Re: Why was Jack Kirby so popular?
Will Dockery
> On Sep 21, 10:13 am, grinningdemon wrote:
>
> > I never liked Jack Kirby's style either...he was a great creator
> > and designer but I never cared for his art...let the lynching begin.
>
> Everybody is entitled to an opinion, even if it's a stupid one. ;)
I guess that about covers it!
Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
Now that's grounds fer a lynchin'.
--
Music & poetry of Will Dockery (no charge!):
http://www.myspace.com/willdockery
Duggy
> x-no-archive: yes
>
> Will Dockery wrote:
> > Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
> > forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
> > Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>
Nah, all of his characters would be seen as rip-offs of stuff The King
created years ago.
===
= DUG.
===
plausible prose man
> On Sep 21, 2:13 pm, TheWatcherUatu <gro...@videlicet.org> wrote:
>
> > On Sep 21, 10:13 am, grinningdemon wrote:
>
> > > I never liked Jack Kirby's style either...he was a great creator
> > > and designer but I never cared for his art...let the lynching begin.
>
> > Everybody is entitled to an opinion, even if it's a stupid one. ;)
>
> I guess that about covers it!
>
> Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
> forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
> Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>
> Now that's grounds fer a lynchin'.
When Jack was great, he was really great. But he sure put out a lot
of dross, he was far from the best pure draughtsman, and he was
generally underserved by his inkers.
grinningdemon
>x-no-archive: yes
>
>Will Dockery wrote:
>> Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
>> forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
>> Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>
>But would Kirby be popular with readers today...
I doubt it...his style isn't flashy enough by modern standards...he
might do alright but he wouldn't be the megastar he was in his day.
stephen...@gmail.com
Mahnke, his work would seem "naive" and "primitive", but in his prime,
Jack's strength was that his characters were always doing something. I
read somewhere that up to 60% of his panels were action shots - a much
higher proportion than anyone else at that time, and infinitely higher
than any of todays artists, whose characters stand around talking for
two-thirds of the book.
On 22 Sep, 04:37, grinningdemon <grinningde...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
Duggy
<stephen.gitt...@gmail.com> wrote:
> In comparison to today's superstar artists like Finch, Cassaday and
> Mahnke, his work would seem "naive" and "primitive", but in his prime,
> Jack's strength was that his characters were always doing something. I
> read somewhere that up to 60% of his panels were action shots - a much
> higher proportion than anyone else at that time, and infinitely higher
> than any of todays artists, whose characters stand around talking for
> two-thirds of the book.
Is that the artist's fault or the writers?
===
= DUG.
===
Quadibloc
> When Jack was great, he was really great. But he sure put out a lot
> of dross, he was far from the best pure draughtsman, and he was
> generally underserved by his inkers.
His creativity is, of course, what people really admire.
Today's popular artists are not the greatest draughtsmen either, for
that matter. They seem to be drawing on Gil Kane for some of their
inspiration, but abuse anatomical proportion. Rob Liefield is just one
example, and not the most egregious.
It is possible to draw women who are... unusually well endowed...
without throwing anatomy (and even perspective) to the winds. May I
recommend the great Wally Wood, who created the look of Power Girl, as
someone to study?
Artists like Russ Manning, Curt Swan, Jim Steranko, Dan Adkins, Al
Williamson, Harold Foster, George Perez, Gil Kane, Carmine Infanito
and Alex Raymond... just to name a few... are well-remembered and well-
recognized. Although, I have to admit, I wish they would be even more
well-recognized.
When Jack Kirby _was_ well-served by his inkers - Fantastic Four #5,
and the period around #65 - of course, the results held up in that
company as well. But his originality and creativity are what elevated
him to another plane.
John Savard
Tim Turnip
>x-no-archive: yes
>
>Will Dockery wrote:
>> Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
>> forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
>> Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>
>But would Kirby be popular with readers today...
The question itself contains a fallacy -- it's like asking what would
happen if a technology like the transistor or the combustion engine
wasn't developed until modern times. You'd have to go back and plot
what the entire history would be leading up to that point, and what
you'd end up with is an entirely different reality.
The reason Jack Kirby was so popular is that, back then, he did what
everyone else did better than everyone else. But the reason he
endures is that it's now clear he LED everyone else in terms of
innovation and originality.
plausible prose man
> On Sep 21, 9:04 pm, plausible prose man <Georgefha...@aol.com> wrote:
>
> > When Jack was great, he was really great. But he sure put out a lot
> > of dross, he was far from the best pure draughtsman, and he was
> > generally underserved by his inkers.
>
> His creativity is, of course, what people really admire.
That, and his dynamism and cosmic wonder
> Today's popular artists are not the greatest draughtsmen either,
I can imagine Neal Adams, say, drawing a pretty good comic of Captain
America fighting Batroc. I'm not at all sure how he'd do with Metron
before the Promethean Giants, or Urgund splitting into New Genesis and
Apokalips.
> for
> that matter. They seem to be drawing on Gil Kane for some of their
> inspiration, but abuse anatomical proportion.
The one that really gets me is Greg Land. I don't get how you can
lightbox everything and still blow the proportions.
> Rob Liefield is just one
> example, and not the most egregious.
No worse artist has ever been more popular, and no more popular
artist has ever been worse.
> It is possible to draw women who are... unusually well endowed...
> without throwing anatomy
Mike Turner used to, you know, bend the rules there, especially when
he was getting sick. You get the impression Rob just never knew them
in the first place. Compare
http://www.comicartcommunity.com/gallery/details.php?image_id=25389
With the first picture on this page:
http://progressiveboink.com/archive/robliefeld.html
(and even perspective) to the winds. May I
> recommend the great Wally Wood, who created the look of Power Girl, as
> someone to study?
And yet, everyone hates Jerry Ordway...go figure.
> Artists like Russ Manning, Curt Swan, Jim Steranko, Dan Adkins, Al
> Williamson, Harold Foster, George Perez, Gil Kane, Carmine Infanito
> and Alex Raymond... just to name a few... are well-remembered and well-
> recognized. Although, I have to admit, I wish they would be even more
> well-recognized.
>
> When Jack Kirby _was_ well-served by his inkers - Fantastic Four #5,
> and the period around #65 - of course, the results held up in that
> company as well.
Then again...if you ask Deep Thought, or, uh...you know, Google "who
is the worst inker ever?" the answer comes back "Vince Colleta"
> But his originality and creativity are what elevated
> him to another plane.
He sure was an amazing idea factory, yeah. And if you told him he
only had to draw one book a month, and Scott Williams was going to ink
it, well..yeah, then I think you would have a total fan favorite there.
YKW
f4c3fb...@k11g2000vbf.googlegroups.com:
> It is possible to draw women who are... unusually well endowed...
> without throwing anatomy (and even perspective) to the winds. May I
> recommend the great Wally Wood, who created the look of Power Girl, as
> someone to study?
Joe Orlando created her look, with some kibitzing from Ric Estrada (the
original artist on the 1970s ASC revival). Wood wasn't even her penciller
for the first year or so (that was Estrada, followed by an embryonic
Keith Giffen), although he =is= sometimes credited for inking her in a
way that tested the limits of the CCA.
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-- The One, 14 Oct 08
Quadibloc
> Joe Orlando created her look, with some kibitzing from Ric Estrada (the
> original artist on the 1970s ASC revival). Wood wasn't even her penciller
> for the first year or so (that was Estrada, followed by an embryonic
> Keith Giffen), although he =is= sometimes credited for inking her in a
> way that tested the limits of the CCA.
