What is your Favorite Art,Drawing or story by Rob Liefeld? 1 1

[awakeintheashes]

There may not be a more important figure in comic book history over the last 25 years.

 

 

I am now convinced RabidFerret is just trolling. No one would legitimately think that, ever.

[Logan510]

I understand that Chuck, but in RMA's post it sounded like someone who can only get five issues per year out is a slacker. I don't think that's the case. Not coming through with solicits is poor managing, but five issues a year is actually a lot of output in the comics I read. A reasonable excuse for not putting out more than five comics in a year is comics actually take time to make when you care about the content. They should have not solicited until the issue was 80% complete or so, waiting on coloring and lettering or whatever.

 

That's not what he meant.

 

 

Gawd, how I hate the "growing roses" defense for being lazy. Not only is it BS, but it puts down dozens of artists who have been able to get high quality work done on time for decades.

[vaillant]

This thread is prospering, while the one about Jack Kirby isn’t: there is something wrong…

[Maccai3]

There may not be a more important figure in comic book history over the last 25 years.

 

 

I am now convinced RabidFerret is just trolling. No one would legitimately think that, ever.

 

 

Instanity Level Up!

[Prince Namor]

I understand that Chuck, but in RMA's post it sounded like someone who can only get five issues per year out is a slacker. I don't think that's the case. Not coming through with solicits is poor managing, but five issues a year is actually a lot of output in the comics I read. A reasonable excuse for not putting out more than five comics in a year is comics actually take time to make when you care about the content. They should have not solicited until the issue was 80% complete or so, waiting on coloring and lettering or whatever.

 

That's not what he meant.

 

 

Gawd, how I hate the "growing roses" defense for being lazy. Not only is it BS, but it puts down dozens of artists who have been able to get high quality work done on time for decades.

 

I don't know. I still believe good art wasn't meant to made every 30 days.

 

What guys like Kirby, Romita, Byrne, etc. did was amazingly consistent, but I think even they would agree that the best work they could do wouldn't be under a 30 day deadline.

 

The reason comics are monthly isn't from an artistic stand point, it's from a financial one.

 

Though using it as an excuse to be lazy is, yeah, annoying.

[RabidFerret]

together they brought on the best and most popular creators of the day.

 

 

I wasn't aware that Frank Miller, Jeff Smith, Barry Windsor-Smith, and Charles Vess were Image founders, too!

 

 

"Best" and "most popular" were definitely NOT convergent during that time period.

 

 

Ok I will clarify - most popular, most successful, with the largest audiences of the day. Best is subjective.

 

So your counterpoint to the creation of Image Comics is pointing to a handful of artists like Smith, Vess, and BWS who self-published their own work? They didn't push for the rights of anyone else. They didn't publish any books but their own. Self publishing has existed for a long time, but mostly in obscurity except for a handful of notable successes like TMNT, Bone, Cerebus.

 

And Miller? Sure let's use the example of the most successful and acclaimed comic artist of the previous 2 decades who was given anything he wanted.

 

The reality is that Dark Horse and Vertigo were not in the business of encouraging lots of creator owned works but in attracting top tier talent. Valiant certainly wasn't. Maybe BWS finagled rights to A&A but I doubt it. Shooter sold the whole catalog for a fortune.

 

The thing about Image was that they did something that had been tried before and failed. Artists had left to try their own studios and publishing and all went under quickly and crawled back to the big 2. Or they left 1 at a time like Byrne and found the entire world didn't follow them.

 

When Image started the fans came along. New fans joined in. It was a phenomenon unlike any other artist revolution in comics, peaking with Image selling more books than Marvel or DC.

 

 

[RabidFerret]

 

The most vital part of growing as a publisher is, precisely as you have said, having content.

 

It took a YEAR for the first five issues of Youngblood to come out.

 

A.

 

YEAR.

 

And then it was ANOTHER year between issues #5 and #6.

 

The company was so horrifically mismanaged, the entire Direct market had to completely rewrite the return and solicitation rules that had been in place for nearly 15 years.

 

Of the original 7 founders, ONE of them....ONE!...managed to put out more than 5 issues in the first year, and that was McFarlane.

