Wally Wood – Page 2 – Greg Goldstein's Comic Art Gallery

Jack Kirby & Wallace Wood — Blastoff

June 26, 2021 Greg Goldstein Original Art and The Artists

Sky Masters, Daily Strip, June 15, 1959

What if…

Jack Kirby’s 1958 Sky Masters newspaper comic strip — about the nascent space race — had turned into a giant hit for Jack, and partner Dave Wood.

What if…

Kirby had been able to easily solve any financial dispute with DC editor Jack Schiff about the strip’s royalty terms. (The News syndicate had originally approached Schiff about the creation of the strip, and Schiff appears to be the intermediary between the syndicate and writer Dave Wood.)

What if…

Despite any financial acrimony over the strip, Schiff didn’t fire Kirby from Challengers of the Unknown… and all of DC comics.

You can see where this is going —

Jack continues to draw Sky Masters, fits in some DC comics work whenever possible, and never finds any time to return to Atlas/Marvel.

And “The Marvel Age of Comics” takes a completely different turn, if it even manages to leave the launching pad.

For those interested in the nitty gritty of dispute, Wikipedia has done a good job of assembling an overview (and sources) here.

Writer Jon B. Cooke provides an even more detailed summary, from the Jack Kirby Collector.

Fun fact: For many years, like most fans, I thought the “Wood” on Kirby/Wood signature referred to Wallace Wood as inker. It actually referred to Dave Wood and his brother Dick who co-wrote the strip. This, despite the fact that that Woody actually did ink the strip for about the first year, including the example above. (Dick Ayers eventually came on the strip as inker, and ultimately Jack inked it himself, likely with help of wife Roz.)

Continuing our month long celebration of the great adventure comic strips:
Week 1: Superheroes
Week 2: Detectives
Week 3: SF
Week 4: Comic Book Giants

Ric Estrada — Of Blood And Roses

May 13, 2021 Greg Goldstein Original Art and The Artists

Unknown Soldier #220, October 1978

Ric Estrada channels legendary artist Alex Toth in this short story about the Boer War.

Estrada had previously worked with, and channeled Toth on a short-lived Hot Wheels series from DC in 1970. In fact, his style was so similar, that an original page from one of those stories was misidentified as Toth at least twice.

So no surprise that this story also feels like a “Toth.” The lettering (un-credited) definitely adds to the style.

Estrada, of course, was a talent in his own right (and under-appreciated by many) and an excellent storyteller. He didn’t enjoy drawing super hero stories, and that may have impacted his “brand.”

When he did draw capes and tights, his storytelling was typically creative and dynamic. His layouts are a terrific fit with Wood Inks on All-Star Squadron. His layout choices appear more inventive and less stiff than Woody’s.

What? Heresy you say? Read those AS issues again and compare pages — Wood’s layouts vs. Estrada’s.

I’ll wait.

(Author’s note — Wood is one of the all time greats, and one of my absolute personal favorites. In this specific case, I’m just calling it the way I see it.)

*The published title page for the story, and an unpublished pin-up tribute to Toth.*

Bob Powell And Wallace Wood — Buddy Movie

January 23, 2021 Greg Goldstein Original Art and The Artists

Strange tales #134, July 1965

The Human Torch and Thing buddy comedies of the early 60s come to an end in this cool penultimate page by Bob Powell and Wallace Wood.

Torch solo stories started in Strange Tales #101 (hey, it worked in the Golden Age) and within a few years, the Thing was added to the strip as well. An ever-changing group of creators, and frankly, some second-rate stories and villains, didn’t apparently do much for sales, and our Fantastic two get bumped by Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. in the very next issue.

Meanwhile, this amusing story features time travel, The Watcher, Merlin the Magician, and Kang the Conqueror, who is apparently about to play an important role in the MCU. (It’s only his third appearance as “Kang” at this point, following two run-ins with the Avengers.)

Because I love time travel stories I can forgive all of it — except maybe Powell and Wood’s execution of the Thing. They are not alone though in rocky renditions of Ben Grimm. Flipping through these old Strange Tales stories, very few artists other than Jack Kirby seemed to figure out how to successfully make anatomic sense of a character made from rocks.

It’s clobberin’ time, indeed.

The Silver Age gets retro-golden very quickly in these early Torch Strange Tales stories. (Although, for the record, that’s an imposter pretending to be Captain America. But you wouldn’t know it until you bought the issue, or stood around reading it at Dave’s Luncheonette until he kicked you out.)

