Kirby: Black Magic
Bob Heer
Back during the enlightened years when super-heroes weren't the be
all and end all of mainstream comics, Joe Simon and Kirby did a book
called BLACK MAGIC, putting out some wonderful work in a horror vein.
While perhaps less polished than much of the more famous EC stuff,
the stories and art have a nice energy to them. Fortunately, in his
days as an editor at DC in the mid-seventies, Joe Simon packaged a
nine issue book of reprints from the series (and from another S&K book,
STRANGE WORLD OF YOUR DREAMS). This had several stories from S&K
themselves, as well as from others in their talented stable of artists.
It's sort of interesting to contrast these with the type of "horror"
stories that Kirby would do at Marvel before the super-hero stuff.
The BLACK MAGIC stuff is better. The Marvel stuff was almost all
"monster" stories, various great looking giant beasties intent on
destruction or world domination. The S&K stuff is definitely more
in the mystery/horror vein, moody stories often dealing with the
supernatural. More human stories, more character based. And more
scary, relatively speaking. I mean, neither make me break out in a
cold sweat, but if either were it would be the S&K, not the "Lee"/Kirby.
And the dialogue is much better. Not trying to be cute, like the Marvel
stuff.
Okay, this is the part where I pick an example and vaguely describe it.
Hm, "The Cloak" seems like a good bet. It's definitely one of the stories
that is pure S&K (several of the others show an S&K influence, maybe some
layouts or inking by the partners, but definitely other artistic hands).
It's in the reprint series BLACK MAGIC #7, original printing unknown.
This is sort of a modern urban gothic horror story. An unemployed man
gets a chance at a job, but needs to look good for the occasion. He has one
good suit left, and goes out to rent a cloak to wear for it (this is back
when men wore cloaks. And hats). It gets delivered to him by a
mysterious guy, it has a label "Asmodeus", and still he doesn't get the
hint. He wears it, and it attempts to kill him several times before he
ditches it, giving it to a derelict. Our man Paul then calls the tailor
offering to pay for the cloak, and finds out it wasn't from there. Now
he looks up "Asmodeus", realizes the guy he gave the cloak is in danger,
and tries to save him. Fails, and the cloak vanishes. And that's it.
Dead vagrant, and no idea if Paul got a job.
A good, if simple, story. And the art just has to be seen. The various
accidents that Paul runs into with the cloak are great, like being
dragged by a train. And the backgrounds are great. I don't know if
Budapest actually looked like this, but it should have.
Bob
Charles Erwin
Kirby's work on 'Tales of Asgard' is collected to some extent.
I've got issue one of the mid eighties comic called, 'Tales of Asgard.'
As for Kirby's talent; he is always better when he doesn't have
full control of a comic's direction. He's was a great idea man, and could
draw with the best of them, when he had full control the comic eventually
lost direction. King Kirby is also king of the nine issue flops.
mrs...@u.washington.edu
bg...@torfree.net
Ed Wilkinson
Bob Heer <bg...@torfree.net> writes:
> Back during the enlightened years when super-heroes weren't the be
>all and end all of mainstream comics, Joe Simon and Kirby did a book
>called BLACK MAGIC, putting out some wonderful work in a horror vein.
>While perhaps less polished than much of the more famous EC stuff,
>the stories and art have a nice energy to them. Fortunately, in his
>days as an editor at DC in the mid-seventies, Joe Simon packaged a
>nine issue book of reprints from the series (and from another S&K book,
>STRANGE WORLD OF YOUR DREAMS). This had several stories from S&K
What did Joe Simon do after splitting from Kirby?
I know that he and Kirby worked as a team through the '40s and
into the '50s, creating Captain America and many other comic
characters. In general, they made above average comics.
Then you hear about Kirby dominating comics through the '60s,
and maintaining a strong presence through the 90s, but you
never hear about Joe Simon after the Kirby years. I didn't
even know that Simon was with DC in the 70s.
Can anyone shed some light on Joe Simon's post-Kirby career?
Ed
Ed Wilkinson
Charles Erwin <mrs...@u.washington.edu> writes:
> As for Kirby's talent; he is always better when he doesn't have
>full control of a comic's direction. He's was a great idea man, and could
>draw with the best of them, when he had full control the comic eventually
>lost direction. King Kirby is also king of the nine issue flops.
I don't feel he ever lost direction with the New Gods/Forever People/
Mr. Miracle series, but it was cut short due to circumstances beyond
his control. If he was allowed to complete it, I think it would
have been great.
After that was cancelled, he seemed to be kinda haphazard with some
good stuff (Eternals, 2001, Captain Victory) and some bad stuff
(Kamandi, Devil Dinosaur).
That's the frustrating thing about Kirby's career...what looked
like it might be his greatest work was cut short, and therefore
is overshadowed by his prior work which had other names on it.
Ed
SRoweCanoe
In article <hhJN7ir...@delphi.com>, Ed Wilkinson <edw...@delphi.com>
writes:
>That brings up a subject of interest that I've been wondering about....
>What did Joe Simon do after splitting from Kirby?
>I know that he and Kirby worked as a team through the '40s and
>into the '50s, creating Captain America and many other comic
>characters. In general, they made above average comics.
>Then you hear about Kirby dominating comics through the '60s,
>and maintaining a strong presence through the 90s, but you
>never hear about Joe Simon after the Kirby years. I didn't
>even know that Simon was with DC in the 70s.
>
>Can anyone shed some light on Joe Simon's post-Kirby career?
Sure. He did humor comics.
He and Kirby broke up in c 1955.
the following is from memory:
packaged super-hero comics for Archie c1959 Fly, Shield
edited super-heroes: Harvey 1966
edited: Sick 60s-70s (I only have a few copies, so I'd guess c62-c72; he
may go back further. Anyone know?)
wrote: DC 1968 Brother Power The Geek
edited: DC 73-75 and wrote: Champion Sports, prez, Young Romance, Green
Team
He also packaged alot of advertising and promotional comics.
I believe that his autobiography is still in print. (The comic Book
Makers).
Steven Rowe
Charles Hatfield
Charles Erwin:
> As for Kirby's talent; he is always better when he doesn't have
>full control of a comic's direction. He's was a great idea man, and could
>draw with the best of them, when he had full control the comic eventually
>lost direction. King Kirby is also king of the nine issue flops.
at both DC and Marvel was subject to obstructive editorial
policy, even direct interference; we were never allowed to see what
"direction" he would have taken his Fourth World books in,
because the series were abruptly cancelled (not a matter of
lost direction, but of editorial fiat); nor were we allowed to
see where he might have gone with The Eternals, because, again,
editorial policy demanded that the book be shoehorned, willy-
nilly, into the "Marvel universe," which resulted in several
embarassing and frankly noncommittal issues before cancellation.
The books didn't "flop" due to lost direction; they were
cancelled because they didn't fit what their publishers
wanted.
On the other hand, Kirby did manage to sustain Kamandi at DC
for over three years, with minimal editorial interference,
without losing direction.
My point is, you seem to have taken Kirby's failed (or short-
lived series) as evidence of his inability to sustain a
project, but you've neglected the rather complicated issue
of how Kirby's books were compromised by those who didn't
want him to have "full control." The fact that many of his
books were cancelled does not mean that he couldn't produce
excellent work on his own; he frequently did, despite conditions
which were frankly inimical to the production of excellent
work. Some of Kirby's "nine-issue flops" are now regarded
as wonderful, indeed seminal, comic books. Don't confuse
short runs with lack of control or quality; don't confuse
cancellation with creative failure.
Charles Hatfield
Amer. Journal of Math.
> Some of Kirby's "nine-issue flops" are now regarded
> as wonderful, indeed seminal, comic books. Don't confuse
>
> Charles Hatfield
I love Kirby's work as much as anyone; but "Machine Man" or "Black
Panther"--both of which I enjoyed--as "seminal" comic books? Uh...I
suppose it depends on how you define the word.
And far be it for me to defend DC editorial policy (I worked closely with
DC marketing and editorial for a few years while I was on the editorial
staff of Previews magazine), but l always figured that the Fourth World
books were canned becuase they weren't selling for beans. In which case,
what other decision could DC editorial have made?
