Marcel Winatschek

Four Inches Tall and Ready to Fight

Ash Ketchum is approximately four inches tall in Christopher Lee’s illustration, and he looks furious about it—badges displayed, chin jutting forward, ready to fight someone who is also four inches tall. That’s the only energy Ash has ever had, and at chibi scale it becomes almost unbearable in the best way.

Lee draws pop culture heroes with oversized heads, tiny bodies, and huge round eyes, and the effect is genuinely disarming. The series is called Select Your Hero, and it moves across decades and genres without feeling like a trivia quiz—old and new, widely known and cult, all rendered with the same generous absurdity. Everything is at his site.

Faced with actually choosing one, I stall completely. Ash with those gym badges and that maximum swagger? Sailor Moon with Luna sitting on her head like a small judgmental hat? Marceline the Vampire Queen from Adventure Time, because she rules and I’ve always had a thing for her? I can’t do it. I’m taking all of them.