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Jose Madureira (born December 3, 1974, in Philadelphia; pronounced [mædəˈrærə]), often simply called Joe Mad^[1], is an American comic book artist and writer, best known for his work on Marvel Comics' Uncanny X-Men and his creator-owned comic book Battle Chasers.

In 1991 Marvel hired Madureira, a 16-year-old student at the High School of Art and Design, as an intern. His first published work was an eight-page story for the anthology series Marvel Comics Presents, starring Northstar. In the next few years, Madureira completed various assignments for Marvel's sprawling X-Men franchise. He became the regular penciller on Uncanny X-Men in 1994 and soon rose to become one of the most popular artists in the industry. As the Uncanny X-Men artist, Madureira designed the "Age of Apocalypse" uniforms, new manga-inspired costumes for the regular title (after Onslaught), as well as the Avengers' brief new designs after The Crossing.

He left Uncanny X-Men in 1997 to work on his own series Battle Chasers for Wildstorm Comics' creator-owned Cliffhanger imprint (before it was sold to DC Comics). Nine issues of the constantly behind schedule comic were released. The tenth issue was announced but was finally never published. Joe Madureira gave up publishing it because it was the first part of a new storyline which he would not have been able to finish in light of other work that he had taken on. Joe then went on to work in the video game industry. Starting with the start-up company Tri-Lunar, he created concept art on a game called Dragonkind which was canceled when Tri-Lunar went out of business. He then went to work for Realm Interactive, another start-up company, on Trade Wars: Dark Millennium. When Realm Interactive was acquired by NCsoft, he continued to contribute to the game as it evolved into Exarch, and was eventually released as Dungeon Runners. During this time, he would occasionally contribute cover artwork for gaming magazines and comic books.

Madureira returned to the comic book industry as the artist on Marvel's The Ultimates 3, with writer Jeph Loeb. ^[2] In late July 2007, the cover done by Joe Mad was featured on IGN.^[3]

After leaving NCsoft, Madureira founded Vigil Games with several other ex-NCsoft employees. Vigil was acquired by THQ in March 2006.

Madureira was dubbed one of the ten most influential comic artists of all time in the May 2002 issue of Wizard magazine. His inclusion was instantly contested by many comic book readers, as this list did not include many artists who are considered to have had a far more profound influence on the comics industry over a much longer period of time.^{[citation needed]} Dreamwave Productions founder Pat Lee claimed of Madureira, "When people think of the late '90s in comics, they will think of Joe Madureira."^{[citation needed]}

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Madureira remarked his early style was heavily influenced by Arthur Adams in an interview with Wizard Magazine,^{[citation needed]} but his style evolved into one more influenced by manga and anime. In interviews, Madureira has mentioned that series such as Ghost in the Shell and Bastard!! are among his favorites.^{[citation needed]} His run on X-Men helped fuel interest in the United States towards Japanese entertainment during the late 1990s.^{[citation needed]}

• Deadpool: The Circle Chase #1–4 (Marvel Comics, 1993)
• Uncanny X-Men #312–313, 316–317, 325–326, 328–330, 332, 334–338, 340–343, 345–348, 350 (Marvel Comics, 1994–1997)
• Battle Chasers #0, #1–9 (Cliffhanger, Image Comics, 1998–2001)
• Excalibur #57–58

• Curtin, Jack. "Steady Costumer." Wizard: The Guide to Comics #49. September 1995.

Footnotes

• Video of Madureira sketching