Carlos Sanchez Ezquerra[3] (/əsˈkɛərə/;[4] 12 November 1947 – 1 October 2018[5][6][7]) was a Spanish comics artist who worked mainly inBritish comics. He is best known as the co-creator ofJudge Dredd.
Born inIbdes,province of Zaragoza,Aragon, Ezquerra started his career drawing westerns and war stories for Spanish publishers. In 1973, he got work in the UK market through agent Barry Coker, drawing for girls' romance titles such asValentine andMirabelle, as well as westerns forThorpe & Porter'sPocket Western Library, and a variety of adventure strips forD. C. Thomson & Co.'sThe Wizard. Despite the UK being a convenient market for artists living in Spain as the exchange rate meant the work paid well, Ezquerra decided to move to London to be near the work,[8] settling inCroydon with his wife.[9]
In 1974, on the strength of his uncredited work forThe Wizard,Pat Mills andJohn Wagner headhunted him, through Coker, to work for the newIPC titleBattle Picture Weekly. He drew "Rat Pack":[10] inspired by the filmThe Dirty Dozen, the strip, written byGerry Finley-Day, featured a gang of criminals recruited to carry out suicide missions. But his commitments elsewhere meant he could not draw it full-time, and other artists were also used.[8] In 1976Battle editor Dave Hunt convinced him to commit himself to the title, offering him the laid-back anti-hero "Major Eazy", written byAlan Hebden. Ezquerra drew nearly 100 episodes in the next two and a half years,[10] basing the character's appearance on the actorJames Coburn.[8]
Judge Dredd in the first panel of Ezquerra's first publishedJudge Dredd story, "Krong", in2000 AD #5, March 1977.
He was asked to visualise a new character, future lawmanJudge Dredd, for the science fiction weekly2000 AD, prior to its launch in 1977. His elaborate designs displeased the strip's writer,John Wagner, but impressed editorPat Mills, and his cityscapes persuaded Mills to set the strip further into the future than initially intended.[9] But Wagner (temporarily) quit over ownership issues,[11]: pp. 12–13 and Ezquerra followed him when the first published appearance of the character was drawn by another artist,Mike McMahon.[9] He returned toBattle, where he once again teamed up with Alan Hebden to create "El Mestizo", a black gun-for-hire who played both sides against the middle during the American Civil War.
Final image of Judge Dredd in Ezquerra's last publishedJudge Dredd story, "Get Jerry Sing", 40 years later in2000 AD #2023, March 2017.
In 1978 he and Wagner created "Strontium Dog", a science fictional western about a bounty hunter in a future where mutants are an oppressed minority forced into doing such dirty work, forStarlord,[12] a short-lived sister title to2000 AD with higher production values.[11]: pp.39–41 Starlord was later merged into2000 AD, bringing "Strontium Dog" with it.[12] Ezquerra was almost the only artist to draw the character, until 1988, when writerAlan Grant decided to kill him off in a storyline called "The Final Solution". Ezquerra disagreed with the decision, and refused to draw the story, which was instead illustrated bySimon Harrison andColin MacNeil.[13] In 2000 Wagner and Ezquerra revived "Strontium Dog" based on a treatment Wagner had written for an abortive TV pilot.[11]: p. 211 Initially, stories were set before the character's death in a revised continuity, but 2010's "The Life and Death of Johnny Alpha" brought Johnny back from the dead.[14]
Other2000 AD strips he drew includedFiends of the Eastern Front (1980), a vampire story set inWorld War II, written byGerry Finley-Day, and adaptations ofHarry Harrison'sStainless Steel Rat novels, with the title character once again resembling James Coburn. In 1982 he returned to "Judge Dredd" to draw "The Apocalypse War", a seven-month epic which he drew in its entirety. He continued to draw the character semi-regularly, handling the whole of "Necropolis" in 1990, "Origins" in 2006–07, and many others.
His son Hector inked and coloured in his pencil work forStrontium Dog between 2008 and 2012.[15]
The character of Stogie from the long-running 2000 AD stripRobo-Hunter was given the full name Carlos Sanchez Robo-Stogie in tribute to Ezquerra.
Ezquerra occasionally used thepen name"L. John Silver" for work such as2000 AD's"The Riddle of the Astral Assassin!" prog 118, andABC Warriors, progs 134–136.
In later life Ezquerra moved toAndorra. He died of lung cancer on 1 October 2018, at the age of 70.[17][18] He never retired, and his uncompleted final work, "Spector," was published posthumously in June 2019 by2000 AD.[a]
In May 2023 the government ofZaragoza voted to name a street after him.[19]
Tankies (3-issue mini-series, April–July 2009, tpb, 88 pages, September 2009,ISBN1-60690-057-9, included inThe Complete Battlefields, Volume 1, hardcover, 268 pages, December 2009,ISBN1-60690-079-X)
The Firefly and His Majesty (3-issue mini-series, March–May 2010, tpb, 80 pages, August 2010,ISBN1-60690-145-1, included inThe Complete Battlefields, Volume 2, hardcover, 200 pages, July 2011,ISBN1-60690-222-9)
Spector (with John Wagner, in2000 AD Sci-Fi Special, June 2019)
He drew the artwork on the header cards forCorgi model's range of X-Ploratrondie-cast models. (Diecast Collector Magazine, September 2006 issue, page 38)[23]