I thought I would check up on this:
http://www.asitecalledfred.com/comics101/141.html
claims that her first appearance in All-Star Comics 58 was drawn by
Ric Estrada and Wally Wood, and the style of the artwork - her _face_,
for example - certainly makes me think of Wally Wood.
Seeing this page, though, I learned of her brief episode with reduced
power levels. I knew of her temporary Arion origin, but I hadn't
realized she had been buffetted around as badly as Wonder Woman.
John Savard
plausible prose man
> On Sep 22, 12:02 pm, YKW <Y...@YKW.YKW> wrote:
>
> > Joe Orlando created her look, with some kibitzing from Ric Estrada (the
> > original artist on the 1970s ASC revival). Wood wasn't even her penciller
> > for the first year or so (that was Estrada, followed by an embryonic
> > Keith Giffen), although he =is= sometimes credited for inking her in a
> > way that tested the limits of the CCA.
>
> I thought I would check up on this:
>
> http://www.asitecalledfred.com/comics101/141.html
>
> claims that her first appearance in All-Star Comics 58 was drawn by
> Ric Estrada and Wally Wood, and the style of the artwork - her _face_,
> for example - certainly makes me think of Wally Wood.
Keep in mind, as inker, Wally Wood, or any inker for that matter,
would've been more or less free to redraw virtually the entire image.
Also, Estrada was turning in less than fully pencilled pages.
RT: In your second story [#59] you're listed as "Designer" instead of
"Penciler." What did that mean? It says, "Ric Estrada, Designer; Wally
Wood, Artist." Did you do less finished pencils on the second one? On
the first, you're listed together as "Artists."
ESTRADA: It was a kind of an iffy thing that I never quite understood.
If you did finished pencils with shading and everything, they called
you a "penciler" or "artist." If you did layouts that were a little
more unfinished and fast, they called you a "designer"-and I think
that's what happened-that they needed a book fast, and I drew it
without any frills. They knew Wally Wood was going to ink it, so I
didn't have to put in too many details and shading. But my structures
and compositions were very complete.
RT: They wanted you mostly for the storytelling.
ESTRADA: Exactly. And that's been my strength most of the time. All my
life, storytelling is my forte.
whoswhoz
I used to know a couple of guys who worked as Woody's assistants. One
of their first tasks was to erase all the pencils he didn't like.
Will Dockery
Yeah, Vince Colletta was always a bit too "scritchy-scratchy" for
Kirby, imo, and the /slicker/ styles of, say Joe Sinnott on Fantastic
Four and when Mike Royer replaced Colletta on the 4th World, things
really got rolling.
Will Dockery
That's a big problem with Vince Colletta's inks on Kirby now that you
reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast spaces of
Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply erased.
Will Dockery
> On Tue, 21 Sep 2010 22:48:45 +0000, Madlove wrote:
> >Will Dockery wrote:
>
>> Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
> >> forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
> >> Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>
> >But would Kirby be popular with readers today...
>
> I doubt it...his style isn't flashy enough by modern standards...he
> might do alright but he wouldn't be the megastar he was in his day.
There's the question that if Jack Kirby was just starting today would
there even /be/ a comics industry as we know it?
I'm amazed at what seems to be forgotten by all the youngsters and may
old folks, as well, that there really would be no Marvel Comics
without Jack Kirby (& Stan, of course) to have created it. How would
comics have developed if DC had survived, but Marvel -in a world
without Jack Kirby- never survived into the 1960s?
Funny, I just assumed the importance of Jack Kirby in the history of
comics was a given... no wonder the comics of today are so lousy, I
suppose.
plausible prose man
In those days, at that company, it would be the artist's fault.
Marvel comics used to be written "marvel style," which meant that the
writer would give the artist a story synopsis, the artist would draw
the story, and then the writer would fill in the dialogue. You can
see where this gives the artist a lot more options as far as pacing
and how to block a scene compared to a full script like Alan Moore,
say, uses.
TheWatcherUatu
Well, that's just grinningdemon's assessment. If you had asked this
question during the height of McFarlane's career (which is where this
thread began), maybe there would have been some question as to Kirby's
art was "flashy" enough for the current mainstream audience. After
all, Kirby never drew 500 separate muscles bulging out of the forearm,
and I don't recall seeing a bunch of pouches all over his costume
designs. But ultimately, good art is just good art.
Will Dockery
>
> > Jack's strength was that his characters were always doing something. I
> > read somewhere that up to 60% of his panels were action shots - a much
> > higher proportion than anyone else at that time, and infinitely higher
> > than any of todays artists, whose characters stand around talking for
> > two-thirds of the book.
>
> Is that the artist's fault or the writers?
Back in Kirby's day, the days when Marvel was really up to something,
the artists really did control the story. Kirby would draw the issue
from a very basic idea from Stan Lee (if that, seems like Kirby would
sometimes hand the pages over to Lee & let him figure it out from
there), and Lee would add dialogue to Kirby's plot.
--
Music & poetry of Will Dockery:
http://www.myspace.com/willdockery
> ===
> = DUG.
> ===
YKW
ba50-586...@n7g2000vbo.googlegroups.com:
> That's a big problem with Vince Colletta's inks on Kirby now that you
> reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast spaces of
> Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply erased.
I'm torn on that. On one hand, you have Colletta removing Kirby figures
from 1965 THOR, Kirby at his height. A very bad thing.
On the other hand, you have fewer of Vinnie's chicken-scratches visible
on the printed page, fewer visuals for him to poop on. A very good thing.
Less great Kirby, but less horrible Colletta. Arrrgh. If only Stan had
just put Jazzy Johnny on Jack's brushwork when JRSR left DC for Marvel,
the world could have avoided this dilemma...
Will Dockery
> Will Dockery wrote in news:f9135822-62c7-47d6-
> ba50-586209be4...@n7g2000vbo.googlegroups.com:
>
> > That's a big problem with Vince Colletta's inks on Kirby now that you
> > reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast spaces of
> > Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply erased.
>
> I'm torn on that. On one hand, you have Colletta removing Kirby figures
> from 1965 THOR, Kirby at his height. A very bad thing.
>
> On the other hand, you have fewer of Vinnie's chicken-scratches visible
> on the printed page, fewer visuals for him to poop on. A very good thing.
Heh...
> Less great Kirby, but less horrible Colletta. Arrrgh. If only Stan had
> just put Jazzy Johnny on Jack's brushwork when JRSR left DC for Marvel,
> the world could have avoided this dilemma...
Why Colletta had such a major job, inking Kirby's Thor masterpieces,
then following directly to DC for the 4th World to skritchy-scratch
issue after issue of so many important titles at such a crucial time
in the Kirby saga..?
Was he and Kirby really good pals, did Kirby owe someone something...
what?
--
Music & poetry of Will Dockery:
http://www.myspace.com/willdockery
plausible prose man
> ba50-586209be4...@n7g2000vbo.googlegroups.com:
>
> > That's a big problem with Vince Colletta's inks on Kirby now that you
> > reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast spaces of
> > Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply erased.
>
> I'm torn on that. On one hand, you have Colletta removing Kirby figures
> from 1965 THOR, Kirby at his height. A very bad thing.
