The Fourth Day of Clasic Comics Christmas 2011

[Cei-U!]

Arguably the first time I ever realized just how big a difference an inker can make was when I first encountered today's featured art team

#9 Herb Trimpe and John Severin

I hadn't cared for Trimpe's singular style up to that point, his perceived faults blinding me to his superior storytelling skills. Few artists, then or now, have a better sense of page design, particularly in balancing angles and POVs while subtly guiding the reader's eye exactly where the narrative needs it to go, but I couldn't--or wouldn't--see it until he joined forces with Severin. Marie's big brudder can sometimes overwhelm a penciller (thank the gods, or else Dick Ayers' later issues of Sgt. Fury would be unreadable) but he was the perfect partner for Happy Herbie. His inks gave the art texture and depth, smoothing HT's rougher edges and enhancing his sometimes rubbery and off-putting figure work with volume and weight. In short, Severin removed the scales from my eyes and made me a lifelong Trimpe fan... and isn't that the highest compliment you can pay an inker?

Cei-U!
I summon the epiphany!

[Red Oak Kid]

#9 Curt Swan/George Klein

Curt Swan is probably the first comic book artist I was aware of because Superboy was the first comic book I got hooked on and actively sought out on the stands. Batman would be a close second. But I definitely had more Superboy comics. The Marvel comics on the stands scared me with their blurb filled covers that seemed to be shouting at me. I certainly didn't know the name George Klein until decades later.

But Swan and Klein turned out a steady stream of consistently great Superboy covers in the 60s that kept me buying them whenever I got the chance. Unlike the inks of Murphy Anderson, who is also great on Swan's pencils, Klein's inks reinforced Swan's story telling without calling attention to himself.

The cover of Superboy 130 was one of my favorites and I loved to sit on the floor and just look at it.

http://www.comics.org/issue/20106/cover/4/

[Judomaster]

I really wanted to include Joe Staton on my list. Much like yesterday's inker, Paul Reinman, much of the stuff I really like by him that I've read is a solo effort. In browsing my short boxes, I flipped through my copies of the All-Star Comics 70s reboot and was reminded of the issues he pencilled for that series.

The finished product, with Bob Layton's inking removes some of the idiosyncracies from Staton's art, but not entirely, and that is a good thing. I was lucky to find one of the pages that stuck with me online, page 17 of #69. The scene between Power Girl and Wayne is very well executed. I've also found a page from #68 that shows where Layton was really able to ink the art in a manner that lets all that is enjoyable in Staton shine through. Note the Psycho-Pirate and Wildcat in particular. Love it!

So, Day 4: Joe Staton and Bob Layton in All-Star Comics 68-69

[Roquefort Raider]

When you first imprint on Barry Smith and his elegant vision of the Hyborian age, seeing the art chores pass to the hands of someone more down to Earth like John Buscema can be brutal. Many Conan the barbarian readers preferred Buscema, if sales are any indication, but for long years the definitive version for me was Smith's and only Smith's. Like any young, opinionated fan, I wouldn't give anyone else a chance.

But with time, that shall pass too... and I grew to like Buscema's art more and more. And that inker, Ernie Chua, wasn't half bad either; he gave the art an earthiness that, while far away from Smith's fine marble floors and elegant palaces, suited the tone of the series quite well. Chua went away for a while and was replaced by other able hands (Tom Palmer's and Steve Gan's among others)... and then returned as Ernie Chan.

Wow! Did he put his back to the wheel on this one. Chan used amost as much feathering and tiny lines as another great Buscema embellisher, Alfredo Alcala. He quickly became a fan favorite on this title, and deservedly so.

I'm not convinced Buscema liked the work of Chan over his pencils. Ernie tends to make everything look like Chan first, everything else second; and while Big John's own inking makes his art look more like Foster or Kubert, Chan's make it look very busy. But boy, did he make those images look good anyway! That's one inker no one will ever accuse of cutting corners, nor of erasing stuff to go faster! I can't imagine what it's like to see the man at work, considering his massive output. He must have been at the drawing board 20 hours a day.

Chan's solo art isn't bad either, but his combination with Buscema was a real case of synergy. For my tastes, Ernie's figures are almost always too short; his Conan is massive, but looks like he's 5'9" or something. Buscema's pencils made him tall, and who can go wrong with Big John's storytelling?

In any case, John Buscema and Ernie Chan became a very famous team for very good reasons, and that's why I rank them here at position #9.

