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Contents
THE
KIRBY COMPARISONS! OPENING SHOT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 JACK FAQs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Mark Evanier’s 2017 Baltimore Comic-Con panel, featuring Tom King, Walter Simonson, Mark Buckingham, Jerry Ordway, Dean Haspiel, John K. Snyder III, and Rand Hoppe
ISSUE #86, SPRING 2023
C o l l e c t o r
EULOGISTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Superstars of comics pay tribute the day after Jack’s 1994 passing GALLERY. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 cover comparisons INCIDENTAL ICONOGRAPHY. . . . . 32 the FF suits up THINKIN’ ’BOUT INKIN’. . . . . . . . . 34 with Dave Stevens, William Stout, and Barry Windsor-Smith KIRBY OBSCURA. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38 don’t open the box! FOUNDATIONS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 the final S&K Link Thorne story BOOM!. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 Jack’s influences and inspirations for the Fourth World and beyond EYEDUNNO. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68 spot the differences KIRBY KINETICS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73 a career comparison COLLECTOR COMMENTS. . . . . . . . 78 Front cover inks: WALTER SIMONSON Front cover colors: TOM ZIUKO Special thanks to: CHRISSIE HARPER COPYRIGHTS: Ben Boxer, Big Barda, Demon, Dingbats of Danger Street, Dr. Canus, Dubbilex, Forever People, Four-Armed Terror, Highfather, House of Mystery, House of Secrets, Houseroy, Infinity Man, Jason Blood, Jimmy Olsen, Kamandi, Kanto, Merlin, Metron, Mister Miracle, Morgaine le Fey, My Greatest Adventure, New Gods, Oberon, Orion, Shilo Norman, Spirit World, Superman, Ted Brown, Witchboy TM & © DC Comics • Arnim Zola, Avengers, Black Bolt, Black Panther, Blastarr, Bucky, Captain America, Celestials, Crystal, Devil Dinosaur, Diablo, Eternals, Falcon, Fantastic Four, Galactus, Grottu, Hank Pym, Harokin, Hulk, Inhumans, Journey Into Mystery, Ka-Zar, Klagg, Lockjaw, Machine Man, Martian, Nick Fury, Orikal, Prester John, Primus, Recorder, Red Skull, Shadow Thing, Shagg, Silver Surfer, Spider-Man, Stone Man, Strange Tales, Tales of Suspense, Thing, Thor, Triton, Ulik, Wasp, Watcher, Wyatt Wingfoot, X-Men TM & © Marvel Characters, Inc. • Black of New Genesis, Collages, Faces of Evil, Ramses, Sky Masters, Sundance of Mars TM & © Jack Kirby Estate • 2001: A Space Odyssey TM & © Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. • The Fly TM & © Joe Simon Estate • Black Magic, Fighting America & Speedboy, Link Thorne, Sunfire TM & © Joe Simon & Jack Kirby Estates • Country Lion, Sorceror TM & © Ruby-Spears Productions • “Camelot” lyrics © MTI
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[above] Splash page pencils from Mister Miracle #13 [April 1973]. Our cover this issue is an unused version of MM #13’s cover, inked on vellum from a Xerox of Jack’s pencils, and originally intended for the UK’s Jack Kirby Quarterly before it ceased publication.
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The Jack Kirby Collector, Vol. 29, No. 86, Spring 2023. Published quarterly (see?) by and © TwoMorrows Publishing, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614, USA. 919-449-0344. John Morrow, Editor/Publisher. Single issues: $15 postpaid US ($19 elsewhere). Four-issue subscriptions: $53 Economy US, $78 International, $19 Digital. Editorial package © TwoMorrows Publishing, a division of TwoMorrows Inc. All characters are trademarks of their respective companies. All Kirby artwork is © Jack Kirby Estate unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter is © the respective authors. Views expressed here are those of the respective authors, and not necessarily those of TwoMorrows Publishing or the Jack Kirby Estate. First printing. PRINTED IN CHINA. ISSN 1932-6912
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1
Mark Evanier
JACK F.A.Q.s
A column answering Frequently Asked Questions about Kirby
Jack Kirby 100th Birthday Panel
Held at the Baltimore ComicCon on Sunday, September 24, 2017 Featuring Tom King, Walter Simonson, Mark Buckingham, Jerry Ordway, Dean Haspiel, John K. Snyder III, and Rand Hoppe. Transcribed by Steven Tice, and copyedited by Mark Evanier and John Morrow
[above] Jack hard at work in his home studio in 1971, and a portrait of the artist as a young Thing [right]. Read the story behind this drawing at https:// kirbymuseum.org/ blogs/effect/2015/ 06/02/the-summerof-jack/ [next page, top] Baltimore Con panelists: (back row, left to right) Tom King, John K. Snyder III, Dean Haspiel, Rand Hoppe, and Mark Buckingham. (front row) Walter Simonson, Mark Evanier, and Jerry Ordway. Photo by Kevin Shaw. [next page, bottom] Tom King has just embarked on a new Kirby-related project titled Danger Street, which combines all the characters that appeared in DC’s First Issue Special #1–13 into one mini-series— including Kirby’s Atlas, Manhunter, New Gods, and Dingbats.
