Greg Goldstein's Comic Art Gallery

Steve Rude — American Idol

Original Art and The Artists

Captain America: What Price Glory #4, May 2003

Concluding our tribute to Captain America’s 80th anniversary.

Ah Las Vegas.

The only place where you are likely to find a giant statue of Captain America, yes? But even Las Vegas wouldn’t have accepted a giant statue of the Red Skull — swastikas and all. (Imagine a giant Patton statue facing off against a giant Rommel sculpture. It does not compute. ) It’s a rare slip in an otherwise fun Cap mini-series penned by Bruce Jones with beautiful visual storytelling by Steve Rude and Mike Royer.

And the good news is that the Skull statue that gets blown to smithereens on this great splash page, anyway.

Happy 80th Mr. Rogers!

In addition to the obvious Jack Kirby references throughout, Rude manages to work in a Steranko homage on the opening page of the issue. Meanwhile JG Jones delivers a surprisingly boring and stiff painting of Cap on the cover, which, to make matters worse, looks like it belongs to a completely different series altogether.

Mike Zeck — Will The Real Captain America Please Stand Up?

Original Art and The Artists

Captain America #279, March 1983

Captain America vs.… Captain America?

The “impersonation” trope is one of my favorites in comics, and a long-standing tradition in Marvel’s history. In fact, the first time Captain America “appears” in the Silver Age in Strange Tales #114, it’s not Captain America at all. It’s a Human Torch villain, The Acrobat, in disguise. 

And this trope was consistently employed throughout the early Marvel Comics. The Skrulls impersonate the Fantastic Four in issue #2, The Chameleon impersonates Spider-Man in ASM #1, and the Avengers are nearly defeated by the shape-changing Space Phantom in issue #2 of their launch title. 

Stan was obsessed with this concept, apparently.

For the record, here on this terrific action page by Mike Zeck and John Beatty, the uniformed Cap is the “real” one.  The clown impersonating Steve Rogers is Primus, The Mutate. 

File that under: “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

Zeck drew one of the most iconic images of the era: Captain America vs. Wolverine.

Dan Jurgens — Classic Melee

Original Art and The Artists

Captain America #37, January 2001

Dan Jurgens delivers a dynamic and powerful splash of Captain America fighting the hordes of Hydra. Whenever I look at this page, I’m reminded of Jim Steranko’s great double page spreads of Cap in action against similar — or — greater odds. 

Dan’s splash is not a swipe — and possibly not even a purposeful homage — but its energy captures the spirit of that great Steranko run. 

This is the part where I should swipe Stan Lee and say “Nuff said, “ except I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the other main figure on the page who appears at first glance to be The Red Guardian. 

He is not. He is, in fact, “Protocide,” an early super soldier experiment retconned into Cap’s continuity — and pretty much retconned out, after the Jurgens run ended.

Now I can say it:

“Nuff Said.”

Steranko’s great splashes always had Cap in mid-air, performing improbable acrobatics against impossible odds!

John Cassaday — The First Avenger

Original Art and The Artists

Fallen Son: The Death Of Captain America #5, August 2007

John Cassaday — a fan favorite artist if ever there was one — delivers a striking double-page splash of the Silver Age Avengers, with Captain America dominating the scene.

In the original comic, it was the Avengers that discovered the World War 2 legend floating in suspended animation in (essentially) a large ice cube. Of course, they never would have found him if it wasn’t for another Golden Age icon, Namor the Sub-Mariner, but as always, we digress.

This rendering actually combines multiple 60s Avengers line-ups into one image; The Hulk quit in a huff at the end of issue #2, fought against the team in issue #3, and was MIA by the time Cap thawed out in issue #4.

Cassaday’s art is stunning throughout this issue, but, biasedly perhaps, I think this is by far the best page(s) among many great ones.

The spread has appeared as both a poster and a limited edition Giclee, so, clearly it’s had some impact.

Assemble indeed!

In short order, Cap returned to the Marvel line-up, received his own solo feature, and then a few years later, his own series. (Picking up the numbering from Tales of Suspense.)

Carlos Pacheco — Shattered Glass

Original Art and The Artists

Ultimate Avengers #3, December 2009, and Avengers Assemble Season 2 (Marvel Universe) #4, 2015

Continuing our tribute to Captain America’s 80th anniversary.

Captain America breaks a lot of a glass. In his very first solo appearance in the Silver Age, (Tales of Suspense #59) Jack Kirby has him jumping directly at the reader, shattering a window as he does.

Maybe that shield gives him a sense of security. After all, the super soldier serum made him super strong, but not invulnerable. And Batman and the other “ordinary” (no enhanced super-powers) heroes tend to break a bit less glass.

This great splash page features rouge Captain America doing the glass bit with tremendous drama and detail by the terrific Carlos Pacheco.

And the art is so dynamic that Marvel used again six years later as a cover for an animated series cover.

That’s pretty cool —it could have been used as a cover the first time around, but second time’s the charm apparently.

The splash becomes a cover a few years later.
Stan Lee and Jack Kirby break the glass in Captain America’s very first Silver Age solo appearance.