 

Portacio was the only one with a reasonable excuse, as he was going through intense family problems at the time.

 

The rest...?

 

You're damn right Liefeld set a precedent: for broken promises, late books (I don't think Image's records for re-solicitations and cancelled solicitations has ever been broken), making the audience wait...and wait....and wait....and screwing retailers over in a GIGANTIC fashion...retailers who made business decisions based on what they were promised, yet never received.

 

By comparison, Valiant put out the same amount books in TWO MONTHS (November & December of 1992) as the ENTIRE OUTPUT OF THE IMAGE FOUNDERS for 1992 (18 books.)

 

So, you really ought to think twice about holding the founders of Image up as a good example of a "growing publisher."

 

 

 

Yeah, Liefeld failed as a businessman. We've already established that and there's little disagreement.

 

But that does not mean he wasn't a great salesman, and didn't fill a marketplace with what people wanted. The books sucked, yes. They never hit deadlines, yes. But without that constant steam of media attention and rising sales Image would very easily have vanished in a year(as many pundits repeatedly claimed it would).

 

The arguments about Image Comics have gone on for years and years, but guess what - they're still around, and producing far better comics than Marvel or DC are.

 

It's not much different from any industry where it takes years and growth for a company to find it's real place. It's not like Marvel Comics appeared in 1960 and just started cranking out amazing books. It was a barely surviving vestige of 30 years before that had mostly copied what everyone else did to make a profit. There was little to no art form then as much as a desire to make a living. It was only after decades of time and near collapse that it became what everyone now thinks of.

 

Valiant I think is a great example here - what happened to them? They went under. They hit a high peak where everyone clamored for their books and the prices soared...and then crashed because people stopped caring and they were poorly run and had to be resurrected to be around today.

[Logan510]

I understand that Chuck, but in RMA's post it sounded like someone who can only get five issues per year out is a slacker. I don't think that's the case. Not coming through with solicits is poor managing, but five issues a year is actually a lot of output in the comics I read. A reasonable excuse for not putting out more than five comics in a year is comics actually take time to make when you care about the content. They should have not solicited until the issue was 80% complete or so, waiting on coloring and lettering or whatever.

 

That's not what he meant.

 

 

Gawd, how I hate the "growing roses" defense for being lazy. Not only is it BS, but it puts down dozens of artists who have been able to get high quality work done on time for decades.

 

I don't know. I still believe good art wasn't meant to made every 30 days.

 

What guys like Kirby, Romita, Byrne, etc. did was amazingly consistent, but I think even they would agree that the best work they could do wouldn't be under a 30 day deadline.

 

The reason comics are monthly isn't from an artistic stand point, it's from a financial one.

 

Though using it as an excuse to be lazy is, yeah, annoying.

 

 

Two out of the Three you mention are among the fastest comic book artists in the history of the medium and would probably not agree.

 

Interesting anecdote:

 

When Shooter became EiC of Marvel he had heard that John Byrne was doing 3 fully penciled pages a day. He asked JB to try ( as an experiment ) just drawing two pages a day and see what would happen.

 

The result? Byrne ending his work day two hours earlier than normal

[RabidFerret]

 

There is some quite good stuff published by Image, none of it by "the founders."

 

The Maxx is quite fun, for one.

 

Stormwatch by Ellis is another, as is Supreme by Moore.

 

Then there's been some quite good stuff published in the 21st.

 

Worth checking out.

 

And where did any of that start from? Would Kieth have left Marvel to start his own book? Doubtful.

 

And then you point to Stormwatch, a Jim Lee book, and Supreme, a Rob Liefeld book, again refusing to give credit to the creators, and only those who followed along afterwards.

 

Clearly you have a thing for Alan Moore. He is sexy, I'll give you that.

[RabidFerret]

Don't change my point to make your weak argument sound better. No where did I say 'storytelling trumps all' or 'artists are defined largely on their storytelling'.

 

 

WHAT I SAID WAS: "storytelling ability, backgrounds (perspective), and anatomy are the ESSENTIAL FUNDAMENTALS of SEQUENTIAL STORYTELLING in the SUPERHERO GENRE".

