Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon.
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| Image by Tumisu from Pixabay |
Even as I type these words, another month is about to end and a new one begin, reminding us there's just one thing in this world that never changes. And that's the fact the world always changes.
But hold your horses, Father Time, because there's one other thing in this world that never changes.
And that's the feature the internet has grown to love and fear in equal measure.
It's the one in which you the Reader get to decide what we're talking about. Many are the things that have happened in the past month and many more are the things that have happened in the past year.
Then again it may be things that have happened in your early lifetime - or before your lifetime or even down in the darkest depths of prehistory - that tickle your fancy.
And what of the far-flung future? That place that Sarah Connor knows it's best to avoid? Who knows what miracles, myths and monstrosities it may unfurl before our very eyes?
Whatever or whenever it is or was or will be, that you wish to discuss, all you have to do is mention it in the comments section below and a veritable tidal wave of talk will, doubtless, be unleashed.
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35 comments:
List your fav runs of back-to-back artists on the same book! Just hours ago the Kirby-Steranko-Romita-Buscema-Colan run was mentioned starting with CAPTAIN AMERICA 109!
Or painful disappointments with artistic changes? (Perhaps Kaluta to R@bbins being a jolt in DC’s Shadow?)
Have fun Pilgrims!
Charles
Well, Charlie, I think you picked just about the best ‘Great Run After Great Run’ example ever, right out of the gate. Kirby >Steranko>Romita>Colan>Romita Again is pretty hard to beat! If only Sinnott had inked all of Colan’s run (instead of Ayers inking the last half)…
A few other excellent Back-to-Back runs:
Daredevil — Wally Wood followed by Jazzy Johnny followed by Gentleman Gene.
Conan — Barry Smith followed by John Buscema.
Swamp Thing — Bernie Wrightson followed by Nestor Redondo.
I didn’t mind Fearless Frank Robbins following Mike Kaluta on The Shadow, not a bit. I liked both about equally for decades, and these days I actually prefer Robbins’ run. Also, I thought Robbins was a distinct upgrade over Sal Buscema on Cap.
I’ll have to give some thought to ‘Worst Follow-Up Runs’….
b.t.
Jim Shooter's Avengers - best of Sal Buscema, Perez, Byrne (Tuska interlude, too).
Spiderwoman - first issue/origin (Marvel Spotlight) had passable Buscema/Mooney art, followed by Carmine Infantino's inferior drivel, in her own comic.
Phillip
Thanks for the topic, Charlie.
For the good runs, the first thing that leaps to my mind is Steve Ditko - John Romita - Gil Kane - Ross Andru in Amazing Spider-Man.
There was also, John Buscema - Sal Buscema - Neal Adams - Barry Smith - Rich Buckler in The Avengers.
Then again, if I remember right, Panther's Rage had Rich Buckler - Gil Kane - Billy Graham.
With the aforementioned Shadow comic, we had Mike Kaluta - Frank Robbins - ER Cruz.
Like bt, I shall have to think about the worst runs.
Didn’t Swamp Thing go Wrightson, Redondo (slight pause) then Tom Yeates, Bissette / Totleben? That’s a hell of a run.
The 1980s ‘Shadow’ revival went Chaykin / Sienkiewicz / Kyle Baker - and Baker’s work is the best out of all those.
*Matthew McKinnon
The last issue of the original Swamp Thing series was drawn by Ernie Chan, Matthew. Although if it helps I thought it looked quite good.
I'm going to go for a long arc of multiple artist runs in 50+ issues of the Dr Strange series that started in the 70s. The first five were drawn by Frank Brunner and Dick Giordano (with a Steve Ditko dreaded deadline room reprint in #3), followed by Gene Colan and (mostly) Tom Palmer up to #18.
Despite the creative team then abruptly getting the push - ruining Englehart's fantastic 'New Atlantis' storyline with a string of dodgy Marv Wolfman issues - Doc still looked good thanks to Alfredo Alcala, Rudy Nebres and Judo Jim Starlin (and Craig Russell, if we include the fantastic annual that came out at that point).