>
> On the other hand, you have fewer of Vinnie's chicken-scratches visible
> on the printed page, fewer visuals for him to poop on. A very good thing.
>
> Less great Kirby, but less horrible Colletta. Arrrgh. If only Stan had
> just put Jazzy Johnny on Jack's brushwork when JRSR left DC for Marvel,
I wonder what Tom Palmer would've done to Kirby.
grinningdemon
If he hadn't been there, someone else probably would have stepped
up...after all, as much credit as he deserves, he's far from the only
reason the industry kept going.
YKW
>On Sep 23, 7:28 pm, YKW <Y...@YKW.YKW> wrote:
>> Will Dockery wrote in news:f9135822-62c7-47d6-
>> ba50-586209be4...@n7g2000vbo.googlegroups.com:
>>
>> > That's a big problem with Vince Colletta's inks on Kirby now that
>> > you reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast
>> > spaces of Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply
>> > erased.
>>
>> I'm torn on that. On one hand, you have Colletta removing Kirby
>> figures from 1965 THOR, Kirby at his height. A very bad thing.
>>
>> On the other hand, you have fewer of Vinnie's chicken-scratches
>> visible on the printed page, fewer visuals for him to poop on. A very
>> good thing.
>
> Heh...
>
>> Less great Kirby, but less horrible Colletta. Arrrgh. If only Stan
>> had just put Jazzy Johnny on Jack's brushwork when JRSR left DC for
>> Marvel, the world could have avoided this dilemma...
>
> Why Colletta had such a major job, inking Kirby's Thor masterpieces,
> then following directly to DC for the 4th World to skritchy-scratch
> issue after issue of so many important titles at such a crucial time
> in the Kirby saga..?
>
> Was he and Kirby really good pals, did Kirby owe someone something...
> what?
Jack wasn't handing out assignments at Marvel in the 1960s; he wasn't on
staff there, let alone involved in matters at all smacking of editorial
direction/discretion. It would have been Stan handing out assignments on
anything of even remote significance in 1965-66. (Sol Brodsky would have
made the call on need-it-yesterday jobs, especially once Stan stopped
coming into the office more than two or three times a week.)
grinningdemon
>x-no-archive: yes
>
>Will Dockery wrote:
>> Funny, I just assumed the importance of Jack Kirby in the history of
>> comics was a given... no wonder the comics of today are so lousy, I
>> suppose.
>
>Comix have been crap for decades. I gave up on them in the 80s.
>The early stuff (50s, 60s, 70s) is still good tho!
Seems odd to be posting to a comics news group if you quit reading 20+
years ago...to each his own, I suppose.
I'll be the first to admit there is a ton of crap out there but there
are still plenty of good books if you know where to look...and there's
only a relative handful of books from before the 80s that interest me
in the slightest beyond nostalgia purposes.
plausible prose man
> On Sep 23, 7:28 pm, YKW <Y...@YKW.YKW> wrote:
>
> > Will Dockery wrote in news:f9135822-62c7-47d6-
> > ba50-586209be4...@n7g2000vbo.googlegroups.com:
>
> > > That's a big problem with Vince Colletta's inks on Kirby now that you
> > > reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast spaces of
> > > Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply erased.
>
> > I'm torn on that. On one hand, you have Colletta removing Kirby figures
> > from 1965 THOR, Kirby at his height. A very bad thing.
>
> > On the other hand, you have fewer of Vinnie's chicken-scratches visible
> > on the printed page, fewer visuals for him to poop on. A very good thing.
>
> Heh...
>
> > Less great Kirby, but less horrible Colletta. Arrrgh. If only Stan had
> > just put Jazzy Johnny on Jack's brushwork when JRSR left DC for Marvel,
> > the world could have avoided this dilemma...
>
> Why Colletta had such a major job, inking Kirby's Thor masterpieces,
> then following directly to DC for the 4th World to skritchy-scratch
> issue after issue of so many important titles at such a crucial time
> in the Kirby saga..?
Comics were even more of a sausage factory then than they are now,
and how many assignments you'd get would have more to do with how
successfully you could meet deadlines and otherwise deliver what was
expected of you compared to, you know, any actual talent or
creativity.
This pages shows us that Vince wasn't such a bad draughtsman after
all. I might upgrade him from "hack" to "jobber" and even there in the
middle of the jobber pack. Plus, Coletta's not nearly the worst inker
the King ever saw, that honor would go to Greg Theakston. Or, maybe
that's unkind...Greg had a different Jack to handle than did Syd
Shores, say.
YKW
41e0-850e-b...@j19g2000vbh.googlegroups.com:
> that honor would go to Greg Theakston. Or, maybe
> that's unkind...Greg had a different Jack to handle than did Syd
> Shores, say.
>
Theakston did all he could with a Kirby who had descended into self-
parody. There's only so much one could do with the 2-D animation-cel
Jack, though, to breathe some life into him before it ceased to be Jack
at all. Greg brought as fluid a line as anyone who handled 1980s Kirby,
and did a lot to un-flatten that work, but 80s Kirby was what it was.
Take a look at this:
http://www.entrecomics.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/con-greg-theakston-
super-powers-_2-1985.jpg
What more could Theakston have done to make this splash sing without
making it more Greg Theakston than Jack Kirby?
Duggy
> Comix have been crap for decades.
What is "comix"?
===
= DUG.
===
Will Dockery
> On Thu, 23 Sep 2010 15:30:08 -0700 (PDT), Will Dockery wrote:
>
> >There's the question that if Jack Kirby was just starting today would
> >there even /be/ a comics industry as we know it?
>
> >I'm amazed at what seems to be forgotten by all the youngsters and may
> >old folks, as well, that there really would be no Marvel Comics
> >without Jack Kirby (& Stan, of course) to have created it. How would
> >comics have developed if DC had survived, but Marvel -in a world
> >without Jack Kirby- never survived into the 1960s?
>
> >Funny, I just assumed the importance of Jack Kirby in the history of
> >comics was a given... no wonder the comics of today are so lousy, I
> >suppose.
>
> If he hadn't been there, someone else probably would have stepped
> up...after all, as much credit as he deserves, he's far from the only
> reason the industry kept going.
The way I read it, Marvel was on the verge of closing their doors when
Kirby (and Lee) created the Fantastic Four.
Without Fantastic Four and all the other Kirby creations that
followed, sure, the comics industry probably would have kept going,
but it seems far fetched to imagine it would be anything like what
we've seen over the last 40 years.
--
Music & poetry of Will Dockery:
http://www.myspace.com/willdockery
Will Dockery
> On Sep 23, 7:28 pm, YKW <Y...@YKW.YKW> wrote:
Damn, that's an interesting thought.
Will Dockery
> On Sep 24, 8:19 am, Madlove <madl...@arkham.dc> wrote:
>
> > Comix have been crap for decades.
>
> What is "comix"?
I read somewhere, like The Comics Journal, that "comix" are a co-mix
of words and pictures..
--
Tim Turnip
>x-no-archive: yes
>
>Tim Turnip wrote:
>> On Tue, 21 Sep 2010 22:48:45 +0000, Madlove <mad...@arkham.dc> wrote:
>>
>>> x-no-archive: yes
>>>
>>> Will Dockery wrote:
>>>> Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
>>>> forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
>>>> Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>>> But would Kirby be popular with readers today...
