hey, it's New Year's Eve! Thanks for a great year! Enjoy yourselves, but be safe out there. I hope to see you all back in 2012! 

Joker Week - Part 5

Joker week concludes, in memorial of the late co-creator Jerry Robinson.

Simonluca Spadanuda

Pretty much sums it up, no?

And finally:

Andrew Asberry

Thanks to everyone who participated this week with their art, words, and by simply checkout what people submitted. On behalf of everyone at Superhero of the Month, condolences to the Robinson family.

Be sure to check out all the Joker Week submissions and our latest contest announcement -- redesigning Gorilla Grodd for the New 52! New posts featuring your redesigns on their way!

Joker Week - Part 4

Joker week continues, in memorial of the late co-creator Jerry Robinson.

Caroline Pereira

Hailing from Porto Alegre, Brazil, Caroline had this to say about her piece:


"[Jerry Robinson] was a special creator and became immortal through his work, [be]cause he will keep inspiring people."

Deemar Daniel

Another fantastic piece by Deemar Daniel.

Let us know what you think, and stay tuned for more Joker art in memorial of Jerry Robinson tomorrow!

Be sure to check out all the Joker Week submissions and our latest contest announcement -- redesigning Gorilla Grodd for the New 52!

Joker Week - Part 3

Joker week continues, in memorial of the late co-creator Jerry Robinson.

BJ Taylor

"Jack Napier is a inner city Hispanic/Caucasian mix.  Due to his reddish-orange curly hair, as a child he was given the nick name of the Joker. A skinny child, he was often the target of bullies and would take out his anger and frustration on anyone or  any thing younger and smaller than himself. After being punished enough from his sadistic bullying himself, he learned to channel his anger through his intellect and whit and would fight back with jokes and humor. At one point he was diagnosed with vitiligo, which wasn't an issue in itself, but started his decline into a life of crime.  His wife was slowly finding less and less attractive, and after a mob attack for making jokes about powerful people, Jack's scars on his face pushed her over the edge.  In the midst of a heated argument in the car, Jack was hit by another speeding car on the passenger side, taking his family away from him. It was then he realized that life was random and pointless and took it upon himself to share that chaos. And he enjoyed every bit of it."

Let us know what you think, and stay tuned for more Joker art in memorial of Jerry Robinson tomorrow!

Be sure to check out all the Joker Week submissions and our latest contest announcement -- redesigning Gorilla Grodd for the New 52!

Joker Week - Part 2

Joker week continues, in memorial of the late co-creator Jerry Robinson.

Thomas Fummo

"Totally inspired by the Burton/Nicholson Joker with this one, I see his origin being a kind of mix between The Killing Joke and Batman: Stand-up comedian gets embroiled with the mob and ends up disfigured after falling in a vat of chemicals. I figured his skin may be bleached and his lips blood red, but any hair would be as good as gone. With the green gone, I removed all other colour and went with a pagliaccio/pulcinella black and white costume."

Let us know what you think, and stay tuned for more Joker art in memorial of Jerry Robinson tomorrow!

Be sure to check out all the Joker Week submissions and our latest contest announcement -- redesigning Gorilla Grodd for the New 52!

Joker Week - Part 1

As many of you by now know, Jerry Robinson -- co-creator of the Joker, Two-Face, Robin, and many more -- passed away earlier this month. On December 9, we put a call out to readers to send us their Joker fan art, redesigns, and re-imaginings -- and readers responded. Let's kick off a week of Joker redesigns! 

And here we...go!

Warren Newsom

This "Happy Holidays" Joker is sure to sing a slaying song tonight.

Alex Getts

"I wanted to include my Joker in our Jerry Robinson tribute. I did this originally for P:R's Off Duty feature, which explains the plain clothes approach. I figured the Joker couldn't go a day without causing some sort of mischief, and figured wearing an Arkham t-shirt would be something he'd find amusing. Now it serves as something of a tribute both to the late Heath Ledger and Mr. Robinson."