 

How'd you miss that? I said it TWICE.

 

 

 

Ok so you like to repeat yourself and use ALL CAPS. Suddenly your argument is sound and reasonable! Oh wait, no it's not...

 

Out of one side of your mouth you're arguing storytelling is essential and out of the other that it doesn't matter for the artists you like.

 

Brian Bolland cover? Generally tells a story (or something about the story inside), always understands perspective, and always understands anatomy.

 

Oh really, they're doing great storytelling on their covers? Seriously?

 

Or this one is clearly about how the Joker takes up photography, right?

 

Or how about his one? How to draw a comic book?

 

I really wanted to find the cover of the girl on the toilet. I assume that was about getting bad Mexican food? Riveting!

 

They are great covers, very well rendered and creative and they draw you in, but they certainly don't tell you what happens inside. Not at all.

 

 

I've spent plenty of time in this forum blaming Marvel for many of the ills of this hobby, and blaming the FANS for the ills of this hobby. It's NOT all Rob's fault.

 

But here, in this thread, we're discussing his part of it.

 

He took that success and he didn't make things better. He didn't make himself better. He just kept milking it for more. He just kept milking YOU for more.

 

Todd realized, his comics are dumb. So he expanded into other things.

 

Jim Lee realized his comics were dumb. So he went back to Marvel and DC.

 

Rob never really realized his comics were dumb, and if he did, he had no problem letting the fan boys lap it up.

 

Again and again you people keep assuming you know Liefeld and his intentions. There doesn't need to be some altruistic goal in creating a comic book. For most professionals it's a job. Liefeld has repeatedly stated that what he cares about is creating properties that he can license in the future - which is exactly what Marvel and DC and Wildstorm were bought for - their properties.

 

And as a few people confirmed clearly, he's done that well - people love the work of Alan Moore on Supreme and Deadpool and Prophet and even the Allred version of X-Force.

 

So by the standard of creating properties, I'd say he's done fine.

 

 

And that's the point I'm making. Another great lesson from our heroes. It's not about the creative process, it's about the payoff.

There's no question Todd works hard. Very hard. Seems like he's having a blast doing what he loves.

And that no longer includes drawing comic books.

 

So now the creative process doesn't matter, it's just about the payoff? So in effect, you're now entirely supporting Liefeld's approach to cranking out art to make money?

 

Cuz that's what it sounds like?

 

NOW he is. His butt's on the line with this New 52 thing and He/DC knows that a Jim Lee book will sell no matter what. He HAS to keep that thing afloat.

Before that it was what... 3 years between New 52 and All Star Batman and Robin 10 issues published over the course of 3 years? 3 years between that and Hush?

 

How much work do you remember Jim Lee doing back in his heyday? He did a handful of issues of Punisher War Journal before moving to UXM where he did spot issues for the first year or two. I think his only consistent run on the book was maybe 10-15 issues long? Then less than a year on X-Men.

 

It's not like Jim produced a book/month for years straight. Todd did. Liefeld did. Jim was slower.

 

If I wanted to waste the time calculating I suspect we'd be surprised to see his output has been steady for decades.

 

Revolutionize the comics industry? How?

Artists had left Marvel and DC before that and published there own work.

 

Give artists back the rights to their own stories?

That had been going on for some time, they didn't start that.

 

A place for them (artists) to get their work out?

There were already places for that.

 

What'd they do for our hobby?

 

Yeah, guys like Neal Adams pushed for artist rights...and never got them. Frank Miller did when he was a huge success. But to this day the Kirbys are still fighting tooth and nail.

 

I don't think you remember well the world at that time. There was talk about all of this but it wasn't happening. If you worked at Marvel and DC you got nothing. If you left you struggled to stay afloat.

 

The world today, full of places like Archaia and Image, is 1000% more encouraging to your artists and their rights. Simply brushing aside a pivotal moment in time as if it was inevitable is just doing a disservice to the whole industry.

[RabidFerret]

I've never liked monthly comics. I have one monthly comic on my pull list, just one. Many comics on my list have no set schedule, and a year wait between issues is not uncommon. I'm of the opinion that an actual quality work is extremely unlikely to happen in thirty days.