MARK EVANIER: I have it in my contract that any place I go, I get to do a panel about Jack Kirby. [applause] We have some people here with lots of good things to say about Jack. I’m not going to waste any of your time telling you that Jack Kirby was a fabulous artist. There are only about 50,000 comic books downstairs that you can look at to come to that conclusion yourself. I was privileged to know Jack, to work with him for a brief time. I was his utterly useless assistant for a couple of years, meaning that he didn’t need assistants, but he was nice enough to say, “Oh, here’s something to do, and here’s some money, Mark.” My two major contributions to his work were to get out of the way—and I think I deserve a lot of credit for that [laughter]—and to help him get a better inker. He was an amazing man, and I’ll just tell you, those of who never had a chance to meet Jack, he was a darling man. He was polite, he was honest, he was a nice person. He stood on no ceremony. [He was] “Jack.” If you called him “Mr. Kirby,” he would correct you, and he treated everyone as an equal. Obviously, a lot 4
of people were not his equal, and he didn’t care. If you came up to Jack with the worst artwork in the world—and, believe me, I did [laughter]—he would give you encouragement. He would tell you, “Keep at it. Keep drawing.” The only two things that would make him give you a negative critique of your work was, number one, if he thought that it was derivative, that you were just copying other people. I tell folks that if I had emerged from my association with Jack able to perfectly replicate Jack Kirby artwork, he would have considered me a colossal failure, because I wouldn’t have created anything. And the other thing is if you were lazy. Jack was a strong believer in hard work. One of the many things I learned from him—I learned lots of stuff from Jack about writing and drawing. I learned an awful lot of stuff from Jack about being a human being—not that I can always apply it. He was just such a decent man, being kind to people—in some cases, I thought too kind with people he shouldn’t have trusted—but I learned that he was a very, very hard worker. One day, a life-changing day, I thought to myself, “You know, you’re never going to be able to have the imagination of this man, but it might be possible to work just that hard, to be dedicated to producing work, and producing not just for the reason of getting a paycheck, or not just even for the reason of having people say, ‘Wow, you do great work’—for the self-satisfaction you get from creating something.” And all of these people up here write and draw, and they’re all very talented people, and they probably have that same quality of, they finish the work, and they go, “Wow, I did something I’m very proud of here.” And sometimes you finish it, and it gets mauled in the production process. It gets inked badly, or colored badly, or printed badly, or distributed badly. You can still get a certain pride in the fact that you did your part of the job right, to the best of your ability, and that was Jack all the way through. He was just an amazing man, whose presence I feel every time I go to a comic book convention; he’s all over the room. He’s everywhere. You look around and you see his influence. Not only do you see the characters that he launched, but you see people doing his style, and you see people who have picked up the
superannuated storytelling that he popularized. Jack told exciting stories. They were all exciting, they were all interesting. This is the reason that we keep going back to his work again and again. You all go back to it and reread it and reread it, and the twelfth reading, you suddenly see something that wasn’t there before, and you go, “Wait a minute. Did somebody sneak in in the middle of the night and doctor my copy? That wasn’t there when I read this story before.” I read the whole Fourth World series maybe twice a year or something, and every time through I go, “Wait a minute, I was in the room when that page was done, and I didn’t notice that.” His stuff is so rich and so exciting that people want to continue it. They want to draw his characters, they want to tell more stories of his characters, they want to try to blend their imaginations. Our imaginations get stimulated by Kirby stories. You want to take that to the next level, and it’s very exciting to just look at Kirby work for the first time, to see someone who just discovers