Previous – 25. Animated | Contents

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

THE ANIMATED ARTIST

If Jack’s optimism and dreams were shattered by the downfall of the Lord of Light production, then a whole generation’s faith and hope died on a dreary Dec. day in 1980. David Mark Chapman assassinated John Lennon in front of the Dakota mansion where Lennon lived with his wife Yoko Ono. Lennon had been the driving force behind the skiffle band that became the Beatles, and a half of the greatest songwriting team in history. He was also known as the passion and wit behind the cultural eruption of the 60-70’s, and his death ended the Love generation. The two teams most responsible for the culture explosion of the 60’s and 70’s were now irrevocably split- never to be put together. One by decision, one by murder most foul.

A small aside:

“Did you know Stan Lee initially wanted to call Marvel’s original and still greatest creation the FF, “The Fabulous Four”? No kidding, everything that we know today as Marvel Comics might have been built on a flamboyantly gay epithet if then-publisher Martin Goodman had not prevailed and made Stan change it to The Fantastic Four. And so it fell to John and Paul and George and Ringo, who hit world culture at the same time as Reed and Sue and Johnny and Ben, to be known as “The Fab Four.”

Haven’t a clue if true, but it’s the quirky kind of stuff you accumulate when researching history.

Totally apropos of nothing a research organization asked

Which team made the greater contribution to their field?

Jack’s new animation job had some immediate benefits. He was able to work on large scale boards, which helped his vision immensely, plus the people who he worked with were in awe of his history and talent. He was the essence of an idea man, no longer restricted by having to work up every little detail, or backgrounds, he was simply throwing out ideas- something he had done all his life.

Jim Woodring an award winning illustrator had just been hired by John Dorman to help out on storyboards. He met Jack Kirby and Jack took on a role as mentor for the young artist. Gil Kane also helped him out. Jim recalls;

“I worked with Jack Kirby and Gil Kane. During post production season my job was to wait for Jack Kirby to come in with a thick stack of crescent board tucked under his arm on which he had drawn anything which came into his mind in terms of characters and possible show ideas. I’d ink them and watercolor them, and they’d be used to pitch shows. Kirby had no restraints put on him and the ideas he came up with, particularly towards the end of his tenure, were just completely psychotic off-the-wall aberrations.

They were unbelievably great. I have a photo of Kirby playing a Stratocaster. We had a skiffle band at the time, and Kirby came in one day and picked up an electric guitar, and started wind milling like Pete Townshend.”

Jim recalls a time of Jack telling his stories to the other artists. “He was fun to draw out in conversation because everything he said was unpredictable. I remember he told me a war story. He told me he was in Italy in WWII and that his division was being hemmed in by some Axis affiliate and they were all going to die, it was obvious. There was one little skiff that was reserved for the officers, so Kirby crawled through the mud to his commanding officer and he said, “Listen pal, I’m afraid I’m gonna get shot.” His CO said, “We’re all going to get shot!” And he said, “But I’m Jack Kirby.” The CO said, “Who?” “I’m Jack Kirby. I invented Captain America.” And the guy said, “Oh, really? Well look, that boat is supposed to be for me, but you take that and you row over to that village across the land and you’ll be safe.” So Jack got in the skiff and rowed across the water while the rest of his division get slaughtered over there. He crawled into a barn and peasant women brought him breadsticks and cold consommé. At least that’s how I remember him telling it.” Kirby told tales. Jim loves to tell of Kirby being chauffeured. “My understanding is that he couldn’t drive a car. He’d get behind the wheel of a car and he’d think he was in a jet plane or a rocket ship or something. That’s what [his wife] Roz told me. So he never drove.”

Gil Kane remembers;

“He wasn’t driving at that point anymore, so Roz always came in with him. They’d come in once or twice a week to deliver an assignment and pick another one up. It was like a freelance job only he was on salary. When I got there, he and I were both working on presentation boards-20″ x 30″-which for me was an experience because I had never worked that size before. And I would see Jack’s stuff come in. His penciling was very impressive; it was very black-&-white. But he would hand in six boards and two or three were just not up to his usual level–wheels would be out of perspective and little things you wouldn’t expect from Jack. Maybe it was his eyesight or his age, I don’t know, but when he succeeded it would be absolutely wonderful. In fact, I wanted to steal one of the boards-they had all this stuff standing around there that they weren’t able to use, and I figured that no one was going to miss one of ’em! But I never got the opportunity to take one of his good pencils that was a homerun, right over the fence.”

“Jack was a natural-and he was a natural early on before the wall hit him. I thought that in the early ’40s, he was just about the best guy around. He had a narrative style that was way beyond Lou Fine or any of these guys. On top of that, he really knew enough about drawing and everything so that there was simply no upgrading him. He was just excellent. It was priceless to me to find Jack Kirby’s work in the “Black Owl” and the eight or nine issues of Blue Bolt, then the early Captain America, the early “Guardian.” In fact, I love the first issue of “Manhunter”-it was such a glossy issue! Beautiful! Just perfect Jack. And Jack did a series of covers for DC before he went into the service that were excellent. But nobody can be king of the world forever.”

Writer Buzz Dixon has a unique viewpoint of Kirby working at Ruby-Spears;

“I was working at Ruby-Spears Productions with Steve Gerber. They had just sold a series called THUNDARR THE BARBARIAN and now the time had come to actually develop scripts & art for the show.

Steve told Joe he could recommend some comic book artists to help give the show a more dynamic feel than standard Saturday morning fare.  What he didn’t mention to me was who these artists would be. We had a production meeting; I came into the conference room early.  There was a little old man sitting there, talking to John Dorman (the head story board artist for the series).  I liked the old guy almost immediately:  He was the only person I’ve ever met whom I could say his eyes literally twinkled.

We started talking about the show, kicking around ideas before the meeting actually got started.  Steve and Joe and the rest of the writing team came in and, since I was already there & chatting with the old guy, everybody assumed we’d been introduced.  The meeting started without further fanfare. As we kicked ideas around, I was astonished at the imagination the old guy was showing.  Joe and Steve would throw out ideas, the rest of us would kick them around & play with them, then he would casually say something and boot that particular concept right into orbit. And he did this again and again and again, “plussing” every idea thrown out there, turning it around & inside out & making it better……and never taking credit for it. Quite the contrary:  He was unfailingly self-depreciating, always deferring to others, and shrugging off praise for his ideas & concepts with a sheepish grin.

It was a great meeting, one of the best & most creative ones I’ve ever been involved in, and when it ended the old guy left with his wife (who had to drive him everywhere since he was turning ideas over so much in his mind he would get distracted in traffic) to start working on the ideas we had discussed. I remember thinking at the time how glad I was somebody with his imagination would be working on the series; not only that, but I was particularly happy how well we had hit it off. He was, as they say in the biz, a good guy to have in the fox hole.

After he left, I drifted over to Steve’s office & commented on how much I liked the old guy.  “But who is he?” I asked.  “Nobody introduced us.” “That was Jack Kirby,” Steve said. “That was Jack Kirby?” — no, wait, that’s not the way I said it.  What I said was:

“THAT WAS JACK KIRBY ?!?!?”

Yes, Jack had finally relented to the family wishes that he no longer drove. Too many memories of cars on a curb, or pedestrians scattering as he mistakenly drove up on a sidewalk, or children left at school. Roz was now the official chauffeur. Sometimes Thib, sometimes Greg Theakston would drive Jack to shows. But Jack had the last laugh. He would let loose a huge guffaw telling a story about Roz behind the wheel. It seems that one day while Jack was working… well here’s his version, “I was at my table drawing a page lost in my imagination, when suddenly the wall to the living room explodes and showers the room with debris, followed by the family car, with Roz driving, crashing thru the garage wall into the room. It seems that she either mistook the accelerator for the brake or simply lost control while parking the car, but there she was all the way through the wall. She wasn’t harmed, but she was in shock and her pride was hurt. I laughed for days.”

Buzz also relates another anecdote that adds another layer to Jack Kirby, as well as showing the drive and resolve of the freelance artist.

“Jack also taught me something about fame. Because at the height of the Jack Kirby “God Save the King” kind of thing, when the Journal and I think Amazing Heroes did a big thing on him and Jack was the talk of the town, while all this was going on, we had gotten an assignment to do some character designs for a client. So Jack went and did some and I went and did some and some other people went and did some, and we all brought them in on Monday and Jack had done 15 or 20 drawings, naturally, and he was showing them all, and he showed his first. The guy looked at them, “Oh yeah, this stuff is great, this is great.” And then I was next and I brought my drawings out and the guy was looking through and he picked up one of my drawings and said, “Oh, this is good, I like this one.” And Jack took the drawing out of his hand and put one of his under the guy’s nose instead and said, “You don’t want his work — this is what you want! This is the real stuff! I learned my trade on the editor’s floor!” And what that means exactly, I don’t know. But what he meant to say was that he wasn’t some young upstart like me. And this is a guy who was having accolades dumped on him by the bucketful. He didn’t like the idea that this guy liked my drawings as well as his.”

So despite all the huzzahs coming his way, Jack remembered that he still needed to sell himself and his work in order to feed his family.

Jack’s time in animation was among the happiest of his life, he was respected by his bosses, admired by his peers, well paid, and even had a medical plan.

Buzz Dixon recalls:

“It was great working with Jack and Steve and John and all the other wonderful writers and artists on THUNDARR.  It was great working with him on other shows and projects.  The first comics I ever wrote professionally were drawn by Jack (Destroyer Duck–and my career has been going downhill ever since ) .  I came to know & love Jack and his wonderful wife Roz & am proud to count them among my friends”

• 

• 

Kirby on his own – Jim Woodring rescued this Kirby piece from Mr. T hell

In June of 1981, the film world was once again agog; this time for Stephen Spielberg’s new extravaganza. Raiders of the Lost Ark was a powerful adventure tale of an archaeologist searching for a lost mystical Biblical relic; one with the power to destroy evil. The film was set up to resemble the old serials where the hero gets into predicament after predicament until he succeeds in the end. The film featured constant cliffhangers that ratchet up the tension and kept the audience on the edge of their seats. But what may in appearance seem like the old Saturday serials actually more resembled the chapters of a comic book serial very much like the chapters of the Black Panther series that Kirby produced several years earlier. Instead of the Black Panther leading the archaeological team, it was Indiana Jones, a college professor, and instead of Solomon’s lost relic the search was for the Biblical lost Ark of the Covenant. The Black Panther was up against a rival crew seeking the idol as was Indiana and while Kirby added in an alien life form, Spielberg used the old standby Nazi’s to thwart Jones and his gang. Weaving through both the comic and the film was a lovely woman whose trust is a matter of question. Once again the team of Lucas and Spielberg seem to borrow heavily from Jack Kirby for their blockbusters. Yet nowhere is any credit or acknowledgement given to Jack for his inspiration.

• 

• 

Architects looking for Biblical items and many explosions just like Kirby

After the Copyright Law of 1978 was enacted, the companies slowly instituted policies that returned the original art back to the artists. Jack received back all the artwork from his second stint at Marvel. But the huge backload of older art was a different matter. Some of the artists were receiving their back stock, but Jack was not. Some even received Kirby art they had inked. Jack constantly asked Marvel when it would be coming, always to be told that it would be as soon as possible. Eventually Marvel stopped taking their calls. Marvel saw Kirby as a different problem altogether. After Joe Simon tried to get the rights to Captain America back, it seemed that the Marvel lawyers were scared that Jack Kirby might make a claim for all of his co-creations. So they refused to return any of Kirby’s old art unless he signed a special waiver where he would sign away all future rights to any of the creations, among other odious and onerous demands. And Marvel only promised to return 88 pages of Kirby’s art. The Kirby’s refused and hired a lawyer to intercede.

Kirby said,

“I’ve always worked in comics without giving anyone a bad time. I’ve been an artist, I’ve been a writer, I’ve been an editor, I’ve been a publisher- there isn’t anything about the comics that I don’t know. One thing I don’t know, though, is why I’m being treated like this by Marvel. I have a million hunches, but they may be wrong. All I know is that I own my drawings, but they got ‘em, and they know I own them. They know, and they’re holding them arbitrarily. In other words, they’re grabbers. They’ll grab a copyright, they’ll grab a drawing, and they’ll grab a script. They’re grabbers-that’s their policy.”

The early ‘80s were a relatively happy and peaceful time for the Kirbys, but the Comic industry was in turmoil. The old system of distributing comics was passé. In its place was what became known as the direct market system. The retailing of comics had switched from the mom and pop candy, and drug stores to specialty stores selling comic and comic related items. They bought their inventory on a deep discount, non-returnable basis. This meant that they kept whatever didn’t sell, and the publishers no longer worried about returns. It was a win-win situation. Hand in hand with this change was the growth of independent comic publishers, small timers who could sell their books directly to the shops. They were able to draw top artists by promising them ownership of their creations, and royalty payments for actual sales. The industry saw a small resurgence, and the top creators were happy with the competition and alternatives with Marvel and DC.

All was not well. In 1981, the genius of Wally Wood was extinguished. His body riddled with the effects of kidney trouble and other alcoholic byproducts were too painful, he placed a 44 pistol to his head and took his life. Jack noticed that his friends and cohorts were falling one by one and reflected on his own health. At last he had found a job with benefits. Too many of his partners were ending up broke and alone, or in hospitals without insurance. Reed Crandall, Carl Burgos, and Dick Briefer would soon join Wally. Ben Oda, the once vibrant, overworked letterer died at his table in 1984 doing what he loved, lettering a comic book, he was 69. He was once credited as the busiest letterer in comicdom.

My buddy Jeet Heer observed a pattern in Wood’s behavior:

“One way to think about Wood’s career is to realize that he followed a pattern common to commercial comic book artists of his era. Think of Kirby, Ditko, Kane, and Eisner (and maybe also John Stanley). All these cartoonists started off as journeymen artists, had a mid-life crisis which made them try to do more artistically ambitious work, but ended up being thwarted either by the limits of their talent or the constraints of marketplace.

Jack Kirby had his midlife crisis in the late 1960s. He already had a formidable body of work, arguably the best adventure cartooning ever done in the comic book form, running from the explosive patriotic bombast of the early Captain America to the mind-stretching cosmic adventures of the Fantastic Four and Thor. But by the late 1960s he was tired of playing second fiddle to that blowhardy glory-hound Stan Lee. So Kirby made his big break for DC and became the auteur behind the hugely ambitious Fourth World series. I’m very fond of the Fourth World series, and even enjoy the aspect of them that is most often mocked, Kirby’s peculiar writing style, which to my ears at least has a kind of vatic poetry. Be that as it may, DC comics wasn’t willing to give the series the support they deserved and the books were canceled mid-storyline, leaving us with the fragments of a promising epic. Kirby would go on doing fascinating work, but he never really got over the sting of losing the Fourth World. None of his subsequent work had the same crazy ambition as the Fourth World.”

It’s an interesting theory but the weakness I see is that I think Eisner continued at top production up until he died. I see no begrudging from him towards an impersonal business model. Even Jack found a successful way out of the cold. Ditko’s career was more of his own making, ignoring the marketplace. Sometimes I think using the top superstars of an industry to explain average behavior in that industry is unproductive. Using Alex Rodriguez’ 250 million dollar salary as an indictment of baseball falls flat. Likewise Will Eisner is probably not best case of a mid life crisis brought on by an unfeeling corporation.

Jack was glad to be away from Marvel, but even then Marvel reached out and shoved Jack’s nose in their messy business practices. It seems that Marvel wanted to publish a super sized edition of the Fantastic Four to acknowledge the twentieth anniversary. A friend had contacted Kirby to see if he would be interested in pitching in. Jack never hesitated and said no. John Byrne wanted to put a drawing of Kirby standing next to Stan Lee on the cover. Kirby reminded Marvel of their agreement to never use Kirby’s likeness to sell a comic. The cover was changed without an appearance of Lee and Kirby. Yet when the comic was released, on the cover is a huge blurb “An all-new FF Blockbuster by Stan and Jack Kirby!!” It seems that when Kirby refused, someone at Marvel got the great idea of taking the storyboards to an FF cartoon that Kirby had provided the artwork to, and Stan did the dialogue, and publish them in a comic like format and called it a new collaboration. Marvel got hold of the storyboards for a retelling of the first meeting of the FF and Dr. Doom, The storyboards were inked by a super-collection of Marvel’s top inkers. Jack had no idea of this abomination until a friend showed him the comic thinking Jack had worked on it. Jack was surprised and upset since he was neither paid for the artwork nor consented to the use of his art despite a special note in the book that thanked Jack Kirby for his consent and cooperation–typical Marvel hyperbole, but to Jack typical abuse and disrespect from Marvel.

• 

• 

The cover with the offending blurb. Notice the empty space next to Stan Lee – Chic Stone inked. Notice Herbie getting into the act

Jack was happy with his animation work; his hours allowed him more time to spoil the grandchildren. Tracy and Jeremy would sneak into the bed and wake up Granddad, who would then spend hours telling stories about the war, and an alien character called the Goozlebobber, who enchanted the young kids. They would join Jack at his table and draw for hours, with Grandpa giving them tips and encouragement. In the afternoons they would go for swims in the pool, and laugh at Jack’s bad jokes. Tracy would fight over who got to sleep on the big “mushy” yellow couch just outside of Kirby’s studio. She recalls, “In my early years, a pen would be in one hand, a pipe in the other. What a wonderful smell! I came into the studio, sat on a couch, quietly watching. “If I was lucky, he would take a break and tell me one of his amazing mystery or World War two stories. (in the style of Boy Commandos of course). Those were the nights I could stay awake forever, just listening and watching…He was the greatest storyteller a kid could ask for—and a great grandpa.” Jeremy would start going to the Cons and watch Granddad talk to the fans and the publishers. It seems the San Diego con had become comic central where the movers and shakers gathered to plot their next moves. It behooved all professionals to be seen there. It’s odd that San Diego would become the hub of an industry still located in New York, but this was where Kirby held court. The comic industry was changing, and Jack was there to help it along.

• 

• 

Animation greats Sid and Marty Kroft and Ruby/Spears in front of Kirby art – more animation art

One of the first of the small independents was a San Diego firm called Pacific Comics. It was owned by two brothers, Steve and Bill Schanes. They started with a small distributorship, and expanded into self-publishing. Their first thought was to Jack Kirby. The Schanes had known Kirby for awhile, mostly through Kirby’s yearly visit to the San Diego Comic Con. Steve Schanes remembers it well:

“I figured if you want to get people’s attention with a new comic book, who better to do it with than the King of Comics, Jack Kirby! We were already friends with Jack. We used to send him free copies of comics he’d drawn for other publishers because they never sent him any! So I just went ahead and called him on the phone, and he turned out to be a nice guy, completely accessible. . . . We negotiated a whole detailed publishing deal between the two of us. No middlemen.”

The negotiations called for a page rate plus .08 cents an issue and increased to .10 cents an issue if the book sold over 100,000 copies; just an incredible deal for someone used to simple page rate. Plus the brothers would assist Jack with international rights. The idea of owning the rights intrigued Jack and he always had a few projects laying around he could make fit.

In fact, he knew exactly which project to resurrect. Back in the late ‘70s Kirby had been approached by an entrepreneur about creating a new comic line called Kirby Comics. Jack had drawn up a 17 page issue called Captain Victory. Unfortunately the funding fell through and Jack was left with the unpublished pages.

• 

• 

Captain Victory

Jack then expanded the story into a 50 page novel, but couldn’t find any backers. For Pacific, Kirby split up the 50 pages into two issues, with some additional panels for continuity. Finally, Kirby would do what he wanted to do. To him, Captain Victory was a warning to us. We had become too complacent, and willing to welcome the visitors. He had told stories, and saw this concept from all directions, and now he was scared; “I think there is complacency now among the young. Sometimes we go overboard on trust.” He understood that any visitors to our Earth would be much more advanced than we were, and he feared if higher intelligence meant a better intelligence. Could life lose that innate aggressiveness and need to dominate. He saw that mankind certainly hadn’t evolved past the “hunter” stage. The story was another epic space fable about an alien life form trying to feed on Earth, when a group of interplanetary police come along to the rescue; a sort of space western. Captain Victory and His Galactic Rangers #1 was cover dated Nov. 1981. Jack even managed later to work in a back history that connected the character to Orion and Darkseid of the New Gods. The art was uneven due to the first two issues being drawn in the ‘70s with Mike Royer inks while the later issues were completely new, with Mike Thibodeaux’s inks. The two styles were very different; Thib had a very florid, flowery approach, very curvaceous, almost romantic. By issue #4 Jack’s Goozlebobber stories filled out the issues, also inked by Thibodeaux. When asked about Mike Thibodeaux, Kirby explained; He’s young, he’s good and he wants to do comics. People (at Pacific) are giving me a breaks, I give other people breaks. I feel that Mike should have his. I’ve never turned anyone down in my life.” “My religion is cooperation, not power.”

Mike Thibodeaux first met Jack in 1974 when he and a friend visited the Kirby’s at their home. Mike’s home life was far from ideal, and he found himself drawn to Jack’s comics and the Kirby’s kindness for refuge. Mike said that Jack became his guardian angel. Roz became his de-facto mother. Harry Slonaker would have been proud, a BBR member passing forward the ideals of the Boys Brotherhood Republic. They became friends and Jack was always helpful to Mike as he worked his way through college. Mike was doing some commercial work using airbrushes; Jack liked his touches and asked Mike to try it over a Thor drawing, the result became a treasured Kirby gift. When Mike Royer couldn’t do Captain Victory due to contractual commitments, Kirby asked Thib, as he was called, to ink them. Mike recalls those first pages;

“There were times I had to do one page in three days, and then near the end of the series there’d be six pages in one day, which I was not very good at. In the beginning he tried to get them to me on a regular basis. I think he was also working on other projects at the time, and that’s why he didn’t devote all his time to it. He was still working for Ruby-Spears, and he was always doing specialty pieces for people. He was always working!”

• 

• 

• 

Mike Thibodeaux – Steve Oliff – Mike Royer

“The first issue of Captain Victory hit comic shops in August 1981, selling around 70,000 copies, ‘those were incredible numbers, right up there with Marvel and DC,” according to Steve Schanes. Within six months, circulation was up to 85,000 per issue, and the comic had been licensed for publication in seven foreign countries. The third issue of Captain Victory netted Kirby a $6000 royalty check, and Pacific’s publishing and distribution ventures together that year grossed about $1.2 million” according to an article in the San Diego Reader dated Aug, 19, 2004, titled Two Men and Their Comic Books.

Just as Jack was beginning Captain Victory #3, Steve Gerber, Kirby’s Thundarr compatriot at Ruby-Spears initiated a lawsuit against Marvel over the rights to a character named Howard the Duck. The suit was costly and Gerber was hurting.

Steve explained his reasoning in an interview with Gary Groth for Comics Journal;

“What disgusts me even more, though, is that I think the writers and artists have largely brought this on themselves.” “They don’t want to know about the business end of comics. They prefer to remain ignorant. They’ve allowed the publishers to convince them that they’re a bunch of no-talent bums surviving on the goodwill of the companies. Very few people in this industry really believe that their work has any artistic merit, or that it’s sale-able elsewhere. Or that they deserve more than they’re getting. You will actually hear them defend the publishers’ ownership of their creations, the low page rates, the cowardice of the companies to explore new markets. That’s why it’s startling when someone like Gil Kane or Neal Adams or Don McGregor or Barry Smith — or Steve Gerber — shoots his mouth off. People in the industry find it disturbing that one of their number might actually take his work seriously, take pride not only in being fast and dependable, but in the work itself.”

Some of his friends came up with an idea, why not create an all-star comic with the friends volunteering their services and Steve would get all the profit to help defray the legal costs.

Steve explained. “Jack and I had gotten to know each other pretty well, and I liked him very, very much, and the feeling seemed to be mutual. So I decided to approach the King of the Comics and ask him to draw a 20-page story for nothing! This is not something you do every day.” I was so terrified that I had to take Mark Evanier with me out to Jack’s house for moral support. ….. I sat there, pouring sweat, and explained about the lawsuit. Every time I started to hem and haw, Mark leaped in. And we explained to Jack what the lawsuit was all about, and that it involved Marvel, and it had to do with character ownership and creator’s rights. We went on for about an hour and a half about this, and finally we got around to the benefit comic book. I said, “I want to do this character called Destroyer Duck…

…I’ve got this idea for it. I…I.. I really want to..to…know whether you’d um…be willing to draw the book….(gulp)…for….nothing.” I just waited there with the silence hanging in the air, and Jack kind of rubbed his chin and said,” Yeah, sounds like fun.” Not even a semi-flinch. He got this weird smile on his face like he’d really enjoy sticking it to them, and then just said “yes”.

The book was called Destroyer Duck. Published by Eclipse Comics the first issue had a March, 1982 date. It was a satirical tale of a character held hostage by a large corporation and his best friend’s attempt to free him. The friend was Duke “Destroyer” Duck, a bad ass Punisher type in a furry feathered skin, and an orange beak. Kirby penciled the title story, the inking was done by Ruby-Spears artist Alfredo Alcala, in a florid style that didn’t quite mesh with Kirby’s hard edged pencils, but the finish was illustrative. Mark Evanier and Sergio Aragones premiered a character named Groo in the back-up story.

Because it was by Gerber and Kirby, it was filled with deliciously bizarre satiric ideas and storylines. For instance: Woblina Strangelegs, A wacky ventriloquist-dummy-lady; Vulpa Packer, the Battle-Ax, who looks like the love child of DeSaad, and Granny Goodness. Holmes the lawyer, who looks like Matt Murdock, but wears sillier clothes. Cherrie Jubilee, a tough broad with a red orb for a helmet; Brad Cogburn and his army of clones, and more Those were just some of the characters! The whole things chock full of madness.

Though it was planned as a one-shot, the book sold very well. After some prodding, Gerber continued the series with Kirby penciling the first five issues; being paid for the other four. The story was very funny, and very biting in its look at how large corporations trample everything in their path. Jack was also in a dispute with Marvel over original art return and his drawing seemed a little more pointed than usual. It was an angry series, despite the biting humor. Gerber explains:

“A good number of the jokes in the book are his. The “Grab it all, Own it all, Drain it all” slogan of Godcorp was his. The designs of the Godcorp complex were his and virtually all of the visual gags in that first issue.”

Jack explained further more philosophically;

“Steve is a very original kind of guy. A man who can make something out of a duck like he did can come up with something important. I think Steve is a fine writer.”

“And, even if it wasn’t Steve Gerber, I would still do the same thing. Because I feel that change has to be made. The comics may not be important to me, right now, but they are important. It’s important that all the media stay alive, so that the ordinary guy can get his chance, without having to pay some ugly price for what he wants to do. The industry could fight tooth and nail on that, and it could continue, but the chance that it could change is the important thing in pursuing Gerber’s case.”

• 

• 

A very mad book

Steve explained, in an interview;

TJKC: Did you get a sense that working on Destroyer Duck was kind of therapeutic for Jack?

SG: “Oh, absolutely! No question. It was like giving Marvel the raspberry for 20 pages. The whole idea of sticking this in their face was a major appeal of the book to Jack.” “It was one of the best experiences I ever had in comics, working on that book with him. He was one of the funniest and most talented human beings I ever met.”

