RIP – Bernie Wrightson

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It was announced today that Bernie Wrightson has passed away after a long battle with brain cancer.  Mr. Wrightson was 68.

Known best for his drawings and paintings in the horror genre, Mr. Wrightson was a humble and soft-spoken man who appreciated his fans.  Wrightson was an artist’s artist.  Not only was his work loved by fans, but professional artists were also in awe of his talent.  Best known as the co-creator (with Len Wein) of Swamp Thing, Wrightson was also known for…

  • Being one of the young upstart talents of “The Studio” (along with Barry Smith, Michael Kaluta, and Jeff Jones)
  • His horror work at Warren Publishing
  • His Frankenstein project (beautiful pen and ink illustrations for Mary Shelley’s classic tale)
  • His work with Stephen King – creating the poster for the movie Creepshow and illustrating King’s Cycle of the Werewolf novella, illustrations for The Stand (restored version), and art for the hardcover editions of From a Buick 8 and Dark Tower V.
  • His comics at Marvel (Punisher, Spider-Man), DC (Swamp Thing, Batman) and IDW (The Ghoul and Doc Macabre – both with co-creator Steve Niles)
  • His conceptual art for films such as The Faculty, Spiderman, and George Romero’s Land of the Dead, and The Mist.
  • So much more

I was fortunate enough to meet Berni Wrightson a couple of times at HeroesCon.  He was kind and humble and appreciative of the praise fans (myself included) gave him.  On the first occasion, when my wife learned that Mr. Wrightson was a guest at the con she came into the show to meet him.  She wasn’t a real comics fan, but she did love Mr. Wrightson’s art, appreciated his talent and wanted to meet him.  When she spoke to him, he seemed genuinely touched. As we were leaving his area other fans were coming over to share their appreciation.  I’m glad Bernie Wrightson was aware of how much his art positively impacted so many people.

My thoughts and prayers go out to Berni Wrightson’s family, friends and fans.

 

The 12 Greatest Giant Monster Movies

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Owen Gleiberman and Variety turn their sights to their choices for the 12 Greatest Giant Monster Movies.

Their list contains excellent choices.  My top three today would be…

  • King Kong (the original Kong)
  • THEM!
  • The Amazing Colossal Man

My most controversial pick would be The Amazing Colossal Man.  The argument could be made for several other (better?) movies but TACM has always been a favorite since I was a kid.  It’s hard to beat the nostalgia factor.

I was also glad to see Mysterious Island made the list.  It’s not normally a movie listed for horror, but it did have some giant monsters so I won’t nit pick.  Plus Mysterious Island is a fun movie.

Ken Meyer Jr.’s Ink Stains 45: Sinnott, Eisner, Ditko, Harvey, Black and More!

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If you’re a fan of fanzines, then you’ve got to check out Ken Meyer, Jr.’s monthly column Ink Stains.  Each month Ken (who is an amazing artist) posts… well, let’s let Ken explain…

I have a collection of over 200 fanzines from the 60’s-80’s that I plan to scan and talk about, one at a time. I hope to have some of the participants answer a few questions. Many of those participants are established comics professionals now, while some have gone on to other things. I will show a few snippets from each zine and give you a link to download a pdf of the whole thing, which I hope all of you will do!

For Ink Stains 45, Ken took a look at Collector #29 from 1974 from Bill G. Wilson.

Collector #29 is a huge issue and features –

  • Color Star Trek cover
  • Very cool cowboy drawing by Joe Sinnott (dedicated to Bill – Black?)
  • An interview with Walter Koenig (Chekov from Star Trek)
  • Star Trek art and articles
  • John Byrne Star Trek art
  • Captain Marvel art and articles (full pager by Bill Black)
  • C.C. Beck art and articles
  • Ken Barr full pager
  • RC Harvey story and art
  • Kurt Schaffenberger full page with Captain Marvel, Superman and Lois Lane
  • Steve Ditko comic story
  • Two full page drawings of The Thing from Another World
  • Art and articles about The Shadow
  • Art and articles about The Spirit
  • Bill Black full page Spirit piece
  • Additional art by Bill Black, Clyde Caldwell, John Byrne, Steve Ditko, Will Eisner, Steve Fabian, R.C. Harvey, Don Newton, Joe Sinnott and more.

