Mitch Byrd obit

Mitch Byrd, Guy Gardner Artist, Passes Away

 

He was not on the list.

Mitch Byrd, longtime comic book artist probably best known for his run on Guy Gardner: Warrior with writer Beau Smith and inker Dan Davis, has passed away at 63, following a recent illness.

Byrd's big break into comics came with the independent series, Cat and Mouse, about a pair of vigilante heroes in Louisiana, with writer Roland Mann and inker Steven Butler (the first issue had a cover by the great Paul Gulacy, so I'm using a later issue with cover art by Byrd), that was first published by EFGraphics, and then at Aircel Comics (when it was a Malibu Comics imprint. Mann maintained the rights to the characters, and has revived them in recent years at his Silverline Comics)...

Byrd did other work for Malibu, but soon did what is likely his most famous run, his stint on Guy Gardner: Warrior. Byrd first did some various DC projects, like some Darkstars fill-in issues, and he co-created the Bloodlines character, Nightblade, in Green Lantern Annual #2...

Byrd's tenure on Guy Gardner: Warrior was a strange one. He joined the book with writer Chuck Dixon, who was challenged to come up with a superhero name for Guy Gardner other than, you know, Guy Gardner (this was back when Guy Gardner was using Sinestro's yellow power ring after leaving the Green Lantern Corps).

However, Emerald Twilight then came about, and Guy lost his ring. Beau Smith became the new writer on the book, and paired with Smith and inker Dan Davis, the book was fascinating, in that Smith and Byrd both clearly wanted to tell classic action adventure stories, which they DID...

But they were also forced to give Guy Gardner superpowers, and thus he was revealed to be part-alien, and he had morphing powers, where he could create weapons out of his body...

This was all during the Zero Hour crossover event, so the title got a lot of attention (Guy played a major role in the crossover). Still, Smith, Byrd and Davis managed to keep the book fantastic outside that strange conceit, and they maintained that basic action style that they had established earlier on. Byrd's dynamic yet grounded art style was a major factor in this working so well.

After Byrd left the book, he did work for Marvel, Chaos Comics, Valiant Comics, and Dark Horse, including a Predator one-shot set in Louisiana called Predator: Strange Roux (with writer Brian McDonald)....

The late 1990s saw the comic book industry go through a major bust period, and suddenly many excellent comic book artists who would normally be drawing regular titles for Marvel and DC suddenly had no gigs, and Byrd was one of those artists who had to turn to other avenues to pursue his art career, doing work for gaming companies and even some design work for HBO. He, of course, still did plenty of independent comic book work, as well.

He was always active on the convention circuit, especially Pensacon. Byrd was really what you would call an "artist's artist," as while his mainstream comic book work was mostly centered in the 1990s, his work was so well-regarded that he released MULTIPLE art books over the years. Anyone who knew Byrd's work was impressed by his art.

Byrd was particularly known for how much he loved to draw dinosaurs, and back in 2013, Bobby Hickey crowdfunded a sketchbook called Mitch Byrd: Women, Dinosaurs Sketchbook vol. 1

Byrd recently contributed a piece of art for the local Mississippi horror anthology, Mississipi Macabre, alongside his fellow Mississippi artist (and longtime friend), the great Steven Butler.

Butler and Byrd would often be found sketching at the Biloxi, MS comic book store, Three Alarm Comics.

CBR offers our condolences to Mitch Byrd's friends and family.