Mike S.
Johns Hopkins University
Mark Evanier
In <Pine.SOL.3.93.960605...@chow.mat.jhu.edu> "Amer.
Journal of Math." <a...@chow.mat.jhu.edu> writes:
>
>And far be it for me to defend DC editorial policy (I worked closely
>with DC marketing and editorial for a few years while I was on the
>editorial staff of Previews magazine), but l always figured that the
>Fourth World books were canned becuase they weren't selling for beans.
>In which case, what other decision could DC editorial have made?
ME: This is kinda my issue so...
You're talking about a period of time when almost nothing was selling
for DC. Almost every new book they started had a short run...and some
of those that lasted, did so because management was not ready to give
up on them, not because they were selling well.
In any case, the current management of DC has given me quotes, for a
book I'm doing on Jack Kirby, that -- based on the sales figures that
are in their files -- they would not have cancelled NEW GODS and its
allied books.
I'm not sure it matters that much, though. So what if they didn't
sell? A lot of good comics didn't sell at some point. I keep getting
drawn into this discussion and it usually is based on the thesis that,
if the Fourth World books didn't sell, it means that Jack Kirby failed.
There are a lot of reasons why a given comic might not sell at a given
moment: Marketing, advertising, timing, promotion, etc.. The
concurrent Marvel CONAN comic drawn by Barry Smith sold below NEW GODS
but Marvel kept it going until it caught on. X-MEN was cancelled at
about the same time due to low sales. So was GREEN LANTERN-GREEN ARROW
by Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams. There was a point there where DC
actually cancelled DETECTIVE COMICS for a few days.
I think some folks are too quick to blame the creative folks when the
decision is made to cancel a comic book. Maybe it was the wrong
decision. Or maybe it was the right comic at the wrong time.
Sometimes a comic can sell poorly on the stands but make the company a
heap o' money in other venues, such as licensing. (DC has probably
made more money off Darkseid toys than they did off the newsstands
profits of some "successful" comics.)
Chris Harper
CWH9...@UConnVM.UConn.Edu (Charles Hatfield) wrote:
>Charles Erwin:
>King Kirby is also king of the nine issue flops.
>
>To what "flops" are you referring? ...<snip>... Don't confuse
>short runs with lack of control or quality; don't confuse
>cancellation with creative failure.
>
>Charles Hatfield
Thanks Charles! I was hoping someone would make the above points in a
somewhat more coherent manner that I would've done. Charles Erwin's
posting was a classic example of a cliche in comics criticism that
everyone spouted 15, or even 20, years ago... but some of us used to
think Don McGregor was a genius, too... ;-)
CHRIS.
"If you tell a good story, an entertaining story,
whether it be on film or paper or any other medium,
if it's entertaining, the artist who created that
story has done his job."
- JACK KIRBY, July 28th 1993.
JACK KIRBY QUARTERLY, 25 NAPIER DRIVE, THE
PARKLANDS, TIPTON, WEST MIDLANDS, DY4 7NW, ENGLAND.
Tel. (0121) 520 5366. (JKQ #6 out NOW!)
THE JACK KIRBY HOME PAGE:
http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~ampcon/
(Last updated: May 13th '96.)
SRoweCanoe
In article <msg23114....@learnlink.emory.edu>, bg...@torfree.net
writes:
>Okay, this is the part where I pick an example and vaguely describe it.
>Hm, "The Cloak" seems like a good bet. It's definitely one of the
>stories
>that is pure S&K (several of the others show an S&K influence, maybe
>some
>layouts or inking by the partners, but definitely other artistic
>hands).
>It's in the reprint series BLACK MAGIC #7, original printing unknown.
It's from Black Magic #2 Dec-Jan 50/51
Steven Rowe
Bob Heer
<a...@chow.mat.jhu.edu>
> staff of Previews magazine), but l always figured that the Fourth World
> books were canned becuase they weren't selling for beans. In which case,
> what other decision could DC editorial have made?
well, that depends on who you talk to. There's disagreement on how they
sold, and if it was low enough to warrent cancellation.
There was also stupid DC tricks in how the book were handled, like
insisting Deadman appear in FOREVER PEOPLE (and then being shocked when
it looked like he was drawn by Jack Kirby), and other stuff. DC didn't
know what to do with the books.
And to answer the subject line, Kirby needed =less= editorial control
(read meddling) than he often got.
Bob
Bob Heer
From: Ed Wilkinson <edw...@delphi.com>
> That brings up a subject of interest that I've been wondering about....
> What did Joe Simon do after splitting from Kirby?
lot of advertising work, I think. A couple of returns to comics, which
I'm sure someone else can list better than I can, but includes PREZ, THE
GREEN TEAM, BROTHER POWER, THE OUTSIDERS and SANDMAN (reunited with
Kirby, but it was... strange). Plus editorial stuff at DC.
More recently, there was an article about him last year in CAPTAIN
AMERICAL COLLECTORS' PREVIEW (where he inked a Byrne cover), about some
paintings he does these days, both recreations of classic Cap covers and
new Cap drawings.
Bob
Amer. Journal of Math.
> ME: This is kinda my issue so...
>
>
> I'm not sure it matters that much, though. So what if they didn't
> sell? A lot of good comics didn't sell at some point. I keep getting
> drawn into this discussion and it usually is based on the thesis that,
> if the Fourth World books didn't sell, it means that Jack Kirby failed.
>
Thanks for your insights, Mark. But please don't infer from my post that I
thought Kirby failed with his Fourth World. Far from it. The books may
have been cancelled (for whatever reason, as you say), but it's
unconscionable to label the entire concept a failure (as some have done)
when DC continues to raid it every time it needs a great villain like
Darkseid, or an authentically original setting (like Apokolips and New
Genesis).
Chris Harper
Ed Wilkinson <edw...@delphi.com> wrote:
>I don't feel he ever lost direction with the New Gods/Forever People/
>Mr. Miracle series, but it was cut short due to circumstances beyond
>his control. If he was allowed to complete it, I think it would
>have been great.
>After that was cancelled, he seemed to be kinda haphazard with some
>good stuff (Eternals, 2001, Captain Victory) and some bad stuff
>(Kamandi, Devil Dinosaur).
>
>That's the frustrating thing about Kirby's career...what looked
>like it might be his greatest work was cut short, and therefore
>is overshadowed by his prior work which had other names on it.
The last point is quite well taken. However, I may be in a minority,
but I actually *prefer* Kirby's *best* writing to anything Stan ever
did. Stan was easier to swallow when I was a kid, because his stuff
was very accessible. But it's kinda hard to take these days - rampant
corn aside, I tend to get annoyed by the fact that the copy often
fails to follow the artwork, which often seems to be just plain
carelessness at times; and at other times, no doubt, an attempt on
Lee's part to subvert Jack's storylines for his own purposes.
Don't get me wrong; Lee and Kirby did some great work. For example,
most FF issues from #44-67 hold up brilliantly. But I love Kirby so
much that I suppose I'm bound to be more endeared by his pure vision;
which sadly never got much of an airing.
I guess the difference between Eternals, 2001 and Cap Victory compared
to Kamandi and 2001, is that the former were done, largely, without
editorial interference. The latter, however, were done in response to
specific editorial requests. That said, I think Kamandi is a terrific
comic! At least 30 of the 40 Kirby issues were just wonderful... a
couple of duds... and 2 or 3 bonafide classics (ie. #16 - always a
favourite). And Devil Dinosaur had nice artwork. ;-)
As for the Fourth World... it's a modern-day tragedy that Jack never
had the opportunity to finish it as he'd intended. But nonetheless,
although the early issues are a little unfocused and the last few
issues somewhat half-hearted (for obvious reasons), those middle
issues, through all 3 titles, are some of the best comic books ever
done... I'm talking New Gods #5-9, Forever People #4-8, Mr. Miracle
#5-9. Stan could never write stuff like this if he lived a thousand
years, IMHO.
Er, by the way, I thought this was cross-posted between racm and
alt.comics.classic... in a perhaps vain attempt to revive this
tragically dead newsgroup. Ah, that's better... just fixed the posting
config... support this newsgroup, people!!