Artist/satirist Scott Shaw reminisces about Kirby’s underlooked talent as a funny man.

“Most people tend to think of Jack Kirby in melodramatic superlatives. He’s been described as the ultimate comic book artist, a master’s master of graphic fiction, an incredibly talented creator of dynamic heroes, dramatic action and cosmic conflicts. Comics aficionados have dubbed him “King” Kirby (a title he wore with some discomfort), and have compared his work to that of Da Vinci, Rembrandt and Rockwell, among other artistic greats. He was, without a doubt, the single most imaginative individual ever to work in the field of comic books. He was equally comfortable working in any of the familiar comic book genres of super-heroics, romance, westerns, science fiction and war, among other dramatic themes. But Jack Kirby was also very funny as a writer, as an artist and as a person, and left behind a surprisingly large body of work to prove it.

One of the strangest paradoxes in comics is that most “straight” comic books (in such “realistic” genres as super-heroes, western, romance, war, etc.) are drawn in styles that actually bear almost no resemblance to truly realistic illustration! Yet, many fans (and even editors) of these comics turn up their noses at anything resembling the kind of humorous cartooning sometimes referred to within the business as “big-foot drawing.” In my estimation, Jack Kirby’s artwork somehow bridges this aesthetic gulf. Judging by life-drawings that he had done as a young man, Jack had always possessed a natural ability to work in a much more realistic style than that with which he is now usually associated. It appears that the exaggerated and dynamic anatomy, poses, design, composition and foreshortening that have become such a Kirby trademark may have been the result of a conscious aesthetic decision on Jack’s part.

One thing is certain, however; once he began his professional career (under a variety of pen names), no matter what the character or genre, whether the subject was serious or light-hearted, Jack Kirby could only draw like Jack Kirby and if humorous illustration could be described as an exaggeration of realistic art, then Jack Kirby’s humor work is nothing less than an even greater exaggeration of his normally exaggerated style!”

• 

• 

• 

• 

Lots of Destroyer Duck – even Frank Miller gets into the mix

• 

• 

Steve Gerber and inker non-pareil Alfredo Alcala

Buzz Dixon came on board towards the end of the run.

“Steve was suing Marvel at the time for possession of Howard the Duck. He had created a character and comic book called Destroyer Duck, which was among the first independent comics. Steve at one point was running into a little bit of scheduling problems, because he had too much on his plate at the time, and he asked me if I would write a short sequence just to help him get caught up in Destroyer Duck. So I wrote about a two-page fight scene between Destroyer Duck and a villain, I forget who the villain was. My first work in comics was illustrated by Jack Kirby!

Buzz went on to write the final 2 issues. By that time the case was over the character was absorbed into other titles that Gerber created. The book had run its course. Buzz always praises Jack Kirby,

“Jack was one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met. Just a great, great person, he and Roz were wonderful people. It was tons of fun.”

This next story starts way back in 1954. A young boy about 6 is out with his mother and comes upon a revolving comic rack and stares in fascination. On the rack are several of those new three-dimensional (3D) comics. He stares and rifles through the books. He shows his mother and asks if she will buy him one. He already has some comics so it’s not an unusual request. His mother looks and when she sees the EC 3D horror comics she blanches. Rather than the crime and gore, she picks out 3D Comics featuring Mighty Mouse, by St. Johns. The kid is spellbound; he had never seen anything like this. The amazing rodent is flying and jumping almost out of the book. This was an excellent choice. Originally created in 1942 as a movie short; Mighty Mouse was a parody of Superman.

He went through several mutations–beginning as Super Mouse– before becoming the mouse we all love. Mighty Mouse became the most popular of the many characters in Paul Terry’s studio. Not many could ever forget the stentorian operatic vocals of Mighty Mouse singing, ”Hereeee I come to save the dayyyyyy.” Opera and farce played a large part of Mighty’s oeuvre, even the constant villain; Oil Can Harry occasionally breaks into aria.

• 

• 

We have a hit

MM was a natural for comics with Timely producing a short run in 1946. St. John’s took over the license and started making comics in 1947 with Mighty Mouse soon their top selling book. It was no surprise that this character was chosen for their first 3D comic. Joe Kubert recalls;

“We produced two sample proofs with the 3-D effect, a panel of Tor and one of the Three Stooges. When we showed them to Archer St. John he flipped over the idea! We went to work on a Mighty Mouse book because St. John felt it would be the best vehicle for 3-D and get the best chance on the newsstands.”

The first book sold out. More were added. Mighty Mouse later became one of the earliest TV characters in 1955 when the studio was sold to CBS. The movies were just beginning to flood the market with 3D movies. Such great titles like Bwana Devil, It Came From Outer Space, and House of Wax, captivated the young man who became obsessed with the concept of 3D. One of his favorite comics was Captain 3D by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby-a wondrous example of the 3D concept. The 3D effect left Ray breathless. Young Ray Zone’s imagination and wonderment were on fire as he now searches out and collects any and everything he can find relating to 3D.

Ray came to this fascination as a consumer, but James Butterfield was deep into the nuts and bolts of the industry. Even as early as the 1950’s he was producing a 3D TV show down in Mexico. He invented several 3D set-ups to improve the quality of 3D pictures and films. In 1979, he started a new business called 3-D Video Corporation in North Hollywood. Ostensibly to transfer 50’s Movies into 3D films for TV showings, he also had plans for other 3D concepts. In 1981, he created 3D Cosmic Publications, a printing division of the parent 3-D corp. One of the first things he did was hire David Starkman for his sales team. A week or so later, he hired David’s wife, Susan Pinsky. It was a serendipitous 1976 visit to a garage sale that got their 3D spark going when they ventured upon an old View-Master. The View-Master was originally invented in the early 1900’s and first presented at the New York World’s Fair. It was a self-contained stereo viewing unit containing 7 pairs of stereoscopic pictures in a round reel that produced

• 

• 

Simply the best, bakelite and a designer’s dream

great 3D shots of scenic spots and entertainment shows. Marvel provided cells from their cartoons as photos for Stereo view. The 3D effect amazed them and they were instantly obsessed with the hobby. David and Susan joined the Stereo Club of So. California, they wrote a newsletter, and opened their own retail mail order business selling 3D paraphernalia to photographer’s, both amateurs, and professionals. At 3-D Video, David was put to work in the sales dept. selling 3D glasses and other trinkets to convenience stores and other outlets. But Susan was given another task. Mr. Butterfield asked her to gather and produce a 3D comic book that could be used as a primer and sales point for the 3D craze. He wanted this to be the best 3D comic ever. He envisioned this book to be sold at convenience stores with the accompanying glasses. This daunting task was the first attempt at a 3D comic in 25 some odd years and Susan decided she first needed a writer who understood 3D and possessed a writing style that could captivate the young readers. The young man from 1954 had now grown up into perhaps one of the most knowledgeable people on the concept of 3D. Ray was working at a large steel company in their art dept. On the side he was writing articles about 3D in various magazines.

From a 1989 interview, Ray recalls;

“I was writing articles freelance and had a couple of articles on 3D published. One was in the 11th edition of the (1981) Overstreet Price Guide and another, called Stereovisions, was in Fanfare Magazine. And that article was an attempt to create a single historic overview of all forms of 3D imaging, including photography, comics, holography, 3D movies, the whole thing. After that article appeared a lady named Susan Pinsky contacted me. She was employed by 3-D Video Corporation in North Hollywood, the company that was producing anaglyphic conversions of old 3D movies for television in 1982. She asked me to write a 3D comic book that would be a graphic history of 3D and hired me to create an original superhero that would be a vehicle to tell that history. After I hung up the phone talking with her, I jumped up and down for about an hour and a half.”

Ray already had a similar idea roiling around in his head. Until Susan had a workable script, she hadn’t decided on an artist. A couple weeks later, Ray gave her his script. Knowing his comic book history and remembering the great job on Captain 3D, Ray later suggested Susan get Jack Kirby to illustrate the book. She was happy, but when she showed James Butterfield the script he had some ideas of his own. He wanted his company and himself to play a role in the story so he rewrote the script and inserted himself in. Susan fought to keep all the historical items in the script. James and Susan finally hammered out the script and Susan set about finding Jack Kirby. This wasn’t too difficult as Jack was listed in the phonebook. Susan called up Jack, and told him a little about what she wanted. Jack shuddered thinking about the hassles making the earlier 3D book. Jack laughingly swore that even thinking about 3D comics caused him heart palpitations. Jack invited her up to his house where Jack and Roz charmed Susan with their graciousness and kindness. After hearing about the progress in technology, and what was needed, Jack quickly agreed and his salary and time was worked out. One good thing was that Susan was given no budget, she was told that whatever it cost; just charge it to the company. There was no dickering over his page rate, or unholy time schedules to work around. None of the usual comic book hassles. Jack was to do the work and turn it in as soon as possible.

Ray enthused:

“A month later Susan Pinsky informed me that they had engaged Jack Kirby to illustrate my script. Then I was jumping up and down for about two days! I still can’t believe my incredible good fortune to have this absolute king of comic books illustrate my script. That was, and is still, just amazing to me. Back in the early days of 3D, in the 1950’s, he produced one of the finest 3D comics of them all, Captain 3D. I was amazed. I went to the president of the company, James F. Butterfield and told him I wanted to work there. He hired me to work in the 3D Cosmic Publications division, which was the print media side of the company. We produced the 3D Cosmic Poster, which was a preview of the comic and I worked on the creation of point-of-purchase displays and different aspects of the print media.

Jack was given the script plus a layout and asked to follow it as close as possible. For once Jack wouldn’t tear the script apart and rework the story to his own fashion. It was an easy job, only 17 pages plus a cover, bc and a poster for the stores. She had Jack Kirby supply the art for the glasses. He did at least 3 presentations before a choice was made. Mike Thibodeaux inked. The poster was actually printed in at least 2 versions, one for stores and another called 3D TV Cosmic poster which oddly credits Mike Royer as inker. Jack finished very quickly and turned the pages into Susan. Susan loved what he had done- not surprising since Jack’s natural style was a version of 3D drawing that he had perfected in his comic book work. He understood forced perspective and driving the action forward. Jack was also happy since he didn’t have to separate the bits into layers like they had in the 1950”s. With the artwork in hand, Susan hired a familiar face. The late Tony Alderson was also a member of the Stereo Club of Southern Calif. He was unemployed at the time, yet he was well versed in the 3D conversion process needed for the comic. Tony was a tall, lanky, mustachioed fellow, lovable but grouchy, given to answering any question with a negative response. Susan had learned that in talking with Tony a different approach was needed. She would ask every question in a reverse negative manner so when he said no, it actually meant yes. So rather than asking Tony if he wanted to work for 3-D Video, she asked if there was any reason he couldn’t work for 3-D Video. When he said no, she then asked him in her reverse manner. Is there any reason you can’t start tomorrow? Tony said no, and started right away. Ray Zone recalls;

“I first met Tony Alderson when I was hired to work at 3D Video Corporation in 1982 and it was Tony who converted Jack Kirby’s art to 3D in Battle for a Three Dimensional World. We have maintained an idiosyncratic dialogue with each other that incorporates Tony’s uniquely satirical slant on the vagaries of stereoscopic business practices.”

Tony explained the process he used.

“I take the drawing supplied me as the left image. I then simulate the right image by cutting apart copies of the drawing and reassembling them with the proper displacements to create retinal disparities when viewed.”

Ray sent a letter to Joe Kubert, thanking him for his part in 3D history and inviting him to partner up for a project. Joe kindly begged off with a note.

“However; I’ve always felt that the 3D graphic process is a viable procedure, if coupled with a good story and art. As a gimmick, it has no longevity (as sadly proven through past experience.)

About the comic book, Joe included a little message.

“A cosmic-comic book, huh? Great! You couldn’t have made a better choice than Jack Kirby, whose work has a tendency to look 3D even when it’s flat. Please give Jack my fondest regards when you see or speak to him.”

A 3D comic is complicated; because of the labor intensity it is a timely process, even with a large crew such as at Harvey Comics in 1953. A regular monthly book is out of the question. It only works on stand alone issues that are not time related to other books. It cannot be made as a regular part of the publishing routine. It is also a costly job due to the time and physical labor needed to transfer. It would bankrupt a company trying to do too many 3D books at once. St. John Publishing had learned this lesson the hard way. They paid the artists twice the normal rate when working on 3D. Not every printer was equipped to meet the specific needs of 3D. It was also a fad that tended to die very quickly at the marketplace. But this was not a problem for 3D Video. It was a stand alone book with no promised publication schedule and continuity. It was being worked on when the people were there, and finished when ready. This turned into a problem because Mr. Butterfield would often corner Susan, now editor-in-chief of 3D Cosmic Publications, and hand her a new project that required the artists, and graphic people on a priority matter. One such project was a set of glasses with 3D drawings on them for a chain of convenience stores to sell, or give away when some item was purchased. 3D Video also produced a set of 3D cards to go along with the movie, Jaws 3D for Topps. Susan and Tony as well as artist Barry Jackson worked on a 3D poster for the movie Friday the 13th Part 3. The comic work was back-burnered during these mini-crises. Among all the other projects, Susan says the book became an almost after-thought. Jack had done his work on a timely manner in late 1981, eventually, by late 1982, the artwork was finished and ready for the printer.

One looming problem, in late 1982, 3D Video was in trouble, their spending spree had caught up to them. The time of no budgets came to a quick halt. The company that bragged about cash flow and how well they were doing was suddenly cash poor. Yes they had taken in over 12 million dollars, but the new accountant told them that they had spent 14 million. The printer needed 6-7 thousand dollars up front to print the 100 thousand issue run. They found the up front money and the printer came through with 100 thousand copies, neatly delivered to their warehouse. Ray remembers this period;

“This was a cosmic book, by the way, it wasn’t a 3-D comic book–hyperbole was the real stuff of our day-to-day existence.”

So I worked there for about a year and in December of 1982 the Battle comic actually was printed and I was there at the printers when it rolled off the press. I have 3-D photos of the book being printed.”

Susan and the chosen inker, John Rupkalvis disagreed about the colors. She recalls;

“When it was printed Ray, John & I were there at the printers, but only John could approve the colors. We both strongly disagreed with his choices, but we were so happy to have it finally being printed that we had to go along with the situation.”

Susan thought they were too faded. Susan lost and some of her pride waned with the inking choices.

On Dec. 11th, Ray set up a comic book signing for Jack at a local comic shop—Ray supplied the books. Susan Pinsky and Tony Alderson accompanied Jack and a lovely time was had by all. The feedback was all positive and Kirby wowed the crowds. After the signing in Studio City, the Los Angeles Herald Examiner ran a newspaper article entitled, Pow! 3D comic craze is back—Cartoonist all smiles: New book a fast seller at (that’s right) $3 The article by Timothy Carlson features a large photo of Jack seated at a table containing many books, and art pieces, signing a book for a young fan. After a particularly shy 10 year old got a book, Jack turned to an older collector and said, “Look out for his generation! They’re gonna zap you!” Jack’s return to 3-D was questioned, Jack explained “It drove me crazy to do the painstaking overlapping of blue and red shading of the drawings (in 1953) this time I just did the drawings and I was happy to leave the rest to 3-D Video.” The flyer for the signing at The American Comic Book Company headlights the first major 3D comic book in over 25 years! But it also mentions his old books plus the new first issue of Silver Star. Also on the shelf were Captain Victory, and Destroyer Duck. Jack kept busy for a semi-retired comic book man. At $3, the book without a price got one quickly, though the other independent books were retailing at $1. Susan said that after the accountant added up all the costs, the books came to about a dollar a piece. 3-D’s marketing director, Linda Feldman boldly told everyone that Battle for a 3-D World would easily sell out its 100 thousand print run. Susan says the hyperbolic b.s. was a direct extension of Jim Butterworth’s personality. The article did make its requisite mistake when they credited Jack with creating Capt. Marvel.

Unfortunately 3-D Video went bankrupt, and the printer never received the remainder. Ray Zone was let go, and the next day Susan arrived at work to find the door sign taken down from her door. She was also let go, as were her assistants Roy Besser, and Mark Beam- both important parts of assembling the comic. The boxes of comics languished on the delivery dock never to be sent to the distributor.

But the story doesn’t end there. Shortly 3-D Video held an auction to raise money for creditors. Ray, David, Susan and a friend, Mark Ober attended this auction and went home with boxes of glasses, the boxes of comics, and other assets. Unfortunately they had no place to store the comics so they sat outside a garage for a period. Never let anyone claim that it doesn’t rain in Southern California. It rained and some comics were ruined. Susan did work out a deal with several Western distributors such as Bud Plant to take the books and distribute them to comic shops. After a year and a half, the public would see Battle For a 3D World.

After being let go by 3-D Video, Ray started his own company.

“In 1983 I started my own company, The 3-D Zone, which was to be, specifically, a company to convert flat, existing images into 3D, make 3D glasses, and do 3D printing.”

Ray was a hustler, always exuberantly looking for the next project. A year later Ray would hire Jack Kirby to create 3 posters of children at play. Jack actually drew four, but only three were chosen. These would be placed in boxes of Post Honeycomb Cereal. Mike Thibodeaux recalled;

“I did some presentation pieces, but I don’t remember if they were for Ruby-Spears or for some other company. They were some toy posters that went into cereal boxes. Nobody knows about these things, but I remember inking them. They were kid sports concepts.”

Ray Zone produced these posters for a cereal account. Ray recalls;

“I did a 3D conversion job with Jack Kirby for Honeycomb cereal. Jack drew great images of a kid on a skateboard, a baseball player, and a scene with a BMX bicycle. I sent down a proposal to Bill and Steve Schanes at Pacific with copies of the Honeycomb 3D sports action posters and a specific proposal for a 3D comic that had all the prices I was charging, including the glasses that could bind into the book. They got back to me in late 1983 and said they wanted to do a book (Alien Worlds 3-D).

• 

• 

• 

• 

When the Pacific book came off the presses, Schanes showed copies to publishers at Petuniacon, in Oakland. The people at Aardvark-Vanaheim were so excited they ordered their own 3D comic. Ray was a master at letting one project sell the next. Later, when Pacific was going through bankruptcy, the Schanes said that their 3D Comic had been a disaster. It was costly and never sold in the marketplace leaving them with bundles of expensive back stock in their warehouse; sort of a curse of the 3D comic. Ray Zone says that story is full of beans! He says Pacific had a quick 100% sell through of their initial 60,000 copy order, and they were so happy they placed a second order for an additional 20,000. Ray says he remembers because he had to manufacture the additional 20,000 glasses for the books. He thinks Schanes was doing some scapegoating. Ray Zone had made a name for himself. He would follow with over a hundred other comics, working with such luminaries as Will Eisner, Steve Ditko and Neal Adams. Ray added that yes it was very time intensive, but at his peak in 1987 he did manage a comic a month for a year or so, but the pressure got to him and he cut back to first bi-monthly, and then quarterly.

Susan’s memories of the Kirby’s are nothing but love. She mourned the passing of both Jack and Roz. She says he was the most professional artist she ever worked with and the most kind and gracious. She sent me a stereo photo of Jack, looking very trim and healthy working on a page. This photo was taken during a visit to the Kirby’s. As a present, Jack gave her a piece of original art which she had framed and is hanging in her living room today. It is with great thanks and respect that the author acknowledges the assistance and memories of the ever young, beautiful, bubbly brunet, Susan Pinsky, for her help in telling this story, and the inimitable Ray Zone for his recollections.

Postscript

In 1982, 3D Video set up a program where they were going to show a 3D movie on a local California station. The catch was that the viewers had to buy a set of glasses for a dollar at a local 7-11 store. This aggravated the heck out of late night host Johnny Carson and he spent a whole monologue railing against this practice. As a prop, Johnny walked out wearing a set of 3D glasses. It seems that by mistake, Johnny had received some 3D glasses from the release of Battle For a 3D World comic book.

Well, at some point, Johnny Carson did a bit involving the glasses, and it soon turned into a riff on the tagline on the glasses. (Kirby-King of Comics)

Carson was quite put off that this Kirby guy was calling himself the “King of the Comics” when he had not even heard of him, not realizing that “comics” referred to the books, not stand-up comedians. Carson asked Ed McMahon if he had heard of him. No, Ed, said. The bit went on for awhile, with Carson ripping Kirby the whole time, even going so far as to call him a con-man. Well, as you might imagine, Kirby, who coincidentally was watching, was quite displeased about this whole thing. So displeased, that he even got a lawyer involved. The lawyer calmed Jack down; they got hold of Freddie DeCordova, Johnny’s producer, who couldn’t have been more apologetic. Fans sent Johnny letters. Ultimately, things were resolved amicably, with Carson devoting time in his show apologizing to Kirby for his mistaken comments.

From June 8th 1982 Latenight Show;

“Now, before we begin tonight-we’ve been off for a week and I have to start with an apology tonight and I mean this sincerely. Remember a couple weeks ago, locally out here, Channel 9 had a 3-D movie and they sold 3-D glasses through stores to see the movie. They sold a couple million pair. Doc was wearing one of his rather loud outfits and somebody had given me a pair of 3-D glasses which I had in my pocket, so I took them out and was looking at Doc’s outfit and I started to talk about the movie, mentioning that over 2 million pairs of glasses sold.

First of all, I was wrong—the glasses I had were not the ones sold at 7-11. Those were glasses designed by the gentleman I’m going to mention in a moment, to view 3-D posters. Anyway, Ed, you were a big help to me that night because you said “Why don’t you read what’s on the glasses? Right, and it said, “These glasses designed by Jack Kirby- King of comics.

Now if you say to a comedian or an entertainer, “King of comics”, what’s the first thing you think of? The comics… comedians, guys who do jokes for a living. And the audience kind of laughed, because we had not heard of Jack Kirby-King of Comics. So when we said – I had turned around and said laughingly, “They made a lot of money on these glasses. Rather than King of Comics, Jack Kirby is King of Con-men.”

Well it shows you we don’t know as much as we sometimes think. (reading from letter) “Mr. Kirby is the king of comics because he has created, or co-created such classic comic book characters as Hulk, Captain America, Spider-Man, Thor, and many others. As a matter of fact, the main reference book on comics is dedicated to Jack Kirby, “without whom there would not have been any comics to write a history about.” (ends reading letter)

Anyway, having not met Mr. Kirby, who has a fine reputation as a comic book artist and creator, we are very sorry. We certainly did not mean it maliciously since we did not know the man and we thought it was some comic picking up a couple bucks making 3D glasses. This letter informing us came from a Mark E-V-A-N-I-E-R and he apparently is a comic book fan who saw our show and realized our error.

So, Mr. Kirby, if you are watching, we certainly didn’t mean to embarrass you or make fun of you.”

The sincere apology ended the whole brouhaha and Jack, in return drew a couple sketches of Johnny and Ed and all was forgiven.

Mark Evanier, in a blog entry wrote about a follow-up face to face with Mr. Carson showing his humble side.

“On one show a few years ago, Johnny inadvertently said some unkind things about one of my closest friends.(Jack Kirby) The details are immaterial except to say that Johnny had his facts mixed-up and didn’t know what he was talking about… and my friend was deeply, deeply hurt by the incident.

I phoned up Fred deCordova and explained the situation. He instantly agreed that a large apology was warranted and he told me that if I wrote a letter giving the facts, he would guarantee that Carson would apologize on the air. I did and, as advertised, Johnny did a long and gracious retraction at the earliest opportunity. It was so sincere, in fact, that several former Tonight Show staffers, phoned me to ask how I had arranged it. Did I have photos of Johnny with an underage goat or something?

Three weeks later, I was walking through the NBC complex, passing Carson’s parking space that is, sad to say, the high point of the NBC Studio Tour. Suddenly, a two-seater Mercedes pulled into it, the driver’s seat occupied by J. Carson. Guards were scurrying out to escort him but I was between them and him and at that moment, it didn’t dawn on me that I was committing any felony by stepping up to Johnny, introducing myself and thanking him for the prompt and civil apology.  So I did.

My back was to the guards but I could tell that they were in a high state of alarm.  Someone is approaching Mr. Carson! They may even have gone for their guns. Johnny waved them away and stood there with me, his arms full of papers and folders, chatting for maybe five minutes. He seemed genuinely thankful that I had gotten the correction in so promptly and without a lot of litigation threatened. He even laughed when I said, “Well, I thought you could do with a few less lawyers in your life.” I recall thinking it was one of those Bizarro World moments: Me making Johnny Carson laugh.

I was delighted he was so polite because, just as I wouldn’t have wanted my Tonight Show watching dampened by an unhappy experience on staff, I wouldn’t have wanted it despoiled by an ugly encounter with Carson. I’m sure he is capable of incivility. I’m just pleased I didn’t see it.

He shook my hand and thanked me again. And then he went in to do his show. And I went home to watch it.”

It doesn’t totally end there. In the mid-Eighties, Ray Zone had a local cable TV show called the Zone Show, where he introduced and interviewed local artists. On Oct. 10, 1984 Jack Kirby was the guest for a taped half-hour interview. Jack was in the studio with a large blue screen behind him. Ray Zone was conspicuously hosting off-screen. During the show a constant stream of Kirby covers were chroma-keyed to appear in the background. It created a most intriguing sight, of the animated Kirby talking with covers floating behind him. The interview stuck closely to Jack’s history and precious little was said about 3D.

Pacific followed up Captain Victory by signing up popular Mike Grell for a book called Starslayer. Mike says that he signed up at Pacific a few weeks before Jack, but Jack got his pages to the company so much faster that his book was published first. The Schanes noticed that there was still room at the back of the new book for a filler strip. They remembered the young man who had hung around their stores and he’d been working on Kirby’s drawings at the Comic-Con. When asked for a filler strip, Dave Stevens agreed and came up with The Rocketeer. Both were very well received. The Rocketeer would be the unqualified hit of the year and the strip that finally put the independents at the fore. It was so big that Marvel reached into their bag of tricks and found a small one-use background character in a long forgotten Daredevil book named Rocketeer. They threatened legal action trying to attempt the strip’s cancellation: typical bullying tactics. The suit ended when Disney expressed interest in the Rocketeer as a movie project, and scared Marvel away.

• 

• 

• 

• 

Kirby’s Kids
John Pound – Scott Shaw! – Dave Stevens – Mike Thibodeaux

During the threatened lawsuit, Kirby was constantly bolstering Dave, Jack volunteered to give depositions or other ways to help out. Jack was very proud of Dave’s success. Dave recalls;

“Jack was kind of proud when any of us snotnoses did something with ourselves later in life. When we were all high-schoolers visiting the house, they probably had no idea any of us would take it further than just a hobby, and I think when Scott Shaw and myself, and John Pound and a few of the other guys actually made a career of it, that kind of tickled him in a lot of ways.”

Even the reclusive Steve Ditko contributed a strip called Missing Man. Pacific was making a name for itself. Mark Evanier and Sergio Aragones contributed Groo, the Wanderer. (after the first appearance in Destroyer Duck)

There were some complaints about the coloring on the early issues of Captain Victory.
To some, the series looked muted and dull; it lacked the dynamics to match up with Jack’s pencils. The Schaneses chose Steve Oliff as the colorist for flagship titles Captain Victory and Starslayer.