 

 

Not saying any of the Image launch titles were good, just saying I can see a staggering difference in quality between comics that emphasize on schedule when compared to those that release when they're ready. Gary Groth has the same philosophy on schedules, and compare the comics he publishes to the best of the best and you have a run for your money. There's too many comics to keep up with anyway, I don't need my Love And Rockets fix every month.

 

I'm in agreement here. Comics are a monthly thing for financial reasons only, and the best books are the ones that come out less often but with more care put into them.

 

I would always prefer a book to come out less often and be good, than be rushed out to give me a weak monthly fix.

[RabidFerret]

There may not be a more important figure in comic book history over the last 25 years.

 

I am now convinced RabidFerret is just trolling. No one would legitimately think that, ever.

 

Please, enlighten me with your wisdom - who would you put in that category?

 

I think the list would be small...

 

Joe Quesada? Jim Lee? Rob Liefeld? Robert Kirkman?

 

People that revolutionized the industry means they need to do more than just create a best selling comic.

 

Mike Mignola created a huge universe with Hellboy, but it didn't change the industry. It was just a very successful book.

 

David Peterson and Mouse Guard could be argued as a huge moment in time since he did a strange format book that has since been copied by many, as well as kept alive Archaia through their almost bankruptcy.

 

 

But Liefeld created a large number of popular characters still known to this day, created a comic company, created a clone army, and brought a lot of people into the hobby.

 

For good or for bad, there's no doubt that without him the comic book world would be a very different place today.

[RockMyAmadeus]

Liefeld launched the first book of the company that set the precedent and was a large part of their output the first 2 years. (Yes, it was fairly bad quality books, but the most vital part of growing as a publisher is having content).

 

The most vital part of growing as a publisher is, precisely as you have said, having content.

 

It took a YEAR for the first five issues of Youngblood to come out.

 

A.

 

YEAR.

 

And then it was ANOTHER year between issues #5 and #6.

 

The company was so horrifically mismanaged, the entire Direct market had to completely rewrite the return and solicitation rules that had been in place for nearly 15 years.

 

Of the original 7 founders, ONE of them....ONE!...managed to put out more than 5 issues in the first year, and that was McFarlane.

 

Portacio was the only one with a reasonable excuse, as he was going through intense family problems at the time.

 

The rest...?

 

You're damn right Liefeld set a precedent: for broken promises, late books (I don't think Image's records for re-solicitations and cancelled solicitations has ever been broken), making the audience wait...and wait....and wait....and screwing retailers over in a GIGANTIC fashion...retailers who made business decisions based on what they were promised, yet never received.

 

By comparison, Valiant put out the same amount books in TWO MONTHS (November & December of 1992) as the ENTIRE OUTPUT OF THE IMAGE FOUNDERS for 1992 (18 books.)

 

So, you really ought to think twice about holding the founders of Image up as a good example of a "growing publisher."

 

I've never liked monthly comics. I have one monthly comic on my pull list, just one. Many comics on my list have no set schedule, and a year wait between issues is not uncommon. I'm of the opinion that an actual quality work is extremely unlikely to happen in thirty days.

 

 

Not saying any of the Image launch titles were good, just saying I can see a staggering difference in quality between comics that emphasize on schedule when compared to those that release when they're ready. Gary Groth has the same philosophy on schedules, and compare the comics he publishes to the best of the best and you have a run for your money. There's too many comics to keep up with anyway, I don't need my Love And Rockets fix every month.

 

There is a vast....vast...VAST difference between artists like Adrian Tomine, Bob Burden, and Drew Hayes, and what was happening at Image at the time.

 

The Image guys PROMOTED their line as regular, monthly or bi-monthly books, they promised and solicited books that didn't show up for over a year in some cases, if at all, and created a shambles of the DM.

 

The real Indie folks don't solicite books (which is essentially a promise) that aren't ready to be published. "You'll get them when you get them" is far, far, FAR more acceptable than "yeah, I'll have them out next week!" and they don't show up for 9 months.

