Ursula Wilde; some early concepts

Last May, when the creative differences with my Athena Voltaire co-creator, Paul Daly, first surfaced, and work on our second mini-series ground to a halt, I started thinking about another project that I could do in place of AV. I looked at everything that I enjoyed about AV: the period setting, a strong female lead, exotic adventures, etc...and started compiling a shopping list of what would make me happy, if the worst case scenario came to fruition and I never worked on AV again.

I opted to not go the period route—both for fear of being pigeon-holed and out of hope that Paul and I could/can resolve things amicably and I'll be able to draw AV again. So that left me with a strong female lead having exotic adventures—probably in a contemporary setting.

Using that as a point-of-departure, I started drawing and playing with names. For about a week, it was going to be Ursula O'Hare, but I dropped that because it was too close to Athena Voltaire. Next up was Ursula Nemo (great for an aquatic adventuress, but not what I was looking for in this instance), followed by Ursula Nero. All were kind of cool, but none exactly set my world on fire.

Returning to the concept, I had decided to make it an ensemble piece, further differentiating it from Athena Voltaire. It would be this Ursula-somebody character leading a team of explorers, like a female Doc Savage.

Then it hit me. Savage. Wild. Or...Wilde. So, by June 1, 2007, we had a working title for the series and a name for the lead character.

...and that's the secret origin of Ursula Wilde. Her name, anyway.

The pencil drawing shown here was my first actual attempt to put a face with the name. The hairstyle is far too coiffed and the gun on the hip looks awkward. I liked the vest idea, though. It's a modified fencing vest, and that provides a plot element to the character's backstory.

The color image was created for a teaser poster I did for last year's San Diego Comic-Con. It's still not on-model, but the hair is starting to look a bit more contemporary. The other elements are just different things that I thought defined the feel of the series. Pencils and inks by me, colors by Jason Millet.