Greg Goldstein's Comic Art Gallery

Tag: Batman

Brian Stelfreeze — Zero Hour, Plus 30

Original Art and The Artists

Batman: Shadow of the Bat #31, September 1994

Brian Stelfreeze provides this amazing “Golden Age” style cover for a Batman story in the 1994 Zero Hour event. The “original” portly Alfred suddenly reappears (from another timeline) — and, spoiler alert — disappears at the end of the story.

No matter: Stelfreeze’s cover painting is terrific, and Brian purposely added all the stains and scratches to give it an aged look.

Bonus: I can cover up his signature and no one realizes Brian painted it; it’s (obviously) nothing like his traditional painting style.

Zero Hour — The first large-scale crossover event at DC since Crisis on Infinite Earths, is celebrating its 30thanniversary. It’s a timeline event, designed primarily to clean up some continuity holes left behind by “Crisis.” Some get fixed, some don’t, but it’s a fun crossover, regardless. (And of course I’m biased, because pal Dan Jurgens wrote and drew the original mini-series.  A brand new 30th anniversary special featuring a new story by Dan and Ron Marz landed on shelves last week.)

Alfred makes his first appearance in Batman #16; He loses weight a year or so later when a thinner actor is cast in the role in the first Batman movie serial.

Howard Chaykin — ‘Round About Midnight

Original Art and The Artists

Midnight Men #4, September 1993

Howard Chaykin, Original Art page from Midnight Men #4, from the collection of Greg Goldstein

Never let a great idea go to waste.

Howard Chaykin turned an unused Batman pitch into an imaginative new series for the extremely short lived “Heavy Hitters” imprint from Marvel/Epic in 1993.

I’ve seen most of the original art for this title, and each page is beautiful: Great storytelling, terrific draftsmanship, and a generous use of deep India ink and screen tone for depth and effect.  He worked his ass off on these pages, and it shows.

Bonus: Great lettering, as always, by John Workman.

Honestly, the only thing I don’t like about the series is the coloring (not by Howard), but hey, it was the 90s.

The four-issue series has never been collected, but individual issues typically turn up in dollar bins, and are worth seeking out.

Remember, you can’t kill the Midnight Men.

I’m sure I’ve used this photograph elsewhere, but, we are pals, and I like it. Sue me.

Michael Keaton — Batman Redux

Original Art and The Artists

Michael Keaton is trending this week because of the Oscars “Batman” moment between him and Arnold Schwarzenegger/ Danny DeVito this past Sunday.

Many of the comments discuss Keaton being the “best” Batman.

Now, as I’ve said previously, I never loved the way his face looked in that original cowl. That’s partly the fault of the costume, and perhaps partly Keaton’s face shape. And the resulting style guide art was… not great.

That said —

Keaton is still the most enjoyable version of Bruce Wayne on screen. By far.

Keaton’s Wayne is both charming and offbeat. He’s very self-aware, has a sense of a humor and charisma, but still on the edge — likely bordering on psychotic. He provides many, many shades to the Wayne persona. His main scene with Bassinger and Wuhl is one of the great moments from the first film.

And hilariously, the whole “Keaton is the best Batman” thread is one of the most ironic critiques in entertainment history.

Why? Because even without the Internet and social media, the trolls managed to make so much negative noise about Keaton cast as Batman in Tim Burton’s 1989 feature.

“The guy from Beetlejuice? Seriously?”

The long knives were out for Burton, Warner Brothers, DC, and pretty much anyone and everyone associated with film prior to release.

Seriously, I don’t how the casting would have survived if social media had existed in 1988.

Which reminds us of the late, great William Goldman’s classic comment:

“Nobody knows anything.”

Except, at least in this case, Tim Burton.

Darwin Cooke — Getting In The Spirit

Original Art and The Artists

Batman / The Spirit #1, January 2007

Batman /The Spirit Cover #1 Original Art by Darwin Cooke from the collection of Greg Goldstein.

Darwyn Cooke welcomes The Spirit into the DC Universe with this outstanding cover featuring Will Eisner’s legendary creation, facing off against… well another pretty well-known comic book legend.

Cooke’s take on The Spirit is one of my favorites, and this entire double issue, with inks by J Bone and colors by Dave Stewart is simply wonderful. It definitely deserved its Eisner award (so appropriate) for best single issue of 2007. 

This cover is the only Spirit art that Darwyn penciled and inked himself, since this issue, and the subsequent ongoing, was inked on separate blue-line by Bone.

Fun fact: The cover was solicited for sale in its original version, and then ultimately flipped for actual publication. Makes sense, since the title is Batman/The Spirit, not the other way around.

