Wasted Potential

[Perpetual Failure]

Alrighty I got yet another idea for a thread and again it is kind of negative so I hope no one takes offense!

What comic creators do you feel never lived up to their potential or otherwise disappointed you in some way? I am thinking mainly of people who were really good at doing comics but for some reason left the medium. Examples would be that you were sad when Stan Lee stopped actively writing comics in the 70's or when Alex Schomburg moved over to illustrating novels instead of comic covers after the golden age.

Actually my motivation for this thread was Al Williamson. I love his work, but it pains me that he never really did a whole lot of it. He has been in the comic business for decades but has spent the majority of his time as an inker. Even if he is a great inker, and is inking very good artists, I still feel a sense of loss that he didn't produce more actual artwork for publication. Other examples I can think of would be Mark Schultz and Dave Stevens, who both slowed down their output tremendously.

So what comic creators are you sad didn't do more work (or do better work)?

[Chad]

Great topic, though I didn't have to think for too long to come up with my answer.

DC was initially going to ask Alan Moore to take over the Superman books following the Crisis, but instead decided that John Byrne would do a better job. As consolation, they asked Moore to write Action Comics with the provision that he follow Byrne's plots. He replied "Sure, if he doesn't mind inking my drawings!"

[Red Oak Kid]

I wish Bernie Wrightson had done more comic book work.

[Mike Kuypers]

Mike Kaluta
Mike Parobeck (died too soon)
Don Newton (ditto)

[Allan Harvey]

Actually my motivation for this thread was Al Williamson. I love his work, but it pains me that he never really did a whole lot of it.

Don't forget that Williamson spent decades drawing comic strips rather than comic books (Secret Agent X9, Star Wars). His "sequential art" output is actually pretty high. Like you, though, I really wish he were drawing rather than inking. If I was a publisher, I'd give him a hundred grand and no deadline and ask him to draw a Flash Gordon graphic novel.

The three issues of Flash Gordon he did for King in the mid '60s? Some of the best comics ever.

[T GUy]

DC... asked Moore to write Action Comics with the provision that he follow Byrne's plots. He replied "Sure, if he doesn't mind inking my drawings!"

LoL, as they say on the wibbly-wobbly web. Perfect reply.

My regret is that we didn't see more work from Alex Toth. Even more, that we didn't see more of Jack Kirby's work without it being interfered with or cut short.

[MDG]

Don't forget that Williamson spent decades drawing comic strips rather than comic books (Secret Agent X9, Star Wars). His "sequential art" output is actually pretty high. Like you, though, I really wish he were drawing rather than inking. If I was a publisher, I'd give him a hundred grand and no deadline and ask him to draw a Flash Gordon graphic novel.

The three issues of Flash Gordon he did for King in the mid '60s? Some of the best comics ever.
Did you see the 2-issue Flash Gordon mini that Williamson did for Marvel about 10 years ago. Beautiful stuff.

But I think one reason that Williamson hasn't done a lot of pencilling work in the past 20 or so years is that he just isn't interested in drawing superheroes.



I wish Bernie Wrightson had done more comic book work.
Why are we talking about him in the past tense? Did something happen?

Actually, I often wonder what Wrightson's working on day-to-day. He's probably one of the greatest talents ever to work in comics.

Two names that come to my mind are Marshall Rogers and Trevor Von Eeden.

MDG

[Jonathan Bogart]

Jack Cole and Bernie Krigstein are at the top of my list, and I'm surprised nobody's mentioned them yet.

Wally Wood and Jim Steranko are two others that often come up in discussions like these.

[Red Oak Kid]

Bernie Wrightson

Why are we talking about him in the past tense? Did something happen?

Actually, I often wonder what Wrightson's working on day-to-day. He's probably one of the greatest talents ever to work in comics.

MDG

Nothing happened:o

He seems to be a regular on the convention circuit these days.

I should have completed the sentence, something like; I wish he had done more comic book work before moving on to other higher paying branches of commercial art like storyboards for movies.

I think he does some concept work for movies too. I think that is where he is given a movie script and comes up with drawings of how the characters and settings would look to him. Not a storyboard, but finished presentation drawings of how things could look.

[MWGallaher]

Rodolfo Dimaggio. He did some magnificent issues of Green Arrow before he moved on to, I think, Hollywood storyboarding. What interested me what how much his style seemed influenced by Dan Spiegle, but when he was asked about it, he didn't seem to know Spiegle, and instead said his style was influenced mainly by Lee Weeks, with whom he'd worked. But, at the time, Weeks was doing work that was obviously influenced by Spiegle..so I think it was second-hand...

[Kan-Man]

When I was actively collecting during the early 70s to the early 80s, I didn't know anything about the behind the scenes politics of the comic book industry, I just knew who I liked and who I didn't. And I remember each month buying my favorite comics and hoping that Neal Adams did the artwork. One of my first comics was Batman 243 and by that time he was almost done doing mainstream work for either DC or Marvel.

[Gingold]

For someone so influential and revered, Steranko's actualy comics output is pretty small. It would've been interesting if he had stayed in comics and kept pushing the boundaries of the medium. Who knows what cool stuff he would've done?

[dan bailey]

Mike Parobeck (died too soon)
Don Newton (ditto)

Gene Day belongs in that sad category as well.