Kristian Hellesund
"Amer. Journal of Math." <a...@chow.mat.jhu.edu> wrote:
>And far be it for me to defend DC editorial policy (I worked closely with
>DC marketing and editorial for a few years while I was on the editorial
>staff of Previews magazine), but l always figured that the Fourth World
>books were canned becuase they weren't selling for beans. In which case,
>what other decision could DC editorial have made?
Ken Jones conducted an interview with Mark Evanier in COMICS JOURNAL #
112 in which the Kirby sales figures were discussed. I am quoting page
76:
JONES: I remember reading in the New Gods reprints that no one knew
why those books were originally cancelled.
EVANIER: True. One day, they'd tell us the books ere selling great.
The next, they'd tell us the books were flops. At one point, we were
told, "Those books are selling well but we expected more of Kirby". I
don't know what to think. I did visit the magazine distributor for Los
Angeles and checked actual honest-to-God sales figures for this area
and they were very high - just about the hottest of the whole DC line.
That may not mean anything. The reprints DC just did of that material
apparently sold great in Southern California and poorly everywhere
else.
Kristian Hellesund
krih...@online.no
http://home.sol.no/krihelle
Mitch Lee
> well, that depends on who you talk to. There's disagreement on how they
> sold, and if it was low enough to warrent cancellation.
> There was also stupid DC tricks in how the book were handled, like
> insisting Deadman appear in FOREVER PEOPLE (and then being shocked when
> it looked like he was drawn by Jack Kirby), and other stuff. DC didn't
> know what to do with the books.
It's not hard to believe that Kirby's initial efforts for DC in the
early 1970's sold well enough; after all, he was just coming off
an incredible run at Marvel. From the viewpoint of a consumer
who visited the newstands and spinner racks of the 1970's, I've seen
large batches of Kirby comics that went unsold. The feeling
among comics fans in the 1970's was that Kirby's art tended to look
crude and slap-dash, especially in comparison to the clean
artwork of Neal Adams and his ilk, which had become the de facto standard
in the 70's. Another thing that did not help Kirby's projects in the
1970's was the amatuerish quality of his scripting and characterization
that seemed too heavily rooted in the style of 1940's and 50's comics.
Regarding the Fourth World series, IMHO, it did not sell because the
readers sensed there was too much demand to follow the beginning
of something they weren't going to finish (or did not sense Kirby
himself intended to finish). Kirby slogans like "DON'T ASK! JUST BUY!"
never endeared a general readership to long Fourth World story
arcs and crossovers; there has to be a coherent sense of direction to
where a series is headed, a middle and ending, otherwise the consumer
eventually feels exploited.
> And to answer the subject line, Kirby needed =less= editorial control
> (read meddling) than he often got.
As a counter-example to your statement that Kirby needed =less= editorial
control, I refer you to the letters pages in the Captain America and
Black Panther runs in the 1970's. Kirby did not lose control of these
two titles because they were cancelled from under him. Rather,
Jack was removed from these two titles because the readers didn't like
Jack's editorial direction and begged Marvel to get him off.
Kirby always worked best when he had a strong sounding board for
his concepts, scripting, whatever. The Kirby work that is revered today
always had a Joe Simon, Jack Schiff, or Stan Lee (ulp!) toning down the
oddball excesses and entailing changes to Jack's panels or dialogue to
craft a better story. To see what I mean, one need look no further than
the Yellow Claw stories that Jack free-lanced during a short period with
little editorial meddling, and see how strongly it resembles his
1970's output: they both have the same oddball, "Ed Wood-like",
apocalyptic look-and-feel. And then compare the quality of these stories
to the stuff Jack did under collaboration with the three guys listed above.
Now, you be the judge: did Jack need editorial control?
Mark Evanier
In <wq4k9xc...@elaine14.Stanford.EDU> m...@elaine14.Stanford.EDU
(Mitch Lee) writes:
>
>It's not hard to believe that Kirby's initial efforts for DC in the
>early 1970's sold well enough; after all, he was just coming off
>an incredible run at Marvel. From the viewpoint of a consumer
>who visited the newstands and spinner racks of the 1970's, I've seen
>large batches of Kirby comics that went unsold. The feeling among
>comics fans in the 1970's was that Kirby's art tended to look
>crude and slap-dash, especially in comparison to the clean
>artwork of Neal Adams and his ilk, which had become the de facto
>standard in the 70's.
ME: The trouble with the above argument is that there is very little
evidence of good sales then featuring the artwork of Neal Adams and his
ilk. You want to name some great-selling DC comics by ANYONE in 1975?
Anyway, I don't remember comic fans of the period thinking Jack's work
was crude or slap-dash. I remember criticisms of him for working
outside continuity and also from some folks who didn't like his
dialogue. But I don't recall any outcry over his artwork.
>As a counter-example to your statement that Kirby needed =less=
>editorial control, I refer you to the letters pages in the Captain
>America and Black Panther runs in the 1970's. Kirby did not lose
>control of these two titles because they were cancelled from under
>him. Rather, Jack was removed from these two titles because the
>readers didn't like Jack's editorial direction and begged Marvel to
>get him off.
ME: That's nonsense. The letter pages reflected only the fact that the
guy assembling the letter pages didn't like the books. It was well
known around the Marvel offices at the time that the negative letters
other comics received went straight into the trash, whereas the
negative letters Jack's books received went into print. (In the book
I'm doing on Jack, I have quotes from members of the staff at the time
about this.)
And I can't recall Marvel EVER taking someone off a comic because they
got letters like you describe. Jack left those books because he was
taken off them to design the Fantastic Four cartoon show.
>Kirby always worked best when he had a strong sounding board for
>his concepts, scripting, whatever. The Kirby work that is revered
>today always had a Joe Simon, Jack Schiff, or Stan Lee (ulp!) toning
>down the oddball excesses and entailing changes to Jack's panels or
>dialogue to craft a better story. To see what I mean, one need look no
>further than the Yellow Claw stories that Jack free-lanced during a
>short period with little editorial meddling, and see how strongly it
>resembles his 1970's output: they both have the same oddball, "Ed
>Wood-like", apocalyptic look-and-feel. And then compare the quality of
>these stories to the stuff Jack did under collaboration with the three
>guys listed above.
ME: Well, you're entitled to your opinion but your example is faulty.
Jack didn't write any part of those YELLOW CLAW stories; he just drew
what he was handed.
I think you also underestimate the popularity today of Jack's solo 70's
work. And, to tell the truth, so did I. But when we started
assembling the big Kirby Tribute Book (which is still in the works),
Frank Miller and I were both amazed at how many professionals were
fighting to be assigned THE ETERNALS or DEVIL DINOSAUR to draw. We
received more requests for THE ETERNALS than for FANTASTIC FOUR
characters. (And I say that as someone who was never a big fan of THE
ETERNALS...)
The problem with blanket statements about someone needing editorial
control is that there are all kinds of editorial control, including the
kind exercised by editors who leave the talent alone. There are good
editors and bad editors, and there are also works that are more
personal. Also, Joe Simon and Stan Lee didn't really exercise
editorial control so much as they collaborated. On some projects, in
both relationships, Jack had more creative control of the material than
either of them. Again, I have some quotes in the book (from both men)
that may put this in a new light, including specific examples of how
each changed Jack's work and how Jack changed theirs.
Mitch Lee
> ME: The trouble with the above argument is that there is very little
> evidence of good sales then featuring the artwork of Neal Adams and his
> ilk. You want to name some great-selling DC comics by ANYONE in 1975?
> Anyway, I don't remember comic fans of the period thinking Jack's work
> was crude or slap-dash. I remember criticisms of him for working
> outside continuity and also from some folks who didn't like his
>dialogue. But I don't recall any outcry over his artwork.
You're welcome to your revisionist history, but the clean, "realistic"
art style of Neal Adams did have an enormous fan base in the 70's,
and spawned many imitators. My point was that Kirby's style in contrast
stood out against the Adams-standard and looked
"crude and slap-dash". This was the consensus among fans
from that era. I've seen print criticism that remarked perhaps more
diplomatically, that Kirby's art at times looked more like "layouts",
or not "up to the usual great Kirby standard". Just because you
"don't recall" doesn't mean it didn't exist. You also contradict yourself
by your claim in the next paragraph, that any negative comments from fans
got trashed and never saw the light of day.
