Greg Goldstein's Comic Art Gallery

Dan Jurgens — Unfair Fight

Original Art and The Artists

Booster Gold #8, June 2008

Continuing our celebration of the 80th anniversary of the Justice Society of America, with each new post featuring a different classic JSA character.

Today’s riddle: What do comic art collectors miss the most that comic book editors and publishers miss the least?:

A: Word balloons on the art board themselves.

Digital lettering is an amazing boon for comic book production, and a disappointment for many art collectors, myself included.

If you work in the editorial department, of course, no one misses the endless FedEx packages trafficking from penciller to letterer to inker, and back. Ugh.

But… the art boards themselves feel less complete without them. These are, after all, comic book pages. Comic books are pictures AND words.

Modern comic book original pages are analogous to silent films. If the visuals communicate well enough, you can interpret the storytelling without words. (And there shouldn’t be too much of that anyway. But I digress.)

Which finally gets us to this page by the great Dan Jurgens and Norm Rapmund. Superman is about to break the neck of  fellow hero Wildcat, while Maxwell Lord looks on gleefully.

Pretty easy to figure out that Superman is either under some sort of mind control — or he’s not Superman at all. (Spoiler alert, it’s the former, and Wildcat survives.)

This is a great splash from a great art team on a great series. As mentioned in a previous post, I’m definitely a fan of this run of Booster Gold, which ended perhaps a bit prematurely because of “The New 52” reboot in 2010.

First appearance of Wildcat in Sensation Comics #1(January 1942), plus earliest appearances in the Silver Age in Brave and Bold and The Spectre.

Alan Davis — There Goes The Neighborhood

Original Art and The Artists

JSA #19, February 2001

I have a sweet spot for the Spectre, and I love the way he dominates this Alan Davis cover of this issue of the Justice Society. Despite the fact that I am an enthusiastic fan of Davis’ work, this is the first (and only) cover he drew that I own. I should rectify that one of these days.

As a young teen, I was the perfect age for the crazy, but brief, Bronze Age version of the character written by Michael Fleisher and wonderfully drawn by Jim Aparo, which featured woeful fates for the character’s antagonists. This version of Spectre arrives  (early 1974) at nearly the exact same time as does another anti-hero, the Punisher, across town at Marvel comics.  

Justice is served, indeed.

Comic book historian Les Daniels discussed the origin of this version of the character in DC Comics: Sixty Years of the World’s Favorite Comic Book Heroes:

“Joe Orlando was mugged and decided the world needed a really relentless super hero. The character came back with a vengeance … and quickly became a cause of controversy. Orlando plotted the stories with writer Michael Fleisher, and they emphasized the gruesome fates of criminals who ran afoul of the Spectre. The Comics Code had recently been liberalized, but this series pushed its restrictions to the limit, often by turning evildoers into inanimate objects and then thoroughly demolishing them. Jim Aparo’s art showed criminals being transformed into everything from broken glass to melting candles, but Fleisher was quick to point out that many of his most bizarre plot devices were lifted from stories published decades earlier.”

I had only recently discovered the classic EC Comics horror tiles, and these gruesome fates seemed to meld together the supernatural, horror and superhero tropes into one wonderful blended margarita of storytelling.

Definitely worth my 20 cents.

Fun fact: 1974 is indeed the year of the anti-hero. Wolverine appears for the first time a few months later. It took a while, but in 1982, a catchphrase summed up his personality. “I’m the best there is at what I do, but what I do best isn’t very nice.” Snikt!

The Spectre appears… and reappears. First appearances, Golden Age, Silver Age and Bronze Age.

Wallace Wood — All Star

Original Art and The Artists

All Star Comics #59, 1976

All Star Comics, featuring The Justice Society, returned for the first time in 25 years, and the legendary Wallace Wood returned to superheroes for the early issues as well.

“Return” for Woody is a bit of an overstatement, since outside of his own creation, T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents, Wood’s work in superheroes was limited. Ironically his most lauded superhero work in the DC universe is Superduperman, an EC Mad Comics parody from 1953.

