Ken Aldred

A terrible loss. A brilliant visual storyteller, superb figurework and character expressions, loved his grittier Bronze Age style on ASM the most. An absolutely classic comic artist.

They didn’t do anything much with the original team, with the exception of Yondu. For me, they even found a more interesting replacement for Vance Astro, a run-of-the-mill, time-displaced telekinetic, with Cosmo the telekinetic / telepathic Space Dog. Again, a character that originated during the Annihilation Saga in the main Nova series.

At least one issue is a must-have classic.

I have this one. Great read… Comics : Between the Panels ’This lavish volume takes an in-depth look at the history of comics in a manner decidedly unlike the dry timelines and profiles of most reference-style titles. Via alphabetical entries, the authors take an irreverent, often hilarious, behind-the-scenes look at creators, companies, characters, collectors, and conventions, pulling no punches when exposing some of the darker sides of the industry. Containing countless stories gleaned from over 150 interviews of comics industry veterans, Comics Between the Panels is loaded with more than half a century of insider information on the talented and eccentric creators who forged the comics industry and art form. Features 670 illustrations and photos — including dynamic and bizarre cover art compiled under such curious headings as Atomic Bombs, Death with Indignity, Gorillas, Headlights, Hooded Menaces, and Skulls.’ https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/1317323

I recall, back in the time of rampant film speculation here, threads would be started asking for boardies to advise about a certain character and then you’d often see a more-or-less immediate strip-mining of high grade copies online. I wasn’t at all into the boiler room frenzy associated with that period, but there was a thread about Quasar and how he was a ‘poor man’s’ version of some character, possibly Green Lantern? (Can’t remember exactly, ‘I’ve slept since then’.) As he’s one of my favourite characters, I understandably wasn’t too happy about the denigration. Soon after that you saw a run on copies, one or two at around the NM $300 mark. Speculators mining the boards for direction and information, not readers who might otherwise have seen the character used only briefly in the Annihilation Saga during its short Nova series, before Phylla-Vell becomes the GOTG’s version of Quasar. Crushing, film version disappointment could’ve been avoided as well. As much as I would’ve liked to see the original character, James Gunn’s decision does make perfect sense.

That’s right. The story was 233 to 234 during which he changed from Marvel Man to Quasar.

Yup. In terms of creativity, considered by many to be the next-level paradigm.

They were both involved with Marvel throughout the transition between the ‘Marvel Monster’ period and the Silver Age super-hero renaissance, so it’s worth thinking about. At least we didn’t get a bit too far down the hierarchy and bring up creators such as Reinman and Bernstein.

Just got Season 1 of Daredevil on Blu-ray for £12. Definitely worth it.

I saw an image out of context and thought it was an alternate multiverse Spider-Man suit, despite the colour. (I’d completely forgotten about the film.)

As a Quasar fan, interested to see if Captain America 217 has tanked hard after GOTG 3? I recall at one stage a few years ago seeing 9.4 raws at $300 or so.

Being British I might be missing the point.

Not even close when you compare them to next-level creators like Ditko and Kirby. Supporting characters in the story of Marvel’s Silver Age ascendency.

OCD. Always been the bane of my collecting. (Shouldn’t use the word ‘bane’ though, as it’s guaranteed to get some smart comments.)

DC Presents 26 First New Teen Titans, some nice Jim Starlin work. One of my favourite books from my teenage years. I apologise for not approaching the question from a speculator perspective.

Some of Roy Thomas’ stories were good, but I’ve always preferred his retro, JSA-related work.

I agree. I like the Caniff styling, but Robbins was clearly drawing well beyond his comfort zone and level of experience at Marvel, and showing that the use of extreme, forced perspective actually requires a lot of skill to pull off successfully. Kirby had decades behind him at the same point. Also, Robbins’ default style, shown above, was more suited to darker, grittier noir material, as with his work on the Batman and The Shadow, or DC horror stories, and simply lacked Kirby’s highly-developed energy and excitement.

Not enough third person.

I like Cal’s eccentricity.

More of this. Possibly with the company's newer horror angle.

Apparently, Corben's artwork is being 'restored' by colourist Jose Villarubia, which hopefully won't lead to anything as drastic as we've seen previously, but we'll find out in just a few weeks when Den is re-released. Likewise, same as you I dislike the presentation they chose for the EC reprints. The easiest-and-best path for me would've been for them to follow the palette chosen by Marie Severin for the original comics; along with Corben, one of the best colourists of all time. Worst of all was the atrocious digital recolouring of the Bronze Age Marvel Conan the Barbarian comics, with so much line detail completely obliterated. At least when the series reverted back to Marvel their latest reprints were a million times better.

I don’t believe it’s permanent.

Kirby DC, especially Fourth World material, was dirt cheap in really sharp, high grade warehouse copies in the London shops during that period. If I’d been up in the northern provinces back then it would’ve been so much more difficult, including your key book there.

In some cases I’ve seen it lead to egregious overcharging with books that were commonplace and still cheap at the time in the UK, talking 1994. As has been an all-too-frequent experience for me, the slightest, most casual mention or perusal of a book or series has led to a dealer, shop assistant or owner aggressively trying to pressurise me into buying and even going for the entire run, when I’d never indicated any actual real interest in a purchase at all. So, at a comic mart I’d very casually mentioned to a weekend trader that I liked Tomb of Dracula, and the next week I got a phone call saying that someone wanted to sell (offload) their run, £40 for issue 1 and £7 each for the other issues, all in ‘Very Fine’, as dictated by the price in Wizard, and with a tone of voice suggesting that the magazine was the definitive be-all and end-all in pricing. Most of those issues were still cheap over here, a £1 or two, and, it was very unlikely that every issue in a 70 + issue run would all be in exactly the same condition. So, I interpreted Very Fine as copies with a range of noticeable defects which kept them out of ultra high grade, and likely lower than claimed. I delivered the sad news that I couldn’t afford them all anyway.

Very pleased to learn that Richard Corben’s back catalogue of classic material is soon to be reprinted by Dark Horse.