him and is just enraptured by him. Since he passed away, I have had people come to me constantly and try to say to me the thing they wish they could have said to Jack, and it’s a very personal thing, usually. It’s not just, “Yeah, I thought the comic book was really neat.” It was always, “That story meant a lot to my life,” or, “That series caused me to become a writer, or an artist, or a sculptor, or a sign painter,” or whatever it was, because he inspired a lot of people. And I keep doing these panels because I want to keep on sharing this good fortune I had to know him with others. These people are all going to talk about what Jack meant to them, and, if we have time, we’ll answer whatever questions you may have about him, and I bet there’ll be plenty. This is Mr. John Snyder, folks. [applause] This is Mr. Tom King. [applause] Mr. Walter Simonson. [applause and cheers] Mr. Jerry Ordway. [applause] Mr. Mark Buckingham. [applause] The mover and shaker behind the Kirby Museum, which is doing wonderful work to preserve Jack’s stuff, and you’ll undoubtedly have spent some time already in their booth picking through stuff, this is Mr. Rand Hoppe. [applause] Mr. Dean Haspiel. [applause] Immediately following, in the same room we’re going to be talking about Len Wein. That will overlap with Kirby in some ways. Well, Tom, you get to talk first. I have this all programmed in my mind. Tom is doing the new Mister Miracle series for DC, which many of you have probably picked up, and the ones of you who haven’t, should. Talk to us. What does Jack mean to you?
series yet, but I will say I’ve met several people here at the convention who’ve said, “Have you seen the new Mister Miracle series? It’s great!” EVANIER: Actually, [DC Comics] sent me Xeroxes or it. I haven’t seen a printed copy yet. How many issues are out—two? That’s all I’ve seen so far, because DC stopped sending me—if you’ve ever worked for DC Comics and you want them to stop talking to you and stop sending you free comics, testify against them in a lawsuit. [laughter] So, anyway, I’m back now working with them, so... TOM KING: When I close my eyes and see comics, I see Jerry Ordway’s pictures, and Walt Simonson drew the first comic that brought me in. I have John’s work on the wall over my desk. Anyways— SIMONSON: We’re all really boring. [laughter] KING: So, confession time. When I was a kid and I read Kirby comics, I hated them. When I first came to Eternals, I thought, “This is big and blocky and—I want John Buscema or even Jim Lee.” I wanted stuff that was fast, and cool, and sexy. I was like, “I don’t get this.” And I didn’t understand Kirby until I went to college. When I was in college, I would cheat on things—don’t tell—but, by turning it into comics, I was taking classes and doing dinosaurs and Calvin and Hobbes and that kind of sh*t. So I was taking a class on World War II, and I was like, “Oh, comic books are in World War II; easy paper to write.” And so I went to the library and read every comic I could from the Golden Age during World War II, and after a while it was like The Matrix, where I could see the code instead of the comics, because there was a formula. You start to see the formula, and what they’re doing is like, “Oh, Batman’s at the circus again and they have to find the bad guy.” And it bored me. But I would notice that the comics that always sort of stopped the wheel from turning, that I’d have to stop reading, were always Kirby comics. There was something he was doing that was storytelling on another level. His comics were still interesting fifty years later. [baby in audience starts babbling] Yeah, that’s what I’m saying. [laughter] That kid gets it. Yeah, there’s something about that. So I sort of understood that there was something deeper here. It was the storytelling. And once I saw that, I started revisiting Kirby, and I realized that he’s just like the foundation of modern pop culture society or whatever, and we don’t understand that because we’ve been in pop culture, so when we see the foundations, it gets a little confusing, because it’s raw and it’s tough. And then just, to talk about what I’m doing now, DC came to me and said—I was like, “I just want something to do,” and they
WALTER SIMONSON: I haven’t seen that
5
It doesn’t make sense, but it makes more sense than the original.
[above & right] Jack’s pencils and Royer’s inks for Kanto the Assassin in Mister Miracle #7. Errol Flynn (top), indeed!