>ME: That's nonsense. The letter pages reflected only the fact that the
>guy assembling the letter pages didn't like the books. It was well
>known around the Marvel offices at the time that the negative letters
>other comics received went straight into the trash, whereas the
>negative letters Jack's books received went into print. (In the book
>I'm doing on Jack, I have quotes from members of the staff at the time
>about this.)
>And I can't recall Marvel EVER taking someone off a comic because they
>got letters like you describe. Jack left those books because he was
>taken off them to design the Fantastic Four cartoon show.
Very interesting. What did Jack do to get this special
treatment? There are other instances of negative comments in
letters pages in other Marvel mags of the same era.
So your point taken is: reader feedback through letter writing
is ignored. This is utter nonsense, since there are cases that letters
are used to gauge reaction to what is working or not in a title
to improve sales, including adjustments in personnel. In the
case of Kirby's last CAPTAIN AMERICA run, he was allegedly off the
title about a half year before the FF cartoon assignment. During
this half year, Kirby was still working on three or four other titles.
Personally, I thought it was sacrilegious to not allow Kirby to continue
on CAPTAIN AMERICA, or at least allow him to tie up the loose-ends.
>ME: Well, you're entitled to your opinion but your example is faulty.
>Jack didn't write any part of those YELLOW CLAW stories; he just drew
>what he was handed.
If you're so sure that Jack had no part in the writing or plotting, then
who is the author of these stories? In regards to your pro-Kirby book,
if it's primarily composed of revisionism and white-washing (as we see
in your posts) how are the other parts of your book going to be credible?
Archie
In article <4po6jh$2...@dfw-ixnews2.ix.netcom.com>,
eva...@ix.netcom.com(Mark Evanier ) wrote:
> ME: Anyway, I don't remember comic fans of the period thinking Jack's work
> was crude or slap-dash. I remember criticisms of him for working
> outside continuity and also from some folks who didn't like his
> dialogue. But I don't recall any outcry over his artwork.
Ulp, I'm kinda ashamed to admit it, as I'm a big fan of Jack's now, but
when I was a kid, I thought his comics were ugly. The slicker work of
Adams, Buscema, Kane and Romita was more accessable to me. For some
reason, I liked his style ok on Thor and the FF, but was turned off by his
Superman and Jimmy Olsen comics. Oh well, no accounting for taste.
> ME:It was well
> known around the Marvel offices at the time that the negative letters
> other comics received went straight into the trash, whereas the
> negative letters Jack's books received went into print. (In the book
> I'm doing on Jack, I have quotes from members of the staff at the time
> about this.)
How did this come about? What reason could anyone have had to be so
mean-spirited?
Archie Cutter
"Time keeps everything from happening at once.
-- Buckaroo Banzai"
Kevin J. Maroney
eva...@ix.netcom.com(Mark Evanier ) wrote:
>... Also, Joe Simon and Stan Lee didn't really exercise
>editorial control so much as they collaborated. On some projects, in
>both relationships, Jack had more creative control of the material than
>either of them. Again, I have some quotes in the book (from both men)
>that may put this in a new light, including specific examples of how
>each changed Jack's work and how Jack changed theirs.
Mark, it's now official: If you die accidentally before finishing this
book, I will have to hunt you down and kill you.
Get it done. The world needs it.
--
Kevin J. Maroney | Crossover Technologies | ke...@crossover.com
Games are my entire waking life.
Mark Evanier
In <wq4rarj...@elaine35.Stanford.EDU> m...@elaine35.Stanford.EDU
(Mitch Lee) writes:
>You're welcome to your revisionist history, but the clean, "realistic"
>art style of Neal Adams did have an enormous fan base in the 70's,
>and spawned many imitators.
ME: Yeah, but you weren't talking about a fan base, Mitch. You were
talking about Jack being taken off books because of negative reaction
to his work. At the time you're talking about, a "fan base" did not
translate into acceptable sales. Neal Adams was, you're right, very
popular with fans at the time but that didn't save GREEN LANTERN-GREEN
ARROW, to name one book.
>
>There are other instances of negative comments in letters pages in
>other Marvel mags of the same era. So your point taken is: reader
>feedback through letter writing is ignored. This is utter nonsense,
>since there are cases that letters are used to gauge reaction to what
>is working or not in a title to improve sales, including adjustments
>in personnel.
ME: Leaving Mr. Kirby aside for the moment, it has generally been my
experience/observation that letters from readers VERY rarely impact the
personnel of any comic book. Mail may occasionally impact plot lines
but I can't think of any case where it caused a company to change the
writer or artist. It is not generally assumed that the mail is
representative of the readership at all. (Rarely, for example, does
the best selling comic get the most mail. And at times, some comics
go years without receiving any real negative mail, even though sales
are plunging. I think we got about four negative letters in 130+
issues of GROO. That does not mean everyone thought the book was
perfect.)
If you don't want to accept my view on this, poll some professionals
whose viewpoints you respect.
>In the case of Kirby's last CAPTAIN AMERICA run, he was
>allegedly off the title about a half year before the FF cartoon
>assignment. During this half year, Kirby was still working on three or
>four other titles.
ME: Jack left all his Marvel assignments at the same time. Some of the
other titles were backlogged so they continued to come out for a longer
period of time. (During this period, by the way, Jack rarely drew the
comics in the order they came out. I have all his work records and
contracts here. At some points, he was way ahead on some titles. You
can't assume anything about when he stopped drawing a book based on its
publication date.)
>If you're so sure that Jack had no part in the writing or plotting,
>then who is the author of these stories?
ME: Probably Ernie Hart.
>In regards to your pro-Kirby book, if it's primarily composed of
>revisionism and white-washing (as we see in your posts) how are the
>other parts of your book going to be credible?
ME: Gee, Mitch, most people usually wait until I finish writing
something before they slam it. The book is not "pro-Kirby" in the
sense you mean the term. But I've done interviews with everyone who is
available (and I did many with folks who are now deceased, like Sol
Brodsky, Don Rico and Bill Everett) and I'm working off all of Jack's
personal papers, correspondence, etc..
There are a lot of critical things about Jack's work (and handling of
his career) in the draft at present. A lot of the historical stuff
won't agree with what you probably believe...and I say that because it
doesn't agree with a lot of what I used to believe, or what others have
said in print. I'm digging up a lot of things that have never been
revealed and I hope that, when I print them, you won't call that
"revisionism." If you do, then I'm satisfied that others will see the
research that has gone into the book and will find it credible.
Bob Heer
m...@elaine14.Stanford.EDU (Mitch Lee) wrote
(I waited to see if Evanier replied to this, since most of my rebuttal
would have been taken from stuff I've heard from him. General "what he
said" for most of Evanier's post)
> large batches of Kirby comics that went unsold. The feeling
> among comics fans in the 1970's was that Kirby's art tended to look
> crude and slap-dash, especially in comparison to the clean
> artwork of Neal Adams and his ilk, which had become the de facto standard
> in the 70's. Another thing that did not help Kirby's projects in the
> 1970's was the amatuerish quality of his scripting and characterization
> that seemed too heavily rooted in the style of 1940's and 50's comics.
and if Adams was so popular than GREEN LANTERN/GREEN ARROW was cancelled
because? And Kirby was asked to do Deadman post-Adams because?
Anyway, I've seen the Fourth World books and I've seen other comics from
the same era, and if fans of that era thought Kirby's work looked "crude"
and his writing was "amateurish", well, they were wrong. Maybe the books
were cancelled because comic fans were stupid back then? I can believe
that. Given their buying habits, I wouldn't say modern fans are much
smarter.
> himself intended to finish). Kirby slogans like "DON'T ASK! JUST BUY!"
> never endeared a general readership to long Fourth World story
> arcs and crossovers; there has to be a coherent sense of direction to
> where a series is headed, a middle and ending, otherwise the consumer
> eventually feels exploited.
um, "crossovers"? Where were there crossovers? And like almost anything
else in 1971/2 had even a fraction of the direction that the Fourth World
did?
