Mike Wieringo Covers PvP

Contest Offers Readers Chance to Win Original Art

ORANGE, CA — 15 December, 2003 —
Scott Kurtz is offering fans of PvP a chance to help him finish the cover of PvP #7 by submitting blurbs for the issue’s cover, illustrated by Fantastic Four artist Mike Wieringo.

The cover is a riff on old EC horror comics like Tales From the Crypt and Vault of Horror, and no parody of those ’50s classics would be complete without a trio of hilarious cover blurbs in the old EC style.

Readers can submit cover blurbs for PvP #7 through Kurtz’s Website, www.pvponline.com. If their blurb is chosen and used, they win:

[li] A credit in the book
[li] A copy of the issue signed by Kurtz and Wieringo
[li] The original art from one of the strips in the issue

“I wish I could take credit for the idea but it was all Mike Wieringo,” said Kurtz. “He was familiar with the storyline and knew that a riff on the old EC Horror comics would be perfect.

“I met Mike at a convention a couple of years ago and I was blown away to find out he reads PvP on a daily basis,” he added. “This issue spotlights my only female character and I wanted her to get the royal treatment on the cover. Mike’s art can have a cartoony edge that fits PvP and he really played that up for me. Mike manages to draw truly beautiful women without making them anatomical impossibilities, and I love that about his work.”

“I consider myself very lucky to have ‘stumbled’ onto PvP on the Web,” said Wieringo. “Scott’s Web strip has given me hours of enjoyment and laughs over the past couple of years since. And I’ve also had the great fortune to meet Scott and become friends with him. He’s a truly mega-talented, enthusiastic, hilarious fella, and I’m thrilled to know him. He’s got a passion for his work and a love of comics and comic strips that’s just infectious – and evident to anyone who reads his work.

“Having watched his little empire grow over the time I’ve known him (and OF him), and seen the great folks who have added their takes on his wonderful characters by way of covers or guest strips – I was overjoyed that he would ask me to contribute a cover for his comic book. Scott’s fond of saying that the different milestones in his career makes him feel as though he has ‘arrived’ – well, getting to draw the PvP gang for Scott makes ME feel that same way.”

PvP follows the staff of Player Versus Player Magazine on their daily routine of covering the world of pop culture. Launched as an Image title in March, Kurtz’s PvP originally debuted as a Web strip in 1998, before being published in comic book format by Dork Storm Press in 2001. A trade paperback collection of Kurtz’s Dork Storm Press work, PvP, Vol. 1: The Dork Ages will be available in March, 2004, and a compendium of the first two sold-out Image issues, PvP: Replay, is on sale now.

PvP #7 is available for order in the February issue of Previews and ship in April, 2004.