Gil Kane and Wallace Wood — Toys For The Holidays (Part 2)

December 29, 2020 Greg Goldstein Original Art and The Artists

Captain Action #3, May 1969

Can lightning strike twice in the toy biz? Inventor Stan Weston thought so, and I for one, became proof of concept.

Weston had created the original 12” G.I. Joe “doll” for Hasbro in 1964 and younger baby boomers like myself quickly became obsessed with the figures and all their wonderfully detailed accessories.

Next up: Weston took his invention to Ideal Toys in 1966, and turned it into a superhero concept, capturing the zeitgeist of the era. Captain Action was born, and despite the goofy name, its dozen licensed superhero costumes were a terrific gimmick.

Kids could turn the good captain into a number of well-known characters including Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, Captain America and Aquaman.

And the best part? The costumes and accessories worked just fine with existing G.I. Joes, so any crafty kid (we were all crafty, FYI) could create a multiverse Justice League without buying multiple Captain Action figures.

The toy line burned brightly, but briefly, and by 1968/69, the product was heading to the closeout racks. That apparently didn’t concern DC, which licensed the character for yet another brief comic book series.

Fortunately, visual storytelling chores were handled by Gil Kane and Wally Wood, making for some great original art. (Wood drew issue #1 solo, and then inked Gil on issues #2, #3 and #5. Gil scripted, penciled and inked issue #4.)

This cool page features the origin of “Dr. Evil,” main nemesis to the good Captain. Remember when I said the Captain Action name was goofy? I have no words for naming a villain “Dr. Evil.”

Wallace Wood — The Truth Is Out There

November 7, 2020 Greg Goldstein Original Art and The Artists

Weird Science Fantasy #26, December 1954

I love stories about UFO sightings. As a kid, that was a (small) section of the library I often haunted.

I don’t believe that aliens are touring our planet, but I’d love to find out I’m mistaken. The problem, of course, is that the science, as we understand it today, makes it pretty unlikely. (A fun book on the subject, The Physics of Star Trek, dives into the detail.)

I like UFO stories so much that this was one of the first actual EC back issues I ever forked over my hard-earned allowance for back in the early 70s.

I don’t own that issue anymore, I sold it when Russ Cochran’s reprints started covering the EC bases.

But I own this great “one-pager” of Wood original art — something I could never have conceived of as a kid.

And who knows? Maybe one day, extraterrestrials actually will land on the White House South Lawn and tell us: “Einstein, nice man, he just had one part of the formula incorrect.”

Happy 50^th EC Comics!

Wallace Wood — EC’s Finest Warms Up

November 5, 2020 Greg Goldstein Original Art and The Artists

Weird Science #8, July 1951

Earlier in the year, we celebrated EC Comics “New Trend” 50th anniversary with some great original art examples from the legendary Jack Davis. Today — and Saturday — we will celebrate once again, this time with the astonishing Wallace Wood.

Woody hadn’t quite hit his artistic prime yet when he drew this Weird Science tale, “The Probers.” But he was perhaps at his most prolific, pencilling and inking up to three pages a day(!) for EC and other publishers of the day.

That sheer volume would decrease as Woody’s detail became more and more intricate, and the finishes more and more polished. In a very short time, Wood’s peers would pretty much always refer to him as best in class.

*Some of Woody’s great SF art (Non EC) can be found in his 50s comic book stories, as well as his illustrations for Galaxy magazine.*

Wallace Wood — All Star

April 23, 2020 Greg Goldstein 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.

Steve Ditko and Wallace Wood — Time Of Death

February 13, 2020 Greg Goldstein Original Art and The Artists

T.H.U.N.D.E.R Agents #7, August 1966

Death in superhero comic books had always been a gimmick. “Robin Dies at Dawn” likely meant he would be back by dinnertime. (In fairness, it’s a pretty good story.)

Imaginary stories, hoaxes, dreams, mad science, robots, time travel, alien resurrection, etc. all kept our featured players in good health. There was not much chance a title character was going to exit from his book permanently.

So back in the 60s, legitimately killing a character was in fact, a groundbreaking novelty. And this T.H.U.N.D.E.R Agents story is one of the first. Ditko, Wood and company had spent 6 issues developing the character of Menthor (John Janus), and they shot him to death on this page in Issue #7.

This historic page captures that collaborative methodology of Woody and the Tower artistic team on T.H.U.N.D.E.R Agents. Dan Adkins scripted and provided layouts, Ditko penciled the story, and Wood inked it, with assists by Adkins.

The original T.H.U.N.D.E.R Agents lasted only last 20 issues, and perhaps, had it survived, John would have been resurrected at some point. But it certainly did not appear that way.