>>
>> The question itself contains a fallacy -- it's like asking what would
>> happen if a technology like the transistor or the combustion engine
>> wasn't developed until modern times. You'd have to go back and plot
>> what the entire history would be leading up to that point, and what
>> you'd end up with is an entirely different reality.
>
>I understand your point, but I meant if Kirby was STILL drawing those
>comics today
>would his style still be popular.
Oh. Well, that is a different question. Kirby's style did decline in
popularity when he was working in the late '70s and early '80s -- but
this is also because by that point his style had actually evolved (or
degraded if you were going to say it less tactfully) to a point where
it was more idiosyncratic and not as crowd-pleasing as it had been.
(Case in point was the DC Comics Presents issue he did with the
Challengers of the Unknown -- I had no idea what I was looking at when
I was 14 and first saw that story with its squared heads, etc.)
So my short answer is, probably not -- because Kirby's style itself
was always changing and never stayed the same for very long.
Will Dockery
> Tim Turnip wrote:
>
> >> But would Kirby be popular with readers today...
>
> > The question itself contains a fallacy -- it's like asking what would
> > happen if a technology like the transistor or the combustion engine
> > wasn't developed until modern times. You'd have to go back and plot
> > what the entire history would be leading up to that point, and what
> > you'd end up with is an entirely different reality.
>
> I understand your point, but I meant if Kirby was STILL drawing those
> comics today
> would his style still be popular.
Okay, so you mean if Jack Kirby were over 100 years old and still
drawing comix, rather than a Jack Kirby born in, say, the 1980s to a
world without Marvel Comics as we know them (since without Kirby
pretty much none of the Marvel characters we know would exist now,
including many of those he didn't actually create)?
As Tim responded, in that case, probably less popular than he was
during the last decade or so of his life. Honestly, Kirby seemed to
lose a lot of heart when DC jacked him around on the 4th World series.
plausible prose man
> On Sep 24, 1:24 am, Duggy <Paul.Dug...@jcu.edu.au> wrote:
>
> > On Sep 24, 8:19 am, Madlove <madl...@arkham.dc> wrote:
>
> > > Comix have been crap for decades.
>
> > What is "comix"?
>
> I read somewhere, like The Comics Journal, that "comix" are a co-mix
> of words and pictures..
I recall that, but it's a back-formation from comix, which was how
underground comics referred to themselves. Perhaps to refer to the
new, adult content, and possibly having to do with...many underground
comics hearkened back to earlier, "bigfoot" cartoonists, like Outcalt
and Herriman and Segar, and part of their shtick was misspelling.
iarwain
Like a previous poster said, Kirby's heroes are always doing
something.
FSogol
Something that the Avengers need nowadays. They mainly just stand
around snarking on each other or have generic fights against numerous
unidentified foes such as Skrulls, demons, venom symbiotes, ninjas, etc.
--
FSogol
plausible prose man
He sure made Sal Buscema shine.
grinningdemon
But there's no way to know...and FF (or some variation) might still
have hit it just as big with Stan working with another artist...and
Kirby didn't have a hand in all of the big creations of that time
(Spiderman, for instance).
grinningdemon
wrote:
That's more Bendis' fault than the artists...Bendis' "Avengers" are a
bunch of bitchy little girls.
Anim8rFSK
grinningdemon <grinni...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
Well, he designed the costume ...
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Learn all about September 19
International Talk Like A Pirate Day!
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Anim8rFSK
YKW <Y...@YKW.YKW> wrote:
> Will Dockery <will.d...@gmail.com> wrote in news:f9135822-62c7-47d6-
> ba50-586...@n7g2000vbo.googlegroups.com:
>
> > That's a big problem with Vince Colletta's inks on Kirby now that you
> > reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast spaces of
> > Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply erased.
>
> I'm torn on that. On one hand, you have Colletta removing Kirby figures
> from 1965 THOR, Kirby at his height. A very bad thing.
Is that why Thor of that era seems to have such barren backgrounds?
plausible prose man
> x-no-archive: yes
>
> Will Dockery wrote:
> > Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
> > forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
> > Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>
If you're asking, "let's say you dropped into a parallel universe that
was just like this one, only there had never been a Jack Kirby, but
there was still a vibrant comic book industry more or less like the
one we know today with the same tastes and everything, if you brought
pages and pages of Jack Kirby comics as they were published in this
unverse, could you pass yourself off as a comic book artist and become
a fan favorite," well, mabye not. On the other hand, if you were
asking something like "If Jack Kirby was a young professional entering
that world, with more or less his strengths (dynamism and output and
composition and creativity) and weaknesses (highly stylized, often out
of proportion characters, a certain limited range) , but free to adapt
and grow to that marketplace, I thiink, yeah, he has a reasonable shot
there. Certainly equally limited, or even just downright worse,
artists have become fan favorites, Imagine Eric Powell or Frank
Quitely with Jack's ability to meet a deadline, or Rob Liefeld with
Jack's skill as a draughtsman. Also, imagine if Jack was free to
discard four out of five of his drawings, or spend four times as long
developing a single page as he did in real life.
"During the late sixties and seventies, he did around fifteen pages
per week of finished pencils (and, usually, script) and before that,
he was even more prolific, occasionally managing 5-6 pages a day.
Now, that is very fast — someone like Curt Swan might do two a day —
but Kirby's output was a function not just of drawing speed but of
endurance and a willingness to sit at the drawing board 10-16 hours a
day. Some artists simply couldn't put in hours like that. And the
other thing that perhaps made Jack appear faster than he was was that
he did almost no planning. This is why you see very few Kirby rough
sketches around. If they called Jack and said, "We need a cover," he
would just sit down and start drawing a cover. Some of his best work
was done with that kind of instant improvisation. But, yes, he was
fast."
Will Dockery
> In article <Xns9DFCA78BE6BF01a9y8a0b1r9i6...@69.16.186.8>,
>> YKW <Y...@YKW.YKW> wrote:
> > Will Dockery wrote in news:f9135822-62c7-47d6-
> > ba50-586209be4...@n7g2000vbo.googlegroups.com:
>
> > > reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast spaces of
> > > Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply erased.
>
> > I'm torn on that. On one hand, you have Colletta removing Kirby figures
> > from 1965 THOR, Kirby at his height. A very bad thing.
>
> Is that why Thor of that era seems to have such barren backgrounds?
There's a site somewhere (I should go look for it) that shows Kirby
pencils next to Colletta's finished pages, and vast areas, buildings,
even people, are simply erased.
What survives still looks like damned good Kirby (except sort of "dry"
& "skrichy-skrachy" with those little Colletta lines), but still...
--
Music & poetry of Will Dockery:
http://www.myspace.com/willdockery
> --
> Learn all about September 19
> International Talk Like A Pirate Day!http://www.talklikeapirate.com/piratehome.html
Will Dockery
<stephen.gitt...@gmail.com> wrote:
> In comparison to today's superstar artists like Finch, Cassaday and
> Mahnke, his work would seem "naive" and "primitive",
Kiby co-created Captain America, and later most of the Marvel Comics
characters we know today (he even had some hand in Spider-Man,
iirc)... the foundation for at least half the comics industry can be
directly traced to Kirby.