Steve recalls in an essay posted on his olyoptics.com website:

“It was the first time I’d tried flat, coded, hand separated color. I had visions of doing flat color like it had never been done before by using some of the full-color tricks I’d learned on the Hulk and Moon Knight. I even went so far as to add Zip-a-tone [pasted-on dot patterns] to Jack’s original art on Captain Victory #1 to get the added tonal values. My good intentions aside, the coloring came out dark and muddy rather than dramatic and moody. It [Captain Victory] wasn’t the best story Jack ever wrote, and I’m afraid I really wasn’t giving it the look he wanted, so he fired me. I’ve never really been comfortable with flat color. Even though it was a shock to be fired by a boyhood idol, I probably deserved it”.

The sales were good, but the reception was very mixed. Many complained of Jack’s explosive dialog—right out of the Forties. Other saw the plot as childish—more consistent with Saturday cartoons than as a comic book fighting for space with Miller’s Daredevil, or the young guns over at Marvel. The Goozlebobber strip was almost incomprehensible. Jack’s over the top heroics seemed simple-minded and farcical in a world grown cynical by Gov’t villainy and third world atrocities.

Some complained that the storyline was too close to Jack’s themes in the Eternals, or the New Gods. Jack replied that Captain Victory was a “kind of warning”. “I think there’s a complacency among the young. Sometimes we go overboard on trust.” As an example Kirby cited the optimism found in Spielberg’s Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Kirby felt that “Spielberg’s vision of the benevolent aliens was as far off-base as the peaceful greeting they received from the American military and Government advisors.” Still he worried about the tigers at the gate.

• 

• 

• 

• 

Next Jack Kirby offered up another sci-fi strip called Silver Star. This was originally meant for a screenplay, but Kirby retrofitted it into comic format. This was a dark tale of genetic engineering and science gone bad. A rogue scientist Bradford “Cowboy” Miller has injected several expectant mothers with a “genetic package” designed to create a new breed of human, Homo Geneticus, which can survive the coming nuclear holocaust he expects. One of Miller’s test subjects is his own son Morgan, whose immense powers emerge during a firefight in Vietnam and who must wear a silver bodysuit for his own survival, to contain his energy. Morgan battles against another recipient of his father’s genetic treatment: Darius Drumm, a preacher’s son who leads a “cult of self-denial,” and attempts to kill off other members of Homo Geneticus (including a circus strongman, a female stunt driver, and ghetto hero Big Masai), and plots to destroy the world

• 

• 

Kirby slipping and dark edges take over

There is also a Christian fundamentalist vibe from the villain Darius Drumm – the mutant leader of a cult of fanatics. Drumm’s purpose is even more insidious than Darkseid’s as his raison d’etre seems to be destruction of humanity, not blind obeisance. Big holes in the premise and continuity show how a slower more purposeful Kirby could have improved his work. Sometimes his mind raced too far ahead of the pencils. Even this late in his career, Kirby’s concepts and visuals still possess extraordinary vitality, and his storytelling has a wild, rollicking momentum. Unfortunately his concepts were not nearly as well realized as his graphics. Jack had reached a point where the two aspects of his genius no longer meshed smoothly.. His imagination could not come up with concepts the equal of his artwork. Perhaps Kirby’s most nihilistic comic, the viewpoint is gloomy and desolate. It had a cover date of Feb. 1983. Mike Royer returned to ink over Kirby thanks to an animator’s strike that freed up his time. D. Bruce Berry finished up the last 2 issues after Royer returned to Disney. Mike Thibodeaux and Richard French provided a back-up strip named The Last of the Viking Heroes in several issues.

Mike talks about Kirby’s role in creating the Viking Heroes;

“I was trying to come up with a concept of my own, and he kept saying, “do something you love” “What do you love?” And I thought the Vikings were the coolest guys ever! They were the ultimate adventurers. Traveling all over the world, with their incredible, mythical gods. The visuals have such endless possibilities. Most importantly, it gave me the opportunity to draw scantily-clad women. He (Jack) was more of a mentor in showing me the importance in pursuing things you are passionate about; don’t try to follow formulas. Formulas can sometimes create barriers for the imagination. Along with this advice, he also drew three Viking Heroes covers for me.” Jack even drew a sketch of Captain America shouting “Don’t say it, Mike! Do it!” for encouragement.

• 

• 

• 

Scantily clad women and some Kirby covers

Meanwhile, Jack was commissioned by a comic shop owner/friend to write and draw something biographical and personal for a magazine he was publishing named Argosy. The publisher was Richard Kyle, who owned a book store in Long Beach, Cal. He had met Kirby at the San Diego Comic Con. It seems that everybody met Kirby at the San Diego Comic Con! While sharing a table with Jack and Roz at a post-Con awards banquet, Jack told a poignant tale of his childhood, and Richard asked Kirby if he would draw it for his new magazine enterprise. He promised Jack that he would print directly from the pencils with just a muted back wash to give an antiquated feel to the story. Kirby agreed as long as the colors were muted and dreary. As Jack said “they weren’t colorful times”. Jack reached back to his early childhood and drew a short 10 page story about a boy trapped in a hellish nightmare of hurtful taunts and youthful gang style camaraderie and fighting. Street Code embodied all of Kirby’s childhood fears in a coming of age story of a sensitive youth wanting to escape the shackles of the ghetto. The exuberance, the struggles, and the dreams of his early life came to life on those pages in as dramatic and unvarnished imagery ever done by Jack.

• 

• 

Richard Kyle – new printing

This was Jack in all his glory unfettered by colorful costumes, super villains and the other accoutrements of the comic stories he had drawn the last 40+ years. This was Kirby ripping off scabs, and wrestling with his inner demons, this was Kirby the “artiste” finally coming out. Unfortunately he never followed up on this. It remains a shadow image of what Kirby might have done-should have done. Due to financial troubles, Kyle had to drop the project. And Jack’s masterpiece was tossed on a shelf.

Temperamental artists were wrecking Pacific’s schedule. Neal Adams had promised a regular series named Ms. Mystic, about an ecological Goddess of Vengeance. The strip first appeared as a back-up strip in Captain Victory to good reviews. But after that it would be months before more pages came in for the promised premiere issue.

Street Code spread – Kirby’s close quarter neighborhood

And another six months before the second was available. Series couldn’t get a toe hold due to long waits. Dave Stevens, ever the perfectionist couldn’t produce Rocketeer fast enough for a regular series. The Schanes personal love for Gothic style horror convinced them to publish several series of these books by people such as Berni Wrightson and Bruce Jones. Unfortunately the market didn’t respond and the sales were sluggish. The roller coasting racing upward had reached the top and caromed wildly downhill. The Schanes managed to keep the presses rolling, until they made a mistake, like Al Harvey two decades earlier, they decided to publish a 3D comic. The result, Three-Dimensional Alien Worlds was a very good book, with art by Dave Stevens, Jon Bolton, Art Adams, and others, but the sales were disappointing, and much inventory began accumulating according to Steve Schanes. Neal Adams created a dreadful one shot book called Skateman, which almost bankrupted the brothers. Other outside pressures began to build such as outstanding debts from some of their biggest accounts that caused a horrible cash flow problem. The books were doing ok, but the distribution end was killing them. Mike Grell, seeing the end coming took his Starslayer to another publisher. Mark Evanier took Groo, and Dave Stevens took his Rocketeer to competitors. A snowball effect took hold and slowly the money stopped coming from the Schanes, Kirby, still doing his animation work simply pulled the plug on the books in late 1983. It was a short but ultimately profitable venture for Jack. Mike Thibodeaux remembers;

“I remember I did a couple jobs for Pacific, and they stopped paying. I think they were in financial trouble at this point. But they always took care of Jack; he was always paid up front.”

By late 1983, Pacific closed shop, one of many casualties that made up the independent comic publishers of the ‘80s. The good thing was that Pacific showed that creator owned strips were viable, and that small publishers could compete against Marvel and DC. It forced the big companies to adopt new policies allowing the creators more independence and reward for their work.

• 

• 

• 

Jenette Kahn – Graphic Novel Hunger Dogs – Super Powers Mini series

The time at Pacific had kept Kirby’s name in the public. And the big companies saw the writing. 1984 looked to be a banner year for Jack. DC had come a callin’ and the news was good. After Jack had left DC in 1975, Carmine Infantino was let go shortly after. The new publisher was Jenette Kahn, the new industry wunderkind.

At only 26, she was the youngest person to ever head up a comic publisher, and the first woman. One of the first new books she assigned was the return of Kirby’s New Gods. She says she had seen the sales figures for the old books, and they shouldn’t have been cancelled. Soon after the rest of the Kirby cast made appearances in other DC titles. Darkseid was upgraded to a major DC villain who would circulate among the assorted DC books and cause mischief wherever he went.

It was under Kahn’s tutelage that DC had regained footing and began a long step back to respectability. For good or ill, Kahn is renowned for transforming comics from a children’s medium to a visually stylish and sophisticated art form for adults. Writer’s such as Alan Moore, and Neil Gaiman brought their talents to comics. One of her most important features was to champion the idea of graphic novels, creator owned properties, and high profile mini-series. After a contentious competition, DC had also arranged with toy manufacturer Kenner Inc. to produce an expanded line of action figures under the umbrella title Super Powers. Sensing a lack of quality villains, Kenner and DC agreed that Darkseid should be included. With the addition of Darkseid, other Fourth World characters were soon added.

Kahn also instituted better agreements with the creators. Though Kirby’s characters were already part of DC’s Universe, Kahn thought it only proper to make sure Kirby would receive royalties for these figures. Kirby would also produce some artwork for the packages. Kirby, though no longer active with DC was still the single most talked about creator at the assorted Cons. One of the most often asked question of the DC execs was “when is Kirby going to finish his New Gods storyline?” In a meeting at the swanky Beverly Hills Hotel Kahn approached Jack with an offer, “if we reprint the New Gods, will you finish your tale? Kirby was still stinging from the abrupt ending to his Captain Victory series but he agreed. The first step was a new establishing story that would appear as a last story in the reprint titles, and then Kirby would do a larger, graphic novel that would wrap up the story. It was also announced that Kirby would oversee a new mini-series called Super Powers where most of DC’s iconic heroes would take on its most iconic villains. This mini-series would tie-in to the new action figure line produced by Kenner. A new cartoon show also carried the Super Heroes logo

The new books turned into an artistic fiasco, maybe not financially. There really was no way that Kirby could wrap up the Fourth World story in one book. So Jack ejected Mister Miracle and the Forever People and concentrated solely on the battle between Darkseid and Orion.

The new story tacked onto the reprint book was dense and excellent. “Even Gods Must Die” ends dramatically with Orion being cut down in a blistering hail of weapons fire. Kirby’s vision shows Orion with huge chunks being blown out of his body. The page was disturbing in its horror and display of destruction. It was always Kirby’s plan for one of them to die, though he did say that a father would never kill a son. Yet for the graphic novel, DC nixed that idea because they wanted the characters to remain available for other stories. So in the Hunger Dogs, Orion was rejuvenated by Himon’s miraculous mother box, and with the help of the lowlies on Apokolips, defeated Darkseid, though he managed to escape in the end, not unlike Darth Vader in Star Wars. Without the dramatic finish Kirby had planned, the story more or less petered out to an anti-climactic nothing; not much different from the ugly, anti-climactic fall of the Soviet Union years later- not with a bang, but with a whimper. No one was thrilled but it was done. The artwork was reformatted several times and with each change different inkers became involved, and the artwork was a mess. Greg Theakston tried but couldn’t connect the dots. Kirby’s draftsmanship was not at a peak, and no amount of fixing made the art of a high quality. It was cartoonish rather than dramatic, and the story was a cut and paste disaster. Not a fitting way for an epic to end. But it was done and the project was brought to a finality of sorts. Kirby was well paid plus DC started sending him royalty checks.

• 

• 

Kirby gets a little wordy – One last crack at glory

The San Diego Comic-Con was aghast! For the first time it would have to go on without Jack Kirby as a headliner. The word came down that Jack had been in an auto accident and was home recovering. The truth was much worse. Jack Kirby had had an heart attack. He was hospitalized and set up for bypass surgery. Jack was scared that if Ruby-Spears found out they would let his contract run out and Kirby would lose his job. A cover story was worked out and his work was told that Jack was in an auto accident, but was well and recovering. Never had Kirby been so relieved to have switched from freelancing for comic companies to full time status as an employee with an animation house-complete with medical insurance. The old set-up would have bankrupted him. Kirby recovered quickly.

• 

• 

• 

Kirby finally gets the chance to do DC characters too late

Greg Theakston was a Detroit boy who migrated east to New York after high school to seek his artistic fortune. He found a home with Neal Adams at the Continuity studio, working at inking backgrounds, clean-up and whatever job Neal had available. He graduated to penciler, and colorist and became part of the Crusty Bunkers art gang. He also started doing commercial work as a cover artist for paperbacks and magazines. He became a regular contributor to Mad Magazine. Greg’s other passions were as historian, working endlessly gathering all he could of the early comic history, and as an art restorer cleaning up old comic art. He met Jack Kirby while in New York and slowly became one of Jack’s trusted insiders. He became a regular inker over Jack Kirby in the mid-Eighties, working on the Super Powers line. It was his job to try to blend Royer’s, and Bruce Berry’s inking on the graphic Novel Hunger Dogs—a most thankless job since no one could ever find a happy medium on that art. Greg continued at DC inking Jack’s pages on the Who’s Who series of books. Greg was also a highly respected painter who painted several of Kirby’s drawings for comics. He would also become a trusted friend and art assistant to Jack when he was fighting to get his art back from Marvel. Greg would go on to produce many volumes detailing the history of Jack Kirby, first in his Jack Kirby Treasury parts 1 and 2, later in his Complete Jack Kirby volumes, and his pair of Jack Kirby Readers. Jack was also a large part of his Sunday Comics, and Pure Imagination anthology books. Perhaps the best Theakston publication was the reprinting of Roz’s wonder book of Kirby sketches of practically all of Kirby’s creations. Greg named this Heroes and Villains. Greg is also writing a Kirby biography called Jack Magic.

• 

• 

Greg Theakston – Pure Imagination

On October 7, 1985, four hijackers from the Palestine Liberation Front took control of the cruise liner Achille Lauro off Egypt as it was sailing from Alexandria to Port Said, Egypt. Holding the passengers and crew hostage, they ordered the captain to sail to Tartus, Syria, and demanded the release of 50 Palestinians then in Israeli prisons. Among the hostages were Leon and Marilyn Klinghoffer.

The next day, after being refused permission by the Syrian government to dock at Tartus, the hijackers singled out Mr. Klinghoffer, a Jew, for execution, shooting him in the forehead and chest as he sat in his wheelchair. Jack knew Leon Klinghoffer, as a boy in the BBR. Leon was the business manager and staff photographer for the BBR’s newspaper. The story is told that the hijackers made disparaging remarks about Klinghoffer being a Jew, and Leon spat in one of their faces. They shot him and dumped him overboard. Leon’s body was recovered a week later and returned to New York for burial. Klinghoffer never forgot the times spent at the BBR. And was a regular benefactor for years and years.

• 

• 

Jack’s good friend gone too soon

Jack would get misty eyed whenever he recalled Leon.

“But this fellow Klinghoffer who you may have read about in the papers, he was killed by the Arabs. I was raised with him. Now the Arabs had machine guns on him right? He didn’t give a damn about the machine guns. He probably walked over and cursed ‘em. Told them not to push women and children around. Which was a terrible thing to do to my generation, see? And he reacted, and of course he suffered for it. So it’s something that you just can’t help doing.”

By 1985, Jack was busy assisting on cartoons like Mr. T and Chuck Norris Karate Komandos; mostly providing weapon and machinery designs. One of the fonder animation efforts was a collaboration of three greats. The Centurions Power Xtreme was created and designed by Gil Kane, Doug Wildey, and Jack Kirby. Thematically it was a copy of every Kirby team unit ever created, it even had the elemental aspect Kirby reused often. It was sort of an updated Challengers of the Unknown, with a sea expert, a flyer, and a ground warrior. They operated out of an orbiting headquarters named Skyvault, eerily similar to Brother Eye from OMAC. It later added an energy master, and an Indian Infiltrator.

The original story arc was a 1985 five episode mini-series. It was hard-edged sci-fi; dynamic and explosive. The result was positive and the next year saw 60 full episodes. This series ran daily between Sept. and Dec. 1986. Led by feisty Crystal Kane, the team featured three men of different disciplines who donned exo-skeletons to fight the cyborg legions of Doctor Terror. The animation was done by the Japanese studio Sunrise, which was common for that time. DC came out with a short 4 issue comic series that died soon. Kenner Toy Company released a series of action figures to tie-in with the cartoon. These figures looked like a blending of Star Wars and Legos, as the main figures had holes – or ports – which allowed the suits and weapons to snap into.

• 

• 

Typical 80’s action figures

Stan Lee had stood astonishingly quiet during the fight for the artwork and Kirby noticed. It bothered Jack, and many fans that Stan had gotten his sweet deal from Marvel but wouldn’t speak up for his old partner. Gary Groth, editor of The Comics Journal in a panel discussion talks about getting Stan Lee to comment on the art dispute. Groth:

“Well we tried to contact Stan Lee for the story that appeared in CJ #100 and as soon as we contacted his office in California, they instituted a new policy that Stan Lee wouldn’t give interviews”.

The audience laughed at the thought of the ever loquacious Stan Lee not giving an interview. Their relationship had reached bottom and would never be repaired. Marvel refused to even talk to their lawyer, and negotiations broke off. To add insult to injury in Variety Magazine dated March 6, 1985 was an ad touting an upcoming movie from Cannon Films featuring Captain America. In the credits it says that the film was based on Stan Lee’s Marvel Comic strip character. Jack was so incensed at this snub that he contacted his old partner and together they had a lawyer contact the studio to correct the credits immediately or face a lawsuit. When asked about it, Stan gave his usual “some unnamed advertising guy mistakenly credited him” spiel. With Stan it’s always someone else who mistakenly gave him all the credit.

The fan media got wind of the artwork dispute and talked of boycotting Marvel unless they gave Kirby back his art-sans waiver. Petitions were circulated and many major artists and artistic guilds sent letters of protest to Marvel. Jenette Kahn of DC sent a particularly scathing letter in support of Kirby

To the Comics Journal,

It is a sad history. During the first three decades in our industry, comic art was destroyed by all the major companies because they were insensitive to even the personal value of the work and unconscious that artists had any rights in it. By the late Sixties, as protests grew, the majors ceased to butcher artists’ pages, but hoarded them instead in warehouses.

In 1973, DC acknowledged what should have been true from the industry’s beginning and what is true for all other magazines and periodical literature. We, the publishing houses, are paying only for the right to reproduce the work. The ownership of the page, the actual object, belongs unequivocally to the artist, and the artist alone.

We emptied our warehouse, searching out artists who had not worked for DC in years. In 1978, DC became –and still is—the only major comic book company to guarantee in every contract written for every piece of work the return of the original art. We also were the first and only to guarantee payment if the artwork we had in our custody was damaged or lost.

Jack Kirby is one of our industry’s greatest innovators and contributors. We are all in his debt. His artwork, like that of all the hundreds of other artists who have received their pages back from the publishers, is his morally and by industry practice for the past twelve years.
There has never been a time in those twelve years that we have singled out any artist and attached different conditions to the return of his art. We cannot imagine a circumstance in which it would be appropriate or ethical. Ownership of artwork is absolute and therefore cannot be subject to negotiation.

Jenette Kahn, Dick Giordano, Paul Levitz

Will Eisner wrote a poignant and passionate plea to Marvel for his former studio mate and friend;

Gentlemen,

I have been following the public debate over your refusal to return Jack Kirby’s art. I have read with growing dismay the details and surrounding rhetoric.

This matter has gone beyond whatever legal merits there may or may not be to your position.

By your public intransigence you are doing severe damage to an American cultural community that is now emerging from the dark years of trash and into an era of literary responsibility.

It is important to those of us who devote our lives to this important art form to know that we have certain inalienable moral rights and that these are respected by the publishers.

For the sake of protecting the standards of this profession—not to mention your own reputation—I urge you to return to Jack Kirby all his original art AND DO SO PROMPTLY AND FAIRLY.

A whole new generation of creative people are watching your conduct. Don’t fail them.

Signed

Will Eisner

All Jack ever wanted to do was sign the same waiver as every other Marvel artist had and get his birthright returned. Kirby had reached an age where he wondered about his legacy, and he feared signing the waiver might just erase any remaining trace of Kirby to his Marvel creations. His financial legacy was also a concern. Original art had become a major collectable, and prime pieces were bringing major bucks. This would help Jack leave a nest egg for Roz should he die.

• 

• 

• 

Center of attention

The newfound celebrity caught Jack by surprise. He was a solitary man in a solitary business, staring alone into a blank white sheet, drawing on his own imagination to fill it in. This attention rattled his somewhat. He was happy for others to take up his cause, but still not used to outside help. “He explained. “ I’m from the old school. I’m from a generation you fellas know nothing about. I ask nobody to do anything for me. If they feel like writing a letter, fine, if they don’t, it’s still fine with me. I’ll continue my own fight. It’ll go on because I want it to go on. If it stops, it’ll be because I stopped it. I ask nothing of anybody.

• 

• 

In an interview from The Comics Journal #105 with Tom Heintjes, Kirby makes a most eloquent observation:

“The strangest part about all this is that the people who make the sales are at the bottom of the heap. There’s a caste system whereby the people who sell the books are treated with contempt. The publishers aren’t doing good business. The sales don’t come from the executives. We’re in a visual medium, and the sales come from the artists.”

• 

• 

Darkseid after Hunger Dogs defeat – old habits DC characters

The Super Powers action figures were a hit, and several other Kirby figures were added in for a total of 11 characters available in stores near you. The Super Powers tie-in comic series was a low point, Kirby had no real feel for DC’s other heroes and the plot was old hat and silly. Kirby did draw the final issue, but it was a mess. A year later, the Super Powers series was continued with a new 6 issue story arc named #2. This was penciled by Jack, from a Paul Kupperberg script and it’s no more coherent than the first series. There were more Kirby creations in this tale as they were spotlighting the new additions to the action figure line. It was fun to see Kirby draw Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern, and Dr. Fate, but his skills had diminished to where the drawings were weak, and distorted. They lacked any of the grandeur one wanted to see in a Kirby comic. Except for an occasional issue, or cover, this was the last work Jack did for DC.

It allowed Kirby to end his DC time on an upbeat note. Gone were the memories of Jack Schiff and Mort Weisinger, or Carmine tearing his heart out. Kirby rarely ever had anything negative to say about DC, He thought his recent treatment there was superlative. He gave the best he had and they responded with love and respect. When asked about any future plans with DC Kirby replied: “DC is the kind of an outfit I would do it for. Everybody there has been wonderful to me.” He said that if given the chance he would like to bring the Forever People and Mister Miracle to conclusions as well.

The annual Comic Con led to a well attended meeting of the old and the young, as Golden Agers Bob Kane, Jerry Siegel and Jack Kirby and wives spent the evening with young Hollywood’s Bill Mumy, Miguel Ferrer, and Mark Hamill, comic geeks all. It was a good time for all despite the crotchety old Bob Kane trying to one up Billy Mumy’s old TV show Lost In Space. Any time the old artists got together was a fun time since time was catching up to all of them. Hamill never forgot that night.

“We were just so happy to tell these guys how much they meant to us. When they were actually working, comic books were not something you bragged about being involved in.”

The new meets the old

The problems with Marvel were escalating. An episode of the TV show 20/20 featured Stan Lee as guest, and during the show, Stan was credited as the sole creator of all the Marvel characters, with no correction from Stan. Jack’s simmer was reaching a boil. In interviews Kirby’s anger had concretized into absolute derision of Stan Lee. Jack would actually claim that Stan never wrote anything nor collaborated on any of the Marvel characters with Jack. Kirby’s claims were as false as the one’s made by Stan, but it was the only outlet available for Kirby to keep his legacy alive. He had no panting media like Stan, he had no position of strength like Marvel, all he had was his own grit and the love of the fans. There were constant clashes between Marvel execs and comic creators, and fans on Kirby’s behalf. Kirby’s good friend Mark Evanier had risen to a position of reverence as both writer and historian with the fans. Once to a journalist he said. “At the point the so-called Marvel Age began with the Fantastic Four #1, Stan had been in charge at Marvel for twenty years. And while he’d written countless stories, have you ever heard anyone single any of them out as “well written”? Implied was that Jack had been creating new characters, new concepts, and even new genres for those same twenty years prior to his work at Marvel. Plus he continued after he left Marvel while Stan Lee never had any successful creations after the split with Kirby. Roz put it more succinctly: “Jack created many characters before he even met Stan. He created almost all the characters when he was associated with Stan, and after he left Stan, he created many, many more characters. What has Stan created before he met Jack, and what has he created after Jack left?

As the conflict grew, so did the demands, when one side added in another demand, so did the other. Marvel went public claiming Jack wasn’t negotiating in good faith, that they were willing to return Kirby’s art, but that Kirby was making claims as to the copyrights. Jack would state that he never ever made any claims as to the copyrights. The low point might have been at a San Diego Comic con panel discussion, Jim Shooter interrupted the proceedings to challenge Jack about the conflict. This so enraged Roz, that she got all up in Shooters 6’10” grill, pointing her finger and finally shamed him into leaving. Shooter became the target for all the public outrage, and other Marvel execs noticing the perceived weakness organized an ouster. After the dismissal, some Marvel employees hung his image in effigy.

While Shooter was in charge at Marvel, some major artists, such as Frank Miller, Steve Gerber, John Byrne, and Gene Colan had refused to work for Marvel. Some of this was outrage over the treatment of Kirby, some not. In May 1987, after over 3 years of dispute, Marvel and Kirby finally reached an accord, and Marvel returned Kirby’s artwork. The quantity was a little over 2,100 pages, roughly one fifth of the estimated 10,000-13,000 pages Kirby had drawn for Marvel’s Silver Age. Amazingly, Marvel has slowly been finding and returning Kirby’s art—even though they have claimed that had no more—for the last 20 years. As a final parting shot, Marvel refused to even insure the shipment; just Marvel being petty to the end. Mike Thibodeaux and Mark Evanier helped Jack sort out the treasure trove. It was a welcome sight when those boxes of art arrived. Mike said ‘He was standing there, holding the splash to Avengers #7 and just staring at it for the longest time. You could see he was into it. He was into what he had done, which I’d never saw him do.”

While looking over the stash of pages, Kirby grew wistfully quiet. All the marvelous pieces of work in front of him forced him to face the totality of what he had accomplished at Marvel. Something he was loathe to do as a rule, he was hardwired to look forward, looking backward seemed a waste.