Let us know what you think, and stay tuned for more Joker art in memorial of Jerry Robinson tomorrow!

Be sure to check out our latest contest announcement -- redesigning Gorilla Grodd for the New 52!

Merry Christmas

I came across this on the web and thought it was a good way to say Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone out there. Enjoy the holidays, and have a great New Year!

Thanks once again to all of you for sticking it out with us over an unusually slow month. I'm hoping that things will pick up in January. If you haven't done so yet, please check out the Gorilla Grodd Official Contest Announcement -- it has all the details for next month's contest. And please check out the updated calender for upcoming contests: Starfire in February! Birds of Prey in March! The two-month, redesign your own team of the Avengers in April and May! 2012 is going to be fun here at Superhero of the Month!

OFFICIAL CONTEST ANNOUNCEMENT - GORILLA GRODD

 When a hyper-intelligent gorilla calls you out on Twitter, you don't say "no":

"@shotmblog promised me they would have a Gorilla Grodd redesign in March if I pimped their new blog." - Gorilla Grodd

The super monkey has apparently developed opposable thumbs, and frankly that scares me. So without further ado, Superhero of the Month is pleased to present March's redesign contest: Gorilla Grodd!

Gorilla Grodd is primarily an enemy of The Flash, although he's had his run-ins with others in the DCU. He has advanced strength and intellect, and has a goal of eliminating humankind.

However, with the old DCU getting a reworking with the New 52/DCnU, Grodd has yet to make a grand entrance in the new universe. Considering the many changes the DCnU has brought to others, there is a challenge involved with this month's contest: redesign Grodd for the New 52 universe!

There's a lot of freedom with that challenge, so we'll be excited to see what you all come up with! Let's design this ape some clothes worthy of his supreme intelligence. Besides, @GorillaGrodd, who is joining us in judging this month, promised me that if we did, he'd spare us from obliteration. So get those pencils sharpened and get to it! Submissions are due January 24 by 6:00 PM MST, and the winner will be announced January 31. Good luck!

December

I'd like to take a moment to address and explain the NOTES contest we held over the course of December.

Based on the lack of submissions received, it's clear that the interest in this contest just wasn't there. And I can understand that. NOTES is a character I would doubt any of our steady readership has ever heard of. So why would we choose him for one of our contests? Shortly after opening up shop, we were contacted by Superhero Enterprises about hosting a contest for NOTES, their flagship character. Having never heard of the character and discovering that Superhero Enterprises was, at the time, just starting up, it was something I was initially hesitant to do. But I also found reasons that I thought could make it exciting, particularly the thought that doing a contest where readers could redesign a character they've had little-to-no exposure to would be cool was because of the immense freedom awarded to the artists.

You'll note that this isn't what the Contest Announcement called for; this was at the request of the sponsor. However, I felt I shouldn't fight it simply because they were providing the prizes; as such, I let it go. In spite of my reservations, I committed myself and this site to the contest and felt it was my duty to see it though. But there's also a duty to the readers. You all come here for redesigns, and this contest didn't promise that. On that front, this month we let you down. I apologize for that.

I don't want anyone to think this is a slight to Superhero Enterprises. All of my interactions with them have been great, and they've been very kind to Superhero of the Month. But it would be an immense error to not recognize that this contest just didn't generate the interest of artists. Part of running Superhero of  the Month for the last year has been seeing what works and what doesn't, and this was one of those experiments where something simply didn't work, regardless of this contest being run and promoted just like all the others we've done. Needless to say, it's just something that isn't worth running the risk of having a month with no submissions again.

From now on, we'll strictly be sticking to well-known properties and brands that most of our readership should be familiar with.

In spite of the lack of submissions this month, site hits have still been very generous, so I'd like to thank everyone for their continued support of Superhero of the Month. I'm very much looking forward to 2012; we've got a lot of great contests already scheduled, and a lot of great characters yet to be redesigned.