Unlike, say, modern times where killing a lead character is a gimmick once again.

Superman. Dead. Then alive.

Batman. Dead? Nope, he’s back.

Captain America? Reborn. Bucky? Not dead, just hiding in Russia for a few decades.

Etc.

*A few months after the death of Menthor, teenaged writerJim Shooter kills off (spoiler alert) Ferro Lad in the Legion of Super-Heroes.*

Menthor’s powers derived from a “cybernetic” helmet, so t was no surprise that another character would don the helmet and ultimately become a new Menthor when T.H.U.N.D.E.R Agents was resurrected by other publishers. John Janus? Still dead, I believe.

Wallace Wood — Agent of Change

February 11, 2020 Greg Goldstein Original Art and The Artists

T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents #11, March 1967

Wallace Wood made his move.

The frustrated artist, working “Marvel style” on Daredevil — plotting AND drawing — but only paid for the art, heard about a new opportunity. Tower, primarily a book publisher, had decided to take a leap of faith into the comics biz, and Woody was ready to help them.

It was the perfect role for Woody, who had carte blanche to develop the comics as hew saw fit. He was artist, storyteller, art director and defacto editor — all rolled into one.

And with the help of friends/colleagues Len Brown (Topps Mars Attacks) and Dan Adkins, T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents was born.

Combining a super powered team (think Justice League) with a secret spy organization (ala S.H.I.E.L.D., which had just launched a few months prior) T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents was an effort to capitalize on the secret agent pop culture craze. (James Bond, Man from U.N.C.LE., et al.).

This page is a great example Wood’s crystal clear storytelling and trademark inks. Adkins is credited in some instances on this story as the penciller, with Wood on inks, and due to the collaborative nature of the creative teams on these stories, it’s often easy to lose the thread of who did what.

But this looks like pure Wood here, as Dynamo and his “duplicate” (there are actually three Dynamos in this story — don’t ask) are mowed down in a hail of bullets.

I’ve I always wanted to use that phrase.

Who are you going to call?:

T.H.U.N.D.E.R. The Higher United Nations Defense Enforcement Reserves.

U.N.C.LE. United Network Command for Law and Enforcement.

S.H.I.E.L.D: Originally Supreme Headquarters, International Espionage and Law-Enforcement Division and later Strategic Hazard Intervention Espionage Logistics Directorate. In the MCU film and TV Universe, it means Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division^.

*By 1965, the super-spy craze (and acronym obsession) was in full bore in pop culture.*

By the time of T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents launch, Wood had created two bonafide superhero masterpieces. The Superman parody in Mad Comics and the Daredevil and Sub-Mariner crossover in DD#7 are still considered classics today.

Denys Cowan and Bill Sienkiewicz — Meta Human

January 7, 2020 Greg Goldstein Original Art and The Artists

The Question #37, March 2010

HBO’s Watchmen was an unexpected television smash of 2019, and it has landed on a number of best of lists. This series of posts explores the Watchmen characters, which have roots in the more traditional superhero universe.

Steve Ditko creates the iconic and mature character Mr. A (with moral absolutism as his trademark) in 1967 for the prozine Witzend, published by Wally Wood.

A few months later, Ditko tones down the violence and moral absolutism just a bit, and creates a more comics-code friendly character, The Question, for Charlton Comics.

In 1983, DC acquires the Charlton superheroes from the financially strapped publisher. The characters first appear in 1985’s mega-event Crisis on Infinite Earths as inhabitants of “Earth Four.”

In 1986 Alan Moore retools the Question/Mr. A as Rorschach for Watchmen.

Even before Watchmen concludes, the Question receives his first own ongoing (and very mature) DC series by Denny O’Neil and Denys Cowan.

In issue #17 of that series, the Question (Vic Sage) reads a Watchmen comic and dreams that he is Rorschach.

A most meta series of events.

Ultimately, The Question series ran 36 issues, ending in 1990. 20 years later, DC added an extra issue as part of the Blackest Night storyline that brought back additional issues of previously cancelled comics.

Which brings us here: In this issue, Bill Sienkiewicz, who drew or inked nearly all of the covers for that original series, inks an entire issue for the first time over Denys Cowan’s dynamic pencils. (Cowan had penciled all but one original issue.)

This is the last page (Renee Montoya is The Question here) from the story. But, of course, certainly not the last of The Question. As he/she has already appeared a few times since, most recently notably in Grant Morrison’s Multiversity: Pax Americana on a new version of Earth Four.

And, in this universe, Vic Sage sounds a lot like… Rorschach.

And the circle continues….