Hotties in Geeky Art
Guest post by Jack Shoulder
Heroes come in all shapes and sizes. Some of them save the world on a regular basis, others pull off cosmos-preserving feats, while others still might fight for big ideals like truth and justice, but do so on a more down-to-earth level. And that’s just the good guys! Geek culture abounds with hunks, heroes, gods and a weirdly sexy monster or two. Whichever media you choose to consume your geekiness through - be it movie, manga, comic or book - there will be a hottie especially for you.
During the day, I’m often seen as a mild-mannered historian who gets excited to share nerdy facts and fun stories with members of the public as they find themselves bewilderingly lost in museums and galleries. By night, I’m a huge comic book geek, devouring page after panel of pulpy WOW! BIFF! POW! as heroes and villains go toe to toe over the fate of the universe. In those twilight moments in between, I’m a writer and historian whose work includes Museum Bums: A Cheeky Look at Butts in Art and Hotties in Art, which explores masculinity and male beauty in art history.
With all this in mind, let’s bring everything together like nefarious ingredients in a bubbling neon flask in a mad scientist’s subterranean lair and launch into that multi-dimensional transporter to explore some of the red hot Hotties in Geeky Art. Will your comic-book crush make the list?
Cover Boys
The cover boy for Hotties in Art is an unnamed German acrobat and vaudeville performer, who wears a form fitting uniform like no-one’s business, and so our very first comic-book counterpart in this piece had to be none other than the blue bamfer, who in X2: X-Men United is introduced by Alan Cumming as… “in the Munich circus, I was known as the Incredible Nightcrawler.”
Nightcrawler is up there with Spider-Man as a hero who artists love to draw pulling off all sorts of amazing acrobatic feats. For me, Kurt has the edge over Peter, not just because of that incredible prehensile tail, but because of his flamboyant swashbuckling schtick. However, in terms of Nightcrawler at his hottest, it’s difficult to top this moment from Uncanny X-Men #168. He’s playfully flirting with Amanda Sefton, and the creative team are having fun with a reference to Burt Reynolds’ infamous Playgirl spread - this time with a plushie protecting the pin-up’s modesty.
Oh, and as this is Proud Geek, let’s enjoy that Esad Ribic cover from Wolverine 6. When Greg Rucka (the writer for that issue) asked about any... “undertones”, Ribic simply smiled and said, “And nobody at Marvel noticed.”
The fans noticed, Esad. We see you.
Oh. My. Gods.
To avoid any divine retribution - and we’ve all read enough Greek Mythology to know better than to incite the ire of the gods - I want to make it very clear to any deities reading that this is not a ranked list! No one is saying anyone is any better than anyone else; it’s not about who has the beefiest bicep or the biggest hammer. Instead, this is more of an exercise in appreciation.
Hercules is a hero who has starred in stories for millennia. Some of the earliest written accounts of his exploits date back to the 8th century BCE, but these tell us that people have shared stories about him for much, much longer and he continues to capture imaginations today.
In the stories, Herc can be a bit of an oaf. He enjoys drinking, feasting and showing off his strength. But the 1997 Disney film gives us an adorkable take on the character, who just wants to go the distance from zero to hero and find a place where he belongs. The emotional journey, coupled with a pair of perfect pecs, makes this version of the character an enduring crush.
And then there’s Thor. While I could talk about Chris Hemsworth in the MCU and what a perfect casting choice that was, I want to take this moment to introduce you to a little bit of Marvel Comics silliness: the Swimsuit Special.
These started life in the early 1990s as a parody of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit specials, and the idea was simple; let’s get our heroes into the skimpiest swimwear we can get away with and watch the cash roll in.
There was a particularly fun response to the 1994 edition, which one fan notes was “very cool because it was 50/50 male/female. For once, someone was fair!” The fan continues in a delightfully unfiltered manner, introducing themselves and telling Marvel bosses exactly what they want to see: “I want to see Thor NUDE! The Dan Panosian/ Tom Smith picture didn’t do him justice (in fact, 60% of all Thor pictures don’t do him justice). THOR is truly a godsend! Please draw him much more handsome and NUDE in next year’s issue! Thank you!”
Letra, the letter writer, didn’t quite get her polite request, but her iconic letter was the inspiration for the Thor variant cover of the 2026 Brand New Beach Day Swimsuit Special.
Tortured Poets
Hotties come in more forms than hunks with rippling muscles. There’s a certain type that I’m particularly drawn to; the guy who has a way with words, and is most comfortable with his nose in a book. Truly, there is nothing hotter than a guy with a way with words and a thirst for knowledge. I tend to think of them as tortured poets.