What have these other three guys, Finch, Cassaday and Mahnke, done in
comparison? Are they, for example, creating characters on a weekly
basis (as Kirby did in his prime), that will still be going strong 60,
50, 40 years from now?
but in his prime,
> Jack's strength was that his characters were always doing something. I
> read somewhere that up to 60% of his panels were action shots - a much
> higher proportion than anyone else at that time, and infinitely higher
> than any of todays artists, whose characters stand around talking for
> two-thirds of the book.
And so many full page drawings with no story at all, last I looked.
grinningdemon
<will.d...@gmail.com> wrote:
>On Sep 22, 2:38 am, "stephen.gitt...@googlemail.com"
><stephen.gitt...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> In comparison to today's superstar artists like Finch, Cassaday and
>> Mahnke, his work would seem "naive" and "primitive",
>
>Kiby co-created Captain America, and later most of the Marvel Comics
>characters we know today (he even had some hand in Spider-Man,
>iirc)... the foundation for at least half the comics industry can be
>directly traced to Kirby.
>
>What have these other three guys, Finch, Cassaday and Mahnke, done in
>comparison? Are they, for example, creating characters on a weekly
>basis (as Kirby did in his prime), that will still be going strong 60,
>50, 40 years from now?
That's not really a fair comparison...the industry is so full of
characters at this point that launching a new one and gaining any
traction is almost impossible because everything has been done
before...that wasn't true in Kirby's day...back then, the field was
still largely wide open.
RVG
> x-no-archive: yes
>
> Will Dockery wrote:
>> Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
>> forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
>> Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>
> But would Kirby be popular with readers today...
Would Hergé ?
I like to compare them, because their style (if not the content of their
stories) is quite similar, very dynamic, mixing realism and caricature
with a rare success, plus they both have created schools of artists.
Hergé litterally invented the Franco-Belgian style of comics, and where
would John Buscema, John Romita and even Jim Steranko be if Kirby hadn't
set the tone of the Marvel comics when they arrived ?
The rest is history. ;)
--
Internet is People
http://rvgmusic.bandcamp.com/
http://www.jamendo.com/fr/user/RVG95
Will Dockery
> Madlove a écrit :
>> Will Dockery wrote:
>
>> Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
> >> forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
> >> Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>
> > But would Kirby be popular with readers today...
>
> Would Hergé ?
>
> I like to compare them, because their style (if not the content of their
> stories) is quite similar, very dynamic, mixing realism and caricature
> with a rare success, plus they both have created schools of artists.
> Hergé litterally invented the Franco-Belgian style of comics, and where
> would John Buscema, John Romita and even Jim Steranko be if Kirby hadn't
> set the tone of the Marvel comics when they arrived ?
> The rest is history. ;)
Exactly.
And there's no reason for there to be another Kirby (or Hergé) since
that history is just that... and has eventually led us to now, where
some new visionary genius needs to come along and get comics on track
again, which is why I asked if any of these new hotshots seem to have
the right stuff?
--
"Shadowville Speedway" CD on Artemis Records:
http://www.artemisrecords.net/dockeryconley.html
Anim8rFSK
<a03b7bdd-1169-43e6...@g10g2000vbc.googlegroups.com>,
Will Dockery <will.d...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sep 24, 4:33 pm, Anim8rFSK <ANIM8R...@cox.net> wrote:
> > In article <Xns9DFCA78BE6BF01a9y8a0b1r9i6...@69.16.186.8>,
> >> YKW <Y...@YKW.YKW> wrote:
> > > Will Dockery wrote in news:f9135822-62c7-47d6-
> > > ba50-586209be4...@n7g2000vbo.googlegroups.com:
> >
> > > > That's a big problem with Vince Colletta's inks on Kirby now that you
> > > > reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast spaces of
> > > > Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply erased.
> >
> > > I'm torn on that. On one hand, you have Colletta removing Kirby figures
> > > from 1965 THOR, Kirby at his height. A very bad thing.
> >
> > Is that why Thor of that era seems to have such barren backgrounds?
>
> There's a site somewhere (I should go look for it) that shows Kirby
> pencils next to Colletta's finished pages, and vast areas, buildings,
> even people, are simply erased.
>
> What survives still looks like damned good Kirby (except sort of "dry"
> & "skrichy-skrachy" with those little Colletta lines), but still...
That's just horrible. :(
Will Dockery
> Will Dockery wrote:
>> On Sep 24, 4:33 pm, Anim8rFSK <ANIM8R...@cox.net> wrote:
> > > In article <Xns9DFCA78BE6BF01a9y8a0b1r9i6...@69.16.186.8>,
> > >> YKW <Y...@YKW.YKW> wrote:
> > > > Will Dockery wrote in news:f9135822-62c7-47d6-
> > > > ba50-586209be4...@n7g2000vbo.googlegroups.com:
>
> > > > > That's a big problem with Vince Colletta's inks on Kirby now that you
> > > > > reminded me. There's a site or more than one showing vast spaces of
> > > > > Kirby's pencils on Thor et cetera that Colletta simply erased.
>
> > > > I'm torn on that. On one hand, you have Colletta removing Kirby figures
> > > > from 1965 THOR, Kirby at his height. A very bad thing.
>
> > > Is that why Thor of that era seems to have such barren backgrounds?
>
> > There's a site somewhere (I should go look for it) that shows Kirby
> > pencils next to Colletta's finished pages, and vast areas, buildings,
> > even people, are simply erased.
>
> > What survives still looks like damned good Kirby (except sort of "dry"
> > & "skrichy-skrachy" with those little Colletta lines), but still...
>
> That's just horrible. :(
My sloppily written post or the thought of Colletta's mangling of
Kirby art?
--
Flying Saucer Mechanic / B. Vaughan, B. Fowler & W. Dockery
http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendId=39701667&blogId=539446319
Anim8rFSK
<9e90121f-e144-442f...@x42g2000yqx.googlegroups.com>,
Will Dockery <will.d...@gmail.com> wrote:
LOL, the idea of somebody not bothering to ink Kirby's work.
grinningdemon
Probably that your description sounds like some sort of rash.
RVG
> On Sep 25, 10:23 pm, RVG<not.h...@themoment.org.invalid> wrote:
>> Madlove a écrit :
>>> Will Dockery wrote:
>>
>>> Who was the then-famous golden boy of comix (now obviously quite
>>>> forgotten while The King stands tall) who was quoted in the Comics
>>>> Journal saying "Jack Kirby was a Putz."
>>
>>> But would Kirby be popular with readers today...
>>
>> Would Hergé ?
>>
>> I like to compare them, because their style (if not the content of their
>> stories) is quite similar, very dynamic, mixing realism and caricature
>> with a rare success, plus they both have created schools of artists.
>> Hergé litterally invented the Franco-Belgian style of comics, and where
>> would John Buscema, John Romita and even Jim Steranko be if Kirby hadn't
>> set the tone of the Marvel comics when they arrived ?
>> The rest is history. ;)
>
> Exactly.
>
> And there's no reason for there to be another Kirby (or Hergé) since
> that history is just that... and has eventually led us to now, where
> some new visionary genius needs to come along and get comics on track
> again, which is why I asked if any of these new hotshots seem to have
> the right stuff?
>
I like the work J.H. Williams III has done on Alan Moore's Promethea,
mixing various styles of drawing and even seamlessly moving to and from
photos sequences (like the "romans-photos" in European magazines of the
60s, just better). I found his work hugely original and beautiful with a
real dreamlike quality.
