Doctor Doom’s greatest fantasy? Murdering Reed Richards, of course.
And if you have your own planet, you too can make your dreams come true.
Leo Manco nicely illustrates Doom choking Reed on this page from the Emperor Doom mini-series.
Reminds me of a film moment of a certain costumed villain that looks an awful lot like Doctor Doom. Art imitates art, imitates art, ad infinitum, apparently.
Manco, an Argentinian artist, is terrific, and I wish we’d see more of his work in the comic book space.
The similarities between Darth Vader and Doctor Doom always choke me up. (Ouch.)Per our last post, Lucas owes some public tribute to Jack Kirby as far as we are concerned.
Doctor Doom — Marvel’s first iconic super villain of the Silver Age* — celebrates his 60th anniversary this year.
And I have a question.
How are the MCU pros going to create a new on-screen look for the character that is true to form, but doesn’t look goofy as hell? These folks are the best in the business, but that’s a hell of challenge. Lesser talents have failed, not once, not even twice, but three times.**
They could go all black (always a safe choice) and make the costume more technological and futuristic, but… I believe George Lucas already beat them to the punch by about 45 years.***
The comic book Doom costume is one of those that almost makes sense in 2D, but three-dimensional? Oof.
I’m definitely looking forward to seeing the results, maybe even later this year, if we’re lucky.
And, as always, we digress.
Here, the versatile Ron Lim creates a dramatic splash page with the most Doctor Doom you will ever see in once place. You see, the good doctor has this cool hobby of building robots in his spare time.
Lots of them, apparently.
Fun fact footnotes:
Ok, Sub-Mariner beat Doom by a full issue — or more than 20 years, depending on how you count Silver Age vs. Golden Age — but I can’t fully embrace him as a villain. (This despite the fact that Doom and Sub-Mariner later appeared together in a comic book called Super-Villain Team-Up.)
** Two contemporary big budget film releases, plus the officially unreleased Roger Corman version. I probably shouldn’t count that, but I do. Sue me.
*** Lucas has yet to acknowledge that Darth Vader is essentially a mash-up of two Jack Kirby comic book creations, Doctor Doom and Darkseid. C’mon George, fess up.
Clayton Henry’s cover to the Fantastic Five is an homage (swipe?) of Kirby’s FF Annual #2
Doctor Doom’s first appearance features a ridiculous bird for good measure.
Art Adams pays homage to Neal Adams with this terrific Avengers variant cover from 2014.
Neal’s original Avengers (#92) cover is from 1971, and remains one of my personal favorites. In addition to loving the dramatic art and striking colors, I have a fond memory of guessing the cover’s story gimmick before I actually read the comic.
(Spoiler alert: Thor, Cap and Iron Man are actually skrulls, which we don’t find out until the next issue. Another spoiler: Writer Roy Thomas shortcuts some of the backstory of how that came to pass — blink and you might miss it. Before it’s all over though, the Avengers will find themselves in the middle of the Kree-Skrull war. But, as always, we digress.)
Art’s modern version swaps out X-Men for Avengers, and seamlessly adds additional characters as well.
2021-2022 is the 50th Anniversary of the Kree–Skrull war, so… Happy Anniversary, and Happy New Year!
This Hulk story — from Incredible Hulk Annual #14 — is a direct outcome of one of the oddest creative moments in Marvel Comics history.
Why so odd? The creative teams on Alpha Flight and The Incredible Hulk did a complete switch with each other. And naturally, they did a crossover to bring readers up to speed. Also, the Secret Wars sequel is involved.
But as always, we digress.
John Byrne, who had been on Alpha Flight, commenced his (ultimately brief) run with issue #314 and this annual, simultaneously. (Bill Mantlo and Mike Mignola went over to Alpha Flight.) And, as prolific as John is, even he can’t produce that many pages at once, so he enlisted art support from Sal Buscema, who penciled and inked the full double issue.
Sal Buscema on the Hulk? Always great.
Sal Buscema on everything else? Always great, too.
After a crossover — and a Secret Wars tie-in — creative teams on The Incredible Hulk and Alpha Flight fully flip-flopped, a first in comics history.
I couldn’t imagine I’d ever see Bill Sienkiewicz create a Jack Kirby version of the Hulk, and then I ran across this odd and trippy one-shot issue featuring an unusual pairing of the Sentry and the green goliath.
And sure enough, during some flashback scenes / dream sequences, we do indeed see Bill’s Kirby-style Hulk, crackle and all.
As a bonus, on this great page, we get “traditional” Bill art along with the Kirby homage.
Definitely a keeper.
Bill combines classic and contemporary images on some beautiful pages throughout this one-shot.
If you’re Chris Giarusso, cartoonist extraordinaire, it’s Green vs. Red vs… Blue?
The Hulk’s co-creator, Stan Lee, would have turned 99 years old today. He might not have ever envisioned a world of rainbow-colored Hulks, but “Hulk Splash?” That’s a gag worthy of Not Brand Ecch.
Happy Birthday Stan. Say hello to Jack and the rest of the team for us.
Here we have a savage Hulk in a… savage land. But unlike his time on “Planet Hulk”, this story takes place on Earth, literally in the “Savage Land”(hidden away in Antarctica), home to Ka-Zar and plenty of prehistoric creatures and other odd denizens.
Dale Eaglesham’s dramatic rendering of the green goliath is the title splash of the issue, despite the fact it’s the last page as well.
Remember when all Marvel Comics had a great opening splash page on page one? Me too, and call me old fashioned, but I liked that formula.
And speaking of old fashioned — once again, I think the dark, overly rendered color detracts from the detailed art, instead of enhancing it.
My favorite version of the Hulk the last 35 years or so?
Mr.Fixit, of course. The gang enforcer you, absolutely, positively don’t want to mess with.
That “character” pretty much disappeared when Peter David left the Hulk title, but he makes a comeback here courtesy of Paul Jenkins and the criminally (pun intended) underrated Kyle Hotz.
And Eric Powell on inks? Count me in, of course.
From our world to others… Mr Fixit was a different kind of Hulk.
Secret Wars Novel, Novo Seculo Brazilian Edition (“Guerras Secretas”), 2015
The Hulk saves his fellow superheroes by holding up a … mountain.
And no, you can’t make this up. It’s Will Conrad’s very dramatic rendering of the original Secret Wars story (Issue #4, 1985) for a contemporary Brazilian edition of a Secret Wars novelization.
How did Jim Shooter come up with 150 Billion Tons? I’m really going to have to ask him that one of these days. All I know is there are some pretty powerful heroes counting on ‘Ol Greenskin, no matter how much those rocks weigh.
Will has done a number of these Brazilian novelization covers and they are all fabulous, but this is my favorite.
Another version of Hulk holding the mountain, from Spider-man and the Secret Wars #1(2010.)
Our 12 Days of Hulk special has featured some great splash paged from the likes of Gabe Hardman, Gary Frank, Ed McGuiness and others.
To change things up a bit, day six features a terrific panel page form Dale Keown, who imaginatively utilizes a variety of panel sizes and “camera angles” to keep things fresh for writer Peter David — and the audience.
I love this page — in addition to the feature listed above, it uses lettering and sound effects to maximum effect. Also, it features some terrific lighting, especially on that first panel of a freaked out Hulk.
Plus, a Defenders reunion.
David’s astonishing 12-year run on the Incredible Hulk title featured great art from the likes of Todd McFarlane, Jeff Purves, Liam Sharp and others, but I confess a certain bias towards Keown’s work on the title. As evidenced here, he has an artistic wit that complemented David’s stories perfectly.
Back here on Tuesday… with Day 7 of “12 Days of Hulk.”