SIMONSON: And when I read that story when the comics were coming out, it never occurred to me. I didn’t think, “Oh, the pill’s paranoid. That’s kind of strange.” [laughter] I knew exactly what he meant. But he just used a shortcut. A lot of Jack’s drawing he did, especially back when the comics were first produced, they were not reprinted. Comics came out like magical corn on a spinner rack. They were gone a month later, you never saw them again. And that’s kind of how they were treated. And so, something like that, there were shortcuts to meaning. It may already have been 22 pages, or 20, whatever it was, and you had to go, “Here’s my meaning.” And Jack
THE CHILLINGLY WEIRD ART OF
was a master of that. Maybe the Paranoid Pill is exactly an example of that, where you got it instantly, and yet you didn’t have to have it explained to you. It was right there. EVANIER: All right, for those of you who have come in the last few minutes, we are now going to miraculously turn the Jack Kirby tribute panel into the Len Wein tribute panel. Can you thank these gentlemen for joining us? [applause] H
MATT FOX
MATT FOX (1906–1988) first gained notoriety for his jarring cover paintings on the pulp magazine WEIRD TALES from 1943 to 1951. His almost primitive artistry encompassed ghouls, demons, and grotesqueries of all types, evoking a disquieting horror vibe that no one since has ever matched. Fox suffered with chronic pain throughout his life, and that anguish permeated his classic 1950s cover illustrations and his lone story for CHILLING TALES, putting them at the top of all pre-code horror comic enthusiasts’ want lists. He brought his evocative storytelling skills (and an almost BASIL WOLVERTON-esque ink line over other artists) to ATLAS/MARVEL horror comics of the 1950s and ’60s, but since Fox never gave an interview, this unique creator remained largely unheralded—until now! Comic art historian ROGER HILL finally tells Fox’s life story, through an informative biographical essay, augmented with an insightful introduction by FROM THE TOMB editor PETER NORMANTON. This FULL-COLOR HARDCOVER also showcases all of the artist’s WEIRD TALES covers and interior illustrations, and a special Atlas Comics gallery with examples of his inking over GIL KANE, LARRY LIEBER, and others. Plus, there’s a wealth of other delightfully disturbing images by this grand master of horror—many previously unpublished and reproduced from his original paintings and art—sure to make an indelible imprint on a new legion of fans. SHIPS FALL 2023! (128-page COLOR HARDCOVER) $29.95 (Digital Edition) $15.99 • ISBN: 978-1-60549-120-2
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18
by ROGER HILL
Eulogists
Testimonials: February 7, 1994 Sample Headline Conducted by phone by Will Murray, the day after Jack Kirby’s passing on February 6 at age 77 [These comments were copyedited by Will Murray and John Morrow, and excerpts were originally used for Will’s article in Comics Scene #42 (May 1994)]
I squeezed in the Sunday in the same day, in order to keep up with the other stuff. Jack was so dependable. The work would always come right on time. He and I worked very good together, because we were both the same mentality. We always meet deadlines. There were no hang-ups with Jack; it just came right on time.
Dick Ayers (1924–2014)
[above & below] Newly discovered filler panels (circa 1960) from Sky Masters; upper inked by Kirby, lower by Ayers. [right] The Wasp gets her powers in this Don Heck-inked art from Tales to Astonish #44 (June 1963).
I didn’t see him that often. When I was doing Sky Masters, sometimes I would meet him at Grand Central Station and we’d have coffee together, but I didn’t know him socially. He was a very talented guy, y’know? I enjoyed his work very much when I inked it, at the point when Stan Lee told me not to trace; not to ink it just as he penciled it. He told me to really let myself go, and “do my thing.” He said if he wanted someone to just draw exactly and ink over his lines, he’d just pick up anybody who could trace off the street. Then I got to enjoy it very much, because his initial concept was always very exciting. His concept was terrific, and his design, but you had to really stretch your imagination on his anatomy. And his guns; when I did Rawhide Kid, I used to get upset because I like my Colt .45s and I want them to look like that, and the Winchester rifles and all of that. His handles were so bad on the pistols, that I’d redraw them. [laughter] But as I say, his concept was always exciting. Creative and prolific. He saved the industry, with Stan. Stan did the choosing; he pitted me with