In All Star, editor Joe Orlando (and Wood’s former protégé at EC) provided Woody the chance to play with many of DC’s classic characters, including Superman, and he was given a chance to help set the look and feel of at least one enduring new one, Power Girl, the “Supergirl” of Earth Two. On this great battle page, we have Hawkman, The Star-Spangled Kid, and Doctor Mid-Nite in all out action.

As demonstrated by the art itself, Wood is responsible for the pencils and inks on this “second” issue, with Rick Estrada providing rough breakdowns and receiving credit as “designer” on this issue.

Woody left the title after less than a year’s worth of issues, but the work he left was behind was definitely “all star” material.

Fun fact: Hawkman was the only original member of the JSA to appear in every issue of the original All Star comics as part of the team.

Fun fact: Despite the fact that All Star had originally continued as All Star Western in 1951, DC re-started the series using the Golden Age numbering.  Today it would be  #1 issue with more than a few variant covers…

Fun fact: “Super Squad” is just… ugh.

The first original Golden Age cover appearances of Star-Spangled Kid, Spectre and Hawkman.
All Star Comics returns with art by the legendary Wallace Wood. Bam!
The new Justice Society launches on CW in a few weeks with the premiere of Stargirl on May 11.

Rich Burchett — Flashy Team-Up

Original Art and The Artists

Justice Society of America #1, April 1991

2020 marks the 80th anniversary of the very first super team in comic book history, The Justice Society of America.

Superhero comics were barely two years old, when a gaggle of heroes appeared on the cover All Star Comics #3. Imagine the reaction of a young comic book reader at his local newsstand or candy store seeing Doctor Fate, Hourman, The Spectre, Green Lantern, The Atom, The Sandman, Hawkman, and of course, The Flash all seated at the one table.

Brain blown.

During the various “Comic Book Ages” (Gold, Silver, Bronze, Modern, et al) the original Flash seems to symbolize the Society more than any one character. This is partly due to the fact that he is the very first Golden Age superhero to be reintroduced into the Silver Age (Flash #123).

In this 1991 JSA mini-series, one classic character receives solo billing in each issue, and the Flash leads off in issue #1, with art (pencils and inks) by the often under-appreciated Rich Burchett. This is a fun and dynamic page of the Flash in action, with the action taking us through the page.

And, I find it amusing that Flash’s helmet and the construction workers are not that dissimilar. If only those guys could run at super speed…

(My pal Mike Gold edited the series, and he provides a lovely history of the JSA, and an origin of this specific series, which is provided below.)

The first appearance of the Flash, and the first appearance of the JSA a short time later.
The history of the JSA, plus some backstory to this mini-series, courtesy of editor
Mike Gold.

Tom Yeates — Cowboys And Dinosaurs

Original Art and The Artists

Jurassic Park #5, 2010

The first series of Jurassic Park comics in nearly 15 years is, unfortunately, nothing to write home about. Or write about here, for that matter. Neither the writing the art (especially) the art were up to snuff of the other licensed books we published at IDW. The less said, the better.

But… the covers were pretty terrific. Frank Miller, Bernie Wrightson and many others contributed to those covers. Included in the group is this one, wonderfully executed by the terrifically talented — and often criminally underrated — Tom Yeates.

Tom channels some Valley of Gwangi with his cowboys vs. dinosaurs scene depicted here.

If you’re not familiar with this film, give it a try. It’s not like we all don’t have a bit of extra time on our hands these days, unfortunately. Might as well dive into classic dinosaur films.

As Ray Bradbury had said, who doesn’t like dinosaurs?

Or great dinosaur art for that matter.

Tom’s cover immediately reminded me of the 1969 film, Valley of the Gwangi, which had its own comic book adaptation. Also pictured above is the original film concept art, which actually reflects the dino to cowboy scale a bit more accurately.

Michael Golden — Monstrous Mayhem

Original Art and The Artists

Jurassic Park Raptors Hijack #1, 1994

Perhaps best known for his work on Micronauts and the Nam, Michael Golden is simply put, a superstar artist.