The return of the artwork wasn’t the end of the conflict. There were still matters regarding credit. Jack wanted the same simple credits on his characters that Stan Lee was getting. In an interview, Roz hissed at the reporter. “Tell them the Kirby’s never stop… there’s still a lot of things to be worked out” Their lawyer Greg Victoroff made it plain. “The issue of credit is separate, and has not been resolved. In fact, it’s rearing its ugly head right now.” (This was during the fight for proper screen credits for the Cannon produced Captain America film that mistakenly credited Stan Lee as creator)

In the same interview, Jack talks of the possibility of an autobiography, which Marvel wanted to limit the discussion of the company to a very small aspect. This after the original art demand prohibited Jack from writing a bio. Roz explained; “Under the old agreement, Jack had to go to Marvel for permission to do his biography.” His lawyer further explained. “One point that came out in the new agreement was that Jack was free to refer to Marvel in a “non-prominent” way. We can’t use Marvel’s name to promote or advertise the book.” Not that that would ever have been a possibility. Just as Jack never wanted Marvel to use his likeness, he certainly never planned to use Marvels. This becomes so hypocritical when one looks at all the archives and reference books Marvel put out with Kirby art as the central selling feature after Jack died. But this might explain some of the odd choices made on the published biographies which show no connection to Marvel.

The best thing about the article was that in referring to the onerous conditions originally made by Marvel as to the handling of the artwork, and the mentioning of anything regarding copyrights, it made clear that the new contract had deleted them. Victoroff made clear; “Jack got just about everything he wanted.” Including the right to sell his art, and be left alone by Marvel. Jack had now secured his legacy with a large cache from which Roz could continue to survive on.

Kirby had recovered from his bypass surgery, but minor problems and mini-strokes plagued him. Was he ever thankful to be working for an animation house rather than freelancing! Jack told Evanier, “If I weren’t working for those guys, I would have lost the house.” Evanier told a panel audience: “Jack had a very secure life in the ’80s. He had a house, a steady paycheck, health insurance, and he was out of comics, all thanks to Joe and Ken.”

For the rest of the Eighties, Jack enjoyed a semi-retirement. He was often called on to provide spot illustrations for DC’ Who’s Who series, or an occasional cover, and several pin-up pages in friendly independent comics. Mike Thibodeaux started up a new series featuring his Last of the Viking Heroes concept. He used the three covers that Jack had provided, plus Jack helped occasionally with plotting. Mostly Jack was content to attend various comic cons and bask in the adulation his career commanded. His house had become a magnet for every fan who wanted to simply tell him how much he was loved and admired. Greg Theakston’s ode to Roz, Heroes and Villains finally saw print.

Jim Shooter, perhaps apocryphally tells of a surreptitious meeting of Jack Kirby and Stan Lee. This occurred during the art fiasco and I have never heard it verified.

“In 1986, again at San Diego Comic Con, I met with Jack. After that meeting — both Jack and Roz were there — I said, “Y’know Jack, we’re having our 25th anniversary party tonight. It would mean a lot to me if you would come.” He said he’d see, and Roz didn’t look too happy about that idea. Anyway, the party’s in full swing in this huge hall in the U.S. Grant Hotel. Stan and I are standing way in the back, fairly near the doors. All of a sudden I look up, and in the door come Jack and Roz. I ran over to them and shook his hand and escorted them over to where Stan was standing.

I have to tell you, it was Stan Lee’s finest hour. Just a moment before they arrived– you know how Stan does the big gesture sweeping his hands around? He had a glass of wine in his hand, and he whacked it against a pillar, and the glass broke, and his hand was slashed; he was bleeding buckets. So here’s Stan; he’s got his handkerchief pressed over his right hand, bleeding, probably going into shock, and I walk Jack over. Jack sticks out his hand, and this panic goes over Stan’s eyes. He sticks out his hand, and Jack shakes his hand — and then Stan has to wipe the blood off of Jack’s hand with his handkerchief. He’s clutching this handkerchief in his right hand, having this conversation with Jack, and it was a really cool moment.

Obviously these guys hadn’t had a real chat for a long time, and I felt privileged to witness it. With Roz impatiently hovering nearby, and Shooter anxious to referee, Lee and Kirby danced around each other.  “Stan was saying, ‘Gee, I really want it to work out,’ and, ‘Jack, I don’t have any control over this corporation.  I miss the old days.  I just want things to be good,'” Shooter said.

“Jack was responding in kind.  So, Stan says, ‘Why don’t you come over to the house sometime.  You know my number.  I know yours.  If I call you, will you come see me?’

“Jack says, ‘Yeah, I’d like to come over.’  And Stan says, ‘Just tell me when.  We’ll go to lunch, or whatever.’

“I’m watching history here.  They’re really getting friendly again.  They really seemed to be becoming friends.  Then Stan says, ‘Ya know, Jack, I don’t care who owns it.  I don’t care who gets the credit.  You can own it, you can have the credit.  I’d just like to work with you once more.'”

So, what does Kirby say?  Shooter said he began to nod.  “He’s like, ‘Well, that will be fine.’  And then Roz says, ‘Over my dead body.’  And she drags him away.”

Lee took it pretty hard.  Then, he caught a ride to the hospital to take care of his hand.

While I can’t verify, I can imagine Roz’s reaction very clearly. For accuracy’s sake I have been told this never happened. I have this interview with Max Borax and Jack where he mentions the meeting, but no sense of reconciliation from Jack’s viewpoint. It appeared on Comics Interview #41

MARK: You were talking to him about this yesterday, at the convention?

JACK: Yes.

MARK: Was it just the two of you alone?

JACK: It was me, him, and Jim Shooter. I told him that he should be more like Larry and just relax and have a great time.

MARK: What did he say?

JACK: He agreed! We got along amicably.

MARK: That’s great!

JACK: Yeah! The only thing is — I’m trying to get my pages back and I can’t understand why there’s such a struggle. Or why there’s a struggle over who did what or who created what. There’s no `reason for that, ’cause Stan and I know. Nobody else knows. And if — if Stan would only come out of that hiding place and just tell it to the world, see —everything would go great.

MARK: Jack, even though each of you, in your own hearts, know who did what —

JACK: We know!

MARK: —do you think that time has obscured some of —

JACK: NO! It hasn’t obscured it. He knows it, I know it. How we’re gonna prove it, I don’t know.

MARK: Do you think there’ll be a resolution to all this soon?

JACK: I don’t think so. I think that people don’t change. They can’t change. Sometimes, it’s too late. And you’ll just go on being what you are, and I’ll go on being what I am because I’m just like that. It’ll be something that, maybe lawyers will resolve for us. Human beings remain human beings. I can predict anything that Stan will do, and, uh —

MARK: He can predict what you’ll do?

JACK: Possibly, he can. He knows I’m a right guy, and I’m not gonna hurt him in any way, and vice versa.

MARK: Apart from the working relationship, do you miss the friendship you guys had?

JACK: No., because I make a lot of new friendships all the time. I know I can’t change Stan. I say my piece, he says his piece, and I let it go at that.

MARK: You know, the whole world would probably like to see the two of you guys shake hands.

JACK: We did, yesterday! But it resolves nothing. I could shake hands with Stan ’till doomsday and it would mean nothing, see. It would mean nothing — it would mean that the dance went on, that’s all. But beyond that the situation’s still the same. Somebody else will have to arbitrate. I’ll leave it to wiser heads. I don’t say I have the wisest head in the world. I’ll leave it to people with patience. I’ll try to have patience myself in the hopes that something positive will come out of all this. Whatever I want out of this is half-gone already, and whatever’s left I’m willing to be conciliatory about.

DC Stalwart Alan Kupperberg had a memory of this meeting;

“I was at that cocktail party in San Diego and I witnessed that handshake. People were so willing to believe that this terrible acrimony existed between Stan and Jack. Stan was sporting a fairly large bandage on his hand at this affair. I jokingly told someone that Stan had been wounded when Kirby threw a glass at Stan. This was instantly believed. I had to hustle to squelch my false rumor. I think some dummies still believe that it really happened”.

There were the occasional flare ups of contention between Kirby and Stan. Usually brought on by another article or TV show claiming Stan was the creator of the Marvel Universe, usually followed by a Kirby blast at Stan in a comic fanzine. One in particular was printed in The Comic Journal #134 Feb. 1990. In this interview Kirby gives no quarter to Stan, claiming Stan was nothing but a toady who did what Goodman told him and had no clue what was going on in the books. That it was all Kirby’s creativity that ran the Marvel Universe. Stan was so mad that he contemplated legal measures, but he rejected it. Perhaps Kirby’s words contained a little too much truth.

After the contention from the art return debate quieted down, Marvel actually began to reprint Simon/Kirby items in hi-quality. The first was Fighting American—the old Prize series and then the 1941Captain America in a 2 book slip cased edition, and finally the Harvey western series Boy’s Ranch; along with what were called the Marvel Archives which published the original issues of Fantastic Four, and Hulk and later all the rest of the original Marvel characters. The legacy of Jack Kirby was once again front and center at the comic shops. There was a deluxe reprint of some Simon and Kirby romance stories as well as several Kirby related biographical and historical compilations. Plus both Marvel and DC began publishing huge black and white collections of all their Golden and Silver Age books. Jack was a huge part of the renaissance of the comic industry.

• 

• 

• 

• 

Joe Simon had bowed to pressure from his son and written a semi-autobiography. The book titled, Comic Book Makers, Crestwood 1990, was part biography and part historical ruminations on the industry and the crazy persons who peopled it. Joe’s memories are sometimes shaky, but never boring as he recalls heroes like Siegel and Shuster, and Mort Meskin, as well as the villains like Victor Fox and Frederick Wertham. The best part was that Joe published a good deal of unseen art, including a whole never before printed Boy Explorers tale. Joe reminiscences of Jack are humorous, illuminating, sometimes confusing but always from the heart. It’s a must read for not just Simon and Kirby fans, but fans of the industry. Joe Simon was undergoing a renaissance of sorts as he became one of the great elder statesmen of the industry, and a wonderful speaker and keen interviewee.

Richard Kyle continued to search for financing for his proposed magazine. Undaunted he could wait no longer, in late 1990, he scraped together enough to publish the second issue of Argosy complete with a Jim Steranko pulp cover, and inside in glorious graphite was Jack’s autobiographical masterpiece. Street Code was finally seen by the public, and the response was overwhelmingly positive. Once again Kirby had changed the perception of comic art.

In 1991, The Ruby-Spears studio had been sold to Turner Broadcasting who also owned Hanna-Barbera, and another animation company. This redundancy was wasteful and Turner narrowed this division down to just Hanna-Barbera. Ruby-Spears closed down and Kirby was once more out of work. Jack decided to retire.

Joe Simon was hired to recreate many of his early Captain America covers; they sold for thousands of dollars. Jack was also commissioned to recreate some of his iconic covers. The money was good, and the feedback very encouraging. Among the work was the cover to Captain America #1. Two copies were commissioned as Marvel wanted a copy for their company. Dick Ayers was hired to do the inking. Jack finished them all. It has been reported that the second CA cover was on Jack’s desk when he died—completed.

• 

• 

The grand old man of comics – Joe’s response to Caps supposed death

Jack Kirby had reached a level of celebrity; he was featured on TV shows, did radio interviews, and ruled the many comic cons across the country. Jack hobnobbed with other celebrities such as Frank Zappa. He palled around with Neil Gaiman, and Frank Miller. He was even part of a meeting of giants when he and Frank Frazetta were feted with a special night. Often, when an outside project needed a comic book reference or a guest appearance Jack was called on.

Scott Shaw recounts a memorial dinner for Jack that threw them all a curve, with Roz joining in.

”Judy and I were honored to be included at a special party held for Jack by Gary Goddard and Tony Christopher, the wizards behind the theme park designing company Landmark Entertainment; both of them are devoted fans of Jack and his work. A number of local pros were in attendance, including Frank Miller, Neal Adams, Bill Stout, Mark Evanier, Steve Rude and others, but some of us were slightly uncomfortable with the knowledge that Tony had hired a “special” surprise for Jack. After dinner and testimonials, an attractive young lady dressed as Wonder Woman entered the private room. At least she started out dressed as Wonder Woman. The idea of paying a stripper to entertain at a party for Jack seemed in poor taste, but Jack’s attitude somehow completely removed any trace of sleaze from the proceedings! Instead of being flustered by this topless young woman’s obvious endowments Jack acted like he was receiving the keys to the city! “I thank you, you’re a lovely young woman!” Later that night, after the mostly undressed Wonder Woman had her picture taken with Jack, someone asked Roz what she thought. Roz held up the photo. No problem, she said. “I’ll just paste a photo of my face over hers!”

Ahmet Zappa recalls a short meeting of Jack and Frank;

“Jack would come over and smoke cigars and Frank would smoke cigarettes, and they’d talk and talk. One of the things Frank and Jack had in common: the prodigious amount of cosmic goodness that extruded from their respective noggins was not the result of drugs; they both enjoyed tobaccy but only the unwacky. … Jack gave me this Silver Surfer book. I didn’t know what to make of this silver dude on a surfboard; it didn’t make any sense but, he was super cool. This was around the time Empire (StarWars) came out and was HUGE and I remember Jack confided in Frank that he felt like the stories he created helped shape the Star Wars saga, that he saw direct parallels between his characters and the movie’s story arcs.”

In Nov. 1987 Jack received a call from Simone Welch, of Author Services. Artist extraordinaire Frank Frazetta was set to receive an award for his services to the Commercial Art Field. Mrs. Welch asked if Jack would kindly make an appearance to wish Frank congratulations. Now despite both men’s long tenure in the art business, Jack had never met Frank, but he thought it would be an honor to make the acquaintance of an artist he so admired. The Kirby’s contacted Mike Thibodeaux to have him drive them to the Hollywood location. This wasn’t hard since Mike was also a longstanding Frazetta fan. They arrived to find a huge throng in attendance, and navigating the crowd to get closer to Mr. Frazetta was a problem. Jack, perhaps showing some of his Ben Grimm demeanor started to bull his way until they met up with a hostess. Jack explained to the hostess that he would like to see Frank Frazetta. The hostess took the message to Frank and she told him that a Mr. Kirby would like to speak to him. Mike T. remembers it well. “It was like the parting of the Red Sea. The chills overwhelmed my body as I saw these two incredible giants clasp each other hands for the first time. The first words spoken were from Frank saying “Jack, it is an honor to meet you. But if I recall Jack, we did meet once before.”

Kirby looked confused. “Forgive me Frank, I don’t remember.”

Frank chuckled, “I didn’t think you would, it was back in 1946, or possibly 47 on the Brighton Beach Subway, I remember it quite clearly. We were coming out of Brooklyn near Newkirk Ave. I noticed you had a portfolio with comic pages. Before I knew it, we were talking to one another. I also vaguely remember seeing original artwork from Captain America”.

Jack replied. “Are you sure it was me?” (It should be noted that Frank was maybe 20 at the time and just beginning his comic career. Jack lived in Brooklyn just after the war. )

Frank laughed, “You’re the short one weren’t you? (Recalling the legendary team of Simon and Kirby)

“With a giant like Joe around, of course I was the short one.” Jack retorted.

After a few more clarifications that showed Jack was there at the time. He graciously changed the subject. Frank said. “Jack, you are truly an inspiration to me.”

Jack replied with modest disbelief. Frank looked surprised and said, “he doesn’t believe me! It is so true that the real greats are always so modest.”

Jack stumbled out a reply. “And look how far you’ve gone, Frank. You’re a superstar!”

Frank asked why Jack had never taken up painting. Jack said his work in penciling was too time consuming for him to diversify to other media. Mike Thibodeaux recalled. “This meeting was fate. Whatever analogies one were to attempt, it all comes down to ….Frank and Jack are the greatest.”

They moved to another room and the families joined together. Frank was humble in accepting the award, a plaque with the simple statement “A culture is only as great as its dreams…and its dreams are dreamt by artists.” The quote was from L. Ron Hubbard – writer and founder of Scientology. I think Frank accepted it for the both of them.

As the evening came to an end, they made plans to meet up again. A couple weeks later, Jack met up with Frank at a page signing of an exclusive Frazetta lithograph. Frank handed Jack a special book signed “To the great Jack Kirby from the great Frank Frazetta.” The book had a special place on the Kirby mantle.

With the growth of the comic collecting industry, and the success of the Superman and Batman movie series, comic characters had crossed over to other medias. Collector cards had become very hot, and the comic companies sought to cash in. Both DC, and Marvel began printing many series of cards featuring characters, comic covers, and pin-up style art. Kirby’s work found a new source. Independent companies made up their own card series, and several featured all-Kirby art—not only comic work but unpublished animation stills. Even Topps provided Kirby drawn cards with their comic books as tie-ins for the new series. A card set was even made featuring prominent comic book creators with Kirby’s photo and Joe Simon.

• 

• 

Plethora of cards

Another outside source was the growing trading pin market. The small pins celebrating the Olympics, and other festivals, as well as Disney creations had become a big business. Marvel, never one to miss a chance to spread their goods hired Planet Studios to make small pins of their characters. They began small with a few selections such as Captain America, Daredevil, Wolverine and others. In 1991, they accelerated their choices by making collectors set devoted just to Jack Kirby. The small set, with two Silver Surfer pins, a Captain America, Hulk, and Thor pins, plus an X-Men pin, done in cloisonné, and a chromed Surfer pin. The back featured a Silver Surfer drawing from the graphic novel with the Surfer done in bright chrome. It was packaged in a small plastic case measuring 5x7x1 inch thick complete with a small Marvel-centric bio of Jack and a signed and numbered panel signed by Jack. I assume. By that time, due to Jack’s health, Roz, or Mark Evanier or others would sign Jack’s name to souvenirs. This may have been the last time that Jack and Marvel collaborated on a product—and one of the few times Jack was rewarded for his work in other media.

• 

• 

From the author’s collection

The action figure industry—which had been producing figures since the early 1970’s really cranked up production in the 1990’s. Every single Kirby character whether DC, or Marvel was produced in multiple versions, and sizes. The likenesses were amazingly accurate and fully poseable. Even small inconsequential characters could be special ordered and created by specialists. Professional studios created busts, and full figures in ceramic, metallic, and other artistic mediums.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Don’t call them dolls – Kirby art never went to waste

In 1989 a sculptor friend proposed a mixed media presentation of Jack’s art. He would sculpt a 3D pewter likeness of one of Jack’s fine art works and sell it as a set with a large limited edition b&w seriograph. They chose Jack’s Jacob and the Angel—a one on one confrontation of a humanoid angel vs. a gruesome techno angel- – for their first case. The artist- Glenn Kolleda worked the San Diego booth with Jack, commissioning sales. After the first piece sold, a second featuring Kirby’s The Beastmaster was planned. During the castings problems arose and the pewter pieces were never finished as the money ran out. Only a few test pieces ever got out; a sad finish to a quality attempt. A friend of mine had helped Glenn at a convention and had prepaid for the Beastmaster piece. He got mad waiting and finally confronted Koledda. He left with a Beastmaster print on acetate and a two-piece firing that when put together made a 3D pewter likeness of the print. He was told it turned out impractical for the piece to be made and he ended up with the prototype.

Noted sculptor Randy Bowen produced a large bust of Jack Kirby complete with cigar, in metal and ceramic. It served as a bookmark to a similar job of Stan Lee.

• 

• 

Peter Laird had Jack draw a version of the TMNTs – DC asked for one final Superman

Craig Yoe and his wife Janet love to explore pop culture; their books represent the lunacy, the diversity and the similarities of our artistic tapestry. In 1991 they were assembling a book looking at the various ways Mickey Mouse had and has been represented by artists over the years. They commissioned a diverse group of artists to supply their unique talents to interpret the mouse. One such artist was Jack Kirby. Jack supplied two drawings, inked by Mike Thibodeaux showing Mickey as a super-hero. They were bright, imaginative and energetic showing Mickey with Kirby semi-circular muscles, forced perspective, and a colorful four-color costume. It was just a wonderful homage to Disney and Mickey. The book was called The Art of Mickey Mouse 1991, Hyperion Publications.

Back in 1991, I did a coffee table art book “The Art of Mickey Mouse.” Craig explains his part:

“I got artists from around the world to do their interpretation of “The World’s Favorite Mouse.” One of the first people I called was Jack Kirby. He and his wife Roz were very excited about the idea. He sent me two drawings, as I recall, and I chose this one. I colored it “animation style,” with the black line on an overlay and the background colors underneath.”

• 

• 

Kirby meets the mouse – Mick as the Sorcerer’s super apprentice

There is one area of contention among comic fans. The pose used for the chosen Mickey drawing is a trace of an earlier Kirby drawing with the original costume erased and the new decorative bits such as the costume and colors added later. This process shows up in several Kirby pieces of the time and even ACG, a comic book company used this method on several covers of reprint books featuring characters that Kirby never drew during his career. Some were inked by none other than Joe Sinnott. Some fans screamed at the charade. They were paying for Kirby art, which Kirby might not have ever touched. Did Kirby make the line changes that created the different costumes? This has never really been answered.

• 

• 

• 

Kirby never touched these copped from other characters – original template for Mickey

A local writer by the name of Ray Wyman, Jr. approached Jack about producing a biography. For many hours they met, talked, and shared experiences. The result, called The Art of Jack Kirby (Blue Rose 1992) is an interesting though flawed attempt at a biography. It suffers from a problem that other biographies have—they rely too much on the verbal history from the subject rather than starting from a checked and rechecked timeline. The remembrances are great but accuracy might have been better. Ray did manage to get to the Kirby soul at times and his work is indispensable. The checklists are next to hopeless as the accrued mistakes make it unreadable, but the graphics are first rate and the Kirby anecdotes are priceless. It also suffers from crass interference in that the cover is a piece of junk cobbled together by Turtle creator/ Kirby lover Kevin Eastman. This was his reward for fronting some of the money.

It should also be mentioned that since the late ‘60’s, Kirby had been working on a novel. Tentatively titled The Horde, Kirby worked and reworked the piece until he gave up out of frustration and piled on feelings of fear and apprehension. The book presents a scary premise of a mass uprising from out of the East. Kirby felt the ending was becoming too horrifyingly real and it worried him. He reached a point and couldn’t go further. Sadly, perhaps at the top of the list of never finished Kirby projects. In appreciation, the Kirby’s gave the novel to Ray for the good work he did on the biography. Ray tried to cobble it together. Professional editor Janet Berliner tried to piece the manuscript into a workable whole. She managed to get a few chapters published and Ray and his partner have attempted to finish the work. Time will tell if it ever sees print.

The late Eighties were a renaissance period for comics. Sales had picked up, the new creators made comics cool again and new companies were sprouting up like weeds. Going into the Nineties, everyone wanted part of the new growth. Topps was a card company; most famous for their baseball cards, Topps was the company that Jack had supplied some art for in 1961. They had managed to expand over the years into other genres such as Mars Attacks, Garbage Pail Kids, and even comic related card series. Len Brown was now the head of Topps. Len had a career that had touched on comics when he wrote some books for Tower Comics and Creepy Magazine. He had long thought of getting Topps into comics. Marvel had also gotten into the card business when they bought Fleer Sports Card Company in 1992. Now the shoe was reversed. Topps didn’t have to spend millions to get into the comic business, just hire a guy with connections. Len Brown hired Jim Salicrup to run the comics division. Jim had been an editor at Marvel and had overseen some of the largest selling series in comic history. They were hesitant about jumping into the superhero market, it was very crowded, and the thinking was to try to find a niche all to them. Their first offering was an adaptation of Dracula- a very classy project; then some Ray Bradbury adaptations. Some people approached Topps with some licensed Kirby material, and Jim thought to himself, Kirby was different than what the market was pushing. The heroes had become as dark and vicious as the villains. Heroes were no longer heroic. “Kirby to me was never anything like that–it was all very heroic, very noble with a lot of solid underlying moral values.”

“We all wanted to talk to Jack directly. So the Topps people flew to California and began negotiations with Jack and Roz,” Jim says while working with Jack that he began to understand how Kirby had let himself be screwed so many times in the comic biz. “There’s a part of him that’s just so sweet and trusting that in the back of my mind I was thinking, if we weren’t offering a really great deal, it almost would be too easy to take advantage of this guy- he’s so nice. In terms of the deal we struck, it was a deal he originally tried to get with DC. Go over to a publisher, sell a bunch of ideas, and then get people like Steve Ditko, Don Heck and the old Marvel gang to actually draw the material.” They settled on several series and a group of one-shots to introduce the characters. The series were The Secret City, and Satan’s Six, and the one-shots introduced Bombast, Glida, and Captain Glory – The Triad Cell. The premise is that Mankind as we know it is the latest incarnation of humanity. Mankind reaches a point every 15,000 years where its technology overtakes its reason and it destroys itself. The previous civilization perished with the floods of Noah, but not before several people had been entombed in a form of suspended animation to be reborn to teach the new humans not to continue to make the same mistakes. During an earthquake the three suspended people were awakened and find themselves in modern day Chicago. This stranger in a strange land concept had been done many times, but it offers lots of avenues for mistrust and misunderstanding to cause havoc in their lives.

• 

• 

• 

Jim Salicrup, Roy Thomas and even Steve Ditko helped out

Roy Thomas was brought in to write the series, and Ditko, Heck, and Dick Ayers along with some newer artists did the art. The Secret City Saga was a mess, many too many hands in this pie, plus another new title Victory that was supposed to wrap all of the Kirbyverse together was unfinished. This brought in Captain Victory and Silver Star to join in the fun. It was a nice tribute to Jack, but it was an abortion of a concept.

The other series, Satan’s Six had a more unique premise. It centered on six souls condemned to Hell, but try as they might, they can’t do bad. Every evil concern they try ends up doing well. And the devil won’t accept them until they do something really bad. This is a book that needed someone truly twisted like Steve Gerber to write. The characters are funny and the art was wacky but the plots were so dreary. Tony Isabella didn’t do twisted. The only saving grace was that Jack had drawn eight pages of art that was sandwiched into the initial issue.

In a mixture of sadness and happiness, Jack ran into Dashing Don Heck at a comic convention. The two old pros happily embraced and recounted old times. Don, a much remembered architect of the Marvel legend had been relegated to the trash heap of comic artists a while back, yet Jack loved and admired Don’s work. Don talked about the hard times, yet told Jack that he had received his largest royalty check ever from his work on Jack’s Secret City series. Jack was so happy, and bragged on his old friend the whole day. Jim Salicrup was amazed when Jack exuberantly thanked him for the series and for hiring his old friend. Salicrup could only mutter that it was Jack Kirby that deserved all the thanks. Writer Tony Isabella could only agree with Don, despite past glories at Marvel, his royalty check from Secret City was his largest.

According to Len Brown; “The first batch of Kirby books sold very well. The line started out like a house on fire! We billed over a million dollars, so we said “Hey this is easy stuff!” But these were the boom years with speculators buying number 1’s probably inflating sales. Sales dropped off quickly.” Jim Salicrup bemoans; The writing was on the wall for the series in very short order. The premature cancellation of Silver Star and Victory was something that lead to changes in how I would continue to be involved with the company. I became Associate Publisher and put through a plan that I never again wanted us to publish one issue of something and just cancel it. I would have sooner not have published it at all and wait for a later time.”

