It's a mix of the Road Warrior and Toad from Mario Kart. Now, I know what you're thinking....but no, this was inspired by the original Mad Max and the countless hours I spent playing Mario Kart with friends. I originally started working on this in February. I hadn't done anything that was inspired by Mario Kart and I loved that game when I was growing up. I had actually shown Nintendo a Mario Kart concept illustration back in the late 90's when they flew me up to their Redmond studio for an interview to be a concept artist for them. The concept piece was of a tandem kart since my friends and I always played 2 vs 2 in the 150 cc cups on the original MK. They loved it and wanted to hire me right there, but I wasn't feeling the constant rain, so I turned it down and flew back to LA.

 

Fast forward all these years and here's my piece. I only used to play with Toad and that's why he's the character for this piece. I also wanted to give him a killer ride.