Jack, and it went from there. At that point, it was so dead, Stan looked at me one time and said, “It’s time to get off the ship. It’s sinking.” I was in the process of taking the exams with the Post Office, and I actually worked there a couple of weeks. I called him and said, “Well, it’s all over.” And Stan said, “Let me try something.” And he sent me a cover to ink, and then he sent me a horror story, and we were off! There was one point where I was doing the inking, and I wanted to do everything he turned out. It got to be like a game; I think it was clocking myself at about 100 pages a month. And then in addition, Sky Masters: To keep up with him, I had to ink all six dailies—I forget whether
Don Heck (1929–1995)
I was just thinking about it. It sorta leaves an emptiness in you. He was super, something special. To me, it’s sorta like losing a big brother. I was lucky enough to go out there last May—first time I ever went across country. I got to be with him up on a stage, and we had dinner together. Topps had paid for it; Jim Salicrup was there too. I’m still shocked about it. I know he was sick, but still, with somebody like that, it’s sorta like Walt Disney or one of the other giants, that you figure will last forever. He was just terrific, and such a great innovator. He was probably the greatest innovator I’ve ever known. He could take just a normal thing, and expand on it, and take it to the limits. It’s hard for me to put it into words; he was just great. There won’t be anybody like him again. Both he and Stan Lee did more for comics than anybody. There’s no question about that. And all the people who are suddenly making all sorts of money, owe a lot to him; [laughter] whether or not they realize that, I don’t know. Some of the ones who really knew what the score is, do. 19
Gallery
COVER COMPARISO
A look at some editorial changes to Kirby’s work, by Shane Foley
[right] 2001: A Space Odyssey #7 (June 1977) Beautifully and faithfully inked by Frank Giacoia—with only a tiny piece of wreckage deleted near the corner box—it seems Kirby deemed this a powerful cover pic that needed no verbiage. Editorial obviously disagreed. To my mind, what finally appeared in the two blurbs is right on the money, and perhaps inspired some new readers to give the title a try, so no harm done there. Kirby either felt the image strong enough without words (fair call) or perhaps he didn’t care, since this was to be the last of the stories themed this way before “Mister Machine” took center stage. [next page] 2001: A Space Odyssey #9 (Aug. 1977) Another cover faithfully, if quite heavily, inked by Frank Giacoia— the only change for this cover is the copy. And personally, I think “From out of the Monolith—the most awesome creation of all! Mister Machine!” (which is what was actually published) is better than what Jack suggested. A powerful and wonderfully designed cover for the second issue of a great series by Jack!
24
ONS
Twice-told Kirby covers, with commentary by Shane Foley
25
Thinkin’ ’bout Inkin’
Approach Shots
by Dave Stevens, William Stout, and Barry Windsor-Smith
[below] Fairly early in his comics career, a young Dave Stevens inked this Kirby drawing, utilizing many of the techniques he discusses here.
[There’s more than one way to skin a cat, as the saying goes. But doing so likely wouldn’t elicit as much outrage as a discussion of favorite Kirby inkers and their respective techniques in doing so. To wit: here are three artists who are masterful in their own work, discussing their own approaches to inking Kirby. Agree or not, we’ll bet the following will generate some vehement responses from fans reading this.]
stands drawing. People assume all it takes is a technician to ink him. That anybody that can use a ruler can ink Jack, and that’s not true, I don’t think. They can ink him, but it’s not gonna look like anything. It’s gonna look like someone taking layouts and inking them straightaway, without any polish. Jack really deserves to have much better inking than he’s getting, to where people will round out his fingers, and will add a little to the hair and features and things like that, and get rid of all these [makes swishing sound] lines in the muscles, and things Jack doesn’t intend to have inked. Some of it, on metal and things like that, you add the sheen, naturally, but there’s all these jagged construction lines that people end up inking, and I’m sure Jack never intended to have that stuff inked. But it gets there; it’s all the way into the final stage.” [This was quoted from Dave’s 1980s video appearance at https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=tWqO83Zt3MM.]
