Commission for DragonFireNY.
Sketchbook Pro, FireAlpaca and Photoshop CS5.1
3 Hours 5 Minutes to complete.
Image © Ben Anderson 2013 all rights reserved
Characters © their respective owners.
The colouring process for THIS IMAGE - which was drawn as a response to my HEADCANNON SKETCH of Wolf O’Donnell.
Completed version of my lil’ headcannon picture.
Make sure you read the original headcannon here.
Quite proud of the blood in this one.
Closeup of the gore here.
Art © Ben Anderson 2012
AN IDEA I’VE BEEN TOYING WITH FOR A WHILE. HEAR ME OUT OKAY…
So, Wolf O’Donnell from the StarFox/StarWing games is supposed to be the big bad guy in the games. But he only ever comes across as a brat with a nice accent and a little bit of a grudge.
I think he’s more than that if you add some more realism (and melodrama) to his personality.
He is a mercenary, a killer for hire. He’s excruciatingly good at it and he seems to take pride in that - a little TOO MUCH pride. He considers himself the best of the best, even going so far to call himself “Lord O’Donnell” at one point. Someone with an ego that big considering his macabre career path indicates that he would probably be some kind of serial killer if he wasn’t already a killer for hire. He simply enjoys it too much.
Then we have his relationship with Fox McCloud (leader of the StarFox team for those who don’t know) - He grudgingly admits that he has respect for StarFox which is very odd since he also wants the pleasure of killing StarFox with his bare hands. At one point in StarFox: Assault he rescues Fox from a common threat so he himself can kill him later.
Yes, Fox wounded Wolf’s ego by defeating him in a dog fight. Ego bruised Wolf does vow to get back at Fox, but outright murder is going very far (only highlighting his psychotic serial killer-like nature previously mentioned), especially when Fox was merciful, but I think there would be far more to it than that.
Consider where Wolf first met the StarFox team; Wolf was hired by Andross on planet Venom. James McCloud (Fox’s father) originally went to Venom but never returned - quite clearly killed but NOT by a Young Wolf O’Donnell (Wolf, according to the game’s back story, would’ve been 19 at the time).
Now, this is probably when Wolf lost his left eye, but he wouldn’t have not lost it in a dog fight in a space-ship. If something exploded inside or outside the ship it would’ve taken his entire head off and he would’ve died instantly. No, something as precise as a missing eye could’ve only been done whilst locked in hand to hand combat.
James probably “relieved” Wolf of his eye. But wolf wont have been the one who killed James in return - The reason why Wolf is so hell bent on killing Fox is because he did not have the pleasure of snapping James’ neck himself - so he opts for the next best thing.
Lets also consider how paranoid he must be - if you’ve played StarFox Assault you’ll see just how tight his security measures are and in any game where Wolf is present, he has all his men on a very tight leash and is not afraid to murder any of them in cold blood for not following orders. This kind of paranoia isn’t home grown in his mind - its too severe and doesn’t fit his self-important ego. He must be paranoid as well.
Drugs instantly spring to mind. Regular cocaine use would make him incredibly paranoid and, if he had enough of it, hallucinate. He thinks everyone is out to get him or usurp his position as the best killer and best pilot in the Lylat system.
Fox has taken best pilot from him and Fox’s father had taken his eye. His drug induced paranoia makes him unstable and only serve to keep his hatred and longing death of the McClouds alive. As a method, by his twisted logic, to keep the grudge fresh and for him to never forget, he sometimes takes a knife and makes the wound deeper - each time representing when he missed an opportunity to kill Fox or lost to him in a battle.
This may be why he went from an eye-patch in Lylat Wars/Starfox 64 to a DBZ style scouter thing in Smash Brother’s Brawl and Star Fox Assault. The eye-patch was no longer enough to cover what was now a giant gaping hold in his head.
He wants to beat Fox in a dog fight to prove that he is still the best pilot and since James’ is dead, he’ll have to go for the next best thing and take one of Fox’s eyes instead. He knows it’ll be gratifying and spectacular to behold, but he knows in his mind that its not James McCloud’s eyes he has went and gouged out and that only makes him more angry.
Maybe once Fox is dead and his eyes displayed in Wolf’s quarters as a sick trophy he’s probably go on a mad hunt through space to find James, or start pulling people’s eyes out as a trophy on his missions until he finds a target that looks like James.
Now, as for the picture itself.
Consider space: Its temperature ranges from so cold that all particles stop moving (absolute zero) to being so hot that things merely disintegrate. Cocaine highs can make you feel either very hot or very cold. Since wolf is covered in fur, feelings of intense heat make sense and, if he is in a colder region of space, would probably strip down to his birthday suit leaning on a metal wall to try and relieve the heat that is all in his head (this explains the condensation he’s breathing from his nose in the picture).
When you really get down to it, you have to admit, it all makes sense!
