Madcap

Sometimes you have to wait a few decades before you really get a chance to shine. This is what happened to the character I chose for my 7^th custom figurine—the indestructible clown Madcap.

Madcap premiered in 1985 in the pages of Captain America #307, written by Mark Gruenwald and drawn by Paul Neary. He came out of nowhere, boisterous and flamboyant, dancing in the streets in a particolored costume and wielding a toy bubble gun. And wherever he went, people who saw him would immediately began acting just as crazy as he did, leading to mass riots in the streets.

Madcap's first foray into public insanity, from 1985.

Cap’s protégé Nomad quickly tracked down the mysterious newcomer and learned his origin: he had been an ordinary, religious man until a truck carrying an experimental A.I.M. chemical crashed into his church van, killing everyone aboard except him. In despair at the loss of his family, he tried to kill himself too, but soon found that nothing could kill him, because his body had been doused in the experimental chemicals. No matter how bad the injury, his body would instantly heal itself.

The exact nature of his healing factor has never been revealed (nor has his real name, for that matter). Some artists depict him as taking damage like a normal body, with blood and broken bones, but then healing almost instantly (like Wolverine). But other artists depict him more like a living cartoon, shedding no blood at all, but resuming his normal shape after being stretched, flattened, or cut up (like Slapstick).

Sometimes blood, never pain

Madcap embraced the nihilistic idea that life has no meaning and nothing makes sense, and he set out to prove this philosophy to everyone else as well. This was made quite a bit easier when he discovered that the accident had given him a second power as well—anyone who looks into his eyes goes temporarily insane.

Madcap bounced around the Marvel Universe for a few decades as a minor irritant, a harmless prankster, or even an outright joke, running into the likes of Impossible Man and the Power Pack. But recent writers have explored a much darker, more frightening and malevolent dimension of the indestructible clown. In 2010’s Ghost Riders: Heaven’s on Fire, Madcap drives the population of an entire town to kill each other, and in 2011’s bloody and brutal series Wolverine: The Best There Is, he is recruited along with several other “Unkillables” by a villain called Contagion to torment Wolverine.

But his greatest adventure came when he crossed paths with Marvel’s other indestructible, insane clown, Deadpool. In Deadpool vol. 2 (2008-2012), writer Daniel Way introduced an unexplained “white dialogue box,” seemingly a second personality inside Deadpool’s mind. This voice was later revealed to be Madcap, who had been fused together with Deadpool by a bolt of Thor’s lightning. Though they were eventually separated back into their own bodies, their time together created a deep resentment between the two colorful psychopaths.

Destined for greatness... or at least, entertainment

After their forced separation Madcap resolved to destroy Deadpool, and their subsequent feud (running from 2016-2018 in the Deadpool books) was one of the best storylines in recent comics: exhilarating, hilarious, poignant, disturbing, and fun as hell. Deadpool's final solution to his Madcap problem is far too entertaining to spoil, and I wouldn’t be surprised if a version of this feud gets adapted for the next Deadpool movie.

Deadpool Annual #1 (2014): one of the best comics you'll ever buy.

From the start, I wanted my Madcap figurine to have a unique posture that reflected his characteristic panache and flamboyance. So I combined the body of Mr. Fantastic with the left arm of the Impossible Man, and by adding a few details I was able to create the effect that he was tipping his big swashbuckler’s hat, while waving his toy bubble-gun around with his right hand. Of course I also added his cape and belt (I even tried to incise the smiley-face on his belt buckle). 

While his costume has stayed the same, artists have conceived his mask very differently over the years. In his earliest appearances, Madcap was an ordinary looking man wearing a simple cloth mask. But later artists began to merge the mask and the face, sometimes treating it as if it was not a mask at all, but rather his real face. In his most recent appearances, the mask is a mask again, but the face underneath is now horribly disfigured (perhaps to underline the similarity with Deadpool). The version I chose for my figurine is his original masked look.  

The design changes of Madcap's face and mask have never been explained. 

 The painting process was challenging. Not only was it hard to create regular stripes on his shirt and pants, but even finding the right shades of yellow, purple, and fuchsia was difficult, and the yellow paint came out looking a little more acidic than I’d hoped. But on the other hand, Madcap’s costume is deliberately supposed to be eye-catching…. so maybe it works out after all. 

Deadpool and Madcap....frenemies forever!

 For the Eaglemoss-style cover mockup, I used artwork by Juan Jose Ryp, from the interior of Wolverine: The Best There Is #6 (July 2011).

* ESSENTIAL READING *

1. Captain America #309 (Sep. 1985). The climax of Madcap’s first battle, on top of a roller coaster against Nomad.

2. Ghost Rider #33 (Jan. 1993). First shades of a darker, more sinister Madcap; Ghost Rider stops his latest rampage but his Penance Stare only makes Madcap crave more punishment.

3. Despicable Deadpool #294 (Apr. 2018). Nearly two years in the making, the explosive feud between Madcap and Deadpool ends here.

Come back soon for more fun!

Next up: He Who Rides The Night Winds -- Phantom Rider!