Perhaps some of his most fascinating art, and possibly least known by anyone other than hardcore Golden fans, are his covers (and portfolios) for Topps’ Jurassic Park series.

Beautifully detailed, wonderful compositions, these covers transcended the JP sequels and side stories that we published at Topps. They are simply stunning. While some are better than others, there’s not a bad one in the bunch.

Michael did 18 different covers, and added two new ones to two separate portfolios. Interestingly, until I looked it up, I didn’t realize that Image actually published the portfolios, which are long out of print and challenging to find on the secondary market place.

(I have no memory of how we were able to swing that with Universal, but I’m glad we did.)

You can see pretty much all of them at this link.

This specific piece? Dinosaurs. Gorillas. Mad scientists. It’s like some crazy Republic serial, gorgeously illustrated.

And for you Golden Micronauts fans? The terrifically talented and tenacious Scott Dunbier has somehow figured out a way to carve out a deal with Golden, Marvel and Hasbro to create an Artist Edition for later in the year.

I can’t imagine it will be anything less than great.

Cover as it originally appeared, and then re-colored for a trade collection 15 years later.
Michael Golden’s portfolios of Jurassic Park art, both of which — especially volume 2 — are very scarce today.

John Byrne — “Gronk”

Original Art and The Artists

Jurassic Park: The Devils in the Desert #1, January 2011

I have no memory of how I acquired a few pieces of art. A chance dealer transaction at a convention perhaps … or possibly a last minute sweetener in a trade? Too much art probably, too many years definitely, and as they say…. hard drive almost full.

But this art’s provenance I remember very well.

NYCC about 5 years ago.  I had heard a lot about John Byrne’s house and all the various art collectibles that made up some of the décor, but hadn’t had a chance to get up to the wilds of Connecticut to check it out.

This time I was determined.  So, one rainy day at the end of the convention day, Chris Ryall and I trudged our way through monsoon-like rain (no exaggeration) to the train station, missed our connection, but eventually made it up to John’s town. After a nice Chinese meal, we headed back to John’s house.

It was everything as described. Great collectibles and memorabilia, and some great art hanging in his studio by comic book legends John admired. (No surprise, lots of Jack Kirby.)

Chris had already a direct working relationship with John, and in fact had been to his house previously. But I had actually not seen John since the early 90s, and he had no memory of our meeting, nor should he. 

As many colleagues can share, John can be reserved at times. Regardless, he was gracious to his publisher, and he definitely warmed up a bit as we discussed art in detail while I enjoyed the tour.

At the end of the night, He pointed us to his flat files of art and told us to each take something. These file were a potpourri of recent projects, pieces he had yet to give to his art representative Jim Warden to sell for him.

Chris found a page from DC’s OMAC series that John was especially proud of. I was a bit more interested in something that we had published at IDW, and after some deep digging, I came up with this great Jurassic Park double-page spread from the mini-series John created for us.

He was delighted that I admired it, and I, of course, was delighted with his generosity. It is a great piece, and to date, I walk past it every day and smile. Permanent collection, for certain.

Getting it back to California from New York wasn’t easy, but that’s a story for another day.

Thanks again, JB!

I love the way the covers link up, especially issues #1 and #2.

Gil Kane — Jurassic Jeopardy

Original Art and The Artists

Jurassic Park #4, August 1993

Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park novel turns 30 this year, so the next few posts pay tribute to the book that became a blockbuster film franchise.

Gil Kane and George Perez teamed up on artistic chores for the original Topps Jurassic Park film adaption. (with writing by Walter Simonson). It was an unique pairing suggested by EIC Jim Salicrup, and for the most part, worked very well. All four issues came out on the predetermined schedule, not an easy feat, especially in those days with newsstand distribution considerations. But the schedule was… tight.

I was delighted to pick up the original art for Gil’s variant cover for issue #4 a few years ago at auction.

The scene is from the climax of the film where our young heroes are menaced in the commissary kitchen by the crafty velociraptors. It’s a cool composition that captures the terror of the moment.