[dupersuper]

Thinking of Dusty Abel makes me sad. I picked up the Superman annual he did, and it looked GREAT. Very open, nice flow...then he proceeded to do almost nothing the next 15 years, and what he did do looked like crap compared to the annual. All dark with jagged lines and ugly, rdiculous looking bulging veins on the arms...so sad.

[Allan Harvey]

Did you see the 2-issue Flash Gordon mini that Williamson did for Marvel about 10 years ago. Beautiful stuff.

It took me ages to find the second issue, but, yes, it's beautiful work by a master of the medium. His adaptation of the 1980 film is lovely too.

As to the wider question, I wish Jim Sherman had drawn more comics. His last few Legion jobs were fabulous. His few pages of Legion #300 I'd rank as some of the best the Legion ever had.

More Brian Bolland comics would be nice, rather than just covers: I remember when he used to draw Judge Dredd regularly. Or Adam Hughes for that matter.

[Cherokee Jack]

Gene Day belongs in that sad category as well.


As do Don Newton, and Joe Maneely. Comics as we know them, would probably be very different had Maneely lived, and stayed at Marvel.

[Rob Allen]

Several great artists started out at Charlton and moved on to bigger & better things - Dick Giordano, Jim Aparo, Joe Staton, Mike Zeck and Don Newton, to name a few. Wayne Howard seemed to be ready for a similar rise to stardom, but it never happened.

And I was disappointed when Sanho Kim moved back to Korea, though I understand he did quite well there.

[MWGallaher]

If I'd thought of it, some of Sanho Kim's covers probably could have served in my contribution to the thread about "Classic Comic Covers that Disturb You". Almost all of his work strikes me as disturbingly wrong in uncomfortable, hard-to-define ways.

[gentlesatirist]

...as mkuypers has cited. From what I've read over the years, the guy's drawing style and pace was much better suited for cover art vs. interiors. Those early issues of the Shadow for DC in the early 70s are all-time classics.

Parobeck also is one of those guys who I think will be more influential as the years go by because of his combination of animation-type art with "straight" superhero designs. I don't know how the timeline works as to whether he was an influence on Bruce Timm or if it was the other way around, but there definitely seems to be a connection there. The best examples of parobeck's work are early issues of Batman Adventures and the short-lived Justice Society series he did around '91 or so.


- FE
Wickliffe OH

[phicks]

For all the Bernie Wrightson fans, he does have a new horror mini-series being solicited for the spring.

How about Neal Adams? He may be one of the most influential artists in the history of comics, but he only really worked in the field from about 1965 to 1975.

Rich Buckler was my favourite artist when I was a kid in the 1970s. My understanding is that he got labelled as a "swipe" artist inside the industry, worked hard to develop his own style, and was then ignored by the comics world. His website says he is now a fine art painter.

What's John Totleben done lately? I hope his vision problems aren't the reason for his absence from comics.

[Slam_Bradley]

Don Newton obviously sprung to mind.

Of those who didn't die prematurely, Jeff Jones and Mike Kaluta stand out for me.

[Aaron King]

Seth Fisher died prematurely.

[Hintermann]

Back in the 1950s & 60s, Bill Wright did some good stuff on Mickey Mouse for Dell & later Gold Key. The problem was that some of his ealier stories were virual reworks of older Floyd Gottfriedson's adventures, with MM and his cohorts changed to suit contemporary readers. While it worked with many readers (like me), too many diehard Gottfriedson fans rejected Wright's work. As a result, his image suffered in later years even when he did original stories. A pity realy, cos I think that Bill Wright had a lot to offer. He too died relatively early, in his 50s, if I am not mistaken.

[Kan-Man]

How about Bill Watterson and Gary Larson? I'd like to see either or both of them working again.

[dan bailey]

I don't know a thing about Gerald McCann, other than that he drew the bulk of Dell's Ghost Stories #s 2-4 in the early '60s ... & that I like his art a lot.

The GCD shows him with only 72 credits, which goes down to 55 if you disallow for reprints of the Ghost Stories work -- 3 in the early '50s, 1 in '57 & the rest in the early '60s, except for 1 each in '65 & '67 for ACG mystery titles. *sigh*

[dan bailey]

And can we ever forget William Ekgren, whose comics output seems to have been limited to a scant 3 covers 50-some-odd years ago? No, we cannot --

http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f171/sportscardsplus/12405_4_007.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f171/sportscardsplus/12405_4_006.jpg
http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f171/sportscardsplus/10289_4_004.jpg

[MDG]

I always imagine that William Ekgren was a starving artist living in Greenwich Village who had an acquiantance who worked for a comics publisher and tried to help him out by buying a couple of his paintings.

MDG

[Jankenstein]

It occurs to me that a great many of my favorite artists aren't as prolific in the comics industry as I'd like, but none of them disappoint me at all.

Kaluta, William Stout, Gary Gianni, Mark Schultz.....all fantastic artists that I'd love to see more work by. I can't really complain about Vess, Mignola, or P. Craig Russell.....they've been pretty busy lately.

I'd love to see more comics work by Craig Hamilton, and wouldn't mind seeing Frank Cho get back to Liberty Meadows.

[Jankenstein]

doggoned multiple posts!

[Jankenstein]

Son of Multiple Posts

[Jankenstein]

The Multiple Posts That Wouldn't Die But Can't Be Erased And Are Very Annoying. :(