Dave Stevens
“Jack really hasn’t changed his penciling since the 1950s, or as far back as you want to take it. His penciling’s still as good as it was then. He is one of these guys that has to have someone who under-
William Stout
“I was asked to be one of the inkers for what is colloquially known as The Book of Roz. The Book of Roz (actual title Heroes and Villains) was a book of pencil drawings by Jack that he did for his beloved wife Roz. Jack drew just about every major character he ever touched in that volume—DC, Marvel, and all of the other comic book companies for which he worked. “Most of the artists inked just one piece. I was asked to ink Devil Dinosaur (if you know my history, you know why I was picked for this character). “Because of my previous work on The Demon (as a favor to my pal Mike Royer who wanted some much-needed family vacation time, I ghost-inked much of issue #15 of The Demon), I had previously inked Jack’s piece from Heroes and Villains illustrating The Demon just for fun and for myself. 34
“Here’s how I did these two pieces: “I made a copy of each drawing enlarged to original art size. I took some home-made carbon paper (I covered my ‘carbon’ with soft graphite, as commercial graphite carbon paper leaves an unwanted residue on the paper) and transferred every speck and line of Jack’s drawing to a piece of cold press illustration board. “I then carefully and completely re-penciled the drawing, using Jack’s piece as a guide, so that it was as close to Jack’s original as possible. Once that was completed, I inked it. “Now, there are at least two ways to ink Jack Kirby. There’s what I call ‘The Royer Method,’ an ego-less process in which the inker tries to remain as true as possible to Jack’s pencils, basically just cleaning up Jack’s work, perhaps inking using a straight edge here and there, if necessary. “The other method is inking Jack in the style that is the artist’s normal style—a style that comes natural to the inker. “I inked The Demon using The Royer Method. “For Devil Dinosaur, I was asked to combine the two methods. I inked the pterosaur in the picture pretty much as I would have inked it using my own style, but inked the rest of the picture closer to Jack’s style. “Decades later, during COVID, I had a hankering to ink a few more of Jack’s Heroes and Villains pieces. One was Ka-Zar (you know me and my love for All Things Prehistoric). I didn’t use the Royer Method with the Ka-Zar piece, however. I thought Jack’s sabertooth in that piece looked pretty goofy. It was not one of Jack’s best attempts at drawing a sabertooth, so I re-drew the sabertooth in the same position, but enhanced it with my own knowledge of sabertooths (I painted the sabertooth mural at the San Diego Natural History Museum and have a sabertooth skull in my studio). I’m especially happy with how the Ka-Zar piece turned out.” 35
Foundations
Here’s Simon & Kirby’s final “Flying Fool” story, “Peril Paradise” from Airboy Comics V4, #11 (Dec. 1947), with art reconstruction and coloring by Chris Fama. What would you like to see in future “Foundations” installments? Let us know!
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Boom!
THE SOURCE the Origins of Kirby’s Old New Gods by Richard Kolkman
[Editor’s note: The following essay served as a big part of the research that went in to producing TJKC #80’s “Old Gods & New” epic. I’m pleased to finally be able to present Richard Kolkman’s full work here, which does an amazing job of connecting and comparing Kirby inspirations and concepts throughout his career, and how they culminated in the Fourth World.]
This deep dive into the headwaters of the Fourth World began when I read Robert Guffey’s essay “We All Live in Happyland” in Jack Kirby Collector #57 in 2011. Mr. Guffey sensed that a JFK connection exists within Kirby’s Fourth World. I have come to second that notion. “The place to look for Kirby’s reaction to the JFK assassination lay not in his Marvel work of the 1960s, but in his most important work for DC Comics in the early 1970s.”—Robert Guffey What I present here is all circumstantial evidence, but in its totality, becomes compelling. It begins firmly in the bedrock of the faithful... “There came a time when the old gods died.” (New Gods #1, March 1971). In Spirit World #1 (Fall 1971), Dr. E. Leopold Maas’ premonition story is the nexus between spirits of ancient Egypt and the events in Dallas on November 22, 1963.
“The sky grew dark and the sun dropped to the horizon! From behind me, came the sound of a rifle shot!”
[right] JFK and Jackie in a premonition of death from 1971’s Spirit World #1. [below] Kirby’s original collage, and its disappointing printing in blue ink from Spirit World #1. [next page, top] Yul Brenner and Charlton Heston from 1956’s The Ten Commandments meet Kirby’s Ramses and Highfather, alongside more Egyptian imagery from Spirit World #1.
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his is how Spirit World #1 begins—with a breathless warning. For Jack Kirby’s entire career, he had the inscrutable knack for combining two diverse inspiration points and creating something timeless and uncanny. The Eternals is a perfect example: Kirby combined Greek mythology and Erich von Däniken’s book Chariots of the Gods (1968) into an epic of cosmic confrontation. While researching the Jack Kirby Checklist for 25 years, it slowly dawned on me: Many aspects of Kirby’s Fourth World at DC Comics appeared to be steeped in ancient Egyptian history (The Hebrews) and the legacy of John F. Kennedy—in the aftermath of his untimely assassination. The death of hope of the “New Frontier” was a cataclysmic shock to the American psyche—it affected everyone. Kirby admitted to Mark Evanier that the death of JFK had a profound impact upon his work. Instead of manifesting itself in the short-term, I believe it was a major thematic inspiration for Kirby’s Fourth World epic of the New Gods, and their battle to free themselves from oppression. The struggle of the ancient Hebrews to free themselves from Egyptian tyranny permeates the thematic ebbs and flows of the Hunger Dogs and New Genesis.