And I liked "Kirby says: Don't Ask, Just Buy It". Surely one of the
classic blurbs in comicdom.
> Kirby always worked best when he had a strong sounding board for
> his concepts, scripting, whatever. The Kirby work that is revered today
> always had a Joe Simon, Jack Schiff, or Stan Lee (ulp!) toning down the
the "work that is revered today" includes the Fourth World. It includes
Kamandi. It includes "Street Code". =You= may not revere it, but you can't
possibly deny that it's revered by a substantial number of fans.
Bob
Chris Harper
Mitch Lee proclaims:
> You're welcome to your revisionist history, but the clean, "realistic"
> art style of Neal Adams did have an enormous fan base in the 70's,
> and spawned many imitators. My point was that Kirby's style in contrast
> stood out against the Adams-standard and looked
> "crude and slap-dash". This was the consensus among fans
> from that era. I've seen print criticism that remarked perhaps more
> diplomatically, that Kirby's art at times looked more like "layouts",
> or not "up to the usual great Kirby standard".
Kirby's work didn't look "crude and slap-dash" compared to Adams'
stuff, in my opinion. It interpreted reality rather than represented
it. The Adams approach was, at the time, new to comics and so had an
ephemeral impact: More to the point, I think you'll find that Kirby
almost always drew *more* detail than Adams, especially backgrounds. I
would, in fact, call Adams himself "slap-dash" in some respects; the
content of his panels was often large, simple and sparse, albeit
rendered in a *fairly* realistic way.
In any case, the '70s was a time when a lot of people regarded Don
McGregor as a genius. I think many of us have revised that view in
more recent times. You seem to be using the fads and trends of the
time as a device for denigrating Kirby, and it just doesn't hold up.
As Bob (I think) commented; what about the taste of today's
readership? Are you, in 20 year's time, going to criticise someone
doing fine work *today* on the basis that they weren't as popular as
Rob Liefeld? Truly, this is the flimsiest of arguments, and hardly
worth acknowledging.
> Very interesting. What did Jack do to get this special
> treatment? There are other instances of negative comments in
> letters pages in other Marvel mags of the same era.
> So your point taken is: reader feedback through letter writing
> is ignored. This is utter nonsense, since there are cases that letters
> are used to gauge reaction to what is working or not in a title
> to improve sales, including adjustments in personnel. In the
> case of Kirby's last CAPTAIN AMERICA run, he was allegedly off the
> title about a half year before the FF cartoon assignment. During
> this half year, Kirby was still working on three or four other titles.
> Personally, I thought it was sacrilegious to not allow Kirby to continue
> on CAPTAIN AMERICA, or at least allow him to tie up the loose-ends.
The truth is, a prejudice against Kirby developed over a period of
time. And this was because Kirby doggedly refused to play the "Marvel
Universe" game. The folks at the Marvel offices continuously prodded
Jack to integrate his stuff more heavily into Marvel's continuity.
In fact, the single most profound instance of this was Eternals.
Eternals was one of their bigger sellers... for this reason, Marvel
was vigorous in their attempts to establish it as part of the "whole"
that was Marvel Assembled. Early on, Jack *did* relent and include
SHIELD agents in #6 & 7; but they were faceless agents that could've
belonged to any such outfit, and portrayed as a bunch of assholes in
any case. I doubt that this was Marvel's ideal concept of integration.
(If you're in any doubt as to the sales figures on Eternals, count how
many Marvel books at the time were given their own Annual.)
The Eternals situation came to a head. Marvel insisted that Jack guest
star one of their flagship characters (the Hulk). Maybe Mark would
have a clearer idea of the specific events, but it seems that Jack
must've agreed to this. That is, he agreed to include the Hulk in an
issue or two of Eternals... I guess he just didn't agree on specifics.
So, it was a robot Hulk made (implausibly) by College students, and
accidently imbued with the Power Cosmic! And throughout this story,
Kirby has various members of the cast continuously refer to Marvel's
characters as though they don't exist outside of a comic book. It was
a stubborn thing to do on Kirby's part... and the book was canned
shortly thereafter. Given that the sales were obviously quite
respectable, I think the decision came down to one simple fact: If
Kirby wouldn't play the continuity game, it *had* to go.
And that's it. Kirby's work at Marvel was marred by this problem. They
just couldn't accept these ideas as stand-alones. And if they were
selling well, imagine the marketing potential - Spider-Man meets
Ikaris! Kirby was standing in the way of such projects. And the
amusing part of all this is, regarding Eternals, Marvel have never
managed to recapture the interest in the concept that Kirby generated
since it was taken from him.
Roffus
Someone is challenging Mark Evanier on facts about Jack Kirby? How
do I get a bet down on this one? Isn't Mr. Evanier the person people
always go to to settle disputes about Kirby history?
I have always found Mr. Evanier's articles to be even-handed and to
possess info not available to those of us who are not fortunate enough to
be on the insides of these things.
Is this Mitch Lee related to Stan Lee? That is the only way I could
imagine that he could know as much about this subject.
Johanna Draper
In article <wq4rarj...@elaine35.Stanford.EDU>,
Mitch Lee <m...@elaine35.Stanford.EDU> wrote:
[in responding to Mr. Evanier]
> You're welcome to your revisionist history,
Is everyone else finding this as entertaining as I am? :)
Johanna
Elmo Amberdon
>>editorial control so much as they collaborated. On some projects, in
>>both relationships, Jack had more creative control of the material than
>>either of them. Again, I have some quotes in the book (from both men)
>>that may put this in a new light, including specific examples of how
>>each changed Jack's work and how Jack changed theirs.
>
> book, I will have to hunt you down and kill you.
>
> Get it done. The world needs it.
While a sentiment with which I'd agree, I can wait for the bio; I want
the tribute art book!
--
"They had a choice, all of them. They could have followed in the
footsteps of good men like my father, or Uncle Scrooge. Decent men,
who believed in a day's work for a day's pay." -- Elmo as Rorschach
--Joev Dubach
elmo (mor...@physics.rice.edu,mor...@fnal.fnal.gov)
http://bonner-ibm1.rice.edu/morrow
Mitch Lee
In article <4pr4cf$r...@sjx-ixn3.ix.netcom.com> eva...@ix.netcom.com(Mark Evanier ) writes:
From: eva...@ix.netcom.com(Mark Evanier )
> ME: Yeah, but you weren't talking about a fan base, Mitch. You were
> talking about Jack being taken off books because of negative reaction
> to his work. At the time you're talking about, a "fan base" did not
> translate into acceptable sales. Neal Adams was, you're right, very
> popular with fans at the time but that didn't save GREEN LANTERN-GREEN
> ARROW, to name one book.
It's all related, Mark. My post pointed out reasons why Kirby's
work fell out of favor in the 1970's. The point here is that
prevailing tastes shifted to a cleaner style like that of Adams and
his imitators. The fact that Adams himself worked on XYZ comic which
didn't sell, is irrelevent because his imitators were prevalent
on books that influenced the general public tastes. Rightly or wrongly
this caused a negative assessment of Kirby's art. The so-called
"fan base" had a role in promoting the former style over that of Kirby's.
BTW, I'm stating this as an observation of the 1970's; don't misread
this as my preference of Adams's style over Kirby's (personally,
I think Adams's work looks sterile today.)
>ME: The trouble with the above argument is that there is very little
>evidence of good sales then featuring the artwork of Neal Adams and his
>ilk. You want to name some great-selling DC comics by ANYONE in 1975?
This is irrelevent, but I'll hazard a guess that in 1975, SUPERMAN
had better sales than Kirby's OMAC from the same period.
They weren't great sellers, but SUPERMAN had a mild resurgence in
the mid-70's. To be honest, I really don't understand what
point you're trying to make here.
>ME: Jack left all his Marvel assignments at the same time. Some of the
>other titles were backlogged so they continued to come out for a longer
>period of time. (During this period, by the way, Jack rarely drew the
>comics in the order they came out. I have all his work records and
>contracts here. At some points, he was way ahead on some titles. You
>can't assume anything about when he stopped drawing a book based on its
>publication date.)