I’d never seen Collector 29 before but would have really been blown away back in the day seeing so many pros and fans coming together in a fanzine.

Ah, the memories of the glory days of fanzines.  Thanks to Ken Meyer, Jr. for making these available!

SUPERMAN: THE GOLDEN AGE – a free FAN COMIC by Adrien van Viersen

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Adrien van Viersen  is storyboard artist (X2, X3, Game of Thrones, and The Flash) and self-proclaimed life-long fan of Superman.  His favorite Superman is that of the Golden Age.

van Viersen has created a Superman story that’s a love letter to that earlier, more innocent age. In the free fan fiction download (that is as good if not better than most published comics) we learn how Clark Kent discovered bullets didn’t hurt him, that a simple pair of glasses could be a great disguise and where he got the Superman persona.

All in all great fun!

 

Top 10 Comic Books That Should Become R-Rated Movies

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Alex Maidy and JoBlo.com posted their choices for the Top 10 Comic Books That Should Become R-Rated Movies.  By now you know how this game is played.  Using just their list I present my top three choices…

  • Goon by Eric Powell:  Set in a universe that has all sorts of supernatural monsters and our hero Goon.  Definitely a tongue-in-cheek comic series full of fun.  The Goon was part of a Kickstarter campaign (and I was in!) but a movie hasn’t been made yet.  The promotional video looked great though.

 

  • Pax Romana:  Although I never read this series, I’m going to have to look it up.  Who wouldn’t want to see a “world where The Vatican discovers time travel and sends modern weapons back to Ancient Rome to change the future”?

 

  • Black Widow: A former Russian spy/assassin now in the US.  Think of Atomic Blonde or A Long Kiss Goodnight, now you’re on board, right?

Other series that didn’t make the list but would be excellent candidates:  100 Bullets by Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso;  Sleeper by Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips; Gravedigger by Chris Mills and Rick Burchett, Polar by Victor Santos and Scout by Tim Truman.

Joss Whedon on Reboots/Reunions, Binge-Watching & More!

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Joss Whedon (Writer – Director – Producer – Actor) makes some interesting observations in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter.   Two things that stuck out for me were Whedon’s thoughts on reboots/reunions and binge-watching tv episodes.

Whedon on reboots/reunions…

“I see a little bit of what I call monkey’s paw in these reboots. You bring something back, and even if it’s exactly as good as it was, the experience can’t be. You’ve already experienced it, and part of what was great was going through it for the first time.”

Whedon is on point.  As much as we want to bring back favorite favorites, it is so difficult.  There has to be some growth or we’re getting more of the same and we’ve seen that.  And Whedon is so right — part of what was great was experiencing it for the first time.

 

Whedon on binge-watching tv episodes…

 

“…the more it (television watching) becomes lifestyle instead of experience. It becomes ambient. It loses its power, and we lose something with it…I would not want to do it. I would want people to come back every week and have the experience of watching something at the same time… I loved event television.”

 

Technology has made movie and television watching less of an event.  I love the convenience of being able to record and watch what I want when I want, but when was the last time watching something became an event (not counting live broadcasts)?  When I was a kid, The Wizard of Oz was shown once a year and you’d better be in front of the tube when it was broadcast.  I can still remember the thrill of being allowed to stay up late to watch it, or Hitchcock’s The Birds.  The series finale of The Fugitive was another tv event that was huge.  So was the murder of JR, a new episode of All in the Family.

 

Binge-watching takes away the event feel.  Not only that, because the series is available ANY time you want, there is less of a pull to watch it.  My wife and I tuned in every week for Longmire.  When it switched to Netflix, we followed but now we could watch it whenever.  We have a full season yet to be watched.  Same with Daredevil.  I’ve yet to watch a single episode of House of Cards or Luke Cage.  What’s the rush?  They’ll be there when I’m ready.