YKW
news:o24v96lqqgp7116m1...@4ax.com:
An entirely appropriate metaphor, considering.
--
------------------- ------------------------------------------------
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grinningdemon
I haven't read Promethea (yet) but I really loved Williams' style on
the Chase series back in the 90s...in fact, that was generally a great
book and it sucks that it only lasted 9 issues.
Will Dockery
> grinningdemon <grinningde...@austin.rr.com> wrote innews:o24v96lqqgp7116m1...@4ax.com:
To be fair, what Kirby art Colletta allowed to remain in Thor was
pretty damned good, though, as I werote earlier, eh?
--
T.O.T.M. (Theatre Of The Mind) / Flying Saucer Mechanic:
* Brian Vaughan: Synthesizers, guitar, loopers, a lot of various
effects, software workstation, sound engineering.
* Brian Fowler: Guitar, bass, theremin, percussion, drums, violin,
mandolin, rhodes piano, lyrics & vocals, sound engineering.
* Will Dockery: Resident space poet, lyrics & vocal performances.
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/TOTM-Theatre-Of-The-Mind/162320477117852?ref=ts
grinningdemon
>x-no-archive: yes
>
>grinningdemon wrote:
>> On Thu, 23 Sep 2010 22:19:01 +0000, Madlove <mad...@arkham.dc> wrote:
>>
>>> Comix have been crap for decades. I gave up on them in the 80s.
>>> The early stuff (50s, 60s, 70s) is still good tho!
>>
>> I'll be the first to admit there is a ton of crap out there but there
>> are still plenty of good books if you know where to look...
>
>Which is why I post here... :-) If you've some good recommendations,
>lemme know!
What are you looking for in a book?
Duggy
> > What are you looking for in a book?
> Good writing, ala Alan Moore (Marvel Man), Pat Mills (Marshal Law).
> (am I dreaming?!?)
Probably.
> Not endless fights, ala Marvel!
Then usenet isn't the place for you.
===
= DUG.
===
grinningdemon
>Good writing, ala Alan Moore (Marvel Man), Pat Mills (Marshal Law).
>(am I dreaming?!?)
>
>Not endless fights, ala Marvel!
I actually meant genre and plot-wise, what are you looking for?
Because there's a wide range of great stuff out there across the
board.
grinningdemon
>How about some decent Batman stories to start. Madlove and K.Joke were
>great tales.
>"Great stuff out there"??? Glad to hear the stories have improved since
>1984.
>Last ones I read were crud... ecch!
>
>I'm getting ready to read 'Neonomicon' and 'All-Star Supes'.
Well, Batman is kind of crap right now since he's not actually even in
the book...but before Batman's "death", Paul Dini (writer of Mad Love)
was doing a great job on his Detective Comics run...if you go back a
few years to when Brubaker and Rucka were working on the Batman books,
there was a lot of great stuff...their work on Gotham Central was
great, as was both of their runs on Detective Comics and Brubaker's
Catwoman run...and there have been a few good stories in Batman
Confidential (the book that replaced Legends of the Dark Knight)
though it is very hit or miss (the current arc is crap)...there was a
recent Blackhawk arc that I really liked and, earlier on, Fab Nic and
Kevin Maguire did a fun little Catwoman/Batgirl(Barbara Gordon) story
featuring a humorous take on their first meeting...Gail Simone's work
on Birds of Prey and Secret Six has also been excellent.
I think the best superhero book out there right now is Robert
Kirkman's Invincible from Image.
As for non-super hero, Dark Horse has got some great books...Mike
Mignola's Hellboy has always been good...for scifi adventure, you
can't beat Rick Remender's Fear Agent...for historical fantasy, Arvid
Nelson's epic Rex Mundi just completed its run and it was fantastic
(though I was a little disappointed with the ending)...and I love what
they've been doing with Conan and the other Robert E. Howard
characters.
The Vertigo book Fables by Bill Willingham is one of my favorite
series...I love his take on the classic fairy tale characters living
in the real world...and Brian K Vaughan's Y the Last Man was another
great Vertigo book that completed it's run a year or two back...BKV's
Wildstorm series Ex Machina is also wonderful and it just finished up
this month.
Will Dockery
>Duggy <Paul.Dug...@jcu.edu.au> wrote:
>>"stephen.gitt...@googlemail.com" wrote:
>
> > In comparison to today's superstar artists like Finch, Cassaday and
> > > Jack's strength was that his characters were always doing something. I
> > > read somewhere that up to 60% of his panels were action shots - a much
> > > higher proportion than anyone else at that time, and infinitely higher
> > > than any of todays artists, whose characters stand around talking for
> > > two-thirds of the book.
>
>
> In those days, at that company, it would be the artist's fault.
> Marvel comics used to be written "marvel style," which meant that the
> writer would give the artist a story synopsis, the artist would draw
> the story, and then the writer would fill in the dialogue. You can
> see where this gives the artist a lot more options as far as pacing
> and how to block a scene compared to a full script like Alan Moore,
> say, uses.
Which is how Jack Kirby gets such kudos for almost single-handedly
creating the Marvel Universe as we know it. He'd hand in the pages
drawn from the barest (or none at all) input from Stan Lee, loaded
with new concepts, characters and plots, which Lee would then add a
snappy script to.
Marvel is, as we said in the 1980s, "The House that Jack built".
--
Music & poetry of Will Dockery (no charge!):
http://www.myspace.com/willdockery
Lilith
I think too that Jack's popularity had a bit to do with Stan's early
flashy approach to promoting Marvel when Jack got vested with the
middle name of "King." Though he likely deserved it, it helped to add
a little oomph to how the readers perceived his work.
--
Lilith
Will Dockery
> On Sat, 2 Oct 2010 02:03:06 -0700 (PDT), Will Dockery
>
Here's a really good Kirby tribute:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/365-Days-of-Jack-Kirbys-Fourth-World/162755977074568
"...To celebrate, on the 40th anniversary of its inception, the
glorious Kirby Koncepts, whether celestial or wacky, of Jack "The
King" Kirby's Fourth World -- The New Gods, Mister Miracle, Forever
People and his work on Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen! I hope to post a
Kirby Koncept once a day and see if I can squeeze enough creative
juice out of those comics to make it a full year! Please help and post
your own faves of ANY of Jack's extraordinary ideas!"
Joe Snod
> On Sep 22, 4:31 am, Duggy <Paul.Dug...@jcu.edu.au> wrote:
>
> > On Sep 22, 4:38 pm, "stephen.gitt...@googlemail.com" wrote:
>
> > > Jack's strength was that his characters were always doing something. I
> > > read somewhere that up to 60% of his panels were action shots - a much
> > > higher proportion than anyone else at that time, and infinitely higher
> > > than any of todays artists, whose characters stand around talking for
> > > two-thirds of the book.
>
> > Is that the artist's fault or the writers?
>
> the artists really did control the story. Kirby would draw the issue
> from a very basic idea from Stan Lee (if that, seems like Kirby would
> sometimes hand the pages over to Lee & let him figure it out from
> there), and Lee would add dialogue to Kirby's plot.
Back then Stan was apparently quite the dictator, with respect to
shoving THE MARVEL WAY down everybody's throat. It was the closest
thing to a corporate culture that Marvel had, and he never let anybody
forget it.