Here’s the rub — Is that a chubby raptor missing a neck? Or a deformed T-Rex? I mean, what the hell kind of dino did Gil actually draw?

You can’t tell from the scan, but there’s an art patch on the dino’s face. Clearly some of it absolutely, positively needed to be altered to be approved overnight. But someone in Universal’s licensing department must have ultimately taken pity on our harrowing schedule, and us, because the final version is definitely not on model.

Since this is technically not the “main” cover, which is by Dave Cockrum, maybe they gave us a pass. (I don’t remember who did the art patch — George, our production department or for that matter, Gil.)

Ah, Gil. We sent him lots of photo reference. I can’t recall if we sent this exact scene specifically, but regardless, he had reference. Like I said, lots of it. Only problem is, as I found out later on, Gil didn’t have much use for reference.

It doesn’t matter. He was one of the best. I consider myself fortunate to know him professionally, albeit briefly. Stories about him were legendary by the time I met him in 1993.

And, I got at least one “Greg, my boy…” out of him, so I could cross that off the list. Whew.

Gil’s published variant cover, along with Cockrum’s “main” cover.
Actual Velociraptors menacing our protagonists in the film.

William Stout — Creature Feature

Original Art and The Artists

Tribute to Ray Harryhausen, 2003

2020 is the 100th anniversary of the birth of Ray Harryhausen, movie visual effects pioneer who inspired generations of filmmakers. Interestingly, Harryhausen and Ray Bradbury, subject of our previous post, were lifelong best friends.

Harryhausen’s cinema creatures are iconic, including The Cyclops from his first color feature, the 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1958).

Bill Stout drew this impressive Cyclops (plus a few supporting “characters”) to use as his cover for his tribute book to Haryhaussen in 2003. Stout has done a number of these tribute books, including one appropriately enough for Willis Obrien, Haryhausen’s special effects mentor.

The art ended up in the collection of film director Frank Darabont, and was auctioned off when Darabont sold much of his collection in 2019.

Leading comic art dealer Mike Burkey then acquired it, and I acquired it from Mike.

And now, to paraphrase, the Cyclops stops here.

The original 1958 US posters featured a hodgepodge of images from the film, but in 1975, the Japanese re-release poster dramatically emphasized the Cyclops.

William Stout — Thunderous

Original Art and The Artists

Ray Bradbury Comics #1, February 1993

The legendary SF author Ray Bradbury would have turned 100 years old this year. He passed away in 2012.

Ray Bradbury’s A Sound of Thunder is my favorite time travel short story.

It’s also the very first time travel short story I ever read. (I had already read HG Wells’ novel, The Time Machine, at that point. Multiple times in fact.)

Thanks to the progressive spirit of my secondary school system, we read the Bradbury short story collection “R is For Rocket” in eighth or ninth grade.

A Sound of Thunder: Time travel. Adventure. Dinosaurs. In other words, for my tastes, perfect.

Nearly 20 years later, Byron Preiss and Topps struck a deal to publish comic book versions of Preiss’ graphic novel series, Ray Bradbury Illustrated.  Main feature in the first issue? A Sound of Thunder, cover by the incredibly talented Bill Stout, who is generally in a class by himself when it comes to Dinosaurs.

(The comic features a new adaptation by Richard Corben and the reprint of the classic EC story by Al Feldstein and Al Williamson.)

And 25 years after that? Stout decides to part with the cover, and I literally stumble upon at his booth at SDCC. Hanging in the frame that hung in his studio for many years.

Serendipity at work. Lets call this one a part of the “ permanent collection.”

Covers for both the Topps comic book version and the Byron Preiss “graphic novel.”
Richard Corben did an outstanding job on the “modern” version of Sound, while Al Williamson drew both the cover and the adaptation of the beloved EC Comics version.
Ray Bradbury’s intro for the first issue of Topps Bradbury comics, along with the cover of the 70s paperback version of R Is For Rocket, ubiquitous at the time.