• 

• 

• 

Kirby provided some covers and a few pages

Unknown to many, Jack was diagnosed with throat cancer. Kirby responded well to the chemo; Steve Sherman says that Jack was the only person he ever knew who didn’t lose his hair from the chemo. But Jack was weakened.

Jack was not in the best of health, and had seriously considered not attending the 1992 Con. But with some gentle nudging by friends he relented and he and Roz attended. Unknown to Jack, his friends had arranged a big function to honor Jack and Roz’s 50th anniversary. It was the bash of the season with tickets being the most sought after item at the Con. Jack and Roz restated their wedding vows and danced to a big band orchestra. It was a glorious event with both Jack and Roz overwhelmed by the attention.

The Kirbyverse had died, but Jack never let it worry him. He was well paid for the concepts and had no hand in the actual production, so he didn’t blame himself. Just as it ended, a new project arose. Mike Thibodeaux started self-publishing with a company called Genesis West. The first comic published was called Phantom Force – a concept created by Mike and Jack during the Last of the Viking Heroes series. Jack and Mike had been pondering working together, and when they started to flesh out the characters of Phantom Force, Kirby drew some conceptual drawings. Then as Mike says “Jack got carried away drawing the first book. He was only going to do a couple pages, and he ended up drawing the whole book. That’s how he worked.”

Thibodeaux took the pages to the San Diego Comic Con to ink; he was spotted by Rob Liefeld who made a suggestion. “Let me put this through Image, and since you have the pencils….” Image was a brand new publishing company started by a select group of hot young artists who had made their mark at Marvel, mostly working on Spider-Man and X-Men titles. Rebelling against the plantation mentality of the large corporate structure, they decided to band together and start their own company where each creator would be responsible and rewarded for their own creations. It was a set-up that Kirby had championed for years.

• 

• 

• 

Rob wrote;

“I am still absolutely fanatical where Jack Kirby is concerned and when the opportunity to publish Jack’s final unpublished work came about, it was an opportunity I could not pass up.

“The opportunity came about through a meeting with Mike Thibodeaux at the 1992 San Diego convention. Mike approached me about inking a Jack Kirby illustration. I was elated! I asked Mike if he had other Jack pencils and he told me of a project called Phantom Force. He said it was the last story Jack completely penciled and that since he co-owned it with Jack that he was able to shop it around on his behalf. Mike originally intended to publish Phantom Force with his own label… but was excited at any mention of bringing it to Image.”

Image had proposed that they would turn the art over to a multitude of artists for each to provide their own take over Jack’s pencils. Unfortunately, with that many pages spread over this wide country Mike was having trouble keeping it all organized. The first advertized deadline came and passed without any product. Unfortunately, the word of mouth had been fantastic and presold orders were thru the roof. It was canceled and reordered; which is always a killer. The book never saw day until more than a year later with a cover date Dec. 1993.

With the backing of Image, and the subsequent publicity, Phantom Force was a guaranteed smash. The first solicitation reached nearly one million units, but when the project was delayed for 6 months, the resolicitation was nowhere near as good. Though not a million seller, the comic sold very well, and the various pages of Kirby pencils inked by the hottest artists in the business was a nice homage. Mike quickly followed this issue up with one by Genesis West. Jack’s vision of the series was a large series of interlocking stories built around the central characters and a few others that they had planned called Malibu Maniacs. Unfortunately Mike is not as quick an artist as Jack was and his output was inconsistent. There was some discussion about a possible cartoon based on Phantom Force but the owners of the costumed hero the Phantom raised a stink quickly stalling any such project.

Rob Liefeld’s plans were slightly different; he saw this project as a way of paying tribute to Jack’s legacy. Rob wanted to have these pages inked, sequentialed, and printed gratis to Jack. Steve Oliff, and Olyoptics would do the coloring. Just like Destroyer Duck was to help Gerber, Phantom Force #1 was to be a present to help Jack during his retirement. Rob said;

“We do it out of respect for the paths Jack blazed for us, Jack’s involvement with a comic company called Pacific Comics was absolutely integral to the eventual formation of Image comics. Through Jack’s efforts, creators’ rights were brought to the forefront of the industry. As a result, the business of comics would change with artists now receiving royalties as a part of their earnings. We could never thank Jack and the others involved in Pacific Comics enough!”

Jim Valentino another Image founder spoke more from the heart. When asked why he wanted to be a part, he said;

“Jack the man: Jack Kirby is one of the most generous and gracious men I have ever encountered. He always has time for his fans; always willing to answer the same dumb questions without agitation, always quick with an anecdote or a story. His demeanor, as well as his obvious devotion to his beloved Roz, has been as strong an inspiration to me as his artwork. My admiration for this man, both personal and profession cannot be understated. For me he is, was and forevermore shall be, a king among men.”

• 

• 

A little dark for me – Mick Gray inks over Kirby

Jack attended the 1993 San Diego Comic Con and worked the Topps booth selling the Kirbyverse books. Gene Colan, a dear friend and fellow artist stopped by to say hello. Gene recalls that Jack’s usual vigor was gone. He lacked his sense of humor and recall. Jack‘s heart was still giving him fits and he had a series of small strokes, that he seemed to bounce back from easily. But his vitality wasn’t there until… After an awards banquet there was a stir among the crowd and from the center emerged Stan Lee. It had been several years since the Comic Journal interview, but Jack and Stan had not seen each other. The crowd reacted nervously not knowing if fireworks might be going off soon. But Kirby, in his usual manner called Stan over and gave him a big hug and Stan says that Kirby told him something. “He called me over and he said… and again, I felt Jack wasn’t fully with it, you know… he said to me -sternly- “You have nothing to reproach yourself about Stan” And it was such… kind of a strange thing for him to say. I was glad to hear it, but I didn’t expect it.” It seems this was Kirby’s stilted way of saying to let the past go.

Even before he died Jack had one last chance to be recognized for his accomplishments. In late 1993, Jack made a guest appearance on the Bob show; Bob Newhart’s 3rd sitcom. The episode was called “You Can’t Win” and Newhart played a comic book artist who meets up with a plethora of Comic Book greats at a convention. Besides Jack and Roz Kirby there are a dozen other Golden Age greats. Jack had a speaking role. It was a wonderful evening for Jack to catch up with old friends, and some new ones.

In one last gesture, Marvel okayed Jack recreating some of his iconic covers for sale. Jack produced about 15 titles and these were auctioned off by Sotheby’s Auction House. Some were inked by Dick Ayers, and some by Kirby. They averaged about $6,000 dollars at auction. There has been some controversy as it has been said that Jack was incapable of drawing these, so they were ghost drawn by somebody. The only evidence I have seen seems to point to Jack doing these with possibly some help in the shading and technical areas (Comic Code Stamps, Logos, etc.)

Steve Sherman recalls that early in 1994, he stopped by the Kirby house. Jack looked down and lacking in energy. Jack leaned over to Steve and quietly said. “That’s it, I’m done.” When pressed by Steve Jack reiterated, “I’m done.” No fanfare, just a quiet resignation. No one knew Jack like Jack. It was over. Steve explained. “He was 77 years old, so it was about time.” His health was failing, his hair was now snow white—yet thick and full as ever. His new answer to the same old questions was” You can read it. It’s in the books, go read it.” Jack knew his legacy and that it was secure.

The Phantom Force series limped along with the occasional Kirby cover. But Kirby no longer had the will. Mike recalled; “I remember him one time saying he wanted to draw. He wanted to create. I think this was so ingrained in his soul. These are the things I remember him talking about, just wanting to draw again. Those last few months he wasn’t doing anything at all.” Halfway through the series, the heart of the man who always gave everything to others no longer gave to him. Jack died on Sunday Feb. 6, 1994. Roz found him crumpled on the kitchen floor and knew immediately that he was gone. She called 911, and then she called Mike Thibodeaux, and she asked him to make the phone calls. His passing wasn’t dramatic; there was no last great drawing on his board, he didn’t die with his pencil in his hand. He passed quietly and with dignity and fairly painlessly while maintaining his routine.

Stan Lee, after some confusion, attended the funeral, he warmly greeted Roz, he sat in the back and left quietly after the burial. For once there was no fanfare, no screaming fans, and no huckstering, just a sad man saying goodbye to a dear partner. After the maddening rush of well wishers, Stan visited Roz and they spent a pleasant evening talking bygone days. Some tears were shed.

Elliot Maggin, an industry pro had about the best anecdote of Jack’s funeral.

“Virtually all of the villains Jack created were Nazi analogs. He served in World War II and was horrified by the news that came out about the camps in the days following the beginning of the liberation. So the chapel at Jack’s funeral was full of comics pros and fans, and of Jack’s big family. I was one of the pros, I guess. The first speaker at the funeral was a nephew, who loved Jack dearly (it was easy to do) but who clearly was not an initiate. He was much more familiar with his uncle than with his work. This kid opened with an anecdote which he began quite apologetically saying “There’s something you’ve got to understand about Uncle Jack. The thing is he just hated Nazis, in whatever guise they appeared,” and most of the congregation hit the floor laughing. This was not a crowd who needed to be reminded that Jack Kirby hated Nazis”

After Jack died, Greg Theakston proposed a memorial. Greg took the penciled pages of Heroes and Villains, around to a who’s who of inkers and allowed each one to ink a Kirby page to their own style. The result was called The Black Magic Edition of Kirby’s Heroes and Villains. Greg explained; “Heroes and Villains became a memorial project, and I was determined to produce it on schedule. I thought the best way for people to deal with Jack’s passing would be to review his career with the drawings in this volume. Roz wanted it to go ahead, so that cinched it

It is ironic that with Jack’s passing, the industry also went into mourning. The sales surge that crested in the late Eighties-known as the speculators market- imploded and disappeared almost overnight. Marvel had a mass layoff, and dropped from 110 titles to around 50. In Dec. 1994, Marvel fired half its editorial staff, and canceled even more titles. The industry was in dire straits, and more than one editor was heard to say. “What we need now is a Jack Kirby to lift us back up.” Unfortunately there was only one of those Jack Kirby types, and he was gone. In a way though Jack did help Marvel to rebound– Hollywood finally came a calling, and with serious talent and money. A series of big films starring the X-Men, Spider-Man, Fantastic Four and the Hulk exploded on the screens and were huge blockbusters. Kirby’s visions of seeing his creations on the silver screen had come true. And with it Marvel once again prospered. The comic division was a shadow of its old self. Sales were pitiful and it seemed the comics were more important as shills for the movies then as serious entertainment for kids to read. In 2009, Marvel was bought by the Disney Corp. Kirby’s creations were big time, the Estate had to fight for a begrudging credit on the films and, at least some recognition was nice at least not in fame or fortune. It should express to all that he was, indeed, the “King”…. of his small pittance rather than proper royalties. Some things never change.

• 

• 

• 

Jack’s gravestone was unveiled, Mark Evanier looked at is somewhat unconvinced. Mark realized the problem and told his fellow mourners. “Jack’s gravestone ought to be the size of a billboard…in full-color with explosions and rockets and super-heroes all over it.” “The sign that identifies where the remains of Jack are interred should announce to all that the man thereon identified gave us all he had to give for over a half-century, dedicating his life to an industry that did not always return as good as he gave.

For several years after Jack’s death, Roz would still attend the San Diego Comic Con, where she was treated like royalty. She was veritably the King’s queen. In 1997, a huge 75th birthday party was thrown for Roz, and all her friends were there. Lisa said; “she was really shining during that time; she was so appreciative of everybody being there.” Roz never really understood that the love of Jack Kirby also meant the love of Roz Kirby.

Mark Evanier called her one day to tell her that the Fourth World books had been reprinted and published by DC, and that they were selling very well. To which Roz simply replied, “Jack always said they would.”

A few months later she caught a cold that traveled to her chest, lungs ravaged with the effects of a life with asthma. Lungs that had gasped and fought for breath could not take the extra strain. After telling Mike Thibodeaux a warm goodnite at the hospital she passed on Dec. 22, 1997. On Friday, Dec. 26, the service was held, and Roz was eulogized as the equal partner of her husband and a mother and friend without peer. It ended with Mark Evanier saying, “Today we’re all sad to lose her. But we’re glad he’s got her back.”

Two children of the gray New York ghetto, who clawed and fought their way out were buried together on a California mountain basking in the sunshine.

I have trouble when it comes to Jack Kirby’s legacy. On one hand, I look to a comic industry shrinking smaller and smaller with nothing new being generated. Most mainstream comics seem to be advertisements for movies, cartoons or other paraphernalia—endlessly rehashing old characters and plots. No one has come forward and claimed the mantle of creativity that Jack left. I see a hobby with no leader and no hope. Perhaps other technologies have come and claimed the youthful attention once spent on comics. Have comics finally reached their predicted quiet ending? Yet on the other hand I see Kirby’s ideas blossom on a larger more venerated area. Besides the earlier Fantastic Four movies, and X-Men and Hulk, we now have seen excellent Iron Man, and Thor, and Captain America movies put out by major producers, though with little mention of Jack Kirby. Have Kirby’s ideas finally reached their promised proportion?

• 

• 

• 

Reprints abound

I also see old companies filling the shelves with reprints of Kirby’s work with the estate getting a cut.

As to new comics; there might be hope. I also see where some of the great creators are getting together to produce a new Kirbyverse in comicdom. Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross of Marvels fame and others have combined for a fresh look at Kirby’s sole creations. The focus seems rightly to be placed on story over aping Jack’s style. Here’s their press release;

The team that brought you the classic “Marvels” returns with a super salute to Jack Kirby and the Kirbyverse via Dynamite Entertainment: “Kirby: Genesis.” This May, Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross — along with Jack Herbert on finished art over layouts by Ross — introduce Kirby heroes like Silver Star, Captain Victory, and others to a new generation of fans. And to make it easy for new readers to jump on, the 32-page first issue will have a $1.00 introductory price.

They seem to be of a right mind to do it justice, though I wonder if late Kirby is the ideal jumping off point. My own preference might be a new look at Boy’s Ranch. I am fond of the special offering price; best of luck to all of them. My one scary aspect is that Alex Ross seems to be channeling Neal Adams, not Jack Kirby for the artwork. They do have a sense of humor. Look at the inset on the black and white satellite drawing and note the Kirby drawn Jupiter plaque attached. There have been reboots of Captain Victory and others that led to nothing, but it’s hard not to trust the talent involved on this project.

• 

• 

• 

Lisa Kirby’s lamented attempt at a Kirbyverse – Alex Ross’ Marvels

• 

• 

Alex Ross – Jack Herbert

• 

• 

• 

Proposed artwork

Looking further at new comics, I do see that Mike Thibodeaux is still mining old Kirby drawings with this up and comer along with longtime partner Richard Fench.

• 

• 

• 

New Kirby – old Kirby in Phantom Force – Ongoing Kirby fanbook

Of course there’s a story. Michael and David first created the concept of The Potential in 1983. At this time, Michael was inking Jack Kirby’s pencils for the Captain Victory comic book series.  While working in Kirby’s studio one day, Michael showed Kirby the cover he had penciled for the first issue of The Potential.  With his typical enthusiasm, Jack not only critiqued the pencils, but quickly sketched out his own version of the cover for the first issue!

Strangely enough even Ruby-Spears in conjunction with Sid and Marty Kroft are searching out ways for Kirby’s old presentation pieces be fulfilled and reach the screen. “I love comic books, but this is a treasure,” said Ariel Z. Emanuel, the co-chief executive of the William Morris Endeavor Entertainment agency, who is representing these Kirby works for Ruby-Spears and the Kroffts. “It’s like a boat sunk at the bottom of the ocean, and all of a sudden you’ve uncovered it.” During his time with Ruby-Spears, Mr. Kirby was employed under a work-for-hire agreement, which means that his work is the property of the studio, lawyers for the partnership said. Marc Toberoff, a copyright lawyer representing the Kirbys in their suit against Marvel and Disney, said that he reviewed Mr. Kirby’s agreement with Ruby-Spears and that he believed any art produced under it was work for hire. This affords Ruby-Spears and the Kroffts a wide berth to turn their Kirby properties into movies, television shows, comics, videos games and more — all of which they intend to pursue.

I would be remiss not to mention that Kirby, and only Kirby has a fannish magazine that has been published non-stop for over 15 years. The Jack Kirby Collector, with over 50 issues, may be the only type of its kind focused only on one artist exclusively. There are also several e-site letter blogs built around Jack Kirby, so though we may be a small community—we are noisy!

• 

• 

• 

Several of Twomorrows’ Kirby books

Though I am pessimistic about Kirby’s comic legacy, I do see where other aspects of Kirby have taken root and entered our psyche, or at least a segment of pop psychology.

Percussionist Gregg Bendian was so moved by Jack Kirby that he produced a tribute to Jack Kirby.

• 

• 

JazzTimes: How did you translate Kirby’s sis-boom-bah images into notation/notes?

There was some literal translation into sound. The album starts with the sonic equivalent of a Kirby energy blast, replete with the vibes and guitar issuing forth crackling sparks, flying off in every direction. The drama, the very large dramatic scope of events, the violent confrontations, the otherworldly-ness, all inspired my writing of this music. The idea of having each piece cover a different approach to jazz composition was inspired by Jack’s incredibly varied output as an artist. Ultimately, I tried to capture that exciting feeling from childhood where I’d pick up a comic book and become completely ensconced in another world of the imagination.

JazzTimes: Your compositions seem to focus on the spacier aspects of Kirby’s work, the psychedelic sci-fi he was so renown for.

I don’t think we focused on the spacey in particular. [Our song] “New Gods” gets very violent during the battle section. So does “The Mother Box.” Then there’s the rattling metal of the prepared vibes and the steel guitar on ”Air Above Zenn-La.” I went for a large scale of emotions and textures ranging from the small to the gigantic. That’s another nod to the breadth of Kirby’s creative power.

I’ve always felt that Interzone [guitarist Nels Cline, drummer Alex Cline, bassist Joel Hamilton] was a bit like my own little Fantastic Four, each contributing a distinct musical identity and using our powers for the benefit of all creative music listeners!

JazzTimes: Was Kirby a jazz fan? He was certainly as prolific as some jazz artists!

I was unable to find out about his musical tastes apart from knowing that he and his wife went to hear Sinatra on one of their first dates. [Comic artist Jim] Steranko tells me that Jack often worked with the TV on in the background and not music.

Like jazz, comics are a uniquely American art form. And I do think of Kirby as a “jazz artist.” He was an energetic, passionate man—certainly no cold, calculating draftsman. As Mark Evanier, his assistant, tells in his liner notes, Jack would sit down at the page with a theme in mind and a pencil in hand, and allow his imagination to run wild. Often the results would surprise even him. Kind of reminds me of Coltrane saying he couldn’t play a transcription of his solos after the fact, because “they’re too hard.”

JazzTimes: Is Kirby the Charlie Parker of comics? His co-creation/refinement of sequential art seems on par with Parker’s co-creation/refinement of bebop.

I think of Kirby as a Coltrane figure. Like Trane, he was a virtuoso and so prolific. Like Trane, his early work defined the parameters of what that form would become for all that followed. Sadly, also like Trane, his later, most personal and abstract work—Jack’s Mister Miracle or Trane’s Interstellar Space—is considered by many to be self- indulgent and lacking coherence. But I don’t think the artist/visionary can help but move into more and more challenging areas, and so I say wrong in both cases.

He invented the graphic novel. Check out the films of Spielberg, Lucas, Ridley Scott and you’ll see Kirbyesque cities, spacecraft, aliens and villains. He was a wellspring of creative ideas, a visionary of sci-fi concepts. He is famous for being able to draw an intricately detailed page as fast as Bird could play an equally detailed solo.

JazzTimes: Do you see parallels between jazz fans and comic book fans—the zealotry, the passion, however misplaced it may be at times?

Yes, and a wonderful result of doing this record is hearing from Interzone fans that say, “I’m a huge comic fan and a jazz fan, and thanks for combining the two worlds!” That’s very gratifying, since I had this feeling I wasn’t alone in sensing the connection between the two. I recently received a note from Sonny Rollins, who heard the Requiem and said he’s pleasantly surprised by all the jazz people who are also Kirby fans!

Hey, with the Michael Chabon book winning the Pulitzer, this stuff is becoming damned near respectable!

There is a small sub-culture of UFOologist who seek to make Jack Kirby an almost god by cherry-picking his stories and granting him prescience.

By Christopher Knowles;

“As uncomfortable as it is for some of his fans and friends to admit, Jack Kirby was a true believer in AAT (Ancient Astronaut Theory) and intervention theory. The scope of his comics work from the early 70s to his retirement is in this regard – the man was obsessed with gods from space.

So why is this important? Why do the beliefs of some old cartoonist who’s been dead for 15 years matter now? Well, Kirby is one of the primary architects of popular culture today. Kirby’s influence on comics is inarguable- as it is on superhero culture in general.

But so is his influence on Hollywood. James Cameron, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas (particularly), Frank Miller, Quentin Tarantino and any other sci-fi mogul you can name today fed at Kirby’s rich trough as kids. In fact, the quick cut/high intensity of action movies today comes directly from Kirby’s Marvel work like The Fantastic Four. I see Kirby’s influence all over video game design as well. You simply have to go back and look at pop culture before the Marvel Age and after, and the centrality of Kirby’s imagination in the recreation of visual storytelling becomes clear as crystal.

And if Kirby is part of the essential DNA of pop culture, so then are his beliefs. You need look no further than Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull to see it- the entire tableau was simply a big budget replay of the first issue of The Eternals.
Remember- Spielberg and Lucas are the two of the most powerful men in Hollywood today, certainly from a creative standpoint. Even beyond the films they make themselves they have their fingers in countless pies through their production and technical interests.

More importantly, we have very strange indications of Jack Kirby’s precognitive/psychic abilities, specifically in regards to events central to the Synchromystic worldview.

For instance:
• Depicting a Face on Mars 17 years before the Viking photos.
• Depicting a 2001 “Stargate” scenario 10 years before the film.
• Depicting a Saddam Hussein/Gulf Wars scenario in 1975
• Depicting 9/11 scenarios 17 years before the fact.
• Depicting SETI and proffering a man/alien union years before Carl Sagan.
• Kirby’s part in the CIA rescue of the American hostages.

Given these synchronicities, I believe it’s important to take his AAT obsession in so far as explicit depictions of AAT, but nearly all of Kirby’s work from 1975 on dealt with aliens, UFOs, interdimensional travel, time travel, genetic engineering and space colonization and on and on. But it’s very seriously. We’ve looked at The Eternals, Devil Dinosaur, and 2001: A Space Odyssey

Kirby’s 1980 Bible portfolio that we’ll be looking at today, which is 1000% Astro-Gnostic at its core.

The first plate depicts God in the standard Sistine Chapel mode, an old, bearded white guy emerging from primordial chaos, accompanied by a heavenly host. So far, so good right? But this celestial being is remote, celestial- more like the Monad of Gnostic mythology than the engaged creator of Judeo-Christian dogma.

What we see emanating from the chaos with him resemble the Aeons. They come from the same source, but are in fact on their own trajectory, away from the Monad

Here the Monad sees Earth and humanity as a ball of sin; lust, greed, hate and other expressions of the Ego, which are separate from Monad. It is a fallen state, the cosmic abortion…

Which the Monad then turns his back on humanity to contemplate non-Euclidean geometry- the other-dimensional interests of cosmic divinity. Mankind then begs of the Monad. But who takes his place in the stewardship of our tiny, insignificant planet?

Well, that’s a no-brainer. Here Kirby reimagines Joshua’s genocidal attack on Jericho as the vanguard of an alien assault employing sonic weaponry.

Are these Biblical androids the result of Kirby’s vast and fertile imagination, or is there some basis for these concepts in the ancient literature?

AAT scholar Jason Martell notes that the Anunaki of Sumerian lore had a servant class called the Igigi, whom he believes could actually be the Greys of UFO lore. These creatures have been described as a kind of wetware, biologically-engineered androids: Some have also called the Agigi the Watchers, much like Kirby’s Watchers.

Martell: “Today’s modern UFO’s and Alien Contacts being reported have a strong similarity to the Ancient descriptions of the “anunnaki” Android Beings. When we look at the descriptions of our modern “grey alien”, we can clearly see that they do not look like us, or the anunnaki. Rather, they look like the ancient humanoid depictions of Figurines. The majority of Abduction cases usually have a similar story to them in that the Aliens abducting them will perform medical examination and sometimes experiments having to do with human reproduction.

Is it possible that the Greys were created by the anunnaki as “Watchers” to oversee their experiments here on earth. Jewish religion also had a class of Watchers.”

This makes a lot of sense. Maybe the Greys are not from somewhere else- they were left here to keep an eye on the Project when the Anunaki were called back home. This would explain why these types of beings are in the world’s folklore and mythology.

Maybe we’re not projecting a technological viewpoint on elves and fairies and leprechauns after all. Maybe the folklore is the filter on a reality we had no framework for before we had technology (or maybe the Greys like to play dress-up and mess with people’s heads)

Again, I realize that’s not a very fashionable notion these days, but it’s one that makes sense to me. And of course, all of this remains in the realm of speculation, but what a boring world this would be without that.

It’s impossible with the last paragraph to be sure if Mr. Knowles was actually pulling our leg or not, but Kenn Thomas, a publisher and essayist on all paranormal things, talks about Kirby’s prescience quite often in his speeches.

• 

• 

Christopher Knowles expounds on Kirby and many more topics – he also expounds on music

From Neatorama:

• 

• 

From a Harvey anthology title in 1957 – My pal Kenn who assisted me

“The above is a great example of collision between pop culture and conspiracy theories. An upcoming talk by Kenn Thomas, one of the more level-headed conspiracy theorists, looks at the links between a story written by comic book legend Jack Kirby, for the comic Race for the Moon, (above) and The Face on Mars – the story coming decades before the feature was discovered.(LOL—Kenn being called level-headed- sorry editor)

“When Steamshovel Press editor Kenn Thomas speaks on “JFK to UFO” at RetroCon, his prefatory remarks will concern “Jack Kirby, Conspiracy Theorist”. Thomas looks at the famous comic book artist’s interest in parapolitics as well as the possibilities that Kirby had back channel sources within the world of covert intelligence. Richard Hoagland speculated that the secret space program gave Kirby information leading to the artist’s 1958 comic book story, “The Face On Mars”–an anomaly that did not become part of the conspiracy lexicon until the Viking probe’s Cydonia photographs of 1976.

Thomas examines the history of this as well as Kirby’s prescient forecasts of American involvement in World War II and Vietnam; the use of conspiracy themes in his 1970s comics; and his documented involvement with a CIA rescue operation during the 1980 Iranian crisis.

How does central intelligence shape our view of conspiracies in the popular culture? “

Does this mean the CIA knows we are about to be visited by 2,000 feet tall alien Gods? Or Devil Dinosaurs?

Kirby’s Face on Mars story seems to have been the basis for the movie Mission to Mars with Gary Sinise and Don Cheadle et al in 2000. Movies like The Matrix, and He-Man also seem to be searching for that Kirby panache.