[dan bailey]

How cool. For the first time, the first 2 picks made my list of finalists & came very, very close to breaking into the top dozen. For that matter, one if not both might still break through, since I find myself in the excruciating position of having to cut 2 from my list as it stands &, if I apply a certain heartless criterion to rationalize doing so, would lose a 3rd as well ... *choke*

(Which isn't to say that there's anything wrong with Judomaster's pick, of course. As I've said before, I've just never liked Staton on "straight" superheroics, as opposed to E-Man. Also, I'm not sure a penciller-inker team that rhymes is to be, y'know, trusted.)

(Or RR's pick, either, which showed up while I was posting this, though I have to admit that another Conan team featuring Buscema is the one that occurred to me.)

[shaxper]

In case you’ve missed it, since I've only just begun to appreciate art teams in the comic world, I've decided to limit my scope and stick to what I know. Therefore, my list will consist entirely of favorite Batman penciler/inker teams.


9. Carmine Infantino and Joe Giella

Ah, the “New Look” Batman. One of these days, I’m going to write a book proving my theory that the best kind of art is motivated by one of two things – caring too much about success and not caring about success at all. In this case, the former is true. Infantino and Giella had to win back a generation of readers that had lost interest in campy heroes, and Infantino’s figures, along with Giella’s textures and shadows, worked painstakingly to do so with disarmingly realistic looking versions of the dynamic duo. Giella kept the drama high with thick shadows, but he also worked hard to show the creases and textures that had never appeared on Batman and Robin’s costumes and faces before. It’s extraordinary to look at. Surely, many art teams have come since and done more with the visuals of the dynamic duo (I can think of eight off the top of my head ;) ), but yet I think it would be wrong to say any of them did better.

[Scott Harris]

Note: I am focusing my choices on one specific title -- The Avengers.

Coming in at #9: Gene Colan and Sam Grainger






I don't want to sound like a blasphemer, but usually Colan's superhero work doesn't quite do it for me. Don't get me wrong, the guy is a master, I just don't think his style is suited to mainstream superheroics; the moodiness and sketchiness really suit stuff like Tomb of Dracula or Dr. Strange more. But I really dig his brief run on Avengers, thanks in part to the inks of Granger, which I think are heavy enough to anchor Colan's pencils for lack of a better term. Colan also was experimenting some with page design, which also helps, though it's my understanding he was read the riot act for this two-page spread in Avengers #65. I personally think it's pretty sweet though.

[dan bailey]

What the heck. My next 5 or 6 are pretty much tied for 3rd, really, so I might as well start picking names out of a hat & proceed ...

9. Sal Buscema & Klaus Janson, mid-'70s Defenders

This team -- which has already shown up at least once -- honestly completely slipped my mind when I was first set about making up a list, checking it twice (& thrice, & ...) & painfully whittling it down. Then someone happened to mention the Buscema-Janson issues of Defenders in a completely unrelated thread, & my fond memories of their work on that run sprang immediately into my mind's eye; I knew I had to include it.

I'm not a huge Sal B. fan, though I deeply respect his always-dependable workmanship, ability to portray action & strong work ethic. During Steve Gerber's Defenders run, Klaus Janson's inks lent a certain ... elegance isn't the word, really, not when applied to the truly dynamic sense of movement & drama conveyed by Sal's rugged renderings, but offhand I can't think of a better adjective ...

... Maybe sophistication? Nah, that's not it, either.

But you guys know what I mean, I hope.

Also, this team's rendering of one of my favorite characters ever, Valkyrie, remains definitive going on 4 decades later. So, y'know, there's that.

[Paulie]

My Day # team is the one from my list with the smallest amount of work... and it is...

Paul Gulacy and Dan Adkins on Master of Kung Fu.

Why? Adkins line work added intensity to the already sleek Gulacy pencils to produce some of the finest spy-fi adventure yarns in the history of comics. See Master of Kung Fu 29-31, 33-35, 38-39 and Giant-Size 1. That's it folks.

[Roquefort Raider]

I'm so glad someone chose a Sam Grainger team. I live his strong line, the way his black really looks black and not gray. Whenever I see some Grainger inking, I always get the impression he's using a better ink than most people. Yay! Guilt alleviated!!!

[Jezebel Bond]

Entry #4

Featured in Wolverine 145, December 1999

One that just about qualifies within the parameters given and my only 90s submission. This would be the first time I ever noticed a Wolverine book in my early teens, the cover was an eye-catcher from a good 12-15 feet away. It would also be the first time I ever experienced a Wolverine/Hulk slugfest. Although the 90s represents my least liked decade in comics in the last 50 years, this was one of the few books I didn't regret getting, albeit in a very disjointed way because I didn't even know Wolverine had lost his adamantium to begin with (remember I was reading 90s comics in a very erratic way in my teens, virtually never in sequence). My main incentive for getting this book was a combination of kickass cover and the wonderful rendering inside. I only own a handful of issues in this series and don't know how long the Wu/Vines lasted but this one represents one of the finer moments in that decade in my humble opinion.



