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Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew
had a very interesting history.

It began as a free Super​man story in the then-popular New Tee​n Titans in 1982; the titular Man of Steel finds himself propelled and trapped in a bizarre cartoon-like reality populated by anthropomorphised animals.   After determining it is in fact the giant starfish alien Starro of Super​man’s reality who is at the root of the strange phenomena (talking for the first time themselves, rather than possessing someone to use as a mouthpiece), Captain Carrot and his hastily assembled Zoo Crew (made up of five animal-folk who all received superpowers) save the day, and with Superman departing for his reality, Issue 3 onwards saw Captain Carrot and the Zoo Crew have their own comic series proper.   Very light-hearted, very goofy as superhero comics of the 1980s ditched the zaniness and went more for hard-hitting contemporary storytelling reflecting issues of the time.

Anyway, Captain Carrot had a civilian identity: Roger Rabbit (later altered to R[oger] Rodney Rabbit, possibly to avoid trouble with the unrelated but then-upcoming animated/live-action movie in 1988), a comic book artist who drew his own Justice League comic called Just’a’ Lotta Animals.   So you have the likes of Aqua-Duck, Bat-Mouse, Super-Squirrel… and as depicted here, Hawk-Moose and Martian Ant-Eater, spoofing Hawkman and the Martian Manhunter.

Most notably in the 14th issue of Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo-Crew (April 1983), to Roger’s bewilderment, the Just’a Lotta Animals manifest into his reality (titled Earth-C) leaving the JLA’s (fictional) world of Earth-C-Minus vulnerable to villains.  It gets very metaphysical and self-aware.*

With all that context out of the way, I took a lot of liberties because… why not? I’m actually surprised there hasn’t been more done with (the human) Hawkman since the guy is harnessed up and is canonically hirsute and shirtless; though I suppose the wings would be a very intimidating thing to draw.  Well,  I tried.

Enjoy and thank you for allowing me the opportunity to try out more action poses outside of my own comics.  And beef.   I like drawing beef.

* On that vein, in 2007, there was a one-off follow-up comic to Captain Carrot, Captain Carrot and the Final Ark, in which R. Rodney Rabbit attending Sandy Eggo Comic Con confirms he got a Cease-and-Desist order from a multiverse-transcending lawyer, forbidding him from lampooning the (human) Justice League again.   And rather sadly, by the end of the 3rd and final issue of the Final Ark, the Zoo Crew (and the population of Earth-C) are catapulted to the then-current (2008) human-centric DC Comics universe.  And as such, devolve to generic regular animals that can’t talk.  Boooo!

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