Well, let's not hedge, was Jack withdrawn from his last run on
CAPTAIN AMERICA before the other titles? It appears to be a quick
decision due to the number of dangling threads that were awkwardly
wrapped up. The two issues that followed Kirby's last consisted of
a non-story filler and a reprint, indicating that the next team
wasn't ready.
>>If you're so sure that Jack had no part in the writing or plotting,
>>then who is the author of these stories?
>
>ME: Probably Ernie Hart.
Probably not, if you examine the oddball science-fiction
twists that are a complete departure from the strait-laced
detective stories of the first issue.
>ME: Gee, Mitch, most people usually wait until I finish writing
>something before they slam it. The book is not "pro-Kirby" in the
>sense you mean the term. But I've done interviews with everyone who is
>available (and I did many with folks who are now deceased, like Sol
>Brodsky, Don Rico and Bill Everett) and I'm working off all of Jack's
>personal papers, correspondence, etc..
>There are a lot of critical things about Jack's work (and handling of
>his career) in the draft at present. A lot of the historical stuff
>won't agree with what you probably believe...and I say that because it
>doesn't agree with a lot of what I used to believe, or what others have
>said in print. I'm digging up a lot of things that have never been
>revealed and I hope that, when I print them, you won't call that
>"revisionism." If you do, then I'm satisfied that others will see the
>research that has gone into the book and will find it credible.
Fine. If your book contains a critical assessment of the full
sweep of Kirby's career--his rise and decline after 1970--
your book will be a good historical record.
On the other hand, apologia that denies negative fan reaction
(e.g., Kirby's negative letters were a Marvel office conspiracy),
or the lack of reception to Kirby's DC work (i.e., "all DC titles
were bad sellers, so Kirby's DC work was not a failure."), really
shows some laziness in critical objectivity and at worst, revisionism.
Ennead
Johanna Draper (dan...@aurora.cis.upenn.edu) wrote:
: Mitch Lee <m...@elaine35.Stanford.EDU> wrote:
: [in responding to Mr. Evanier]
: > You're welcome to your revisionist history,
: Is everyone else finding this as entertaining as I am? :)
It's an edge-of-the-seat-handfuls-of-popcorn thriller so far, definitely.
I'd say ME is winning many more debate points, but Mitch Lee may well win
the "bravest man on rac*" award come next year's squiddies.
Yours,
--Ampersand
noticing that "brave" and "foolish" are often synonymous
Mark Evanier
In <wq4pw71...@elaine44.Stanford.EDU> m...@elaine44.Stanford.EDU
(Mitch Lee) writes:
>
> It's all related, Mark. My post pointed out reasons why Kirby's
> work fell out of favor in the 1970's. The point here is that
> prevailing tastes shifted to a cleaner style like that of Adams and
> his imitators. The fact that Adams himself worked on XYZ comic
> which didn't sell, is irrelevent because his imitators were
> prevalent on books that influenced the general public tastes.
ME: I'll tell you, Mitch, I have some doubts that prevailing tastes
shifted to ANY approach to comics in the seventies, at least insofar as
art styles were concerned. I have a pretty good set of sales figures
for that period -- not complete, but certainly indicative of trends
over the years. So if you're talking about work falling "out of favor"
in terms of people not buying it, it is certainly relevant that sales
were so poor across the board.
If you're talking about working falling out of favor in terms of the
fan community, I think that's arguable. I know what my friends and I
liked and didn't like, you know what you and your constituents felt;
I'm not sure that there was any universally-recognized consensus at the
time...or that it hasn't been re-evaluated in hindsight.
I do think that some of Jack's work of that period received some loud
negative criticism, though I think it was more directed to the writing
than the artwork. But that's just my impression, just as yours is just
yours. For the book I'm doing, I have quotes from a number of
different folks who were involved in Jack's seventies work, including
Jack, Mike Royer, Archie Goodwin, Stan Lee, plus others who were
working on allied comics. They do not agree on the popularity of
Jack's work at the time...so my answer is to print a number of
different viewpoints and let the readers decide whom to believe. They
don't all agree with you or me or even each other.
>This is irrelevent, but I'll hazard a guess that in 1975, SUPERMAN
>had better sales than Kirby's OMAC from the same period. They weren't
>great sellers, but SUPERMAN had a mild resurgence in the mid-70's. To
>be honest, I really don't understand what point you're trying to make
>here.
ME: Well, my point is that you're talking about the popularity of
certain comics during a period when, insofar as I can tell, nothing was
very popular. If you don't see that as relevant to this discussion,
then just ignore it and let's move on. (But depending on the month and
whether the first Superman movie was in theaters, you could well be
wrong that SUPERMAN outsold OMAC. There were some extended periods
there where SUPERMAN sales were lower than many comics which were
cancelled.)
>Well, let's not hedge, was Jack withdrawn from his last run on
>CAPTAIN AMERICA before the other titles? It appears to be a quick
>decision due to the number of dangling threads that were awkwardly
>wrapped up. The two issues that followed Kirby's last consisted of
>a non-story filler and a reprint, indicating that the next team
>wasn't ready.
ME: This is from memory but my recollection is that Jack drew his last
few CAPTAIN AMERICAs long before they went to press. I don't know if
he knew when he did them that they'd be his last or not. I know there
was some difference of opinion about this time because Marvel wanted
the book to tie in with other titles and Jack didn't want to do
anything that crossed-over that way; he wanted to do books that were
self-contained. This is something I have to research further. (For
one thing, I have some office memos of the time that were sent to Jack
but which aren't dated; I have to see if I can figure out which books
they're talking about.)
>Fine. If your book contains a critical assessment of the full sweep of
>Kirby's career--his rise and decline after 1970--your book will be a
>good historical record.
ME: Well, I think it will be a good historical record. Whether it will
agree with your understanding of that situation, I can't say.
>On the other hand, apologia that denies negative fan reaction
>(e.g., Kirby's negative letters were a Marvel office conspiracy),
>or the lack of reception to Kirby's DC work (i.e., "all DC titles
>were bad sellers, so Kirby's DC work was not a failure."), really
>shows some laziness in critical objectivity and at worst, revisionism.
ME: Well, I happen to think that the letter page thing has some
validity to it, especially in light of another incident that is
detailed in the book. But I don't dwell on it because I think that the
contents of any comic's letter page is a completely unreliable gauge of
fan reaction.
By the same token, I think the sales figures on Jack's DC work are
arguable; again, I have conflicting quotes -- from Carmine Infantino,
Dick Giordano, Paul Levitz and Jenette Kahn, among others -- on this
subject (also, some of the actual sales figures) and, again, readers
can draw their own conclusions. (I also think that sales figures
aren't always an indicator of success or failure in more than the
narrowest sense. I think it's possible to respect a comic that didn't
sell and to fault one that did.)
If you have some critiques or facts you think oughta be in the book,
please forward them to me. Many aspects of Kirby and his work were
controversial (and still are, obviously) and I'm trying to present an
overview. A lot of areas, I think, do not have ONE right answer...and
anyone who thinks there is one is going to be disappointed because I'm
going to air differing viewpoints, not just what he thinks is the one
and only truth.
Rodrigo Baeza(VP)
Mark Evanier wrote:
>ME: That's nonsense. The letter pages reflected only the fact that the
>known around the Marvel offices at the time that the negative letters
>other comics received went straight into the trash, whereas the
>negative letters Jack's books received went into print. (In the book
>I'm doing on Jack, I have quotes from members of the staff at the time
>about this.)
I've always wanted to know more about this. I consider Mark to be
an authority on Kirby, but I've read different versions of what
happened.
The following are quotes from a letter written by Roger Stern that
originally appeared in Comics Scene #4 (July, 1982)
"When I started working at Marvel in December of 1975, standard
operating procedure was to basically let Jack do whatever he
wanted. [....] Most of us would have been afraid to talk to him,
much less try to undermine his books.