Happy Will Eisner Week!

Paul Smith — Joke’s On Us

Original Art and The Artists

Joker Speciality Piece, 2020

Paul Smith Joker Speciality Original art from the collection of Greg Goldstein

True Story:

Nearly everyone I spent some time with at NYCC 2023 ended up with Covid-19. I indeed returned from the show feeling a bit under the weather, but when I tested negative, I assumed I had a case of the more common “con-crud” and went about my business. 

Next day, I stopped at a local fast-food taco joint for a seasonal lobster burrito and COULD NOT TASTE IT. So, I went home and took the test again, tested negative, and napped. Woke up, ate dinner, still couldn’t taste a thing, and went back to sleep.

Next morning, tested again. Third time a “charm?” Nope, still negative. Did some homework, and learned the home kits have about a 15 percent false negative result. Called the doctor’s office, and the nurse told me to check back in if I felt worse. I could practically see her shrug through the phone.

Fortunately, I didn’t get worse, and my taste buds returned to normal in a few days. Covid? Maybe. Maybe not. Welcome to the 2020s.

Which makes this great Paul Smith specialty art even greater. In my case, The Joker could have burned the test, and it wouldn’t have mattered.

Oh, and the punchline: Where did I acquire this art? 

NYCC 2023. 

Kismet, no?

Some additional Paul Smith takes on the Batman family…

Irv Novick & Dick Giordano — Silent Night, Deadly Night

Original Art and The Artists

Batman #239, February 1972

It’s surprising — and definitely a miss  — that only a few “Christmas” superhero stories have had made much impact in the comic book format.

But of the ones that do exist, Batman’s “Silent Night, Deadly Night” (Denny O’Neil) is one of the key holiday classics for Silver Age/ Bronze Age fans.

I’m not sure I had ever seen an original page from this story prior to acquiring this one, a few short weeks ago. None have ever been offered by Heritage Auctions for sale, and their database is a reasonable bellwether for historical availability, at least in this century.

Did I wildly overpay? Probably. Did I pay the right price? Possibly. Do I want to get into a bidding war with someone else who wants this page and find out?

Nope.

And that, my friends, is how you have unexpectedly large bill come due during holiday season.

Great page, legendary story, and the sweet spot of my superhero comic book reading era. 

There was nothing I could do.

Welcome to Day 11 of the 12 DC Days of DeCember.

Oddly, you can only find this classic story in two reprints beyond the original — this 1974 DC treasury, and the sixth and final volume of DC’s Batman Showcase black and white reprint series.

Mike Parobeck — Batman, Forever

Original Art and The Artists

Batman Adventures #7, April 1993

Kevin Conroy THE voice of Batman for millions of bat fans, has passed at at age 66. From Comic Art Fans:

“The Bat-signal will shine a little dimmer over Gotham City tonight as word has come down that Kevin Conroy, iconic voice of Batman for generations in the Bruce Timm-verse of cartoons, has passed at age 66. Just this past he added the credit of comics writer to his resume with a short story in the DC Pride 2022 anthology about how he related his secret life as a gay man in the 80s to the Dark Knight. 

“Kevin was a brilliant actor,” co-star Mark Hamill said in a statement. “For several generations, he has been the definitive Batman. It was one of those perfect scenarios where they got the exact right guy for the exact right part, and the world was better for it. His rhythms and subtleties, tones and delivery — that all also helped inform my performance. He was the ideal partner – it was such a complementary, creative experience. I couldn’t have done it without him. He will always be my Batman.”

 Our deepest condolences to his family, friends, and fans around the world.”

Posting this great Batman Animated page by the great Mike Parobeck, who also passed much too soon, to remind us that, fortunately, the work will always live on.

Cam Kennedy — The Wire

Original Art and The Artists

Batman / Judge Dredd: Vendetta in Gotham, January 1994

Earlier this week, we posted a beautiful page from one of two Batman / Punisher crossovers. Today we have a terrific Cam Kennedy action page from the second of four Batman / Judge Dredd prestige format comics by writers Alan Grant and John Wagner.

The complete list as follows, thanks to our friends at the Grand Comic Database — GCD. (This blog would be lost without them.)

Batman / Judge Dredd: Judgment on Gotham (DC, 1991 series);
Batman / Judge Dredd: Vendetta in Gotham (DC, 1993 series);
Batman / Judge Dredd: The Ultimate Riddle (DC, 1995 series);
Batman / Judge Dredd: Die Laughing 1,2 (DC, 1998 series).

Now all we need is Punisher / Judge Dredd crossover and we’d be all set. Unfortunately, Marvel doesn’t do crossovers anymore. Sigh.