Ron Frenz and Bruce Timm — Saluting The Creator

Original Art and The Artists

Captain America #50, February 2002

Captain America officially turns 80 in a few weeks, and this iconic character is definitely worth an anniversary celebration. (Cap #1, created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, is cover-dated March 1941, but the on-sale date was December 20,1940.)

First up is this great Jack Kirby homage by Ron Frenz and Bruce Timm that appeared as a pin up in Captain America #50 (3rd series.). This piece, typical of Timm’s other published comic book work, is “inks-only” over a Frenz layout.

The layout itself is an homage to Jack’s Captain America art that appeared on the cover Marvelmania #1 (fan magazine), near the end of his Silver Age run at Marvel. Frenz added the Super-Adaptoid, and Bruce did his magic, creating a classic Kirby look.

Jack’s original art for this cover was little-seen until it finally appeared in color as the cover to the Jack Kirby Collector (#34, 2002),
The Super-Adaptoid was a mid-60s creation appearing early during Cap’s Silver Age revival. Also pictured, Captain America #1 with Cap decking Hitler a full year before the U.S. entered World War II.

Liam Sharp — Green Reunion

Original Art and The Artists

Green Lantern #8, August 2019

“Grant Morrison and Liam Sharp’s The Green Lantern is imaginative, surprising and just plain weird. And one of the most fearlessly unique comics currently on the stands.” –Rosie Marx

Liam Sharp reunites Green Lantern and his old teammate Green Arrow for a trippy alien drug ring story written by Grant Morrison.

Sharp has been a stellar artist since he broke into the industry in the 80s with work at 2000 AD, but in my opinion, his storytelling and draftsmanship get (ahem) sharper all the time.

I loved his contemporary work on Wonder Woman as well, but many of those originals were drawn at 18×24, and I hate to say it, but space is finite.

The GL pages — at least from this issue — are drawn at standard art size, and therefore a bit more manageable.

And of course, terrific.

  • I don’t know about you, but I’m looking forward to the Green Lantern series on HBO Max. Managed well (and budgeted accordingly) it has astonishing potential.

Joe Staton — Green Energy

Original Art and The Artists

Green Lantern #143, August 1981

Continuing a celebration of Green Lantern’s anniversary this week.

Joe Staton somehow manages to channel a bit of Gil Kane and a bit of Neal Adams on this dynamic Green Lantern action sequence from 1981.

I first started following Joe’s work (with writer Nicola Cuti) on the quirky E-Man from Charlton back in 1973 1975.  (Funny enough, it lasted 10 issues, and I kept all 10, which is unusual for me. Guess I really liked it.)

Shortly thereafter, he took over art duties on the Justice Society in All-Star Squadron, a book I also enjoyed.

This page is from Joe’s first run on Green lantern with writer Marv Wolfman, and this story introduces the extraterrestrial superheroes, Omega Men. Joe later returned on the Green Lantern Corps with writer Steve Englehart.

When conventions finally return (mid-late 2021 is my guess) make sure you visit Joe wherever —and whenever — you find him. He is truly one of the humblest and nicest creators in the business. And obviously, very talented.

Shannon Wheeler — Happy Thanksgiving!

Original Art and The Artists

Sh*t My President Says, 2017

To paraphrase an old adage, sometimes you get the bird, and sometimes… the bird gets you.

I’ve discussed my pal Wheeler’s terrific cartooning skills previously. For this book (on which I actually have a co-editing credit, because of all my nagging, nudging and general meddling) he let me have first dibs on any piece, and I chose this one.

Urban legend: Ben Franklin suggested that the turkey should be the national bird. He actually did compare the bald eagle very unfavorably to the turkey, but apparently did not bring forth an official turkey proposal.

Every holiday (hell, every day, actually) feels so bizarre this year, but I’m thankful to all of you who take a moment from our apocalypse-in-training to check in on the blog.

Thanks again, and have a good holiday. Be safe out there!

Gil Kane — Green Anniversary

Original Art and The Artists

Green Lantern #14, July 1962

Green Lantern celebrates two anniversaries in 2020. 

The original Green Lantern (Alan Scott) first appeared in 1940, and the Silver Age Green Lantern, Hal Jordan, gained his own DC comic book series in 1960, shortly after first appearing Showcase #22 the year prior.

During the first 75 issues of GL’s own Silver Age comic, Gil Kane is the artist most associated with this run.

In these early issues Gil is not quite GIL KANE yet. The art is very solid, slick, and polished, in DC tradition, but it would take a few years before Gil’s trademark style would fully break through the conservative confines of the scripting and editing.

By the time Gil finishes his 10-year run with issue #75, Green Lantern is not a giant commercial success, but Gil Kane is most certainly GIL KANE. Reading through collected editions of the series, you can clearly see the metamorphosis of his storytelling capabilities and artistic style.

As for issue #76 in 1970 (Another anniversary, now that you mention it) Denny O’Neil and DC shake things up a bit by adding Green Arrow to the mix — and artist Neal Adams takes the reigns.

The rest, as they say, really is history.

Green Lantern milestones: The first appearance of Alan Scott in 1940; the first appearance of Hal Jordan, 1959; The first Silver Age issue of the Jordan GL, 1960.