THE MOUNTAIN OF JUDGMENT Ramses’ words ring out in righteous indignation: “It would take more than a man to free the slaves; it would take a god!” Indeed, Moses delivered the Jews from the tyranny of the Egyptian Pharaoh. With a staff like Highfather’s, Moses parted the Red Sea—an avenue of escape from Egyptian slavery. The mythos of the Hunger Dogs is grounded firmly in the Old Testament chapter of Exodus. Slavery is an evil affront to life: “You’re dead as an individual. You have no choice. You can’t object and you
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have no stature as a person. You’re dead. A slave is a dead man. That’s what Darkseid wants. Darkseid wants complete subjugation of everything at a word—his word. He wants every thinking thing under his control.” —Jack Kirby (Train of Thought #5, Feb. 1971). Cecil B. DeMille’s epic film The Ten Commandments (1956) was screened for movie fans in a visually stunning new format: “Cinemascope has more dimension to it, more depth... the more lifelike it is, the more impressed you are with the image.”—Jack Kirby (1969). For years, The Ten Commandments was broadcast on ABC-TV every Easter. Watch it and listen carefully—it sounds and feels every bit like New Gods. The twin stone tablets brought down from Mt. Sinai by Moses were “commandments,” but they were always subject to man’s free will. The Source always represented the “Life Equation.” The hand of fire only guides us—it does not possess us. (Kirby’s character Dubbilex reminds me of the double-X: the two tablets that contain the Ten Commandments, X+X). Ramses was Kirby’s original villain in his developing “New Gods” idea in 1966. Alternately known as the “Black Pharaoh” or the “Black Sphinx,” the concept art was ably inked by Don Heck. Kirby’s lineage of Pharaoh antagonists from the past can be laid out thusly:
“The Mad Pharaoh.” King Hatap comes out of suspended animation with his black arts knowledge to menace Iron Man. With a cover by Kirby and Ayers, the story art is by Don Heck, which gives him some rights to a Pharaoh villain in 1969’s X-Men. • F antastic Four #19 (Oct. 1963) “Prisoners Of The Pharaoh.” RamaTut descends in his time machine (The Sphinx) and rules ancient Egypt. His “Chariot of Time” also ties in with Dr. Doom’s time platform in issue #5 (July 1962). •R amses (concept art, 1966, above), Kirby’s original Fourth World villain (inked by Heck); Ramses wields an unidentified “Eye Weapon.” When Heck utilized the Pharaoh concept in X-Men #54–55 (March–April 1969) as the “Living Pharaoh”, he is diminished somewhat when Arnold Drake’s Iceman refers to Pharaoh as “Pyramid Poppa”! Perhaps this is why Kirby developed Darkseid as a serious replacement in 1969. •A nd finally, Prester John [left] wields an “Evil Eye” after emerging from a centuries-long sleep in Fantastic Four #54 (Sept. 1966). “I Am the Alpha and Omega” (Revelation 1:8 and 22:13). The beginning and the end of all things—Kirby played with this idea, first in Fantastic Four #82–83 (Jan.–Feb. 1969) when Dr. Doom’s “Alpha-Primitives” overwhelm the FF, and later as Highfather’s “Alpha Bullets” reclaim the Forever People in their issue #7 (March 1972). The “Omega Effect” first occurs in Amazing Adventures #4 (Jan. 1971, right) when the Mandarin consigns his co-hort to oblivion—in exactly the same manner
• Challengers of the Unknown #4 (Nov. 1958). “The Wizard Of Time” features Pharaoh’s astrologer, Rhamis, his time machine, and a telescope he calls the “Cosmic Eye.” • Tales of Suspense #44 (Aug. 1963) 49
Eyedunno
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Spot The Differences
o you know the “Spot the differences” game? You are given two very similar images and you must find all the, however subtle, differences between them.
by Dario Bressanini
the original cover as conceived by Kirby. The same cover was later reprinted in the US in the Marvel Masterworks series.