Following Judo Jim, Tom Sutton took over, til Gene the Dean returned. Then it was the Marshall Rogers ryn, where his style actually worked pretty well.
Admittedly I had to ignore an issue drawn by the deeply average Al Milgrom, but thats good going for the newsstand era.
How about Mike McMahon and Brian Bolland alternating on the 'Cursed Earth' era Dredd, with completely different yet somehow complementary versions of the character?
-sean
Man that Avengers run listed above is probably my favorite!
Also the Fantastic Four run with a couple of the same guys; Perez to Pollard to Byrne.
This how much Marvel thought of Pollard, he was practically doing FF, Thor and Spider-Man at the same time. What a beast!
FF - Kirby, Romita, Buscema
X-men - Cockrum, Byrne, Cockrum, Smith
Mister X (Vortex first series) Hernandez Bros, Paul Rivoche, Seth
Miracleman: Leach, Davis, Beckum (snigger)
DW
Ah, you guys have effectively covered the ones that initially came to my mind! Ditko/Romita/Kane/Andru on Spidey, Perez/Byrne on Avengers, Smith/Buscema on Conan. Soooo.....something different?
Val Mayerik/ Mike Ploog on Man-Thing.
Jim Sherman/Dave Cockrum/Keith Giffen on Legion of Super Heroes.
Dave Cockrum/John Byrne on X-men.
As for a jolting change? A much tougher question. I can only think of writer changes that fit, but that's not today's issue. Hmmmmm...
DW- great call on Mr. X! Yes! That series had some terrific art.
Steve:
YES! Buckler>Kane>Graham on “Panther’s Rage” was pretty consistently stunning.
Also, most of the gritty urban atmosphere of the HERO FOR HIRE series vanished when Graham stopped inking Tuska’s pencils. Going from Tuska/Graham to Tuska/Colletta was a major drop in quality.
b.t.
All the best back to back art teams seem to have been covered above . For a jolting change I can only think to add Jack SparlIng taking over from Jim Steranko on SHIELD .
Jolting changes -
The post-Chaykin American Flagg.
Kamandi after Jack Kirby. In fact, any of his solo titles after he left, or were later revived without him (Simonson's Orion - the only post-Jack Fourth World series worth reading - is a notable exception). I'm aware some people are a bit down on Kirby's 70s Captain America run, but they should really check out the issues afterwards. And probably develop an appreciation of awesomeness while they're at it.
Both of those examples are instances of the artist also being the writer, which I expect made their absence even more striking.
-sean
DW, yeah, I nearly went with Marvel/Miracleman, and Chuck B 😊
For back-to-back writers, the obvious example is Spawn - hey, you can't do better than Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Dave Sim and Frank Miller in succession. And of course the Toddmeister himself...
-sean
Charlie, here's one just for you - Burne Hogarth following Hal Foster on Tarzan.
-sean
Sean! Magnificent observation! Hogarth and Foster were really in their own world.
Does Neal Adams get mentioned above? Surely there’s something good about Smith following J Buscema following Adams in Avengers 90s 100? (But who was inbetween JB and BWS?)
And on the jolting side, charlie will go out on a limb and guess that whoever preceded and seceded Neal at Green Lantern, Batman, or Xmen probably came in 2nd place?
Btw… reading a nice little interview with Roy Thomas in his monthly Alter Ego / Back Issue magazines that pay homage to Adams this month. Roy indicates working with Adams wasn’t exactly smooth but considers him the best comic artist besides Kirby. Period.
For me the worst jolting change was John Buscema on the FF being replaced by Rich Buckler's Kirby pastiche which I loathed and still loathe. I wasn't very happy about John Romita being replaced by Gil Kane on Spider-Man either.
Phillip, I must confess to liking Carmine Infantino's "inferior drivel" on Spiderwoman.
Charlie, my local Tesco supermarket is selling persimmons again so I've bought a pack of three.
"(But who was inbetween JB and BWS?)"