"As for the idea that competing writers filled the pages of Jack's books
with overly critical letters- 'knock letters' as Jack called them- well,
nothing could be further from the truth. To the best of my recollection,
the letters pages to Jack's books were assembled by then-staffer Scott
Edelman and neo-writer David Anthony Kraft, though I put together a
few myself. Certainly none of us coveted Mr. Kirby's assignments, nor
were we in any position to have even dreamed of assuming them.
"Not fully trusting my memory on this, I checked back over the old letters
pages to see just how negative the printed mail was. In Captain America
and Black Panther, I found that over two-thirds of the mail responses
were out-and-out raves, an impressive statistic when one considers
that the previous writers associated with those two series- Steve Englehart
and Don McGregor- had such a rabid fan following. On the 2001 book, mail
was about 75% positive. In the only letters page to run in Machine Man
during Jack's tenure, mail was 100% positive. I could find only four
negative letters in the entire run of the Eternals, and one of those
was from a reader who felt the book raised troubling theological questions."
(end of quotes)
I'd like to add another thing. From the Marvel comics I've read of
that period, I would never have imagined that "the negative letters
other comics received went straight into the trash". I do remember
reading negative letters in books such as Tomb of Dracula, Conan,
Master of Kung Fu, and others (Deathlok's first appearance generated
some very critical letters, as well).
I'd like to know, Mark, if you agree with Roger's statistics. And
any additional info you may have about this matter would be
appreciated (unless you're saving it for your book, which I'll
buy anyway).
Rodrigo Baeza
rba...@ing.puc.cl
Mark Evanier
In <4pt9of$6...@huequi.puc.cl> rba...@huara.ing.puc.cl (Rodrigo
Baeza(VP)) writes:
>
>I'd like to add another thing. From the Marvel comics I've read of
>that period, I would never have imagined that "the negative letters
>other comics received went straight into the trash". I do remember
>reading negative letters in books such as Tomb of Dracula, Conan,
>Master of Kung Fu, and others (Deathlok's first appearance generated
>some very critical letters, as well).
>
>I'd like to know, Mark, if you agree with Roger's statistics. And
>any additional info you may have about this matter would be
>appreciated (unless you're saving it for your book, which I'll
>buy anyway).
ME: Marvel went through a number of different policies regarding their
letter pages. When I was visiting in New York in '74 or '75, a friend
of mine was freelancing, writing letter pages for DC, Marvel and Warren
books. In most cases, the comics did not receive enough letters to
fill the columns so he was just making up letters...and inventing
mythical fans who wrote in to the different companies. The same
mythical fan might be in an issue of DAREDEVIL and an issue of CREEPY
the same month.
Later, I believe some regimes insisted on no fake letters...but there
have been times when the policy was that the letters page was to be
considered an extension of the house advertising. That is, no negative
letters unless the company wanted to justify a change they were making
in a character. I believe a few assemblers of lettercols had to resort
to phony letters...or, in one case that I know of, they just took a
negative letter and rewrote it into a positive one.
I've never tallied the letter pages in Jack's comics so I don't know if
Roger is correct. Roger's a bright/honest guy so I assume he's right,
at least insofar as office policy is concerned. But Jack had one or
two enemies on the staff at the time, as demonstrated by an incident
I'd rather not explain here until I do a little more research. I've so
far been focussing on earlier parts of Jack's career in my work on the
book. I will look up those pages when I get back to that period.
One other thing about letter pages. It has always been my observation
that about 95% of the letters you receive on a comic are imitative of
the kind you print. That is, if you print short, silly letters, kids
send you short, silly letters. And if you print long, negative
letters, kids send you long, negative letters. If you started printing
recipes, they'd start sending you recipes.
This is one of the reasons I feel that letters pages are not indicative
of the true reaction. (To be more specific: I believe the letters you
receive are not really indicative of the general readership and the
particular selection of them that some lowly assistant makes is even
LESS indicative. And I say that as a former lowly assistant...)
Bob Heer
rba...@huara.ing.puc.cl (Rodrigo Baeza(VP)) wrote
(quoting Roger Stern)
> "As for the idea that competing writers filled the pages of Jack's books
> with overly critical letters- 'knock letters' as Jack called them- well,
> nothing could be further from the truth. To the best of my recollection,
this is fascinating, since the critical letter angle was brought up by
Lee, apparently basing it on personal recollection, not comments from
Kirby or Evanier. From Lee's description, it sounds like the fans were
about to burn Kirby in effigy or something.
(I personally mostly ignored any text that didn't come
out of California in those books. I'll have to take a closer look
sometime. I do recall glancing at a few that I thought were much more
critical than one normally sees in a Marvel comic, and much more rudely
critical than the negative letters in the Evanier/Sherman pages at DC).
Bob
Kevin J. Maroney
eva...@ix.netcom.com(Mark Evanier ) wrote:
>One other thing about letter pages. It has always been my observation
>that about 95% of the letters you receive on a comic are imitative of
>the kind you print. That is, if you print short, silly letters, kids
>send you short, silly letters. And if you print long, negative
>letters, kids send you long, negative letters. If you started printing
>recipes, they'd start sending you recipes.
What? You mean that not _every_ comic received between three and
thirty requests for the definition of "mulch" every month?
Bob Heer
m...@elaine44.Stanford.EDU (Mitch Lee) wrote
> valuable asset to this newsgroup. He does have his subtle biases
> on Kirby, whether you like them or not. The bottom line for me is
well, sure he does. He's not preparing a massive book on Kirby because
he's a disinterested observer. But past experience has shown that he
usually does get several sides of the story, and isn't shy about being
critical.
> story from over 30 years ago. Personally, I'd like to see more
> posters put a stake in the ground and defend a controversial position.
Why? I mean, "put a stake in the ground" implies to me that they'll
continue to defend the "controversial position" even if the exchange
shows that they have their facts wrong (many positions are controversial
because they're wrong) or even if they change their minds. In which case
the conversation degrades to "No it isn't!"/"Yes it is!", of which
they're quite enough.
Bob
bill...@clark.net
In article <4pshks$8...@netnews.upenn.edu>,
Johanna Draper <dan...@aurora.cis.upenn.edu> wrote:
>In article <wq4rarj...@elaine35.Stanford.EDU>,
>Mitch Lee <m...@elaine35.Stanford.EDU> wrote:
>[in responding to Mr. Evanier]
>> You're welcome to your revisionist history,
>
>Is everyone else finding this as entertaining as I am? :)
Unfortunately, Mitch Lee's posts are lagging several days on my server,
so I'm only getting Mark Evanier's replies. I feel like I'm missing
out on half the fun...
Jeremy Billones http://www.clark.net/pub/billones/index.html
Objective Reality Isn't Go Caps & Orioles! ISTJ USSF Certifiable
"And right now, more than anything in the world, I wish it would rain."
SRoweCanoe
article <wq4rarj...@elaine35.Stanford.EDU>,
m...@elaine35.Stanford.EDU (Mitch Lee) writes:
(to Mark Evanier)
>You're welcome to your revisionist history, but the clean, "realistic"
> art style of Neal Adams did have an enormous fan base in the 70's,
> and spawned many imitators. My point was that Kirby's style in
contrast
> stood out against the Adams-standard and looked
> "crude and slap-dash". This was the consensus among fans
> from that era.
You guys are both right. Mark is talking about the early and mid 1970s;
and Mitch is talking about the late 1970s. Not till the direct market
begain to be the majority of sales, did Neal Adams sell well. The fan and
newstand markets were allways different. Certainly Adams was popular in
the fan market of the 1970s (his first Batman - Brave and the Bold-) won
the fan Alley Awards for it's year. However , his Spectre work was
widely paned by fans and newstand readers.
Taste change, as does readership, as do artists.
Steven Rowe
Elayne Wechsler-Chaput
Mitch Lee (m...@elaine44.Stanford.EDU) wrote:
: I would assume Mark eats, sleeps, and farts like the rest of us.
: He is a comics professional with industry knowledge and so, a
: valuable asset to this newsgroup. He does have his subtle biases
: on Kirby, whether you like them or not. The bottom line for me is
: to generate an interesting thread, aside from the usual synopsis of
: an old Kirby story from over 30 years ago. Personally, I'd like to see more
: posters put a stake in the ground and defend a controversial position.