It's common knowledge that Stan never formally typed up plots for the
stories he did with Jack, the way every other writer did, under THE
MARVEL WAY of creating comics. Typically, the two had a short meeting
in Stan's office, of fifteen minutes or less. They kicked some ideas
back and forth and came to an agreement on what the story would be.
Jack drew it up and then Stan wrote dialogue.
Lilith
From what I've read just recently Stan did give the artists one page
writeups on the stories. But when you consider the number of titles
per month he was putting out back then I really don't see how he might
have had the time to do much more.
--
Lilith
grinningdemon
wrote:
I'm probably going to get blasted for this but I've never thought much
of Stan Lee as a writer...he created (or helped create) some of my
favorite characters of all time and, along the way, he had some
interesting plot ideas...but the writing itself was always pretty weak
and the dialogue in particular was attrocius...and it's not just a
sign of the times because even his more recent work is just as bad.
plausible prose man
> On Thu, 14 Oct 2010 18:40:29 -0500, Lilith <lilith...@gmail.com>
No, I agree with that.
>..he created (or helped create) some of my
> favorite characters of all time and, along the way, he had some
> interesting plot ideas.
And probably most importantly, he created Marvel Comics as distinct
from, and much more creative and fun place compared to, National
Periodicals. You know, a lot of that, he "copied" from EC, but...while
National positioned itself as a rather faceless corporation where
seemingly a skeleton staff of faceless employees turned on the comic
book writing machine and fed what came out into the comic book drawing
machine, Marvel presented itself as this officeful of fun creative
people, the "bullpen," who worked hard to create the comics you
enjoyed so much, and as a result just by buying one you were part of a
cool secret club of discriminating connoisseurs
> ..but the writing itself was always pretty weak
Let's say it was, uh...serviceable. Like the Jack Kirby art it was
usually paired with, there were certain things it couldn't do at all
well, but there were certain things it was really amazing at.
> and the dialogue in particular was attrocius.
The industry had to learn a more...naturalistic style gradually. I
think there was some idea the audience couldn't really follow the
story without the characters constantly explaining what they were
doing and what they were seeing and why any of that was important. You
know, and plus stuff like "Look! THE SEEKER has been ACTIVATED!"
"He'll DESTROY the CITY!! We've got to ACT FAST!" and "if I can just
DISCONNECT these wires in the BACK of his BATTERY PACK, I MIGHT be
able to DEACTIVATE him!" "it's WORKING! he's SLOWING DOWN!" is just
the way to write if you need to whack out a hundred pages of books a
month.
>..and it's not just a
> sign of the times because even his more recent work is just as bad.
RIght, well...there was an article in some newsstand fanzine, maybe
Amazing Heroes or Comics Collector or the CBG, or possibly even the
Journal, that broke down how to write like Stan Lee; how to make a
story seem better than it was with fast pacing, drama, and bullshit.
The part that sticks out in my mind was having a hero and a villain go
through their whole bag of tricks on each other. You know, the
Mandarin would unleash one of his ten rings, the ridiculous one, and
Iron Man would strain to counter it with his nonsense ray, and you'd
go through this until they're just blackmystech rangering the crap out
of each other, and then two guys come through the door with guns...
So, but yeah...if you're used to writing that's influenced by shows
like Friends and The Office, where characters snark around things that
happened several years ago while saving the day rather than how their
ONLY CHANCE is to ACT FAST and tear open the bag containing the snack
chips enabling them to enjoy a delicious snack, well, sure, some of
that seems ridiculously quaint.
Duggy
> And probably most importantly, he created Marvel Comics as distinct
> from, and much more creative and fun place compared to, National
> Periodicals. You know, a lot of that, he "copied" from EC, but...while
> National positioned itself as a rather faceless corporation where
> seemingly a skeleton staff of faceless employees turned on the comic
> book writing machine and fed what came out into the comic book drawing
> machine, Marvel presented itself as this officeful of fun creative
> people, the "bullpen," who worked hard to create the comics you
> enjoyed so much, and as a result just by buying one you were part of a
> cool secret club of discriminating connoisseurs
You know I always hated the "Stan the Man" rants in Marvel comics.
One of the things that I hated about Marvel comics as a kid.
Which goes some way to explain the reason I dislike DC Nation.
===
= DUG.
===
Tim Turnip
<George...@aol.com> wrote:
>On Oct 14, 8:45�pm, grinningdemon <grinningde...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
>> I'm probably going to get blasted for this but I've never thought much
>> of Stan Lee as a writer.
>
> No, I agree with that.
>
>
>> ..but the writing itself was always pretty weak
>
> Let's say it was, uh...serviceable. Like the Jack Kirby art it was
>usually paired with, there were certain things it couldn't do at all
>well, but there were certain things it was really amazing at.
>
>> and the dialogue in particular was attrocius.
>
> The industry had to learn a more...naturalistic style gradually.
Thank you for that last bit. I'm not sure grinningdemon would agree
with this, but when you stack Stan Lee's '60s dialogue next to, say,
well, ANY DC book of the '60s, Lee comes off as a genius. His
dialogue style may have been "cheesy", but it was brilliant at zipping
the story along quickly and at conveying true character personality,
two areas which almost completely eluded DC's Silver Age house style.
I can't help but think gd is basing his complaints more on comparing
Lee's style to modern comics, which would be a very unfair contest.
DC's dialogue of the same era was wooden and homogenized. To pick out
Lee's dialogue as being bad seems to me to miss the entire nature of
'60s comics.
(And yes, I know that Lee did not bother to update his style with the
changing times, as has been noted elsewhere -- however that is an
affliction common to virtually all veteran comics writers.)
Joe Snod
Not Jack. The other artists yes, but Stan's relationship with Kirby
was much more evolved, and Jack had a lot more autonomy. The minute
he left Marvel, he immediately started writing his own stuff, from top
to toe, and when he came back, he then did the same for Marvel.
Don't forget, Jack started at Timely at least as early as Captain
America #1, while Stan didn't start until several issues into Marvel
Mystery. I'm not exactly sure of the chronology, but at worst, they
arrived at roughly the same time, when Stan was about sixteen years
old.
Lilith
According to "Masters of the Comic Book Universe Revealed" Stan
started as a copy boy working for Joe Simon and art directory Jack
Kirby.
Lee was assigned gigs writing "filler" copy for various comic books.
The name "Stan Lee" first saw print in captain American #3,
cover-dated May 1941, in the story "Captain American Foils the
Traitor's Revenge." Stanley Leiber used the name Stan Lee because he
had more ambitious literary goals.
--
Lilith
YKW
news:9e9bca9d-9636-4988...@f25g2000yqc.googlegroups.com:
With dialogue far more tinny than anything The Man ever wrote. Jack was
great at ideas, absolutely awful at scripts.
> Don't forget, Jack started at Timely at least as early as Captain
> America #1, while Stan didn't start until several issues into Marvel
> Mystery. I'm not exactly sure of the chronology, but at worst, they
> arrived at roughly the same time, when Stan was about sixteen years
> old.
>
Stan was already at Timely (or, more broadly, Magazine Management) as
office boy and staff floutist when Joe was wooed away from Fox (and
Funnies, Inc.) and back to Goodman, bringing Jack with him. (Stan claims
it happened differently, with Simon hiring him without knowing the family
connection. Right. Goodman had half a dozen relatives on his payroll at
the time.)