No-one.
#97 - Buscema
#98-100 - BWS
#101-107 - Buckler
And the Spider-Man enthusiasts have a name to add - it ought to go Ditko/Romita/Buscema/Romita/Kane/Romita/Kane/Andru/Romita/Andru
(OK, I thought Mooney was in there too, but a quick check shows he did a swag of inking instead)
Steve, b.t. - I would suggest adding Klaus Janson to the list of artists on 'Panther's Rage', as he bought a lot to the look of the series. He made it hard to spot Buckler's swipes, and Gil Kane's work never looked better. A shame he left the series a little way into Graham's run...
-sean
Colin - Apologies! Maybe, with Carmine Infantino, colour makes the difference. I found him slightly better(as regards black & white) on Nova.
Phillip
Was there a worse series of artist jolts than late 70s Daredevil roulette?
Back then, when you got an issue of DD seemingly at random it could be drawn by Gil Kane or Gene Colan... or Carmine Infantino or Fr*nk Robb*ns! And just when you thought maybe Gene the Dean was properly back, they went and gave the job drawing the comic to a new kid, Frank something or other.
-sean
You're entitled to your opinion of Infantino, Phil - what about his work on Star Wars?
Sean:
Agreed about Post-Kirby CAPTAIN AMERICA. Perfunctory pencils by Our Pal Sal, indifferent inks by Esposito, Tartaglione and Perlin, revolving door of writers including Thomas, Glut, Gerber, and Makenzie, none of whom seemed to be excited by the gig. Weak.
McScotty:
I think it was Frank Springer (not Jack Sparling) following Steranko on SHIELD, but yeah.
Colin:
I also quite liked Infantino’s art on those early Spider-woman issues. The first few (inked by Tony DeZuniga) looked especially nice to me.
Speaking of following Chaykin:
Two issues of crisp retro pulp adventure in the first two issues of THE SCORPION, followed by blatant generic Spider-Man clone nonsense by Gabe Levy, Jim Craig and (uncredited) Jim Mooney. I got whiplash from it back in the day.
b.t.
And Steve:
I know you were a fan of Atlas’ PHOENIX — that last issue with the Wannabe Marvel Makeover must have hit you like a ton of bricks.
b.t.
Colin - I'm afraid I don't rate Infantino's Star Wars stuff, either! But, like you say, each to his own.
Phillip
Wasn't Carmine Infantino on Star Wars another example of following Chaykin? 'Nuff said!
(Although as it happens, I don't think Star Wars was Happy Howie at his best)
-sean
b.t., Its also worth comparing the solo Kirby Captain America with the issues just before his return too. By Tony Isabella and Fr*nk R*bb*ns...
-sean
b t Your right it was Frank Springer apologies, i get them mixed up
So not much love for Frank Robbins on here then - I really like his stuff especially his Daredevil fill in issue.
Colin, I agree with you on Rich Bucklers Kirby take on the FF, it wasn't great but Buckler was a good artist . I really didn't like Mr Infantino's art on Star Wars .
.
Biggest jolt for me was the switch from Miller / Janson-then-just-Janson on Daredevil to the horrible horrible art by William Johnson and Danny Bulanadi. And that team seemed to stay on the book forever.
Bt, I don't remember what my thoughts at the time were about the Phoenix's transformation into the Protector but my adult thoughts on it can be found right here: https://stevedoescomics.blogspot.com/2010/09/phoenix-protector-4-nurses-in-bikinis.html
In fairness, there is something fitting about a character called The Phoenix transforming into a totally different hero after just a few issues. Thinking about it, it'd be quite interesting to read an entire series about a hero who, every few issues, transforms into a totally new hero, so that we get a whole string of identities for him.
Or her, Steve.
Actually, a way to keep it interesting would be to have the character changing gender regularly, along with their identity. Its a bit surprising there doesn't seem to be a superhero that has both male and female forms (not since Starhawk anyway).
-sean
Paul, I've nothing against Rich Buckler - only his Kirby pastiche on the FF.
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