There are three for-sure things all people love in life: comic covers, cover bands, and MS Paint. Some warned us to never combine this holy trinity. We here at Multiveristy Comics said no, threw caution to the wind, and combined mankind’s three favorite things into our new weekly feature: MS Masterpaint Theater! Each week, we will highlight some of the best comic cover art by recreating those masterpieces in the artist’s ultimate tool, MS Paint.

Welcome to this week of MS Master Paint Theater. Before we enjoy this week’s masterpieces, let’s run over the rules again real quick.

Rules: 

1. Must use MS Paint. 
2. Must use mouse and keyboard. 
3. No tips, tricks, or hints. 
4. 1 hour per piece. 
5. Each piece will be rated on a scale of 1 to 10. 

Simple enough! Let’s open the curtain on this week’s covers! Enjoy

Masterpaint Theater

Worst X-Man Ever #4
By Michael Walsh

I can remember first seeing Michael Walsh’s work way back in “Murder Book” the noir anthology from Ed Brisson. I loved his thick simplistic noir style. It has been exciting to see him just explode with work at Image, Marvel, IDW and more. While at times he is able to be focused and detailed, Walsh has an amazing ability for simple shapes and silhouettes that I love. This cover is fantastic example of his range. Being able to see Bailey’s face and expression clearly and the broken down shroud of Magneto behind him is very evocative. Hopefully mine wont be evocacrap.

Worst X-Men Ever #4
By Kyle Welch after Michael Walsh in Paint

Kyle: Kyle?
Kyle: Yes Kyle?
Kyle: This is not bad?
Kyle: It’s not terrible. Did we..
Kyle: I think we did it. Shut it down!!

I might have to quit right now. This is not half bad. To be fair it still looks like a super poor resolution compressed version of Walsh’s but I can actually make out what it is suppose to be. I think I might have nailed this Paint program. Listen boys and girls, put your mind to anything and you too can master a useless skill. Man I am feeling good, let’s check out the next one. Surely it is as good as my effort here.

8 out of 10 life skills achieved. 

Legacy Of Luther Strode #6
By Tradd Moore

This week brought to close one of my favorite series in recent years. Justin, Tradd and Felipe brought the house in the finally issue of the Strode series as Luther and Cain fought it out in an insane battle. Tradd Moore in my opinion is unmatched in his ability to create movement, power and force in a comic. He is able to take the often static image we get on covers and provide an added level of energy that you can feel pulsing in your eyeballs. Tradd has been doing amazing work at Marvel on covers and in honor Luther’s conclusion I will attempt the cover for #6. I feel good about doing this cover justice especially after my Worst X-Men success.

Legacy Of Luther Strode #6
By Kyle Welch after Tradd Moore in Paint

NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! What happened! I lost it already. Tradd’s cover is a beautiful sea of muscles and mine is a dumpy lake. You can make out the faces, so if you just focus on those it is not bad. Try to make sense of anything outside of that and you might slip into madness.

3 out of 10 short lived victories. 

Thank you for checking out another installment of MS Masterpaint Theater. Look for two more stunning recreations next week. As we have settled into a weekly groove I will look to get other Multiversity Staff ] into contributing and maybe even possible creator guests! If you are a reader and would like to contribute, we would love your submissions for your MS Paint masterpieces. Send them here: kwelch@multiversitycomics.com. Until next week, may your airbrush always be crappy.