You know you have reached a level of celebrity when there have been tabloid stories of children channeling the life-force and artistic talent of the dead artist. The Weekly World News dated Apr. 16, 1996 reported “Ghost of Dead Comic Book Artist Teaching Me How to Draw” He has reached legend. Could saint-hood or canonization be far removed?

Perhaps a sure sign of continuing legacy is when one of your creation, characters or concepts is applied to a new project to give it a sense of magnitude and gravitas. Joshua Glenn is a writer, philosopher, and conceptualist who calls himself a “semiotician”. He writes an ongoing column for the Boston Globe newspaper in their Ideas section. One of his fascinations has been an attempt to reperiodize the 20th Century into a cohesive set of generations to show the changes of thought and passions. His most recent suggestions as published and distributed throughout the internet:

1884-93: The New Kids
1894-1903: Hardboiled Generation
1904-13: Partisans
1914-23: The New Gods
1924-33: Postmodernist Generation
1934-43: Anti-Anti-Utopian Generation
1944-53: Baby Boomers
1954-63: OGX (Original Generation X)
1964-73: PC Generation
1974-83: Net Generation
1984-93: Millennials
1994-2003: TBA

Note number 4, (1914-23) It is no coincidence that Glenn named it after Jack’s greatest creation. Many have adopted Tom Brokaw’s title “The Greatest Generation” when talking about this group, but Glenn thinks they deserve better.

“Throughout their lives, they have been America’s confident and rational problem-solvers: victorious soldiers and Rosie the Riveters; Nobel laureates; makers of Minuteman missiles, interstate highways, Apollo rockets, battleships and miracle vaccines; the creator’s of Disney’s Tommorowland; “men’s men” who have known how to get things done…World War II provided them with a coming-of-age slingshot, a catharsis more heroic and empowering than any since the American Revolution…No other generation this century has felt (or been) so Promethean, so godlike in its collective, world-bending power.”

It is no coincidence that the atomic bomb, and the polio vaccine came from the same generation. As did Ted Williams and William Burroughs.

Glenn explains;

“Is it any wonder that I find “Greatest” an insufficient superlative for this generation of Americans? By all accounts, they’re not mere mortals; they’re homo superior. That is to say — they’re superheroes! On the surface they may have looked square, in their gray flannel suits, fedoras, and horn-rimmed glasses. But really they were heroic, empowered, godlike. They seem to have operated in two registers — the everyday and the mythical — simultaneously.”

“This generation produced only one president, but it was John F. Kennedy, who brought the “best and the brightest” into the White House, faced down the Soviet Union, and put a man on the moon. Astronauts Alan Shepard and John Glenn are members of this generation; so is faster-than-sound test pilot Chuck Yeager.”

“The 1914-23 generation came of age during the Depression, during which time they were kept busy by the Civilian Conservation Corps “getting things done, building things that worked, things that have lasted to this day,” as it’s been admiringly put. (Members of the older Partisan cohort, meanwhile, engaged in sit-down strikes in assembly-line industries, and questioned the inevitability of capitalism.) As adults, the 1914-23 generation fought World War II; note that a handful of Americans born in 1924, like George H.W. Bush, saw action in the war, and are honorary members of this generation. After the war, they saved American industry, tamed the business cycle, built the suburbs and moved into them. “

It was also this generation that brought forth the super-hero comic—which offered up a new vision of man, one which offered justice, truth and a vision of mankind never imagined before. It’s contribution to the arts was uplifting and grand in its vision.

“Beginning in 1938 with the debut of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster’s Superman in DC’s “Action Comics” no. 1, and continuing through the Forties, superheroes as we know them today were invented and refined, and the comic book made its debut as a mainstream art form. Americans born between 1914 and 1923 — including comics editors, writers, and artists like Joe Simon, Bob Kane and Bill Finger, Will Eisner, Bill Everett, Carl Burgos, and Sheldon Mayer and Jack Kirby — gave us the original incarnations of Superman and Batman, Captain America, Plastic Man, The Spirit, etc.” Stan Lee and Jack “King” Kirby would later give us the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, Thor, the Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, the Silver Surfer, Doctor Doom, Galactus, The Watcher, Magneto, the Inhumans, and many more iconic characters. “

“In Kirby’s honor, I’ve named his entire generation after “The New Gods,” a short-lived comic book series that he created for DC in 1971. Kirby’s New Gods are a race who lives outside of normal time and space in a dimension called the Fourth World. Although they resemble homo sapiens, they are stronger, faster, and smarter. They possess superior technology; they are immortal. They are, in short, the greatest.

For good, or bad it was this generation that pushed the envelope in philosophy, politics, music, the arts, and sports that define the 20th Century and Glenn concludes that it was a Kirby creation that best spotlights it.

I find the designation comforting, but when I peruse Glenn’s long list of New Goder’s, another pattern emerges. It is one I had noted before, rather than New Gods, I think it might be more accurate to call it the Second Gens in recognition of just how many of the great people were second generation of the immigrants and slaves that arrived at the turn of the century; a second wave of yearning and wandering outcasts. Jews, Poles, Italians, Irish, blacks and others suddenly became the backbone of this generation, and their love of country became a personal love affair. Using the drive instilled by their hard-working immigrant parents, and the constant demand to better oneself they broke free of the ghetto tyranny and expanded outward touching all sectors of the country. Using the memory of their own persecution due to race, and creed, they pushed this country to do the right thing and brought the irrevocable demand of justice and history in securing civil rights for all. The arts and humanities are dominated by this new generation fired by the hard times of their childhood, yet comfortable as Americans first. Jack recognized how much he owed to the struggles in the Lower East Side, and just how much his parents wanted him to do better. He used that traumatic childhood to feed his desire to get out, yet never forgot the steel it melded to his backbone; the same for Joe Simon, and Siegel and Schuster, and Will Eisner, and a whole crop of writers, and actors and athletes using their chosen professions as stepping stones out of the morass. This pattern has a ying to its yang, as others failed to make the leap such as Julius Rosenberg, and Richard Nixon – men who just couldn’t let their childhood turmoil behind and build a better land.

Whenever I get down on this subject and struggle to find its core, I am reminded, and drawn full circle back to Sholom Aleichem. Though he died in 1916, his memory and legacy would see full exposure 48 years after his death when Fiddler On The Roof exploded on Broadway introducing Sholom’s soulful tales to a new audience, and making his heirs proud and rich. For Kirby’s heirs, when in their darkest hours they stumble and fail, I hope they keep the words of Sholom Alichem’s granddaughter close to them.

“I am the only living person who remembers him. I remember his laugh, the warmth of his hand, a few scenes from my childhood. He taught me to speak in rhymes, he invented funny stories and silly games, and I adored him. Above all, he taught me to laugh instead of crying.”

Of Jack Kirby, I can say I saw this man and remember his warmth, and his laugh and his elegance and spirit. And he left me feeling better about life than before I met him.

So I think Kirby’s legacy is secure….. as long as people like Mark Evanier, Greg Theakston, Kurt Busiek, or myself and others continue to tell his story, and a new generation thrills to Silver Star, The FF, Captain America, and the Fourth World, his stories live, and breathe, and the flame is passed. In time, a new media will adopt his words and entertain once again.

So hope is not lost. Jack may yet be transformed into a larger consciousness, one that teaches us Kirby’s lasting message.

“Create your own story, that’s the Kirby way.”

Previous – 25. Animated | Top

Previous – 24. Once More Into The Breach | Contents | Next – 26. The Animated Artist

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

ANIMATED

No one realized that Jack was having vision problems, and these problems sometimes skewed his perspective. His natural instincts corrected some of these problems and his inkers fixed what they could, but it was obvious that Kirby was slipping. His mind was as full of ideas as ever, but his ability to render the amazing was no longer strongly in his grasp. His problems with plot continuity continued as he raced from one amazing context to another. The many years of staring at an art board was taking its toll, not just physically, but mentally as well. Kirby didn’t have the strength to fight the system anymore. In a memorable dinner at a local dive, Jack talked to Mark Evanier of his future, bemoaning the fact that his contract was soon up and he couldn’t bear the thought of another tenure doing comics for a big impersonal comic house. Yet he had no alternatives. Then for perhaps the first time, instead of Kirby making his fortune, fortune found him.

• 

• 

Kirby did the thumbnails

In 1978, Marvel had leased to an animation company the rights to produce an animated Fantastic Four series. Someone suggested that since Jack Kirby was now living in California; why not get the original source to provide storyboards. A quick phone call from Hanna-Barbera Studios and Kirby was back where he had begun, working for an animation studio. Kirby and Marvel agreed that his working on the FF series would count toward the pages required of his contract so they had no problem, plus it took him away from the nitwits in the office who were jealous of him.

Suddenly Jack was out from under the yoke of deadlines and assembly line comic creation. Due to behind the scenes fighting, the project ended up over at the DePatie- Freleng studios and Stan Lee, who had recently moved to California to oversee Marvel’s cinematic properties, was brought in to help produce the toons while Kirby oversaw the art direction. Jim Shooter was upgraded to Stan’s publisher position. Under a strange agreement, the character of the Human Torch had been licensed to a different film

company, so the Torch was replaced in the cartoon by an irascible robot named Herbie. Some have speculated that it was a nod to Star Wars because of some similarities to R2-D2, others say that standards and practices rejected the Torch after a child had been burned while imitating the earlier cartoon. Neither seems to be true. The loss of the Torch really weakened some of the stories, especially in the visuals where the Torches flame was so visually exciting.

In FOOM #22 Marvel advertised the new show as if the impossible had been done, just their regular over the top huckstering. Complete with photos of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby and production drawings of Herbie the robot. (first called ZZ123)

“They said it couldn’t be done!

They said we couldn’t reunite the titanic talents of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby!

When we did that on the sensational all-new all-great Silver Surfer book from Simon and Schuster, they said we couldn’t come back to sweep Saturday morning TV with an animated Marvel feature series!

They were wrong!

Because Mighty Marvel is-as ever- on the move, and we’re making our push to become Masters of the Media! Yes, it’s true! In case you haven’t heard, faithful FOOMer, the Marvel Comics Group has just recently joined in pandemonious partnership with DePatie-Freleng, an awesome animation studio responsible for many of your favorite cartoon features.

The result is The New Fantastic Four Show, with rock ‘em-sock ‘em storyboards by King Kirby and slambang scripts by Stan the Man and others…”

The strip lasted just one season. Featuring 13 episodes of mostly dumb-downed, barely animated retellings of Fantastic Four comics.

• 

• 

• 

• 

To round out his soon to end contract, the last Kirby item was a series built around a big red dinosaur and the scruffy little kid who controlled it. Stan Lee heard that DC was pushing a Kamandi cartoon to CBS. Stan approached Jack about a similar child’s title that he might be able to pitch to animators. Devil Dinosaur was Kirby trying to regain the kiddie market–much like Kamandi had been an antidote to Kirby’s super-serious New Gods trilogy. Though childish in nature, Jack nevertheless delved into his vast cache of scientific knowledge. Jack explained; “One guy published a theory that we are descended from killer baboons.”

Jack was referring to what is called the Killer Ape theory as espoused by Dr. Raymond Dart, a noted anthropologist who proposed that man was evolved from bands of killer apes and that the aggressive behavior of man came from that natural need to kill for food. As layed out in his thesis in 1953, Dart’s ideas were met with disbelief and much curiosity. It became fodder for sci-fi writers and film makers. Books and movies such as Planet of the Apes, and the opening of 2001-A Space Odyssey borrowed heavily from Dart’s theories. Kirby had had a man vs. red dinosaur as early as 1961. Kirby had used pieces in books like 2001, Eternals, and Kamandi. “I believe that,…Forty years ago we just got through shoving people into ovens—on a very flimsy reason.” Kirby continued; “Man has a drive for domination” and Kirby extracted this and imbued it to his aliens. “The dinosaur was on Earth for 750 million years. Do you mean to tell me that it didn’t have the intelligence of …a dog? When I did Devil Dinosaur, I did a thinking dinosaur. My belief is that dinosaurs were intelligent. I mean, if we acquired the intelligence we have, say in a short period of about 4 million years, what might the dinosaur have accomplished in 750 million years?

The book was scoffed at by the older kids, but it was a great thrill ride for the kids. It was a cartoon in book form. Though never picked up by animation studios this series has become a cult classic, pure kitsch. Jack quit.

• 

• 

• 

• 

It was what it was

The finality of his decision hit Jack hard. Jack told Steve Sherman,” Fine, I’m done!
I get a pension, I get health benefits, I get treated like a human being.” “That’s it with comics. OK I’m done.” Mostly trying to convince himself. A lifetime of putting pencil to paper ended with a suddenness unimagined, but not unwelcome. With the end of his contract in mid-1979, his time at Marvel was through. He would now devote the rest of his career on animation presentations; with a detour or two along the way. But the tenure didn’t end on a happy note. The Fantastic Four cartoon series only lasted one year, but Stan Lee immediately followed this up with perhaps the ugliest, least inspired cartoon project ever.

Marvel leased the character of the Thing to another Hanna-Barbera animation project titled Fred and Barney Meet the Thing. Though the Stone Age duo never shared an episode with the Stone hero the concept is widely considered one of the worst cartoon shows ever created. Jack was unhappy as the habit of Marvel projects not crediting him with the creation of characters continued. Worse still is the abomination heaped on Kirby’s iconic character. Instead of the grumpy, anti-hero forever doomed to live in a rock-like exterior, the character is now a normal teenaged boy named Benjy Grimm who becomes a rocky super-hero when he touches two rings together and shouts “Thing rings-do your thing”.

• 

• 

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeewww! – Jack in 1971

Jack’s anger over Marvel’s refusal to list him as co-creator in such books as Origins of Marvel Comics and Sons of Origins plus credit for the Hulk and the Thing cartoon concretized into total disdain for Marvel’s practices. When asked if they could use his face on a proposed cover, Jack refused. In response to the growing disrespect, Jack made an agreement with Marvel to never use his likeness as a means of selling a book. If they wouldn’t credit him, he wouldn’t help them sell product.

Another new portfolio of Jack Kirby’s artwork hit the stands when Privateer Press released The Jack Kirby Masterworks. With another short bio of Kirby by Mark Evanier, and dozens of large unpublished pages, rejected Marvelmania pages, and production pages done with loving care and a quality cover presentation showing a Kirby drawn Fighting American inked by Walt Simonson. It offered a great sweep of Kirby’s career. It also featured the first publishing of Kirby’s proposed Soul Love strip. It’s a wonderful adjunct to Jack Kirby Unleashed.

• 

• 

• 

Original pencils from Jack Kirby Masterworks (1979) colored and reversed for Invasion #1 (1997 ACG)

In 1979, Disney Productions released a live action film called The Black Hole. It was Disney’s entry into the new burgeoning sci-fi genre started by Star Wars. It was common for Disney to also produce a Sunday newspaper strip of their current movie that ran under the title of Treasury of Classics. Mike Royer was working for Disney at the time and recommended Kirby for the job of producing the strip. Jack wasn’t busy so, after some negotiations, Kirby agreed. His job was to adapt the movie into cartoon format, over a certain period of time. It was most important for copyright and trademarks that the characters and concepts match up to those presented in the movie. Mike Royer was given the job to ink and maintain model consistency on Kirby’s pages. The movie was not a hit, but Kirby’s rendition is very true, plus more dynamic than the movie because of Jack’s bombastic style, and special effects techniques. What the movie and the strip adaptation lacked was a real climactic ending. When the spaceship tore through the Black Hole, there were no visuals depicting what the journey was like; nothing as memorable as the mind blowing visuals of 2001’s final star journey. It was a nice gig, and it allowed Kirby to keep his storytelling muscles toned. The strip ran for 26 installments-six months- Sept. 1979 to Feb. 1980, and was reprinted several times. Disney paid well for the strip.

True to the source but anti-climactic

An entrepreneur approached about starting up a new comic’s line called Kirby Comics. Jack as usual threw his all in and produced a Graphic Novel-like presentation named Captain Victory. Like many times before the economic end fell through before actual publication.

Jack worked for DePatie –Freleng about a year when he got a call from Ruby-Spears, another animation house. Steve Gerber, a former writer at Marvel had pitched an idea for a cartoon called Thundarr the Barbarian, a mix of Conan, and Planet of the Apes. Mark Evanier recalls; “ABC was on the fence about buying the show.” Joe Ruby said we had to get more artwork done and Toth (Alex Toth) who designed the main character was not available.

I recall saying, “Let’s get Jack Kirby.” So Jack did a bunch of big pieces of artwork, most of which were inked by Alfredo Alcala and that closed the sale with ABC.”

Jack and Alex Toth (rhymes with both) were friends and admirers whose approach to art and storytelling were 180 degrees apart—total opposites. Alex was born in New York 10 years after Jack and spent his early years bouncing between DC and some of the smaller companies; he had moved to California and found most of his work at Dell Comics and Charlton. He also worked for animators providing production designs and character creations with Space Ghost his most notable creation. To call him curmudgeonly is being nice to curmudgeons. Yet they were good friends and admirers who just couldn’t quite grasp the others genius. Once Alex went to a barbecue over at Jack’s house and spent the day talking with Kirby. When he left he told a companion that he didn’t know why he went, he and Jack have nothing in common. They would talk for hours at cross-purposes yet reach in many ways the same goal. Toth was cutting and gruff, while Kirby was a teddy bear of a man. Toth was minimalistic while Kirby became more detail obsessive with time. Toth was meticulous and technical, while Jack was spontaneous and free-wheeling. Toth was opinionated and hard to work with while Kirby was always polite and easy going and malleable with others.

Flush from the sale of the series, there was talk of a Thundarr newspaper strip and Jack produced several weeks’ worth of continuity samples. It never came to fruition.

Joe Ruby described the genesis of the strip. “So I pitched the idea to ABC’s Marilyn Olin and Judy Price at the Beverly Hills Hotel from a list of about 15 ideas I had. Thundarr was pitched two ways- one a post-nuclear world, or a world destroyed by a natural disaster from space. We all agreed the first way wouldn’t be so good for kids. Well, after getting the development deal, I went about finding a development team of artists and a writer to work with me on the bible of the yet unnamed series. Alex Toth designed the three main characters (Jack Kirby later designed all the other characters after the series was sold) and Dave High designed the world they lived in, I considered two writers, and decided on Steve Gerber, who had done some scripts for us the year before.”

Joe Ruby always said that he envisioned this cartoon differently from the rest. He wanted a hard edge feel, full of dynamics, action, and drama rather than soft cuddly feel good graphics. They went back to an earlier animation technique. The army of horses and reptiles and rodents were rotographed using men on horsebacks to get the flow and motion of real movement. This technique started at Kirby’s earlier employer Fleischer Studio.

• 

• 

Gemini he of the two heads – Wonder if Kirby got royalties on the figurines

“I wanted to show things and be dynamic. I believe it was John Dorman who told me about a guy named Jack Kirby, who I hadn’t heard of, I’m ashamed to say. I was familiar with all his characters from eight years old, but I never knew Jack.” He came over; he was a giant of a man when I realized the characters he had created. But then I saw him, and he was an unassuming, very friendly, very cordial man. To me he almost seemed humble, and I thought, “Holy Cow, this is the man that did all those wonderful characters?” But anyway, I said “Okay, you’re hired.” “Jack wasn’t just an artist, he was a creator. He created very distinctive characters, people or creatures, whatever they were. He created with a story in mind. He would put story behind his creations. He had a philosophical view. Where are these characters coming from? that all came out on the paper. Jack had it. He had it all. And prolific! You’d ask for 2 or 3 pages, you’d get a stack. We put him under contract for six years.”

Ken Spears, the production end of the studio recalls, “Deep into this I start looking at the budgets and the costs, and I’m seeing this guy where all this money is going. So I go to Joe and I say. ”Who is this guy Jack Kirby, and why is he costing us so much?” He goes, “Well, he’s a great artist and he does all this stuff and he was a great Marvel artist.” “And blah, blah, blah.” So I go, “Okay great, how many weeks is he going to be working for us?” And Joe says, “I’ve got him under contract.” And I go, “Holy….are we going to be able to afford this?” “Oh don’t worry; he’s great he’s great.” And I’m thinking, how great could he be?” “But Jack was terrific; a wonderful guy and all I’ve got to say is, he gave me an opportunity to get a much lower price on our storage fees, because of the volume of work that this guy put out. It was absolutely incredible.”

Jack Kirby worked under a gentleman named John Dorman, the head of development for Ruby-Spears. It was John who recommended such people as Kirby and Gil Kane, and Jim Woodring. They were so close that they were named Dorman’s Los Angeles Bastards. Stories of John’s biting humor and caring nature abound. In addition to being a prolific and experienced creative talent, John Dorman was a near-mythic character with an epic sense of the absurd. He sprinkled his conversations with anecdotes of Jimi Hendrix, and sat spellbound sharing war stories with Jack Kirby. He was much more than a storyboard artist or art director, as anyone who worked for him in the early to mid 1980’s can attest. He was especially adept at helping gifted people (even a few legends) once their industry had hung them out to dry. In 1983 he paid a talented young storyboard apprentice named Dan Riba two hundred bucks over weekly union scale just because he knew that beginning wage was not enough to live on. Dorman was notorious in the industry for his sarcastic behavior as well as work habits and with his crew was oftentimes referred to simply as the “bastard”.

After John Dorman sadly passed, Dan Riba recalled. “The important thing is that John made me feel special, when I was feeling like a failure. He gave me the confidence to continue and learn. The main lesson I learned from John, was to treat artists with compassion. From giants like Jack Kirby, Doug Wildey and Gil Kane, to a beginner like me. We were all part of a creative fraternity different from the rest of the world. I believe that I’m a better supervisor, because of him. I will never forget the kindness that he has shown me.”

Kenny Thompkins (computer animator) added in. “I was also a part of the bastard crew. I came on after Thom Enriguez left. I shared a space with Ted Blackdude ( Blackman), that’s what I called him. One morning I heard screaming and cursing coming out of John’s office, so I’d ask Ted who John was cursing out, because it lasted about 20 minutes, with a phone slam to punctuate the conversation. I was new there, so I was kinda fearing for my job. Ted would just turn around calmly and say, “Oh, he’s just talking to the boss.” I thought if he talks to the boss like that, I hope I stay on his good side…. We all are a little crazy, that’s what this industry does to us. John just let a little leak out. We love you John, now you can go rock on with Jimi and go tell war stories with Jack. He was something!”

Buzz remembers an incident where the gruff storyboarder had the last word thanks to Jack Kirby. “While working on the animated Moses film, Prince of Egypt, John was assigned the task of storyboarding the parting of the Red Sea. The Exec in charge had some strong ideas how the story should be told, or rather, re-told. Specifically, to make it more “female friendly”, the Exec ordered the scene written with Moses’ wife breaking his staff across her knee & telling him to have faith in himself if he wanted to part the sea.

John was not a very spiritual, much less religious man, but he knew enough about the Bible to know camel dung when he smelled it. Still, a job was a job & John needed the money, so he storyboarded the scene as written…but he also “plussed” it a bit.

John turned the storyboard in and the Exec smiled at how well John had interpreted the Exec’s ideas, then noticed something and frowned. “This is all wonderful work,” the Exec said to John, “but who’s this figure here? the one in the cape with the horned helmet and a big hammer?”

“Oh, that’s Thor,” John said. “I figured since you were fucking around with the Bible I might as well throw him in.”

The Thundarr experience wasn’t totally happy for all. Steve Gerber talks about the step by step process of making a cartoon. “The final product often bears little or no resemblance to what the writer puts on the page.  By the time a film or TV show gets to the screen, the writer has collaborated with literally hundreds of people, and a little of the original vision has gotten lost at each step between script and finished product.  The writer writes, and then everybody else; the story editors, directors, producers, network executives, censors, actors in live action, storyboard artist in animation, gets to have ‘input.'”  He called the final product a “bastardized version.”  “The only thing that’s really better about working in TV than comics is the money…” Gerber griped that the Programs Practices people wouldn’t allow his barbarian, Thundarr, “to punch or to hit anybody.  He can do all sorts of acrobatic things, but he can’t even trip anyone.  We had to design a sword which was not a sharp object, which naturally led people to a laser sword.  However, that had already been done before so we had to take it one step further to a lightning sword.”  Thundarr was emasculated.”

With success, more work came Jack’s way; character designs, villains, machinery and such. Kirby stayed with Ruby-Spears. Jack worked on other shows such as Goldie Gold, and Action Jack, Mr. T, Rambo, Sectaurs and Chuck Norris Karate Kommandos. He also pitched in on a few Hanna-Barbera shows like Space Stars, and Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show. Joe Ruby said; “We liked Jack’s work so much we put him on staff for six years. He was great.”

In late 1979 another unusual project grabbed Kirby’s attention. A movie producer named Barry Ira Geller had optioned the movie rights to a much touted sci-fi book named Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny. Geller had a grandiose idea of making a movie while at the same time building an amusement park from the movie props and settings. Geller approached Jack Kirby about doing some production drawings from which he could sell the idea to investors. Jack was also scheduled to be artistic director for the movie. Jack provided 13 of the most amazing epic sets ever imagined. They incorporated Mayan, Hindu and Eastern influences into the architecture, and seemed to rival the pyramids and Sphinx in scale and mass. The idea captured all the feelings that Kirby felt were embodied by comic work. It was powerful, imaginative and had a modern scope touching on tolerance, religion and the future. The business sales pitch was over the top:

From the Business Development section: “During the period of 1978-1980, professional associations included: a seasoned financial manager who managed four Studio heads, a Major Studio promise of distribution, an Oscar-winning actor’s promise of participation, an Oscar-winning Makeup Special effects director’s employment, the employment of the creative artist/designer responsible for 50% of the Comics Industry, two of the world’s top science fiction writers consulting, two of the world’s leading architects, and last but not least the personal involvement of one of the world’s most famous inventors. It was described as a property whose vast resources both creative and financial talent appreciated.”

I do like the part where the creative artist is credited with being responsible for 50% of the comic industry. Probably close. An example of how Geller and Kirby communicated: “Jack, I want to have something with 100-200 feet of revolving virtual image holograms of all the different people on the planet, and states of consciousness, and energies, and emotions”

• 

• 

Original Lord of Light – producer Barry Ira Geller

Then I said, “Let’s try it with just the revolving gardens” which is more like the novel. The novel doesn’t really say where anything is, so I took artistic license with it. And Kirby came back a week later with 2 pieces titled The Royal Chambers of Brahma. Kirby had looked for and finally found the awesome!

Kirby’s enthusiasm for the project was unparalleled. “Firstly, if I had not been invited to be involved with Lord of Light, I would have gone out of my way to make sure I could be.” This film is going to have a tremendous impact in the world, it will show enormous strength, it will allow the Eastern man and the Western man to relate to each other. And once mankind relates, they will never again have to fight. They will understand each other’s needs and idiosyncrasies.” I believe that this film and the way we are conceiving it could contribute to saving the world. I had to be involved…and I most definitely am.” His enthusiasm was admirable, his prescience not so well.

• 

• 

• 

AWESOME!

On November 4, 1979 the country awoke to a shocking reality. Half a world away, fanatical followers of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini had overtaken the country of Iran, and were holding 52 American hostages at the U.S. Consulate. Unknown was that six Americans had escaped and were in hiding, with Canadian assistance, hoping to be rescued.