Stay tuned, we've got new posts coming every day for the next week, including January's contest announcement coming tomorrow, and Joker Week beginning December 26, commemorating the late Jerry Robinson.

Jerry Robinson and Joker Week

Jerry Robinson: January 1, 1922 - December 7, 2011

The world lost a comic book legend this week when Jerry Robinson passed away at the age of 89. Like many, I was sad to hear of his passing.

Robinson's work in Batman lore is phenomenal. He was there almost from the beginning, and his contributions to Batman's mythology include having a hand in the creation of two of Bruce Wayne's most trusted allies, Alfred and Robin, as well as the villain Two-Face and, perhaps the most famous of all, his arch-nemesis The Joker.

As our friends over at Batman-News.com pointed out, without Robinson's work, we likely never would have had The Dark Knight. I'm going to take that a step further: had these characters never existed, 1989's Batman and Batman: The Animated Series wouldn't be nearly the body of work that they are today.

To say "thank you" to Mr. Robinson, we're going to be hosting a Joker Week from December 26 - 30 where we'll be posting any artwork you'd like to send us (obviously, within appropriate guidelines -- be smart). Fan art, redesigns, reimaginings of the Joker are all fair game. Because of the Holidays, anything you want to send must be received by Friday, December 23 at 6:00 PM MST. Send your work to superheroofthemonth@gmail.com. Any thoughts on your piece are welcome, as are thoughts on Robinson's work.

Thank You

With the winner of the Superhero of the Year contest announced, I want to publicly thank some people.

First and foremost, I want to thank every one of you. Whether you've contributed to contest once or several times, whether you've dropped a comment, shot me an email or tweet, or if you read the site in any capacity, thank you. Superhero of the Month started modestly, and took off because of all of you. Word has spread about our site and our contests, and none of that would be possible if it wasn't for you guys and your willingness to give this site a chance. So, as corny as it might sound, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

I'd like to thank everyone who helped out for the Superhero of the Year contest: Dave at Dr. Volt's, Scott at Scott's Comics, Tyson and Lucas from Big Shiny Robot!, our fan guest judges BJ and Taylor, and the always awesome crew of Girls Read Comics. I'm bummed I couldn't fit in a proper profile on them this time around, but they'll be back with is in March to present our Birds of Prey contest, and we'll for sure be running some nice words on them during that month.

Thanks to all our sponsors over the last year. Obviously, this includes those listed above that returned for the Superhero of the Year contest, as well as The Goblin's Cavern (formerly Dan's Comics) and Heebeegeebeez Comics & Games. I'd also like to thank Chris from Batman-News.com, who co-presented our Batman contest with us in October. All of your participation really made sponsored months a lot of fun.

Thanks to Mitch, who does a great job in helping judge each month's contests. His help is much appreciated, and I'm looking forward to having more posts on Superhero of the Month say "Posted by Mitch Albright" in future months.

I hope you're all excited for what we've got coming in 2012. Gorilla Grodd, re-imagined for the New 52 in January. Starfire in February. Birds of Prey in March. These are just the start of redesigns suggested by fans of Superhero of the Month or, in the case if Birds of Prey, contests that give you significant freedom in choosing who you will redesign.

Keep an eye on Superhero of the Month throughout December. We'll be finalizing the new look of the site. We've got a new poll running, asking you whether we should make Superhero of the Year an annual thing. (Sorry for the crappy text color on the poll. That should be fixed once the site is completely updated.) The Gorilla Grodd contest announcement will be coming after Christmas (but feel free to get started now). And once we get Superhero of the Year prizes finalized, we'll let you know what the winners pulled! (Trust me, if SHotY becomes an annual thing, this will be figured out before the contest!)

Thanks again to all of you. You have made the first year of Superhero of the Month a success.

- Alex

PS - Got a suggestion for an upcoming contest? Questions to be answered? Comments, concerns, or jokes? Sound off in the comments!