Steve Dillon

Steve Dillon drew faces like no one else in comics — plain, exhausted, brutally honest human faces that could flip from deadpan comedy to quiet devastation within a single panel. The British artist, who died on 22 October 2016 at the age of 54, spent his career proving that the most expressive art in comics is rarely the flashiest. As the artist and co-creator of Preacher with Garth Ennis, he drew some of the most iconic pages the medium has produced. Perfect for fans of understated character acting, Vertigo’s 1990s golden age, and comics where the acting happens in the eyes.

Born in London on 22 March 1962, Dillon was hired by Marvel UK at just sixteen, drawing for Hulk Weekly and the Nick Fury strip before cutting his teeth through the 1980s in the pages of 2000 AD — Judge Dredd, Rogue Trooper, ABC Warriors, and his own Hap Hazzard — while also creating the much-loved Doctor Who villain-hunter Abslom Daak. Alongside Brett Ewins he co-founded and edited the landmark magazine Deadline (1988–1995), which launched a generation of British talent including Jamie Hewlett and his younger brother, Glyn Dillon. The Hollywood Reporter’s obituary traces the move to American comics through the 1989 DC miniseries Skreemer.

Dillon’s defining collaboration began in 1992, when he was paired with Garth Ennis on Hellblazer — their run, including the drug-addiction saga “Dangerous Habits,” reshaped John Constantine into the chain-smoking, doomed trickster fans know today. In 1995 they launched Preacher, the 66-issue supernatural western that became the decade’s most acclaimed comic, winning the Eisner Award for Best Continuing Series in 1999 and following a Texas preacher fused with a hell-born entity as he hunts a God who abandoned creation. Dillon drew the entire run, and his grounded character work is the reason its filth, violence, and tenderness never felt cartoonish.

After Preacher, Dillon and Ennis moved to Marvel, where their work on The Punisher — from the definitive “Welcome Back, Frank” revival at Marvel Knights through the brutal Punisher War Zone and PunisherMAX — made Frank Castle his. He also penciled Wolverine: Origins and Thunderbolts, returned to Vertigo for the Ennis-written Sixpack and Dogwelder, and served as co-executive producer on the AMC adaptation of Preacher, which debuted months before his death. The Beat’s tribute remembered a “stunningly great cartoonist, with a clear line and a rock solid sense of storytelling that never wavered,” and The New York Times obituary honored a man beloved for his gentle nature as much as his art.

Dillon’s work lives on in every new edition of Preacher Book One and in the generations of artists he influenced. He is remembered not just as a giant of British comics, but as the easygoing soul who drew the greatest road trip in comics history.