PS By comparison, I've included the classic Herb Trimpe/Jack Abel take of Hulk/Wolverine from 1974. Adorable in own way, but I prefer the art that followed 25 years later.

[An Ear In The Fireplace]

9. Gene Colan and Tom Palmer

--Tomb of Dracula.

I have heard about many different pencillers who did great pages only to have their work ruined by inkers. Back in the day, it was especially hard to render a pencil sketch in black ink for the printing presses that comic books used. Gene Colan was clearly one of those artists who did amazing pencil pages, but for any inker doing justice to those pages must have been a real challenge. No wonder that DC chose to shoot Colan's work from the pencils instead of having them inked for Nathaniel Dusk--when it was now possible to do that kind of thing.

In the 70s, I was a big fan of Howard the Duck and Steve Leialoha did a good job inking Gentleman Gene on that. But I never read Tomb of Dracula. It wasn't until some years ago when I picked up all the Essentials that I had a chance to read this series. And to my mind Tom Palmer solved the problem better than anyone of how to render those pencils. His use of black ink to render the shading on Colan's pencils is an amazing feat.

[Judomaster]

When you first imprint on Barry Smith and his elegant vision of the Hyborian age, seeing the art chores pass to the hands of someone more down to Earth like John Buscema can be brutal. Many Conan the barbarian readers preferred Buscema, if sales are any indication, but for long years the definitive version for me was Smith's and only Smith's. Like any young, opinionated fan, I wouldn't give anyone else a chance.

But with time, that shall pass too... and I grew to like Buscema's art more and more. And that inker, Ernie Chua, wasn't half bad either; he gave the art an earthiness that, while far away from Smith's fine marble floors and elegant palaces, suited the tone of the series quite well. Chua went away for a while and was replaced by other able hands (Tom Palmer's and Steve Gan's among others)... and then returned as Ernie Chan.

Wow! Did he put his back to the wheel on this one. Chan used amost as much feathering and tiny lines as another great Buscema embellisher, Alfredo Alcala. He quickly became a fan favorite on this title, and deservedly so.

I'm not convinced Buscema liked the work of Chan over his pencils. Ernie tends to make everything look like Chan first, everything else second; and while Big John's own inking makes his art look more like Foster or Kubert, Chan's make it look very busy. But boy, did he make those images look good anyway! That's one inker no one will ever accuse of cutting corners, nor of erasing stuff to go faster! I can't imagine what it's like to see the man at work, considering his massive output. He must have been at the drawing board 20 hours a day.

Chan's solo art isn't bad either, but his combination with Buscema was a real case of synergy. For my tastes, Ernie's figures are almost always too short; his Conan is massive, but looks like he's 5'9" or something. Buscema's pencils made him tall, and who can go wrong with Big John's storytelling?

In any case, John Buscema and Ernie Chan became a very famous team for very good reasons, and that's why I rank them here at position #9.

Having grown up in Quebec, I had a bunch of Editions Heritage translated reprints. I don't remember the lettering ever being quite as off-putting as in that panel from Conan you've provided.

Love the choice though!

[mrc1214]

#9 Ka-Zar the Savage
Pencils:Brent Anderson
Inks:Carlos Garzon




Simply stunning pencils by Anderson here and Garzon brought the colors like I have said before. The art alone is worth picking up this series.

[The Confessor]

9. Pencils: Frank Miller, Inks: Klaus Janson



This team appeared in yesterday's thread, picked by mrc1214 I believe, so here's another vote for Miller/Janson...specifically their work together on Daredevil. I liked what I saw of the art in Sin City and The Dark Knight Returns was certainly a mind-blowingly good read when it first appeared in 1986, but for me, Frank Miller's finest hour was on Daredevil in the early '80s.

I could list plenty of reasons why I like Miller and Janson's art during this period of Daredevil so much, but the moody shadow work, the dynamic energy Miller brings to Daredevil's acrobatics, the unabashed Will Eisner influences and the added weight and thickness that Janson brings to Miller's pencils are all "up there" in terms of why it works so well for me. I've read, although how true it is I don't know, that Miller's pencils in the early part of his Daredevil run were pretty rough and ready, and that Klaus Janson's inking really hid a multitude of sins. Regardless of whether that's true or not, however, I find Miller and Janson's work together on the book simply a pleasure to behold.

Here's a couple of samples...