’90s-Style Comics Meets ’90s Anime — Talking Comics With Artist V Ken Marion

Comic book artist V Ken Marion has a lot on his plate these days. He just wrapped up art duties on Nightwing and had a chance to draw an exclusive variant cover of Batman for Happy Valley Comic and Collectibles Convention. Comicon.com caught up with Marion at the show to discuss how he got into comics, how his artwork has evolved over the years, as well as the origins of his highly stylized name.

Tom Smithyman: So I need to start with the obvious — Talk to me about your unique name. Do you go by Ken? Do you go by VK?

V Ken Marion: All of the above! I mostly go by V or V Ken is something that’s become colloquial. My first name is actually just the letter V. My grandpa’s name was Vincent, and he most went by V. It’s on my driver’s license and everything.

Smithyman: We’re at Happy Valley Comic and Collectibles Convention, and you got to draw the show’s exclusive cover for Batman #6. How cool was that opportunity?

Marion: Oh it was so cool! It was my first mainline Batman cover. It’s awesome! I was so excited about it. I got to draw Robin on it too. I got to draw both Robins — Tim Drake and Damian. They’re both in the background, which was cool. It was one of my favorite characters growing up.

Smithyman: You recently wrapped up your stint drawing Nightwing, but Batman never appeared in that run, right?

Marion: No, he wasn’t in it. But I was really excited to get to do Nightwing. He’s one of my favorite characters growing up.

That Jim Lee run on Hush was what made me want to draw comics. I always liked anime, and I always liked comics in general — I always liked drawing — but I didn’t know what that meant career-wise. At the time, when I was in 7th, 8th, 9th grade, people thought that meant drawing for Disney.

Then I picked up Batman Hush, and that was the first time I associated the name of the artist with the art. I thought comics was comics. I never paid attention to it. But Hush looked so different to me than anything else. And I was like, “Aww man, I want to do this.” I kind of fell down that rabbit hole of noticing artists’ styles and associating artists with particular styles.

Smithyman: It started with Jim Lee. Who else has inspired you?

Marion: Michael Turner was right after that. He did the covers for Flash at the time, and that’s how I realized who he was. Then I discovered Fathom and Soulfire, the things he was doing on his own besides DC. And also Joe Mad [Madureira] was really big for me because I love anime. The mix of anime and comic style that Joe Mad had was something that I try to bring to my own work now.

Smithyman: How do you describe your style?

Marion: I would describe it as 90s-style comics meets 90s anime. That’s the stuff I loved growing up. Dragonball Z, Gundam Wing, and Ronin Warriors — all that stuff was so huge for me growing up. The blending of those and through my filter, whatever comes out comes out. I used to try much harder to chase a style, but at this point, it is what it is.

Smithyman: Do you find that your style changes from book to book or publisher to publisher?

Marion: Not so much book to book, but as time goes on I’ve noticed changes to my style. It’s not so much a conscious thing. When I started inking myself in 2020, I noticed a big change in my style. BY nature of working slight faster, it changed. It became more natural. What I’m trying to convey is coming out.

Smithyman: Why did you start inking yourself?

Marion: It was during Covid. It was hard to ship stuff out. It was also financial. I wanted to start to do more things. I actually started to color myself recently too. I colored some of my prints and all of my stickers. Tyler Kirkham has a book called Final Boss. I did a variant cover for that, and I penciled and colored the whole thing.

Smithyman: How has coloring changed you as an artist?

Marion: That’s interesting because I had never really thought about it a lot until I started doing it. It’s interesting to see how much color can change what the final product looks like because there’s so much drawing that you’re doing with the shadowing. I’m really conscious with how I draw the shape of the shadows.

Smithyman: I know you can’t talk too much about upcoming projects, but what can you tell us?

Marion: I’ve got three different things right now that I can’t talk about; they’re in development stages. Which ones goes next, I’m not sure yet.

I have some Superman trading cards coming out through a line I’m doing with Upper Deck. I did 10 cards for them. A bunch of Superman characters like red and blue Superman, the classic Superman, and Steel, who is one of my favorite characters. It was awesome to draw a Steel card!

Smithyman: You also have a crowdsourced book called Battle Chronicle Sol-Stryker. What is next for that?

Marion: The first one’s come out. We have a plan for a big chunk of story for it. It hard though, because it’s creator owned, so I have to work on it on the side. This first one was supposed to come out the Christmas of 2024 but didn’t come out until last summer. It was a six-month pushback, which I hear isn’t the worst in Kickstarter world.

Me and my co-writer Jason Matthews have a big story planned for it. I just talked to him a few days ago about issue #2. We’ve already got most of it written, so I just need to get drawing it.

Smithyman: It sounds like you have plenty to keep you busy. Thanks for taking the time to talk to Comicon.com.