: What is really bizarre is the fawning attitude (e.g., see digressions
: from this thread) in some posts whenever a comics pro is in the
: neighborhood...
Yo, present! <g>
I haven't seen that many people fawn over Evanier at *all*. I mean,
besides me, and everyone knows I flirt as much with fans as I do with
pros (c'mere, Chary <g>). Mark Evanier is extremely well-respected in
this newsgroup because he expresses himself well and thoroughly and has
been around... heck, longer than *I've* been here, that's for sure. The
fact that he's an industry professional is a nice bonus, but not the main
reason for that respect.
- Elayne
--
E-Mail me, the "Firehead Head," for more info about the official ()~~
Firesign Theatre newsletter, Four-Alarm FIRESIGNal, available via ##
snail mail or free online! "This replica... houses our guru, ##
Tiny Dr. Tim. Let's knock on the door and see if he's in..." _##_
A Man Stalking His Mid-Life Crisis
Rodrigo Baeza(VP) (rba...@huara.ing.puc.cl) wrote:
: I'd like to add another thing. From the Marvel comics I've read of
: that period, I would never have imagined that "the negative letters
: other comics received went straight into the trash". I do remember
: reading negative letters in books such as Tomb of Dracula, Conan,
: Master of Kung Fu, and others (Deathlok's first appearance generated
: some very critical letters, as well).
I don't claim that negative letters were not allowed, but from personal
experience with Marvel's letters pages (on two occasions) I can tell you
that critical comments that I made in letters were edited out.
In one I pointed out that a certain villain appeared in a formulaic
fashion every sixth issue over a two year period, this was cut out
entirely. In the other, I explained why I found the dialogue in a
particular issue unrealistic, coming from a certain character, but
discovered that this too was edited out. Positive comments that I made
(in the first case, about the title character and in the second about the
book's artist) were all that saw print. After having been "edited" like
this twice within a few months, I decided never to write a LoC to a
Marvel title again.
Sorry to go off-topic.
Steve
--
sh...@panix.com "It's not smart, or correct, but it's one of
the things that makes us what we are."
Red Green
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Mark Boyd
I just had to add my two cents worth. I have collected for about 20 years
now and I can tell you that the impact of Neal Adams had basically a shock
effect on those who had seen a lot (and I mean a LOT) of Kirby imitators
at the time.
I grew to love Kirby in later years, but at the time he was in the
mainstream, I really ignored his books for the most part. I mean, for one
thing, the guy was friggin' EVERYWHERE. Now I can admire and respect both
Kirby and Adams for their contribution to the field, but at the time, as a
young collector, I was significantly impressed with Adams. His range of
emotion, his slick illustrative style, etc.
Of course, I could say the same thing about Jim Steranko, who began his
career inking and imitating the Kirby style. Or Berni Wrightson, who was
influenced by a lot of hardback book illustrators or Jeff Jones, or Mike
Kaluta, or a half dozen others who were just hitting the stands at the
time.
But, to me, Jack Kirby is not just a name. He was a true force in the
industry for the span of his lifetime. And I gotta tell you, I know that
the "Marvel style" of storytelling (a synopsis or outline where the artist
had a free reign) would probably not have ever come into existence if
anyone at Marvel felt their key artists couldn't do that kind of work.
That meant Kirby really had to produce, guys. I mean, from the sheer
volume of work we can see where his style was adapted into a type of
visual shorthand. Yes, you could say that his style became more like
layouts; that was the whole point. Go look again and see how many lines
were used to portray a scene in Kirby's work and then compare that to
ANYTHING Neal Adams or ANY of his subsequent clones did and you can see
where Kirby drew what HAD TO BE THERE, PERIOD. This is, to me anyway, the
definition of the word "clean" uncluttered. I mean, this is just my
opinion, but Kirby had a MUCH cleaner style than some of the Image guys do
today.
Crude? I don't think so.
Powerful, effective and punctual in it's approach? DEFINATELY.
And what a keen sense of design. Man, those creations will live forever.
The rhythm of his pacing, the effect of his linework, the style of his
storytelling was classic.
I think this has to be looked at historically in the sense of his overall
effect on the industry and I for one cannot think of anyone in the comic
book industry who had more influence than Jack did, ever.
Now I think an argument could be made as to the effect he had as compared
to others in the comics industry at large say, some one like Alex
Raymond or Hal Foster (who, in my opinion, created the adventure genre in
comics between the two of them). But to compare him to anyone in the comic
BOOK industry is sorta missing the point of his contribution.
His contribution can be measured, for example, in the idea that the
sixties are still referred to as "The Marvel Age of Comics" ( and I for
one still hear the phrase). The idea that the Marvel superheroes of the
sixties were innovative, fresh, and more involving was due in no small
part to Kirby's art, design, and strong sense of space and time.
Mark Boyd
--
Mark Boyd
illustration, design of web art and comic art
mb...@cyberramp.net
Mark Evanier
Hello. I need to amend a previous statement of mine here and to
apologize for spreading some disinfo. I spent this evening doing some
Kirby research (for the book I'm doing) and I realized that I got
something wrong in my debate a week or so ago here with Mitch Lee.
Mitch said that Jack was taken off CAPTAIN AMERICA (in the seventies)
because of bad reaction to his work. I said that Jack stopped all his
Marvel work about then because he went to work on the FANTASTIC FOUR
cartoon show. Well, I went through some of Jack's files this evening
and, as it turns out, we were both wrong.
Jack was under a contract with Marvel that called for him to write and
draw a certain number of pages per week. When Marvel wanted him to
work on the F.F. show, they worked out a lower quota; that is, he cut
back on his comic book work so he would have time to do the cartoon
series. That meant he had to drop some books.
He had just done the first issues of DEVIL DINOSAUR and MACHINE MAN
(the latter replacing 2001 on his schedule) so they kept him on those.
He had room on his schedule for one more. He was doing three other
books at the time -- BLACK PANTHER, CAPTAIN AMERICA and THE ETERNALS.
If I am correctly interpreting a memo in Jack's files, he was given the
choice of which of the three to retain and he picked PANTHER.
So he did give up CAPTAIN AMERICA because he had started doing the F.F.
cartoon show (as I said) but he didn't stop doing all his comic book
work for Marvel at the same time (as I said).
Sorry to have gotten this wrong.
John P. Selegue
In article <4qdjs3$t...@dfw-ixnews3.ix.netcom.com>
eva...@ix.netcom.com(Mark Evanier ) writes:
>Hello. I need to amend a previous statement of mine here and to
>apologize for spreading some disinfo. I spent this evening doing some
>Kirby research (for the book I'm doing) and I realized that I got
>something wrong in my debate a week or so ago here with Mitch Lee.
>
>Sorry to have gotten this wrong.
om spams and misdirected for sale posts, but this Kirby thread has given it
real life. Mark Evanier's posts are especially interesting reading.
I realize that most (I don't think all) of the posts are also going to
r.a.c.misc but they get lost in the noise there.
I have nothing substantial to add (I am a Kirby fan without any insider informa
tion or passionately held opinions) but congratulations to the originator
and participants for reviving this group!
JPS
Roffus
tell me how to receive it?
Chris Harper
>I understand there is a Kirby mailing list on this system. Could someone
>tell me how to receive it?
Just sent me a "subscribe" request via email. Digest option available
(good for tidier mailboxes).
Thanks,
CHRIS.
"If you tell a good story, an entertaining story,
whether it be on film or paper or any other medium,
if it's entertaining, the artist who created that
story has done his job."
- JACK KIRBY, July 28th 1993.
JACK KIRBY QUARTERLY, 25 NAPIER DRIVE, THE
PARKLANDS, TIPTON, WEST MIDLANDS, DY4 7NW, ENGLAND.
Tel. (0121) 520 5366. (JKQ #7 coming SOON!)
THE JACK KIRBY HOME PAGE:
http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~ampcon/
(Last updated: June 18th '96.)
Chris Harper
>Just sent me a "subscribe" request via email. Digest option available
>(good for tidier mailboxes).
You can even "send" a subscribe request if you want... I'm not
choosy... ;-)
Yours illiterately,