Joe had done work for Martin before going to Fox as an editor (and
freelancing for Jacquet), but Jack's first work for the company was
CAP #1. (That is, his first =direct= work; prior to that title,
Jacquet/Funnies was packaging some books for Goodman on which Jack did
quite a bit of work.)
grinningdemon
I can't stand DC Nation for two reasons.
First, it has no real direction...half the time, it looks like someone
just picked a random memo off of a desk in the DC offices and sent it
to the printer regardless or whether or not it actually offers
anything of substance or that even makes sense.
Second, and most importantly, Dan Didio is a fucktard (for lack of a
better word)...and I think you and I can agree on this one, Duggy.
grinningdemon
wrote:
While I agree the dialogue back then was all pretty hokey and lame, I
really don't think Stan stands out from the crowd much in that
regard...but he bothers me more than most because so many of my
favorite characters can be traced back to him in particular that it's
kind of a constant reminder...and, as you say, he never bothered to
update his style and, unlike most of his contemporaries at this point
(many of whom are no longer with us), he still writes.
In some ways, it's kind of like Chris Claremont...every new project he
comes up with just chips away at his reputation and legacy...but,
unlike Claremont, Lee's not limiting his bad ideas to comics anymore.
Duggy
> I can't stand DC Nation for two reasons.
> First, it has no real direction...half the time, it looks like someone
> just picked a random memo off of a desk in the DC offices and sent it
> to the printer regardless or whether or not it actually offers
> anything of substance or that even makes sense.
> Second, and most importantly, Dan Didio is a fucktard (for lack of a
> better word)...and I think you and I can agree on this one, Duggy.
We can and have in the past.
Can anyone tell me why my posts to usenet aren't showing up on google
groups (especially since I'm posting via google groups)?
===
= DUG.
===
grinningdemon
No idea...they seem to be showing up fine on this end.
Duggy
> On Sat, 16 Oct 2010 00:09:37 -0700 (PDT), Duggy
> >groups (especially since I'm posting via google groups)?
Good. I'd hate to think you were replying to them and they weren't
showing up on your end.
===
= DUG.
===
Will Dockery
Yes, Stan's smooth style was really missed when Jack first defected to
DC.
> > Don't forget, Jack started at Timely at least as early as Captain
> > America #1, while Stan didn't start until several issues into Marvel
> > Mystery. I'm not exactly sure of the chronology, but at worst, they
> > arrived at roughly the same time, when Stan was about sixteen years
> > old.
>
> Stan was already at Timely (or, more broadly, Magazine Management) as
> office boy and staff floutist when Joe was wooed away from Fox (and
> Funnies, Inc.) and back to Goodman, bringing Jack with him. (Stan claims
> it happened differently, with Simon hiring him without knowing the family
> connection. Right. Goodman had half a dozen relatives on his payroll at
> the time.)
>
> Joe had done work for Martin before going to Fox as an editor (and
> freelancing for Jacquet), but Jack's first work for the company was
> CAP #1. (That is, his first =direct= work; prior to that title,
> Jacquet/Funnies was packaging some books for Goodman on which Jack did
> quite a bit of work.)
Stuff I've seen, like Mercury and whatnot, been a long time for me but
I know Kirby was knocking stuff out all around... there's even word
that he did some work in an early, one of the first, issues of Captain
Marvel, though I haven't seen that mentioned much.
--
Poetry & Music of Will Dockery & Friends:
http://www.myspace.com/willdockery
YKW
a0b1-200...@i21g2000yqg.googlegroups.com:
> Stuff I've seen, like Mercury and whatnot, been a long time for me but
> I know Kirby was knocking stuff out all around... there's even word
> that he did some work in an early, one of the first, issues of Captain
> Marvel, though I haven't seen that mentioned much.
Joe and Jack "knocked out" (I like that phrase!) the first unnumbered
issue of CAPTAIN MARVEL ADVENTURES together.
Joe Snod
Which titles did Jack do at Fox?
Will Dockery
> Will Dockery wrote in news:0d4ebb82-ff7e-4fee-
> a0b1-200e35865...@i21g2000yqg.googlegroups.com:
>
> > Stuff I've seen, like Mercury and whatnot, been a long time for me but
> > I know Kirby was knocking stuff out all around... there's even word
> > that he did some work in an early, one of the first, issues of Captain
> > Marvel, though I haven't seen that mentioned much.
>
> Joe and Jack "knocked out" (I like that phrase!) the first unnumbered
> issue of CAPTAIN MARVEL ADVENTURES together.
A fact they never seemed very proud of, even opting out of the chance
to sign the work:
http://kirbymuseum.org/blogs/simonandkirby/archives/category/serial-posts/early-jack-kirby
"...Coming out the same month as Captain America was a special
freelance job Simon and Kirby did for Fawcett’s Captain Marvel. Joe
and Jack were effectively ghost artists and as such they are trying to
mimic another artist’s style. Still you can easily detect their hand
in this comic..."
--
Poetry & Music of Will Dockery & Friends:
http://www.myspace.com/willdockery
> --
Will Dockery
> > >On Oct 14, 7:40 pm, Lilith <lilith...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >> On Thu, 14 Oct 2010 11:46:13 -0700 (PDT), Joe Snod
>
http://kirbymuseum.org/blogs/simonandkirby/archives/category/periods/2-fox
Joe Snod
> On Sep 23, 2:28 pm, Madlove <madl...@arkham.dc> wrote:
>
> > Tim Turnip wrote:
> > > On Tue, 21 Sep 2010 22:48:45 +0000, Madlove <madl...@arkham.dc> wrote:
>
> > >> But would Kirby be popular with readers today...
>
> > > The question itself contains a fallacy -- it's like asking what would
> > > happen if a technology like the transistor or the combustion engine
> > > wasn't developed until modern times. You'd have to go back and plot
> > > what the entire history would be leading up to that point, and what
> > > you'd end up with is an entirely different reality.
>
> > I understand your point, but I meant if Kirby was STILL drawing those
> > comics today
> > would his style still be popular.
>
> Okay, so you mean if Jack Kirby were over 100 years old and still
> drawing comix, rather than a Jack Kirby born in, say, the 1980s to a
> world without Marvel Comics as we know them (since without Kirby
> pretty much none of the Marvel characters we know would exist now,
> including many of those he didn't actually create)?
>
> As Tim responded, in that case, probably less popular than he was
> during the last decade or so of his life. Honestly, Kirby seemed to
> lose a lot of heart when DC jacked him around on the 4th World series.
What did they do to him?
YKW
c14439...@l8g2000yql.googlegroups.com:
> What did they do to him?
Refused to promote the titles, redrew figures without notice, cancelled
books without waiting for sales figures, stuck him on books he had no
interest in, refused to publish books dear to his heart that National
already had in inventory and paid for, and so forth.
Will Dockery
> Joe Snod <joe.s...@yahoo.com> wrote in news:408613b8-6c57-4310-a9be-
> c14439ba6...@l8g2000yql.googlegroups.com:
>
> > What did they do to him?
>
> Refused to promote the titles, redrew figures without notice, cancelled
> books without waiting for sales figures, stuck him on books he had no
> interest in, refused to publish books dear to his heart that National
> already had in inventory and paid for, and so forth.
Yes, just pretty much cut short the last great run of Jack Kirby just
as it was getting started.
--
Poetry & Music of Will Dockery & Friends:
http://www.myspace.com/willdockery
> --