“Who (or what) is Iron-Cow?†you might ask…
Well, way back in the summer of 1987 (give or take) I had a close circle of friends, and we spent nearly every day hanging out together. Because of the Texas summer heart, we would often pass the time indoors playing various role playing games. This would usually be the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles RPG. It’s pretty much the same as Dungeons and Dragons, but instead of wizards and elves, you choose to be some wacko radiated mutant animal in the distant future. Sure it was dorky, but it kept us out of trouble, and was certainly a lot of fun.
For my character, I chose to be a cybernetic bounty hunter bovine with a bad habit of getting into bar fights, and an even worse habit of blowing things up. It was this upright cow that would juggle grenades, get into bar fights, and cause more damage than good, really. Thus was born
Robo-Cow, a spoof of RoboCop, Wolverine, Iron-Man and Boba Fett.
Hey, if you’re gonna rip off some pop culture characters, why not rip ‘em ALL off?
Anyway, Robo-Cow started off pretty much your generic character. There was nothing all that original about him, really. The movie RoboCop had just opened in theatres, and I guess it was in the back of my mind as I designed the character. And as luck would have it, I went to a comic convention that summer. Imagine my surprise when I saw a guy there wearing a RoboCow t-shirt, that was also a spoof of RoboCop! I had assumed that my little creation would at least been unique in name, but maybe it wasn’t quite as original as I’d hoped.
With that in mind, I tried a handful of other names, and eventually I settled simply for Iron-Cow, and reworked the armor design.
Years later, when I went to register my domain name, my jaw dropped again when I learned that there is an Iron Cow t-shirt company operating out of Canada. Sometimes you just can’t win…
Anyway, going back to that childhood summer, we eventually tried out different role-playing games, and whether it was a medieval adventure, a Star Wars game, or even a spoof involving teenagers from outer space, the one constant in all these was some version of Iron-Cow. He’s had various armors to match, yet every time I try to update his ‘look’ in recent years, I find that I can’t get past the design I made nearly 20 years ago. Sure it rips off Iron Man the most, but I guess it’s just what stuck with me.
Anyway, here are a few of the various sketches I’ve done of ol’ I-C throughout the years. Enjoy!
Iron-Cow even appeared in a backup story submission for Ninja High School comic book! The story has never published though… until now! Keep in mind this was the work of a 10th grader, so don’t expect any sort of masterpiece (although at the time I created it, I definitely had delusions of grandeur).
Click the image below to read the (pretty terrible) Iron-Cow vs. Professor Steamhead epic When Egos Clash…
But wait… THAT’S NOT ALL! Want to see even MORE interpretations of ol’ Iron-Cow?
Be sure to check out the Iron-Cow Prod. FAN ART section!