Our first member of the tortured poets’ society is Prince Oberyn Martell, as played by Pedro Pascal in Game of Thrones. The show amped up the sexiness and downplayed the bookish elements of his character - he did earn 6 links of a Maester’s chain at the Citadel, don’t forget! Oberyn is a character full of passion; it’s a shame we couldn’t spend more time with him.
Then there's everyone’s favourite bookworm; Rupert Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Anthony Stewart Head played the role perfectly, giving us a father-figure, a learned librarian and a reformed rebel all at once. And let’s face it, who doesn’t love a man with a huge… collection of books?
A Superman to Sweep me off my Feet
Bonnie Tyler spoke for us all when she said she needed a super man to sweep her off her feet. Farm boy turned journalist and secret superhero Clark Kent fits the bill perfectly. There’s something so sweet about his commitment to truth, justice and the promise of a better tomorrow; it’s something we should all be striving for.
Superman fits so many archetypes; in his super mode he’s the big, strong hero type, as Clark Kent in the City he’s a bit of a goofball, too big and hunky to properly fit in, and then there’s farm boy Clark, who wears a pair of overalls just as well as his super suit.
It’s Clark on the farm that I think is an underappreciated aspect of him, and the cover from Superman: Son of Kal-El #17 shows this off perfectly.
Of course, with Clark, I could have picked the Tom Welling iteration or the more recent Henry Cavill version, but I think Henry deserves his own spot on this list.
Whether he’s a DCEU superhero, a moustachio’d assassin in Mission: Impossible or the grunting, bath-taking Witcher, or even a computer-building, Warhammer-playing nerd, he’s quite possibly the epitome of hunks in geek culture.
I Want That Twink Obliterated
At the other end of the hot guy spectrum we have the twinks. Twinks have a longer tradition in geek culture than one might think, usually acting as a hero’s companion, well, “companion,” but sometimes they take more of a centre stage in the stories they appear in, driving the action forward rather than just being supporting players.
Oscar Wilde gave us an OG Demon Twink, the central and eponymous figure in The Picture of Dorian Gray. It is a story all about art, beauty and the different faces men wear, and this Victorian novel was a big inspiration to me when I was writing Hotties in Art. As Dorian is a character from literature, we get to imagine what he looks like, and imagine our own ideal twink.
For those that need some help, there’s the very pretty Ben Barnes from a very terrible adaptation.
The title of this section comes from a panel in Lords of Empyre: Emperor Hulkling #1 (2020), by Antony Oliveira and Tee Franklin and so I want to spend a moment on Marvel’s King of Space and his conjuring consort: Hulkling and Wiccan.
These boys are unusual in comicdom as they are happily married. Writers tend to avoid happily hitched heroes because there is a feeling it restricts plot and action, which, if we look at couples like Reed and Sue Richards, or Lois and Clark, Scott and Jean, we know this isn’t the case.
For me, Billy and Teddy are a brilliant shining light to young queer people; you can save the world, and enjoy domestic bliss with your loving partner. You can have it all!
Put that Bass in Your Walk
"As far as I'm concerned, that's America's ass" says Paul Rudd as he defends Chris Evan’s bodacious booty from Robert Downey Jr’s pointed barb about Captain America’s previous costume in Avengers: Endgame.
It truly is one of the best bums in all of comics. But, and it’s a big but… it’s not the best.
That particular honour goes to Nightwing, whose bum takes centre stage in the Nicola Scott cover for Nightwing #118. Nicola has spoken a lot about why she loves to showcase Nightwing’s best feature; she’d said: “...he's a gymnast. He's probably got a pretty decent ass. So make the subtext all the text.”
Not only did Nicola give us exactly what we needed, she also subverted something we see time and again in art history: women are objectified while the guys are not, and this simply isn’t fair. It’s a mindset I’ve brought with me throughout Hotties in Art, to try and redress that historical imbalance.
As we come to the end of this post, I’d like to share my final hotties in geeky art, and that is: the entire cast of the 1999 cult classic The Mummy (yes, even Benny).
If you’d like to spend more time with the hotties here, Proud Geek can help you get your hands on titles that show these guys off in all the best ways. If you’re keen to explore more butts, biceps and beautiful men, treat yourself to a copy of Museum Bums: A Cheeky Look at Butts in Art or Hotties in Art from Proud Geek too.
Comments