Our third annual Halloween tribute continues now through October 31.
Ash Wood has accomplished much in his career, but I still miss his trippy interior comic art. As clearly exemplified here.
And Ghost Rider 2099? That was the easily the trippiest of the 2099 Universe, spearheaded by my long-time pal Joey Cavalieri.
Most of the 2099 material has yet to be collected, but given the passionate enthusiasm in 90s comic art material of late, it won’t surprise me if an omnibus or two is coming our way shortly.
(I’d buy the Ghost Rider material just to revisit the art — even if I’m still not entirely sure I could explain the narrative clearly.)
Our third annual Halloween tribute continues now through October 31.
Remember that time hat Superman lost his head?
You don’t?
I do, and I was pleased to see this page come up at auction earlier this year.
I was mostly done with the Superman Family by the time this issue appeared in 1971, but occasionally something off the wall (pun NOT intended — this time, anyway) would grab my attention, and this was one of those issues.
It’s rare (although not impossible) to find a title page that has such a literal cover interpretation, and of course the fact that it was drawn by the great Superman art team of Curt Swan and Murphy Anderson is a giant selling point for me.
Also rare: The cover is taken from the back-up story instead of the main feature. Obviously, someone at DC knew how to grab attention — at least mine, anyway.
Fun fact: On both Superman stories in this issue, the “Swanderson” art team gets top billing in the credits. They deserved it, as the art was light years ahead of the story material.)
Our third annual Halloween tribute continues now through October 31.
Gabe Hardman creates an image of The Black Terror, that’s… well… pretty terrifying.
Launched in the Golden Age, the character has since fallen into the public domain, and has appeared in numerous titles and incarnations. This most recent version of The Terror spins out from the Project Superpowers project, the clever Alex Ross-driven series from Dynamic Forces that combines a number of PD characters into one universe.
As noted multiple times previously, I find Hardman’s work among the best in modern comics art.
I just wish for more of it.
The Black Terror’s launch and subsequent iterations from Alex Ross and Alan Moore / Chris Sprouse.
Our third annual Halloween tribute continues now through October 31.
Dracula transforms into a bat and transforms back again in this cool page from the master of moodiness Gene Colan.
I’ve written about Colan’s Tomb of Dracula work with Tom Palmer previously; this issue precedes Palmer’s permanent partnership with Gene on the title, and is instead inked by Vince Colletta. (No I am not going to knock Vince’s work here. That’s what comics’ social media is for. Talk about beating a dead horse…)
So… a vampire transformation page? Cool, I will take it.
Fun fact: All the art panels on the page are pasted onto the art board that leads me to believe the story was revamped (pun intended) at some point.
Our third annual Halloween tribute continues now through October 31.
1986 was arguably DC’s finest year. In fact, it may be one of the most of critical years in any company’s history. (DC’s entire two-year period of 1985-1987 is unmatched in terms of quality projects.)
Watchmen. The Dark Knight Returns. The Superman reboot by John Byrne, Man of Steel. Not too mention Crisis the year earlier, Batman: Year One a year later. Etc. Etc.
Occasionally lost in all of these amazing titles is the astonishingly gorgeous Deadman mini-series by Jose Garcia Lopez (Written by Andy Mangels). Every page looks great, and some are breathtaking. (A word, I rarely, rarely use, at least as far as comic art is concerned.)
Don’t trust my word here. Read the series, finally collected in the recent Deadman Omnibus. (Which also collects most of the Silver and Bronze Age Deadman material including the earliest stories by Neal Adams.)
It’s just beautiful wok by Lopez, who is often referred to as an artist’s artist. Ask just about any professional artist to name the top talents in the industry and Lopez’s name is invariably near the top of the list.
I’m grateful I acquired this cool page earlier this year.
Our Third annual Halloween tribute continues now through October 31.
Charles P Wilson III creates a knockout cover for a collection of Joe Hill’s unrealized scripts for a proposed reboot of Tales From The Darkside.
Wilson is absolutely among the top underrated artists working in comics and graphic novels today. He created a number of terrific looking projects for us at IDW Publishing, including Hill’s the Wraith and illustrated some other stunning variant covers for Locke and Key, X-Files, and TMNT, among others.
We begin our third annual Halloween celebration with a terrific Alan Davis splash of Thanos becoming Death in The Infinity Conflict graphic novel.
Like all recent Davis and Farmer pages, it’s a combination of blue-line printing and pencil by Davis, and finishes by Farmer. And, also like all pages by that terrific art team, it looks great.
Happy Halloween — foe the next few weeks. See you on Thursday.
Today, after an 18-month pandemic induced delay, No Time To Die finally opens in the United States. We mark the occasion with our third, and final, piece of James Bond original art.
Ah, comic book art in the age of powerful digital technology. This original cover by Glenn Fabry starts off with two beautiful Russian women, but ultimately ends up without them.
(The gun in the background also disappears between solicitation and actual publication, but that is more a function of the trade dress choice, and certainly less jarring.)
Digital manipulation aside, it’s still a cool cover. And kudos to Dynamite for landing the rights. At IDW Publishing, we hounded the rights holder(s) endlessly and continuously came up empty handed. (I’m sure other publishers tried as well.)
And speaking of disappearing acts — When I was at Topps Comics, we acquired the Goldeneye (Pierce Brosnan’s first outing as Bond) rights in 1995. We launched with a first issue of what was planned as a three-issue adaptation. Unfortunately, issues two and three never appeared. In addition to approvals that came in at the speed of molasses, the licensor — and I kid you not — objected to the adult material that was appearing in the comics.
Nothing crazy — just the same “adult” material that appears in the film.
Seriously.
The infamous Topps Goldeneye comics; Issue #1 was published (and also distributed as a special #00 issue at the James Bond Convention in NYC.) Issues #2 and #3 were cancelled. All three featured great painted covers from Brian Stelfreeze.
Until the last few years, James Bond’s appearances in comic books are rare. Added all together prior to 2016, they most definitely would not fill an omnibus.
Rights issues are always tricky with this franchise; although Eon Productions —and its merchandising arm, Danjaq — manages film rights, the literary property itself remains controlled by the Ian Fleming Estate.
Which explains why this run at Dark Horse features a James Bond who doesn’t in fact look like any other Bond we’ve seen previously. In fact, here he looks a little bit like — Paul Gulacy.
Regardless, It’s great Gulacy page from a good-looking miniseries; even if this specific example looks like it would be more at home in an Indiana Jones comic book.
James Bond through the years in comics. (The experience was so distasteful for Howard Chaykin on For Your Eyes Only that he left Marvel Comics.)
