GARDEN COMICS

WANTEDMAN XX is a Weird-Western comic strip written, penciled, lettered, inked and colored by Chad "VBS" Eckersley (for now). The trigger happy gunfighter was created in October 16, 2021 in Uptown, Chicago, IL.

The idea came by complete accident. I was working on my first gallery art show "Artoons & Cereal" where I was reimagining classic cereal brands. The paper sketch and soon after canvas painting for Apple Jacks was becoming my favorite. I took the 1970s Apple Jacks box characters and replaced their eyes with X's and the stitched smiley face. This was to resemble VVVASTE GHOST, the mascot for my 2021 rap album VVVASTELAND. 

I thought it'd be ironic to have a toy gun as the "prize inside", so I found this Field Marshall Pistol still in plastic from an antique store in Coloma, MI. When it came time to paint on the retitled "APPLE JAXX" box, "FREE INSIDE FIELD MARSHALL PISTOL" was added to the front. 

The back of the box was where the magic happened. By googling images for "vintage toy gun ad", I found a picture of boy dressed as a cowboy for my drawing reference. When I painted the body and added the face of my remixed Apple Jack Kids, a new character was born. 

Two nights later I woke up at 2 AM and had the creative urge to expand on the concept. I sketched up three different drawings and titled it "VVVANTED", playing on the spelling of VVVASTELAND. But with more space on the page I included "Man" to fill out the lettering. 

As they say,

"The Rest is History".