Avengers #1
Avengers #2
Below is Marvel’s house ad for The Avengers #2, and on the next page is the original cover (on the left) and the one reprinted in the Marvel Masterworks book (in the center). Can you spot the differences, apart from the different colors? In the Marvel Masterworks cover (center): 1) The giant green arrow pointing at Giant Man is slightly bigger. 2) The blue sign above Thor is bigger, and touches the green arrow. 3) The right edge of the right window is slightly displaced to the right. It is hard to see, but notice that the bricks touching the window’s edge are shorter. 4) Although all the characters are identical, there is an additional shadow for the
September 1963 was the cover date for issue #1 of The Avengers—cover and story art by Jack, of course. [above] Here on the left is its famous cover. Before going to print, Stan Lee ordered a small change in the cover art, as in countless other cases: he asked to hide part of Thor’s cape. The cover as originally drawn by Kirby was shown in an ad in Fantastic Four #18 [center]. Fantastic Four at the time was Marvel’s flagship publication, and ads were meant to alert the readers to new comics coming out. To me, Jack rendition of Thor’s cape seems better, showing its right side. Maybe Stan Lee wanted to leave some space around The Wasp? When I was a kid, I used to read Marvel comics translated in Italian, starting in 1971. A few decades later I started reading the reprints of the original comics, and occasionally I was puzzled looking at the cover art. Something seemed wrong—often there were small and sometimes subtle changes to the cover I had memorized, impressed in my mind by the countless times I reread those stories. At top right is the Italian print of the cover taken from my own collection. The Avengers in Italy did not have, at the time, their own book. Instead they were published as the second story of the book Il Mitico Thor (The Mighty Thor), a 48-page book with usually two fulllength stories and a short one, usually “Tales of Asgard.” For this reason, the covers were often printed as the internal pages. And the version they printed in the Italian comic book was 68
right leg of Giant-Man. When I noticed the differences, what bothered me more was the shadow. I admit it is a rather unimportant detail, but I asked myself if that shadow was really drawn by Kirby or not. A few times the Marvel Masterworks reprinted the original cover stat, photographed before the cover was modified. It happened, for example, for The X-Men #1. But why on Earth should Kirby draw the shadow only for the right leg and forget the other? Maybe he simply forgot; after all, he was overwhelmed with work. He produced 139 published pages, including many covers, with cover-date Nov. 1963! Maybe Kirby forgot to draw the other shadow and at the office, production manager Sol Brodsky erased it. However, there is another puzzling detail in both covers: look at the glasses in the two windows. They have different sizes, and the right window is wider than the left one. Why? I find Marvel Comics’ handling of the reprints of various Silver Age books particularly confusing. Sometimes they recolor both the interior and the cover differently than the original. But most annoyingly is when they use a cover different than the original, without any explanation. I do love to see in print alternate or even previously unpublished covers. There are spectacular covers by Jack Kirby that were rejected back then, that have been rediscovered and published only recently. But if a different cover is used, some explanation to the reader is expected. I couldn’t help but wonder: where did the Marvel Masterworks cover come from? Who penciled that shadow? Was it erased or was it added? Which one of the two covers has been drawn by Kirby and modified later? The surprising answer is that neither of them is the original unretouched cover that Jack Kirby gave to the offices at
Madison Avenue. Fortunately, we can look at the original cover, as conceived and drawn by Jack, in the ad published in The Uncanny X-Men #2 [top right]. Now let’s play the “Spot the differences” game with the ad cover against the original printed one [above left]. How many differences are you able to find? 1) The green arrow and blue sign above Giant-Man and Thor are the same as in the Masterworks reprint—bigger than they appeared in the original printed cover. 2) Not only the shadow of the right leg of Giant-Man is present, but there is also the shadow of the other leg and a part of the body! Kirby did not forget to draw it after all, but for some reason at the office, they decided to erase all the shadows and, rather oddly, when reproducing the Masterworks cover, someone decided to leave only one shadow. 3) In the right portion of the cover, instead of an empty yellow wall, there is a pipe and some bins. On top of the pipe there are lines (another wall?) that apparently have the wrong prospective. Kirby must have really been in a hurry, since that part of the background is not very refined. It was probably for this reason that someone decided to erase that portion and leave a clean wall. 4) The window is a single window instead of two, but Kirby forgot to draw the left border. The glass squares are all the same size. Someone added the left portion of the frame, divided the window in two different windows, added the top frame, and to show it, moved the green arrow and the blue sign upward a bit. The mystery of the shadow has been solved!
Avengers #4
The Avengers #4 is a seminal issue: Captain America is being brought to life 69