Saturday, November 30, 2013

The Lot EC Stories Part Eight

Saturday Severin Day.

After all these war stories it is nice to see John Severin and Colin Dawkins use their EC training for a crime story.

Friday, November 29, 2013

A Comic Odyssee

Friday Comic Book Day.

When their company MikeRoss went bankrupt in the mid fifties due to bad sales and/or distribution problems artists Ross Andru and Mike Esposito worked for just about every company before landing at C, where they went on to carry out their bit of comics history with their war stories and the early sixties superhero book Metal Men. They had a long (and more separate) career after that as well, but since I am preoccupied with the fifties here, here are two completely unknown Ross Andru stories from those hectic years. I have always liked Andru's early style a lot more than the slicker style he developed at DC or even the more action oriented style he used on Spiderman in the seventies. His grotesk faces and big eyes complimented a very good sense of storytelling. The high point was just about every book he did with Mike Esposito and Martin (Rosen)Thall for their own company. The sense of caricature and humor worked very well with their Mad imitation Get Lost, of course. But also on their romance books. Just before that they also did a superb run of western stories for Comic Media's Death Valley (which also saw some of Don Hecks earliest work). What I am showing here is in a similar style. The big eyes, the big cheeks, the exagerated bodies. After Ross Andru died Mike Esposito always said in interviews that Andru had to really work for his art, never finding the right balance and that he (as his inker) had to sometime correct his art and take out the parts that were too grotesk. Maybe that were the parts I like best.

I don't know what happened to the splash page on the second story, but I don't think that's by Andru.

Thursday, November 28, 2013

Tuska, Gee!

Thursday Story Strip Day.

MY 2000ST POST! CHECK THEM ALL!

Continuing my run of the last months of George's Tuska's work on Scorchy Smith. The quality of the strip drops slightly, which may be due to a new inker or to the fact that from April 1959 he also took over the daily and Sunday versions of Buck Rogers. That's the publication date, so he must have been doing two strips for at least a couple of months.





























Tuesday, November 26, 2013

All Betts Are On

Wednesday Advertising Day.

It's been a long time since I have shown some of Jack Betts work. He was a versatile and busy comic strip artist, who worked mainly in advertising (and did some illustration work on the side). He died tragically towards the end of the fifties and seems not to have been remembered either by the comic book historians or his colleagues. Other than some letters from his daughter (from a failed marriage, so even she did not know him for very long) I have nothing to go on. Except for these wonderful, airy, funny and lively ads he drew.He had two main series, many of which I have shown before (and will show again). It seems that the Nestlé series was not originated by Betts, but by his colleague at Johnstone and Cushing, Craig Flessel. I wish I had known what I know now when Mr. Flessel was still alive.

The first ad is a rarity, what seems like of the few ads Jack Betts did in a more realistic style. Someone else at Johnstone and Cushing may have been involved, possibly even Craig Flessel. But I don't think so. The second one seems to be by another artist.

The last one is by Al Capp, who did a short run of Nestlé ads when Jack Betts had died.