Craig Rousseau

Craig Rousseau is an American comic book artist.

During his career, Rousseau has worked for various comic book companies, but is best known for his work on DC Comics titles like Harley Quinn, Batman Beyond and Impulse. He also worked for Disney Adventures (Kim Possible), Beckett (Ruule: Kiss and Tell, Ronin Hood of the 47 Samurai, The Cobbler’s Monster), Image Comics (Tellos: The Last Heist, Tales of Tellos, Invincible Handbook, Monster Pile-up) and Marvel Comics' Creative Services.

He has additionally drawn, and co-created with Todd DeZago, The Perhapanauts for Dark Horse and Image Comics (Perhapanauts: First Blood and Perhapanauts: Second Chances). He worked on Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane for Marvel Comics.

Career

Early career Growing up, Craig Rousseau never saw comic books as a viable career option, instead wanting to explore a career as a commercial artist. "(I) wasn't planning on doing comics for a living. I grew up reading comics with a few of my good friends and never outgrew them. I always wanted to get into the art field and my parents were very supportive of that."

Rousseau began in comics in the mid-1990s while he was graduating from college with a double major in Painting/Illustration. His initial plan was to do freelance illustration and not comics. However, he was hired to work at Marvel's Creative Service Department designing POGS and children's books and soon began illustrating comic books.

Rousseau's influences are varied. In a 1998 interview, he stated, "There are lots of guys whose work I like and try to take something from and use it in my own way - Art Adams, Mike Mignola, Walt Simonson, Teddy Kristianson, Mike Weiringo, and lots more." He has also drawn from non-comic book artists and has cited artists such as Norman Rockwell, NC Wyeth, Aubrey Beardsley, Egon Schiele and Mucha as being strong influences on his work.

Perhapanauts In 2001 Rousseau helped develop and co-create the series Perhapanauts with writer Todd DeZago. Rousseau and DeZago had previously worked together on DC's Impulse title and DeZago pitched the initial idea for Perhapanauts. "When I first pitched The Perhapanauts to Craig," says DeZago, "I think I told him that it would be part X-Files, part Mission: Impossible, and part Archie comic. (I had imagined that it would be a Saturday morning cartoon of a comic book; a spooky Scooby-Doo-type adventure, and then a few pages of Archie-like jokes and gags.) As the first issues unfolded, however, with our concept still fairly ambiguous, we found that it was developing its own voice, its own 'flavor', and, like parents with a young child, we let it go and discover its own identity." Together the duo took the concept to Dark Horse Comics where a mini-series was published, after which DeZago and Rousseau moved to Image Comics. The reasons for the move included a perception of apathy for the series on the part of Dark Horse. "Craig and I were feeling zero love from Dark Horse," said DeZago, "They did nothing at all to promote our second series, Second Chances, when it came out and were very slow at getting back to us with any sales or financial information. People would come up to our table and claim that they had never even heard of the book. Craig and I would go to shows/conventions and find that Dark Horse didn’t even have our book at their booth!" His recent comic book work includes a four-part Marvel Comics series titled Iron Man and the Armor Wars, which Marvel has described as being, "Cash, cars, boats, houses...Tony Stark has got it all. The only thing that could ruin his day? If every single one of his IRON MAN armors were stolen, and then turned against him. Join us for a nail-biting, strapped-to-your-seat adventure as Tony battles his greatest creations, and tries to discover who could (gasp) OUTSMART him!?!? In 2010, Rousseau was announced as the artist for a new Marvel title focusing on an all-female team, Marvel Her-Oes.