 

If Image had behaved like Kitchen Sink or Fantagraphics, then there wouldn't have been a problem but, you see, there was no way they could: they had to gobble up market share and tie everyone up, or they would have lost the prestige (and CA$$$H) that came with it.

 

And we couldn't have THAT, now, could we...?

[RockMyAmadeus]

 

Don't change my point to make your weak argument sound better. No where did I say 'storytelling trumps all' or 'artists are defined largely on their storytelling'.

 

 

WHAT I SAID WAS: "storytelling ability, backgrounds (perspective), and anatomy are the ESSENTIAL FUNDAMENTALS of SEQUENTIAL STORYTELLING in the SUPERHERO GENRE".

 

How'd you miss that? I said it TWICE.

 

Changing other people's arguments to make his sound better (straw man), and ignoring foundational details is RabidFerret's go-to debate technique.

 

It's unfortunate, and intellectually dishonest, but he's done it so consistently, I don't think he's even aware of it...he certainly has made no attempt to change it, even mocking people who point it out to him.

 

Oh well.

[Logan510]

I've never liked monthly comics. I have one monthly comic on my pull list, just one. Many comics on my list have no set schedule, and a year wait between issues is not uncommon. I'm of the opinion that an actual quality work is extremely unlikely to happen in thirty days.

 

 

Not saying any of the Image launch titles were good, just saying I can see a staggering difference in quality between comics that emphasize on schedule when compared to those that release when they're ready. Gary Groth has the same philosophy on schedules, and compare the comics he publishes to the best of the best and you have a run for your money. There's too many comics to keep up with anyway, I don't need my Love And Rockets fix every month.

 

I'm in agreement here. Comics are a monthly thing for financial reasons only, and the best books are the ones that come out less often but with more care put into them.

 

I would always prefer a book to come out less often and be good, than be rushed out to give me a weak monthly fix.

 

 

Biggest pile of horse mess I've read today and totally disrespecting to artists who have been able to put out stellar work on a monthly basis for decades.

[Prince Namor]

together they brought on the best and most popular creators of the day.

 

 

I wasn't aware that Frank Miller, Jeff Smith, Barry Windsor-Smith, and Charles Vess were Image founders, too!

 

 

"Best" and "most popular" were definitely NOT convergent during that time period.

 

 

Ok I will clarify - most popular, most successful, with the largest audiences of the day. Best is subjective.

 

So your counterpoint to the creation of Image Comics is pointing to a handful of artists like Smith, Vess, and BWS who self-published their own work? They didn't push for the rights of anyone else.

 

Who did Image push for the rights for? Who did they champion to get rights for? Themselves?

 

If you published under Image's 'umbrella', you owned the rights to your work. That wasn't unique or new. Marvel had the same kind of deal with Epic. DC had the same kind of deal with Vertigo. Dark Horse had already been doing it. All the small publisher's did it.

 

They didn't publish any books but their own. Self publishing has existed for a long time, but mostly in obscurity except for a handful of notable successes like TMNT, Bone, Cerebus.

 

Obscurity? Diamond and Capital's catalogs were full of independent publishers. Many who published for YEARS. Longer than most of the original Image books, half of whom didn't even make it to 10 issues.

Realistically, Image had two books that succeeded: Spawn and Savage Dragon. That's it. Everything else ended.

 

And...The Image guys didn't start out publishing on their own. MALIBU COMICS did it for them.

 

And Miller? Sure let's use the example of the most successful and acclaimed comic artist of the previous 2 decades who was given anything he wanted.

 

Why not? You're using the three biggest names in comics who used there clout to... and understand this, because this is truly what it was all about: to incorporate themselves and maximize the profits from anything they did.

 

They can word it however they want about creator's rights and blah, blah, blah... they took the millions, yes MILLIONS of dollars they made from Marvel's ROYALTY system at the time, and decided to cut the strings, smack daddy in the face, and go start their OWN company to make even MORE money.

 

Hey more power to them, but please stop trying to position them as some kind of champion of creators rights.

 

They were MILLIONAIRES who wanted to be BIGGER millionaires.