A few weeks after the takeover, a message was slipped to the State Dept. acknowledging the hiding staffers and where they could be found for rescue. Tony Mendez, a former chief of the C.I.A.’s Disguise Section was given the task of coming up with a plan to sneak agents in to remove the six in hiding.

After a few days, Tony came up with an ingenious plan to pass off agents as location scouts for a Hollywood movie production, allowing them fairly free access through Iranian territory. For this to work, all the accoutrements of a Hollywood production would be necessary, first and foremost an actual movie prospectus to show the Iranians. His plan was nicknamed the Canadian Caper. Mendez knew they had to plan the ruse down to the last detail. “If anyone checks,” he said, “we need that foundation to be there.” If they were exposed, it could embarrass the government, compromise the agency, and imperil their lives and the lives of the hostages in the embassy. The militants had said from the beginning that any attempted rescue would lead to executions.

• 

• 

Mendez contacted a make-up designer in Hollywood who was well known to him from earlier escapades. This make-up man, John Chambers –of Planet of the Apes fame, had a clue for the perfect film prospectus. He had been among the first hired to work on Barry Ira Geller’s Lord of Light project. Since the production centered on a Middle Eastern location, the pictures fit the idea of using Iran for location shooting. When told of the project, the C.I.A. stole the script and production drawings from Geller’s Denver offices. It has been argued that the Lord of Light’s legal problem emanated from data stole by the C.I.A. backed D.A. office.

Tony gathered a core group and started “Studio Six” with the goal of entering Iran and extricating the hidden six. With his mission impossible cast of characters they set about setting up their cover story of making a movie named Argo. Mendez arranged for promotional ads in the Hollywood newspapers, and for business meetings and lavish parties announcing the movie beginning production. After considerable practice, The CIA men slipped into Iran, with Tony in the role of the exuberant Irish producer. “I have a business meeting with my company associates,” he explained to Iranian authorities in Germany. “They’re flying in from Hong Kong tomorrow and are expecting me.” Mendez had broken into a cold sweat in the airport — even professionals have their moments of doubt — but he knew there was no turning back. He put his faith in the strength of his cover story. That night the six escapees had dinner at a local residence of a Canadian friend, when Mendez arrived and told them they were to be secreted out of the country. They were told of the movie cover story and given new identification cards showing them as part of the movie production crew. They were given copies of the script and of Jack’s drawings as well as dummy contact phone numbers in case someone questioned their authenticity. When asked if they wanted to go individually, or together, the small group chose to stick together. They were also given special fake Canadian passports; not really fake since the Canadian government had them specially printed for the rescue mission.

The morning of Jan. 28, they made way to Mehrabad Airport. The airport had become chaotic since the revolution. The worst part was the Revolutionary guards who continually harassed passengers they thought might be smuggling riches out of the country. But that morning seemed calm. There were komitehs at customs, but their attention was focused on locals trying to smuggle out rugs or gold. Mendez had picked the early morning because by 10 am, Mehrabad would become a chaotic developing-world transit hub, with disordered lines of people, commotion, yelling, and shoving. That’s when the Revolutionary Guard would show up to have their run of the place. Mendez had gone ahead. His office had been testing out Mehrabad, sending agents to enter and exit the country, checking the security. But he preferred to see things for himself. Mendez could tell instantly if things felt right. He’d assess the customs and immigration desks — how diligent, for example, was the staff? More worrisome than the professionals were the komiteh and Revolutionary Guards standing behind them. Armed and unpredictable, they made the airport truly dangerous. Mendez led the way, running interference for the frightened passengers, talking to anyone nearby in a typical Hollywood b.s. fashion if they came too close.

“Tony recalls; The Iranian official at the checkpoint could not have cared less.” Some Iranian Revolution Guards had arrived and began harassing people. There was a heart pounding mechanical delay that shook everyone’s nerves. Just as the Guards started to bother the international passengers, they announced boarding to begin for the Swissair flight to freedom. Though it seemed interminable, departure and takeoff went smooth. Once the bar opened on the plane, Mendez dropped the charade and ordered Bloody Mary’s for all and raised a toast. “We’re home free”

The dramatic rescue was a success; the six arrived safely and were reunited with their families. A few months later, there was a military attempt at rescuing the 52 hostages at the Embassy. That rescue mission did not go so well when two Army helicopters crashed during a freak sand storm and the mission was aborted. Jimmy Carter’s presidency never recovered. Mendez met with President Carter in a small secluded non publicity setting; Carter thanked him for his heroism. Mendez received the C.I.A.’s Intelligence Star award and John Chambers was given a Medal of Merit.

The depth of the extrication only became known to many in 2000, when a TV show interviewed Mendez, and got permission from Geller to use the artwork. In this interview Mendez openly admitted the theft of the script and artwork, to help in one of the great adventure stories.

As for the Lord of Light project, unfortunately there were some legal problems, and the project was shut down by the Gov’t. Later, in 1980 Prevue Magazine reported about a growing scandal involving real estate fraud, and misappropriation of funds. Several members were indicted, but Barry Geller was cleared and left alone, his project in tatters. Jack was devastated. Mike Royer the inker for the Lord of Light production pieces says the whole CIA story was bullshit! But later facts back it up as real. Jack had a few other minor brushes with the CIA, such as a proposed flying jacket similar to the one on Jack’s Jacob and the Angel piece.

Jack Kirby never knew about how his drawings were part of a dramatic rescue of the six Americans. Yet I’m thinking he would have been proud; a little cosmic payback for the loss of his good friend Leon to terrorists. Ben Affleck is set to direct a movie based on this escapade.

Previous – 24. Once More Into The Breach | Top | Next – 26. The Animated Artist

Previous – 23. Why Did The Fourth World Fail? | Contents | Next – 25. Animated

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

ONCE MORE INTO THE BREACH

Sometime in the early 1970’s a friend gave Jack a nicely bound artbook with a black blank cover as a gift, for doodling or practice. Since Jack did neither of these he used the book for a different purpose. As a present to Roz, he carefully drew most every comic creation he had had a hand in. The book took on a life of its own. Variously called Roz’s Black Book, or Kirby’s Wonderbook, the creation was a valuable treasure shown only to those close to Roz, Greg Theakston had the luck to see the book in the later 70’s and expressed to Roz that someone should publish it. Over the years several publishers approached to do just that, only to be refused by Roz because she didn’t want to be separated from the book. At some point in the 80’s Greg talked to Roz and after a stern promise not to let any harm come to the book, she allowed Greg to publish it. Greg named it the Heroes and Villains book. Greg lovingly reproduced these pages in a manner fitting the love and graphite Jack put into them. The results were substantial. Greg had to reprint the book several times in order to meet the sales. The book is a cherished part of any Kirby collection.

Just as Jack made the decision to leave DC, a relative of Steve Sherman’s arranged for jack to meet ex-Beatle Paul McCartney. Paul and his new group Wings had just released a new album which contained a song called Magneto vs. Titanium Man, inspired by Jack’s comic book work. Gary (Steve’s brother) called Capitol Records headquarters in Los Angeles and spoke to the A&R man assigned to McCartney. He told the rep that Jack had done a drawing to honor Paul for the song and wondered if Paul would like to meet Jack. The AR man was well aware of who Jack Kirby was and after talking to Paul’s road people called back and told Gary that Paul would love to meet up with Jack at the Forum pre-show. Gary called the Kirby’s and told Lisa to show Jack the album and have her dad do up a sketch to give Paul. It had to be done quick as the show was in a couple hours and Jack was more than an hour away.

Just another day

When Gary arrived Jack showed him the sketch, Gary recalls it was great. It was a large size drawing of Magneto holding Paul and Linda while members of the band floated in the air. All of this done during Gary’s trip over to pick them up—not more than 45 minutes.

Gary piled them into the Kirby car and headed to the Forum, Kirby contently smoking a big ole stogie. Kirby seemed more interested in the chocolate cake promised him for the aggravation. When they arrived they went to the rear entrance where security introduced them to the lovely Linda McCartney who thanked them and gave then a tour.

Then around the corner came Paul. Gary recalled; “Ello Jack, nice to meet you.” Jack gave Paul and Linda the drawing which they thought was “smashing.” Paul thanked Jack for keeping him from going bonkers while they were recording the album in Jamaica. It seems that there was very little to do there, and they needed to keep their kids entertained. Luckily, there was a store that sold comics, so Paul would go and pick up all the latest. One night the song “Magneto and Titanium Man” popped into his head. The thing about Jack was that within a few minutes you felt as if you were best friends, so Paul too was soon laughing it up with Jack as if he had known him for years.

Lisa had her camera and snapped pictures of all involved. Paul comp’ed them some tickets and sent them out front sitting nestled between Ryan O’Neal and Michael Douglas. During the show Paul stopped and asked everyone to give it up for Jack Kirby. Jack stood up and waved just as Wings broke into Magneto vs. Titanium Man. After the gala event, as they were driving back to Thousand Oaks. Jack told Gary just how much he appreciated the evening and to show his appreciation he suggested stopping at Bob’s Big Boy for some more chocolate cake.

It should be noted that the intervening years at Marvel had been tempestuous as personnel came and went, the only new series to really succeed was a tie-in character of the barbarian Conan – a pulp character by Robert E. Howard. They were succeeding by quantity, not quality. If one Spidey title had worked, why not try two, or three. Spin-offs and reprints seemed to be the winning hand; new stuff came and went. Stan Lee had jumped around; sometimes as editor, sometimes president, and sometimes freelance contributor. The company though always kept Stan as figurehead—the smiling face that created the comics. They went so far as to place the heading “Stan Lee Presents” above all the comic titles—even when Stan had no part in them. Stan got away from the comics and started writing and editing regular books about the beginning of the Marvel revolution. Books like Origins of Marvel Comics were big hits yet the titles credited only Stan Lee. Any mention of Jack Kirby was purely as minor as noting who the illustrator was. Jack noted these slights. Roy Thomas says the reason was purely political. Kirby was now a competitor and you don’t highlight competitors. To Kirby, the truth was the truth. Despite his legend as a comic genius, when Stan had the reins of Marvel the company almost went belly up—Stan could not repeat his sales increases once Jack Kirby left.

Despite its roots as an honorary society, the Academy of Comic Book Arts, under its early president, artist Neal Adams, became an advocacy organization for creators’ rights. The comic-book industry at that time did not return artists’ physical artwork after shooting the requisite film for printing, and in some cases destroyed the artwork to prevent unauthorized reprints. The industry also did not then offer royalties or residuals, common in such creative fields as book publishing, film and television, and the recording industry. Once the ACBA — riding a wave begun by the mid-’70s independent startup Atlas/Seaboard Comics, which instituted royalties and the return of artwork in order to attract creators — helped see those immediate goals achieved, it then gradually disbanded

In 1975, the 1974 ACBA awarded its annual recognition called the Shazam Awards.

1974
Presented 1975

• Best Continuing Feature: Conan the Barbarian (Marvel)
• Best Individual Story: “Götterdämmerung”, Detective Comics #443 (DC)
• Best Individual Short Story (Dramatic): “Cathedral Perilous” (Manhunter) by Archie Goodwin & Walt Simonson, Detective Comics #441 (DC)
• Best Writer (Dramatic Division): Archie Goodwin
• Best Penciller (Dramatic Division): John Buscema
• Best Inker (Dramatic Division): Dick Giordano
• Best Humor Story: “Kaspar the Dead Baby” Crazy #8 (Marvel)
• Best Writer (Humor Division): Steve Skeates
• Best Penciller (Humor Division): Marie Severin
• Best Inker (Humor Division): Ralph Reese
• Best Letterer: John Costanza
• Best Colorist: Tatjana Wood
• Outstanding New Talent: Craig Russell
• Superior Achievement by an Individual: Roy Thomas
• Hall of Fame: Jack Kirby

But this didn’t mean Jack was done.

Jack ran into Roy at a convention and during the discussion Jack explains he is not all that happy at DC. Roy, taking the hint says that Marvel would love for him to return. Stan was delighted and after agreeing to terms very similar to Kirby’s DC contract such as self editing, writing and art control, Kirby agreed. Despite some initial blowback from other Marvel employees, Stan told Roy Thomas that he was bringing Jack back. “I think that’s great” Roy exclaimed, “I got one piece of advice. Don’t let him write” Stan understood but explained that part of the contract was that Kirby was the writer. Roy still liked the idea. Things were so bad at Marvel that the idea of Kirby returning must have seen like a gift from God. At a comic convention in New York, Stan made the joyful announcement to the fans that Jolly Jack was once again returning to the House of Ideas. The crowd erupted in excitement. Kirby promised that his new concepts would “electrocute the mind”. Stan just shook his head in amazement. Marie Severin – never a shrinking violet remarks about Kirby’s return to Marvel. “I came up to the office and I saw Jack, and Stan put a page in front of my face and said, “You did not see any of this!” And I said, “Okay, I did not see any of this” and I went out in the hall and yelled, “Kirby’s back!”

During the changeover, Kirby also found some outside advertising work. In response to the rise of G.I. Joe, Caption Action and other military style action figures, Mattel had manufactured the Big Jim action figure since the early 1970s. In 1975 they decided to expand and reformat the figure into a sort of Mission Impossible/merc team name P.A.C.K. Jack designed the packaging for a part of this line of action figures. Jack did not create the characters, but Big Jim and his crew of soldiers of fortune got the Kirby treatment on their boxes and comic book ads. John Buscema provided a comic insert. Ironically, Mark Evanier tells a poignant tale about how one day, he took Jack and Roz shopping, and while Roz was in the store, Mark suggested that he and Jack go into a nearby Toys R Us toy store.

Free money

Jack’s manner became stiff and shaky and he told Mark he can’t go in there, to which Mark replied that it would be ok, Roz will be a while. Still Kirby refused and Mark could see real fear in Jack’s eyes, so he changed the subject. Later when he got Roz alone he asked her about the incident, and Roz explained that when Jack would go into a Toys R Us type shop he would get physically ill from seeing so many toys based on his creations for sale, using his art, and ironically while Kirby received nothing back for all the money he was making the companies. Here he was making good money on just such advertising for characters he hadn’t created.

Everpresent Kirby characters for Marvel items c.1975

Jack’s Back!! So read the cover of FOOM #11. FOOM was Marvel’s in-house magazine. The cover featured Jack Kirby bursting thru the cover drawn by John Byrne in a Kirby style bombastic pose. Thus Marvel reintroduced Kirby to their public. It offered an error-filled history and a Kirby interview where he talks about being back at Marvel. The cover might be more symbolic than one realizes. Since Kirby left for DC, Marvel had been promoting several artists as the hot new thing, and John Byrne led the list. In fact the comic industry had entered a period that might be called the “Cult of Personality” phase where the artists, rather than the characters were presented as the selling point to the buying public. With hindsight perhaps it was Kirby’s time at DC that began the cult of personality cult. With Kirby returning, the rightful claimant to the hot artist title had returned. As noticed, Kirby had just been awarded a place in the Comic Book Arts Hall of Fame; an award that Kirby vowed not to be a signal for an end of a career, but a continuation.

In the interview Kirby explains that his first job is reintroducing Captain America. “The story I’m running now is slanted towards the Bicentennial. In fact, it’s a long running novel with many chapters in it. Each chapter is a separate but connected story. Of course, the climax of the story is going to occur on the Bicentennial in 1976. It’s going to be Captain America as he should be. Captain America winning because he has the character to win and to triumph over evil.” What Kirby describes is what we now call a mini-series, a format that would become popular a decade later. What wasn’t mentioned was the meetings with Stan where they decided just what Kirby would do. Jack refused the FF and Thor—he didn’t want to regurgitate, he wanted to create. A compromise was reached where Jack would do Captain America plus some new series. Jack refused to continue Cap, he rather start from scratch, so the ongoing story was ended mid-stream.

Steranko failing as Kirby – Byrne doing his Kirby-est

Kirby also notes that he has also started the adaptation of 2001: A Space Odyssey; a large format retelling of the epic Kubrick film from 1968. Plus he mentions a secret project about “gods who walk among us”. Once again, it seems Kirby had his plate full and he felt energized.

What the buying public first saw was something different. Of the titles cover dated Nov. 1975, Kirby supplied the covers for a whopping ten Marvel titles; from Fantastic Four to Conan GS #1. The following month had a couple more. None of these featured any Kirby interior art, but it was a great way to let the buyers know who the rightful king was and who Marvel thought represented the type art that sold comic books, despite having Marie Severin provide layouts and providing working sketches of characters unknown to Jack. For the next several years Kirby covers would be used to help sell non-Kirby series; this so resembled how Kirby used to draw the covers for almost all of the early Marvel titles. The reprint titles became even more oppressive a factor on the news stands that it must have looked like Kirby did twenty books a month. That same month DC published 4 Kirby inventory titles. These had all interiors done by Jack, but no covers. A very strange month.

Big and better

With the release of Captain America #193 dated Jan. 1976, customers finally saw new Kirby stories and this was unique; “Madbomb, Screamer in the Brain” was an eight part dense tale of mind control and conspiracy from within our own government. It also featured probably Kirby’s oddest cameo since Don Rickles, when Henry Kissinger paid a call on the red, white and blue Avenger, and his new pal, The Falcon. The Falcon was not a Kirby creation, but a small time black, flying character that had partnered up with Cap while Kirby was away. The black and white tension was used effectively by Jack during a scene where both men become overwhelmed by a mind altering ray and their worst tendencies took over. Henry Kissinger’s dialogue was a take off on comedian Henny Youngman. Jack always saved his best art for Captain America. Once again, Jack’s name was proudly featured on the cover.

But all was not well, While Kirby was gone, a whole new editorial crew had emerged at Marvel, and their memories weren’t as tied into Kirby’s time at Marvel. Scott Edelman was just such a person; he had been promoted to assistant editor. In an interview Scott admitted; “I know there are plenty of people who loved the work Kirby did on his return to Marvel in the ’70s, but I wasn’t one of them. I can remember sitting in the Bullpen and proofing the original art for Jack’s first issue back on Captain America, and just feeling … sad. I still feel that nothing Kirby did alone could compare with the work he did Stan Lee—in my opinion, they needed each other—but looking back on how I expressed myself then, I know I came off like an ungrateful brat. And I don’t like that. After all Kirby did for us, we should have been happy to be able to read whatever he was willing to give us, whether it was up to the old days or not.” Kirby might have lost some, but Stan Lee had totally lost his mojo. He had not created anything or written anything memorable in years. The only memorable Lee story was a novelty effort where Spider-Man took on the drug trade. The story was nothing much, but the fight with the code ramped up the interest. With Stan shuffled off to the background, there was no one there who could have improved Jack’s stories.

Jack’s new series may not have been the same Stan Lee style adventure, but it had a vision and an energy no other Marvel editor had. No one else had a yearlong plan for their books. The dialogue wasn’t Lee’s glibness, but the plot was as dense and active as ever found with Kirby’s pacing on the Captain America saga among his best ever. Kirby even made the Falcon an interesting partner.

When asked about working on a non-Kirby character like the Falcon, Kirby explained: “I feel the Falcon is a very valid super-hero. He’s a strong type, and a team operation is just as effective as a single, if it’s really good, and that’s what I’m trying to make it.”

One of Marvel’s reprint books was a series titled Marvel Treasury Editions. These were reprints, but in a larger, more explosive size and format. Kirby supplied several covers for these issues, and he really liked the large size pages. It allowed him to make the backgrounds more emphatic, something that was lost when the page size was reduced in the late ‘60s. He also did two full books in this size and they may have been the best things he did during this new stint. 2001: A Space Odyssey was a comic book adaptation of Kubrick’s sci-fi film, and no artist but Kirby could have captured the majesty and the power of Kubrick’s visuals.. Kirby also colored parts of the book and the work is breath taking. Each page is a stand- alone masterpiece of innovation and design.

Kubrik’s masterpiece – Kirby always did his best for Captain America

For the country’s bicentennial, Kirby created a huge allegorical tale of Cap as seen thru American history. In Captain America’s Bicentennial Battles, Cap is given the ability to go back in time and see how he would have influenced the course of US history. We see him during the Revolutionary War, frolicking with Ben Franklin and inspiring Betsy Ross to create a red, white, and blue flag with stars. We see him just before the Civil War assisting a slave fleeing for freedom, and in a WW1 aerial dogfight, and most poignantly during the Great Depression helping out a scrappy young news boy being strong armed by gangsters, a youngster who promises to be a big-shot comic artist one day, and make the gangsters pay for their cruelty. Cap also returns to his darkest day, the day Bucky died during WW2. All this time travel is similar to James Stewart in It’s a Wonderful Life. Buda, the little guy who sent Cap thru time and space is trying to shake the depression from Cap over the bad things he sees in the US and make him realize all the great moments, and the role he has played in making the US great. It ends with Kirby’s most heartfelt patriotic sentiment. Cap tells a group of young teens, “I’m looking for something bigger than any super-villain—and I think I’ve found it here among you young people. It isn’t an object exactly, it’s a terrific feeling that we can become strong enough and smart enough to beat the overwhelming problems which every American has to live with.’ The young kids respond “Yeah, We can be anything we want to! And Cap/Kirby says; “That’s America! A place of stubborn confidence—where both young and old can hope and dream, and wade though disappointment, despair, and the crunch of events—with the chance of making life meaningful.” What a great valentine for America from one of its true heroes; a boy born of nothing who through grit and pluck became its greatest storyteller.

The next big news was the release of Kirby’s “gods who walk among us” series. Originally titled “The Return of the Gods”, but because of the closeness to a new DC title, it was changed to “The Eternals” Coincidentally, the DC title was called “The Return of the New Gods” which brought Kirby’s New Gods concepts back into DC’s universe. It should also be noted that the other Fourth World characters didn’t disappear; they all showed up in the showcase title Brave and the Bold with long time DC characters.

True to his source

The Eternals was a sprawling cosmic tale of a collection of Celestial beings who have returned to Earth. It seems that these beings have visited Earth several times in the long past and have done experiments on the bestial inhabitants that evolved into three separate races, who have unknowingly cohabitated the Earth. The first race was mankind, who settled on the land and cultivated and prospered. The second race was the Eternals, a group of near gods who were gifted with super powers and virtual immortality. Their homes were the mountain tops. The third race was the Deviants, a group of demons and monstrous beasts who resided in the depths of the seas. In the far past these three races did intermingle, and from those times stories of godlike creatures who inhabited the heavens, and devilish creatures who inhabited the inner Earth were told. After some battles among the races they separated and left each other alone. But with the return of the Celestials, it has become necessary for the three races to work together, for the role of the Celestials was to judge mankind and if found wanting, to destroy it. This tale was part Erich Von Daniken’s Chariots of the Gods , part 2001 A Space Odyssey, part Jewish mythology, and part Aztek and Roman/Greco mythology, and mostly Jack’s manic imagination. It was as far out as any story ever told, An old problem soon arose. Jack’s story couldn’t easily fit into Marvel’s universe, so the editor asked for some cross-over characters to interact in his tale. Kirby managed to squeeze in a few references to SHIELD without actually having Nick Fury appear, but eventually he relented and threw in a story about a remote controlled robotic Hulk that misfires and runs amok, and the hero Ikaris has to subdue it.

Kirby bristled but took it like a man and gave them what they wanted. Not unlike the New Gods, the Eternals problems were Kirby made. It was too sprawling and no easy way for newcomers to work their way in. Its dark operatic tone did not fit into Marvel’s happy friendly milieu. After 19 issues, and an Annual, the series ended. But as always, the characters had become a part of the Marvel Universe, and still show up in different ways. No other Marvel series had such a scope.

Another pop-sci-fi favorite fell into Jack’s lap when Stan Lee turned a proposed series based on the cult favorite TV show The Prisoner in Jack’s direction. The Prisoner was a short lived British spy genre show starring Patrick McGoohan as a spy, whose retirement is interrupted when he is shunted off to a sinister remote Island run by a faceless corporate entity that restricts his movement and access to the outside world- literally a scenic prison. Originally scheduled to be produced by writer Steve Englehart and artist Gil Kane, the rejected project was handed off to Kirby. Perhaps due to Kirby’s familiarity and appeal to paranoid, dystopian concepts, and man against corporation struggles. Amazingly, Jack was given the job of writing the script as well as illustrating the tale. Jack produced just one issue’s worth of art, and it contains the first half of the original origin story from the TV show titled “The Arrival”. Mike Royer inked and lettered just five pages when the project came to a halt. The few pages ever published show a very restrained, almost claustrophobic Kirby—heavy in text and lacking his usual bombast and explosiveness. Though true to the source material, it appears that the cerebral nature of the show might have been too much of a restriction to Kirby’s natural inclinations—but it would have been interesting if Kirby was allowed to take the concepts in his own direction.

Kirby trying to be faithful

Ever since the late 1960’s, Marvel’s financial position had been heading South. It remained the industry leader, but its value had dropped dangerously. Jim Galton, the CEO actually talked about bankruptcy. Roy Thomas had been hired to help relieve Stan’s burden. For the first couple years, he played a small role. His position at times was one of derision. Jack’s caricature of Roy as Funky Flashman’s toady was not that far off. Roy had been tasked with the lowest, most meaningless titles. But lightning struck one day when he was told to get Marvel a license for a sword and sorcery title. His first instinct was that the one he wanted would be too expensive, but surprisingly, the Estate of Robert Howard was practically begging for someone to publish new Conan stories. Despite little urging from the powers that be, Roy found his cheap art source and created the only real success Marvel would have for the next 5 years. The success of Conan did not make Marvel suddenly profitable, but it helped stem the hemorrhaging. But by 1976, even Conan could no longer stop the flow; nothing Marvel put out was helping. Very little came from merchandising and licensing of their products.

With this success, Marvel expanded into the licensing market and other properties from outside were added. Thongor and Kull became a part of Marvel’s Universe. In 1976 Stan Lee had a meeting with film-producer George Lucas, about creating a comic book based on a new movie called Star Wars. Stan was of the opinion that a new “space opera” was not really salable, and passed. George Lucas and his partner in the Supersnipe Comic Shop Ed Summer went to Roy Thomas – the golden boy since Conan – and made the same proposal. At this dinner George Lucas was relaying his story for Star Wars in which Roy Thomas noticed it sounded a lot like Jack Kirby’s New Gods. What Roy took away from this part of the dinner was that George Lucas was hugely indebted to Jack Kirby for Star Wars. Roy’s feelings were more positive and after further negotiations, Roy was able to obtain the licensing free. Just the opposite where Goodman once gave the movies free rights to Captain America, now the movies gave a comic publisher free rights hoping for good public feedback. All Lucas asked for was that the books hit the stands before the movie so that it could help the build-up.

With the go ahead, Roy again ignored the more expensive and perhaps, more logical penciller, and went to a lower tier artist who had done sword and sorcery work for Roy. Howard Chaykin was hired for the first edition.

Guest starring Dr. Doom?????

Jim Shooter-soon to be editor-in-chief explained the results;

“The first two issues of our six (?) issue adaptation came out in advance of the movie.  Driven by the advance marketing for the movie, sales were very good.  Then about the time the third issue shipped, the movie was released.  Sales made the jump to hyperspace.