 

The reality is that Dark Horse and Vertigo were not in the business of encouraging lots of creator owned works but in attracting top tier talent. Valiant certainly wasn't. Maybe BWS finagled rights to A&A but I doubt it. Shooter sold the whole catalog for a fortune.

 

Dark Horse was all about it. Vertigo was open to it.

Valiant was set up more like Marvel and how Image wanted to be in getting work for hire to produce comics of their owned properties.

 

The thing about Image was that they did something that had been tried before and failed.

 

What? Publish comics? There were plenty of independent publishers in 1992. One's who'd been around for years. YEARS.

 

Comico had been around for what, 10 years? Malibu for 6 years. Eclipse for 15 years. Fantagraphics and Viz Media for 15-16 years.

Innovation had been around a few years.

First Comics had just ended after a 9 year run (Grell - Jon Sable, Chaykin - American Flagg, Starlin - Dreadstar, Baron/Rude - Nexus, books that had been published for years and would find other publishers)

 

These weren't failures - these were successful runs.

 

You want to talk FAIL? Image failed as badly as anyone else did.

Youngblood? Failed.

Cyberforce? Failed.

Shadowhawk? Failed.

Pitt? Failed.

Brigade? Failed.

WetWorks? Failed.

Hellshock? Failed.

 

First Comics alone, out lasted and out published ALL of those books.

 

Artists had left to try their own studios and publishing and all went under quickly and crawled back to the big 2.

 

Like Jim Lee and Rob Liefeld!

 

Or they left 1 at a time like Byrne and found the entire world didn't follow them.

 

Or... they left to make a creator owned project with a trusted publisher, but continued to do work for hire with other publishers.

Ya know, because, it's about making comics. Not being a rock star.

 

When Image started the fans came along. New fans joined in. It was a phenomenon unlike any other artist revolution in comics, peaking with Image selling more books than Marvel or DC.

 

Image never sold more books than Marvel and DC. Impossible. They never had enough books to come out in one year to compete with the number Marvel and DC has.

 

They had a blip here. A blip there. And that's it. It all fizzled.

 

But they got to keep all the rights. For themselves.

 

[Maccai3]

i would argue that the Killing Joke cover is very telling of the story

 

it could be the best cover ever IMO

[CAHokie]

I was going to say the same thing. I do not even read Batman/Joker that often and that cover drew me right in.

[Logan510]

i would argue that the Killing Joke cover is very telling of the story

 

it could be the best cover ever IMO

 

 

Good lord, I do think that Liefeld fan is high....but best cover ever? I wouldn't even rank it in my top 1000. It's a very, VERY good illustration, but not a good comic book cover IMHO.

[RockMyAmadeus]

And that's the point I'm making. Another great lesson from our heroes. It's not about the creative process, it's about the payoff.

There's no question Todd works hard. Very hard. Seems like he's having a blast doing what he loves.

And that no longer includes drawing comic books.

 

This is something I've said before, and it got all the fankids up in arms, ready to stone me, but it's absolutely true:

 

Todd McFarlane is NOT an Artist (Capital "A"), and never was.

 

You're damn right he wasn't.

 

He USED his talent to make money, and when he no longer NEEDED his talent to make money, he abandoned it for other things.

 

"But, but, but, but....he still continues to INK stuff!"

 

 

An ARTIST, regardless of his or her field, creates. It's what they DO. It's in their BLOOD. They get up every morning with an overwhelming drive to CREATE.

 

Pablo Picasso never, ever, ever stopped drawing/painting/sketching. Neither did Frazetta. Mozart, Bach, Beethoven wrote music until almost the days they died (and Beethoven didn't need to.) The Rolling Stones STILL tour, and they are in their 70's. Jack Kirby was drawing comics in 1993, a couple of months before he died at the age of 76.

 

"But, McFarlane still does DESIGN work for his toys!"

 

Yes, he does. But the majority of his time is taken up in MANAGING his various business ventures. He is a BUSINESSMAN, not an ARTIST.

 

There's nothing wrong with that....but to pretend otherwise is a slap in the face of real artists the world over. His drive, the thing that gets him up in the morning, is management, not art.