Star Wars the movie stayed in theaters forever, it seemed.  Not since the Beatles had I seen a cultural phenomenon of such power.  The comics sold and sold and sold.  We reprinted the adaptation in every possible format.  They all sold and sold and sold.

In the most conservative terms, it is inarguable that the success of the Star Wars comics was a significant factor in Marvel’s survival through a couple of very difficult years, 1977 and 1978.”

Once again, Roy Thomas – the almost forgotten gofer had become the hero; as Jim Shooter says, “Roy Thomas saved Marvel” And it came from outside. The success of Star Wars finally helped lift all boats. Jim Galton says that Star Wars comics made him rich—and after some begrudging, he offered Roy Thomas a $500 bonus. Nice guy!

Nestled deep in the beautiful Tuscan treeswept landscape is a miraculous walled town of Lucca, Italy. Its claim to fame is that the famed musician Puccini was born in this sleepy little Renaissance town. Oddest of all, it has become the center of the comic book fan industry as every Oct. it is transformed into a costumed Mecca of comic fans. Since 1966, since the con was moved to Lucca, it has become the center of European fandom. In 1976, Lucca decided that Jack Kirby should be the honoree of the convention. The group running it sent Jack and Roz tickets to show up. Jack was wined and dined and treated like royalty. The main event was held in an old Renaissance opera house that intimidated Jack and Roz. Most seemed to be a whirl of activities and wrestling with translators. Jack recalls; KIRBY: “Well, actually, there were two awards. There was a plaque which was presented to me by the mayor of Lucca, and it has the image of the opera house on it. It is a substantial award, in weight anyhow. I believe it is an etching of the opera house of Lucca which, of course, I am always going to remember because it was so colorful. The other award was a gold-plated statuette of the Yellow Kid, mounted on Italian marble. And, it has an inscription on the statuette itself which is in the dialogue of the Yellow Kid, which in turn, I believe, is supposed to be the first comic strip ever done.” Shel Dorf asked him about the Italian people; Do they have good restaurants? KIRBY: “Their restaurants are terrific. They have terrific restaurants, they have terrific food, and they have terrific personnel who serve you. It is a pleasure eating in any Italian dining place. I hope that many more Americans go there, and enjoy themselves as much as I did.”

Lucca is for comic lovers

Kirby was certainly enjoying his new found celebrity in his later years. Years later, a dream came true when Jack and Roz accompanied a group from their Temple to The Holy Land. One can only imagine what Kirby drew and slipped into the Wailing Wall.

Roy Thomas wanted Kirby back on a company product and they chose the Black Panther. Kirby’s African chief had gone through several incarnations, straight super hero, an Avenger, and lately a social force taking on the Klan and racism. What I have often wondered was, why not ask Jack Kirby to do the Star Wars book when Roy personally thought the premise was ripped from Jack Kirby, plus he wanted Jack to do a company property. Jack was the best at “space opera”. Why give him a decade old 2001 adaptation but not give him a new book? I think Marvel missed the boat here. Despite the dropping of the Prisoner project, Roy did talk Jack into renewing the Black Panther. When Kirby took it over, he took the Panther on an even stranger route. The Panther was now an archeological treasure hunter, and his prize was a Biblical artifact of immense power. His search would take him on many an adventure and even bring him into conflict with an alien life force of great power, plus an undersized companion and a new femme fatale. His search was also thwarted by other searchers, who also wanted the mystical relic. This storyline effectively took the Panther out of the current Marvel Universe and once again seemed to isolate the other Marvel bullpenners. But in mid-1977, something else caught their attention and kept them busy.

In May 1977, the film Star Wars hit the screen. No film had ever influenced pop culture so immediately before or since this film. It was a phenomenon. Space Opera on film would never be the same. The special effects were leap years ahead of any space film before it. The scope of the story, and the mixture of genres was comparable to only one thing; Kirby’s New Gods trilogy. His villain looked like Dr. Doom. The interfamily dispute, the father son dynamic, The “source/force” similarity. That the evil presence was actually called the dark side, as compared to Darkseid. Even the grouping of characters was similar to Kirby’s time tested template. The heroic pilot, the hot headed kid, the burly brawny sidekick, and the elderly mystical mentor, could all be found in Kirby’s road tested template. The movie justified Kirby’s belief that people could accept a sprawling, action packed, space opera that worked on many different levels. The special effects ability had finally reached the point to match what comics had been doing for decades. The ability to add mass, detail and scale took out the campy look most sci-fi movies had been saddled with.

Kirby returns to the black Avenger with a twist

After several years dormancy, Marvel products once again started appearing in movie and TV productions. Late 1977 would find a Lee/Kirby creation back on TV; The Incredible Hulk was given the full live action treatment in a pair of made-for-TV movies. The show starred Bill Bixby as David Bruce Banner, and body builder Lou Ferrigno as the Hulk. The movies were well received and in March 1978 became a weekly TV series. The series eschewed the sci-fi super-hero genre and centered on a “Fugitive-like” serial concerning research scientist Dr. Banner. Wanted for crimes, he escapes and travels around the country where he meets different people in moments of crisis and peril. Dr. Banner transforms into the Hulk in moments of extreme rage and the rampaging brute takes care of all villains and people of bad intent. Banner is hounded by a newspaper reporter in a Javert-like obsessive search to prove his eyewitness account of a brutish monster was true. The comparison was intentional, producer and writer Kenneth Johnson’s first instinct was to turn down the series, but then, while reading the Victor Hugo novel, Les Misérables, he became inspired and began working to develop the Hulk comic into a TV show. This aversion of comic book clichés and their accoutrements allowed the series to be taken seriously while still amazing the kids with the awesome transformation into the gruesome green monster. Though actually getting little screen time, Ferrigno’s mute monster played up the misunderstood lovable monster first seen in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

At the same time Nicholas Hammond portrayed Peter Parker in a TV version of Spider-man.

Jack was of several minds concerning the show. Once again Marvel produced an outside product without crediting Jack for his part in the creation, and Jack received no moneys from the leasing of the product. But Jack really liked the finished product. He loved Bill Bixby and thought the producers treated the creation respectfully and avoided the campiness of most TV super-hero shows such as Batman and Wonder Woman. In the second season, Jack even weaseled his way into a small cameo role as a police artist who had to draw a sketch from a crime victim’s description.

Kirby gets a cameo

In 1979, CBS produced two Captain America made for TV movies. Played by pretty boy Reb Brown in a silly costume hoping to get a series; they were so bad the idea died soon. The new Cap was the son of the original Cap. It was sort of Evel Knievel in a pair of blue pj’s. As usual; no credit for Jack and Joe.

On Jan. 1, 1978, the Copyright Law of 1978 took effect. This was the first make over of copyright laws since 1909. The reasoning behind coming up with a total new law was threefold; first because of the various new technologies that came to be after 1909. Many of the laws simply didn’t address the realities of duplication techniques that now existed. Second was to bring US copyright law into compliance with that of other countries because we were expected to become a signatory to the Berne Agreement, which controlled most of Europe. Third was to address the many loopholes and carve outs that had arisen due to 70 years of litigation and corporate strong-arming. This third area was what concerned the comic industry so much. There were two immediate concerns. First was that under the new law, original art was now clearly owned by the original artists. The company only paid for reproduction rights. So now as soon as the companies made their stats, the original art was shipped back to the artists. Second, the companies had always claimed that the artists were commissioned under what was called “work for hire” status. Their art and creations were owned exclusively by the companies and the artists had no rights to them.

The new law did not end the onerous “work for hire” status but decreed that work for hire must be agreed to in writing by both sides for it to be legal. So the artists who had worked for decades without any contracts now had to sign specific contracts for their services. What the law didn’t do was clarify how all those pieces created prior to the new contracts would be viewed for copyright purposes. Another change was that the tenure of copyright ownership was lengthened from 56 years to life of artist plus 50

And a clause that would really rattle the industry, though its effects wouldn’t be felt until the ‘90s, was that after 56 years of a company owning the copyrights, the law mandated that the rights reverted back to the creator. Not only would the rights revert to the artist, but the artist could not legally sign away that right. The idea is simple. Originally when an artist created a work, he would own the copyrights for 56 years. The artist had the right to assign those rights (lease) for a period of no more than 28 years. The reasoning was that 28 years was long enough for the leasee to exploit the property but then the copyright reverted back to the original creator to take advantage of any increase of value that the property had accrued in the 28 year period. So the artist now had a second bite of the apple and was able to sell the rights again, either to the same leasee, if the artist was happy with them, or, to a second company to exploit the copyright anew. This second bite of the apple was effectively removed when publishers, using their stronger negotiating position of power forced the artists to sign away not only the first but also the second 28 year term before they would publish the work. The Supreme Court ruled in a very important case that it was legal for the publishers to force the artist to sign both terms away at first publication because the law never specifically refused the artists from doing so. The new law removed this possibility by allowing for an automatic return of copyright after the initial copyright term (now 35 years) and for those caught in between, for the mandated return after the completed second term of copyright, not to exceed 56 years. The law also made clear that any contract that tried to circumnavigate the termination clause was unenforceable. So any artist forced to sign away his copyrights beyond the second 28 years found that that forced contract was invalid. Most of these changes were phased in over time, but it strengthened a movement already growing among the artists. That they had some power to demand changes in the way the comic industry worked; such as money for reprints, and artists owning the copyrights of their characters, and return of their entire stash of original art, plus proper credit for the work. The pendulum has started to swing from complete control by the company to a shared reward for successful properties. All those reasons that caused people like Steve Ditko, and Jack Kirby and Wally Wood to leave Marvel, were now being addressed in favor of the artists. The industry was being forced to enter the Twentieth Century.

After the publication of the oversized 2001, it was decided that Kirby should continue his cosmic explorations, but from a familiar source. In the ongoing monthly series 2001 A Space Odyssey, Kirby expanded on his own concepts as well as some from Kubrick’s film. Where are we going? Somewhere in the dawn of time we began — somehow, in these perilous times we keep moving on — and sometime in the future, something will happen to change us! This was Kirby’s introduction for the series, not an easy premise to live up to.

From 2001, Kirby did it just for fun – just another page an inkers nightmare

But Steve Sherman says that space travel and aliens just came naturally to Jack. “I remember one evening just sitting with him, and I’d just read the book Rendezvous With Rama. I’m sitting talking to Jack about flying saucers and things like that, and Jack always claimed he could see UFOs from his picture window in Thousand Oaks, and you’d believe it. And in the space of about 45 minutes, Jack’d come up with 13 different stories about flying saucers and people meeting them; an entire series. Complete stories, telling me about the characters, the beginning, the middle, the end, the whole thing. It was just amazing.”

New comics and a lot of covers for others

The series focused on people and events affected by the monolith throughout time and space. In most issues we see an event from our distant past and through contact with the monolith this event is echoed in the distant future; a one issue time travelogue. In a latter issue, a new recurring character emerged, Mr. Machine, a machine made sentient via the monolith, who was trying to fit into a world that didn’t trust or want him; shades of Eando Binder’s Adam Link. Kirby had done something similar with the character Quasimodo in the FF. Quasi was a machine made into a sentient being by the power of the Silver Surfer. 2001 ended quietly after 10 issues—when the license with the movie ended, but Mr. Machine went on to get his own series; renamed Machine Man due to the closeness of a toy character, and he became a type of reluctant searching super-hero. This series lasted several years, even after Kirby left Marvel again. The concept survives to this day.

None of Kirby’s Marvel series really exploded, and soon there were rumblings from within the company. Some of the young upstarts started referring to Jack as Jack the Hack, or as a has-been who no longer had the magic touch, perhaps even a bit senile. There were rumors of editors salting the letter columns of Kirby’s books with negative letters. But mostly they resented Kirby’s independence; his unwillingness to work with others who wanted to write books for Kirby to illustrate. Kirby had earned this independence and he held unto it fearlessly. But Kirby’s natural optimism was dimming. His art, to many, seemed to be slipping into a parody of his style.

During the Seventies, Marvel’s management had made a complete changeover from those during the Lee/Kirby/Ditko days to a new generation absent any connection to its birth. Kirby suddenly had to work with and respond to unfamiliar people of little or no history. Scott Edelman was a new assistant editor, and he was given the job of proofreading and correcting Jack’s books. Scott remembered;  “ I know there are plenty of people who loved the work Kirby did on his return to Marvel in the ’70s, but I wasn’t one of them. I can remember sitting in the Bullpen and proofing the original art for Jack’s first issue back on Captain America, and just feeling … sad. I still feel that nothing Kirby did alone could compare with the work he did Stan Lee—in my opinion, they needed each other—but looking back on how I expressed myself then, I know I came off like an ungrateful brat. And I don’t like that. After all Kirby did for us, we should have been happy to be able to read whatever he was willing to give us, whether it was up to the old days or not.” Other minor management people, like new assistant editor Ralph Macchio seemed to delight in filling Kirby’s letter columns with negative letters.

Jim Shooter, when he became the big guy, looked at this in dismay. “I cannot imagine what the people putting the letter columns together were thinking. Were they trying to be “fair and balanced,” and show that some people were disappointed with what Jack was doing? Was it that they, themselves, were disappointed with what Jack was doing and weighted the lettercols to express their POV? Putting together a negative lettercol is stupid, amateurish and/or malicious.”

“It reached a point where Kirby went to Shooter to complain. Jim recalls; “When I became EIC, again, I didn’t have time to check up on what I assumed was a no-brainer operation that no one would screw up, that is, lettercols, until Jack called me to complain about them. I’ve told that story elsewhere on the blog. It was, as I recall, the only time ever that Jack complained about anything. I felt terrible that we had let him down so badly.”

During the mid-Seventies the companies started to shift from the old newsstand distribution to a new plan called direct market system, which sold comics on a non-returnable basis. During this changeover, the companies used both as the direct sales market was trying to expand to all areas. The companies knew that selling on a non-return basis was much more profitable as it removed the returned books that had to be counted and subtracted from the print run. Yet the older newsstand system hit the whole market and still accounted for a large part of the business. This split dichotomy produced some interesting results. In some newsstand areas individual retailers would bypass the distributors and buy up the books before it reached the retailers. This hoarding caused havoc on the companies as their books weren’t reaching all markets; creating holes in the series runs. In those few cons that sprang up in larger cities, these few dealers had massive amounts of books that the common buyer could never find at the store level, and could only be bought at inflated prices. Another problem was that selling 10,000 issues on the direct market meant much more profit to the company than selling 10,000 issues at the newsstands, since they also might include 10,000 copies returned for credit. Jim Shooter talks about how this might affect specific books and artists. Jim said; “though Jack’s books did not sell well on the newsstands, because, I think, to casual readers they seemed old-fashioned and un-hip, they sold gangbusters in the nascent direct market, as well or better than the X-Men, and far more than all other titles. I remember noticing that a couple of Jack’s books were selling upwards of 30,000 copies — just about enough to break even all direct — at a time when Spider-Man, the Avengers, etc., were selling closer to 10,000 direct. “

A lot of themes for an R.E. Howard salute

In 1978, Jack was commissioned to provide an illustration for a fantasy book called Ariel-The Book of Fantasy. He provided a beautifully whimsical and creepy two–page illo for a Robert E. Howard poem called “Musings”. The drawing was light and airy—filled with fairies and other fey iconography—as well as monsters and mystics –perhaps foretelling some of Kirby’s future animation work. Ariel was a large size art book that focused on fantasy stories. The issue Jack appeared in had an evocative Barry Windsor-Smith cover. I am not sure how Kirby’s participation came about. A review of the magazine by noted Sci-Fi critiquer Tarbandu expounds.

“Ariel: The Book of Fantasy’ (1978) was one of the more unusual experiments in retail fantasy literature and art publishing in the mid-70s. There were four issues (‘volumes’) printed between 1976 and 1978.

‘Ariel’ was a large (12 “x 9 “, 80 – 100 pp), full-color magazine printed on quality paper stock, and featured illustrated fiction and comics from a number of well-known genre authors and artists. Ariel carried a steep cover price ($6.95) for the mid 70’s, which unfortunately placed it out of ready reach for the burgeoning, but young and poor, generation of SF and fantasy fans then starting to make their economic presence felt (albeit if only in a modest way). After four issues had been produced Ballantine decided to pull the plug on the magazine, and there really hasn’t been anything quite like it on the retail shelves since (perhaps a sign that this form of publication just doesn’t strike much of a chord with the US buying public).

Issue three of ‘Ariel’ (edited by Thomas Durwood) featured as its cover an arresting illustration (‘Devil’s Lake’) by the English artist Barry Windsor-Smith, who is the subject of an interview in the magazine. By 1978 Windsor-Smith had long since departed Marvel and ‘Conan’, and was making a living as a studio artist. The interview is an informative one and touches on the artist’s philosophy of the ‘New Romantic’ movement in art and illustration, and his admiration for the artists of the Victorian and Pre-Raphaelite eras.

Among the other entries in volume three is a new Elric story, ‘The Last Enchantment’, by Michael Moorcock, with illustrations by Tim Conrad; a poem by Robert E. Howard, ‘Musings’, with an illustration by Jack ‘King’ Kirby; an admirable comic adaption of Harlan Ellison’s story ‘Along the Scenic Route’ by Al Williamson; and a short story, ‘The Halls of the Frost Giants’, by Alexander Heart, with illustrations (in an Arthur Rackham style) by Michael Hague.

The quality of the reproductions appearing in the magazine is quite good, particularly when one remembers that ‘Ariel’ appeared in the pre-computer-based typesetting and printing era.”

Jack’s drawing was of two natures, like a lot of Kirby’s better work. At once optimistic and whimsical it was also foreboding and scary. Much like Howard’s work, it possesses multiple sides of human nature.

Some wonky figures but a feeling of rapture – Silver Surfer gets a flying f**k with Loni Anderson

In late 1976 a long mentioned project came up; Stan wanted to do a graphic novel with Jack of the Silver Surfer–possibly as a vehicle for a movie project. Graphic novels were new: a long form format telling one big story in a novelized package, including a hard cover and painted sleeve. Instead of monthly serials, a whole story in one thick package. The idea intrigued Jack.

Meticulous research by Greg Theakston gave us the behind the scenes skinny. The rights to the Silver Surfer had been optioned to producer Lee Kramer. The plans called for a huge budgeted production complete with Rock Opera music and staging. The story was the telling of Galactus’ and the Surfer’s contact with the Earth. Since the FF’s options were held by another company, they would be excluded. Without the FF, they needed another strong presence, preferably a female presence that could be played by Kramer’s then girlfriend, Olivia Newton-John, a beautiful singer who was transitioning into films. Kramer was a lifelong fan of the Silver Surfer, and now that he had clout in Hollywood, he wanted to go forward on the product. “Doing the Silver Surfer has always been a dream of mine and now it was going to be realized.” Kramer told a film magazine.

Kramer’s resume’ was checkered, he started out as a farmer, and an antique dealer. He had met Olivia Newton-John five years previously and had become her manager. With her, he had produced several well received TV shows, and a couple of movies like Xanadu. His Silver Surfer was scheduled for release in 1981. Olivia Newton-John proved her bankability with her appearance in Grease, the very successful movie based on the Broadway play.

With this go-ahead, Stan and Jack had a story conference and Jack got right to work. This was good for Jack as he had been falling behind on his contracted amount of pages for Marvel. (though I could not find any gap in the printed books that would cause a loss of pages) According to Greg; ”When Jack turned in the pages, they were accompanied by a fully realized plot on paper. When Lee called for his usual changes, Jack was displeased, but acted like a professional and complied. After all, a lot of money was being gambled.“

Stan Lee didn’t stand silent, Using all of his bluster and hucksterism, Stan told a magazine, “The Silver Surfer is still on the way to being a big movie. Lee Kramer, who’s going to produce it, is at this very moment in Australia and I think he’s renting the whole continent as the setting! He found a scientist in England who is working on something called linear induction. At the moment he has this linear induction worked out so it can make a surfboard go this high above the ground and really travel with a man on it. They promise me by the time the thing is filmed, they’ll get the surfboard that high. They get the camera underneath it, they paint the sky–it’ll look like he’s out in space!” Lee also said he’d be “closely involved” with the making of the movie and that the Surfer “will probably fight Galactus” in the film.”

Kramer’s relationship with Newton-John was precarious, and when it eventually broke up, the money dissolved and the production ended. Newton-John was the selling point; not Lee Kramer. All that was left to show for this effort was Kirby and Lee’s historic book to be published by major publisher Simon and Schuster. It was a success, published in both hardcover and softcover. It has since been reprinted.

At 100 pages, the art had some of Kirby’s old spark, but there were differences between Kirby’s and Stan’s ideas. One seemed to be an attempt to modernize Kirby’s formatting. Sprinkled in among the pages were bad attempts at Neal Adam’s style jagged panels. The results were jarring. Stan Lee provided some of his most pretentious dialogue in order to add grandeur to the tale. Stan wanted to add gravitas to the story. The results were laughable. Kirby compromised as well as did Stan and the finished product was fairly good, not great, but a solid piece of work from these two old war horses. Interesting to note that Kirby’s Golden girl seems more modeled after the buxom, curvaceous Loni Anderson rather than the slim svelte Olivia Newton-John; a much better choice in my mind.

Previous – 23. Why Did The Fourth World Fail? | Top | Next – 25. Animated

Previous – 22. Allegory Of His Life | Contents | Next – 24. Once More Into The Breach

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

WHY DID THE FOURTH WORLD FAIL?

Actually this is somewhat of a misnomer; the Fourth World books did not fail. The characters and worlds that Jack Kirby created are still alive and ever-present in the current DC continuity, and comic reality. Darkseid is at the top of DC’s villain pantheon. Yet it is obvious that the original series did not make the immediate impression necessary for DC to continue them. So while I can’t label them a failure, they certainly weren’t a rousing success either.

Much has been made- and very little convincingly-that for some unexplained reason, Carmine Infantino undercut Kirby’s series. The suggestion is that Infantino, in some Machiavellian scheme had simply hired Jack Kirby away from Marvel with the mistaken impression that without Kirby, Marvel would fold.

How absurd! First, Carmine and Jack were longtime friends before and after Kirby’s tenure at DC. Carmine had personally sought out and hired Kirby, giving Jack an unprecedented four books to tell his tales, and DC had followed through with a huge advertising blitz spotlighting Kirby’s new books; hardly the action of an editor and company who cared not if Kirby succeeded.

As for sabotaging Marvel, Carmine was an editor; his job was to sell books, not work behind the scenes trying to undermine the competition. At the time that Kirby left Marvel he was doing two monthly books and the occasional filler strip; less than one twentieth of Marvels output, no one could imagine that his leaving Marvel would cause irreparable damage to them.

Editors have to answer to owners and bean counters; they don’t cancel books that are profitable, but they might cancel a borderline seller if they think the creator might have better sales with a different concept. Not so different from Stan Lee transferring Jim Steranko from the poor selling Agent of SHIELD, to the better selling Captain America. Carmine didn’t fire Kirby, he simply shifted him in another direction in the hopes that the next idea might be the blockbuster title he so wanted. I see no evidence that there was any personal animosity or political intrigue behind what happened to Kirby, just an editor doing what editors do–right or wrong.

Now saying this, I am intrigued that just after Kirby left DC, they began bringing back some of the Fourth World characters, more intermingled in the regular DC continuity. But I think that might have happened anyway, copyrights demand that a concept be used periodically and it’s not unusual for dormant characters to be returned to active duty for a short period and then return to the trash bin. It happened with some of Ditko’s characters created just before Kirby came to DC. Plus there was a regime change just after Kirby left and Carmine was gone and new editors took over. It’s possible that they saw the sales figures and compared to what DC was than selling, those figures looked good.

I have come to the conclusion that Kirby’s Fourth World series failed for five specific reasons; four were industry changes beyond Kirby’s and Carmine’s control, and a fifth that Kirby might have changed but it would have gutted any sense of grandeur and “epicness” from the concept.

The first reason was simple bad timing. The comic industry was caught in one of its cyclical downswings, and nowhere was this more evident than DC. DC was hemorrhaging! Stan Lee and the boys had produced a new generation of readers to whom DC had become anathema. Marvel Zombies didn’t do DC. In some ways Jack’s past success at Marvel prevented him from growing a new crop of readers. It was around this time that Marvel’s total sales eclipsed DC’s, and DC’s continued falling. DC was gasping and even Kirby couldn’t overcome the perception.

Nothing that Infantino tried since he became editor had worked; despite artistic and writing changes, many longtime series such as Green Lantern, Aquaman and the Atom had reached bottom and were jettisoned. And none of the myriad new series, despite quality work from such artists as Steve Ditko, Neal Adams and Bernie Wrightson had caught on; in fact, it was rare for them to last more than 6-7 issues.

DC of the early ‘70’s was much like the comic industry of today; nothing they tried caught the public’s fancy and the editorial turmoil meant that the editors had to show immediate results or they and the series got canned. There simply was no time for a series to grow organically, steadily building a hardcore following with new readers joining with each issue. The results had to be immediate and overwhelming, so instead of new concepts, they simply retold and packaged the popular characters in new books

But to Jack’s credit, his series did last longer than most. Perhaps Kirby did have a core constituency that followed him–not large enough to guarantee success, but large enough to try to build on. Perhaps Carmine felt that with some fine tuning the series had a chance The Deadman issues of Forever People and the makeover of Mister Miracle from Apokolyptian palace intrigue into a typical super-hero strip may have been attempts to widen their appeal, especially among the many die-hard DC fans who had resisted the Kirbyization of DC.

Either way, DC of the early ‘70s was a black hole even Kirby’s cosmic light couldn’t escape; which brings us to reason #2.

When Marvel finally got out from under the yoke of DC’s distribution company in 1968, they embarked on a program of expansion that would see them go from fewer than 20 titles to over 40 in two years and upwards of 60 by the mid-Seventies; first by increasing their super-hero line, than by adding sword and sorcery and horror titles and then romance and westerns. But most of all they flooded the market with reprint titles. In a normal market this possibly would not have had any effect on Kirby’s Fourth World titles, but this wasn’t a normal market. While Marvel was expanding their line, the retail reality was that the outlets were either maintaining the same space or cutting back due to smaller profit margins, which meant that new titles had to fight for space like never before. This same thing happened after World War 2 with the easing of paper restrictions the companies glutted the stands, with the result that many new titles were returned unopened or got pushed to the side in favor of better known quantities. If one ran a mom and pop store and were faced with carrying only 50 titles from among 5-6 companies, you naturally would choose the fifty most popular, or at least well-known titles. Mister Miracle had to fight with Spider-man, FF, Batman, Superman and the other long-time favorites for decreasing space in a shrinking market. It’s no wonder that new series failed much more often than succeeded. Outside of large markets, just finding these titles was a major battle. This flooding of the market was an old stratagem of Martin Goodman’s; in fact it was his usual m.o. when he controlled his own distribution. It should have come as no surprise that as soon as he had the chance he would revert to old ways. The big change was that Marvel had become a big fish and his glutting was killing DC, the largest fish.

Reason #3 may be Martin Goodman’s final stroke of genius. As revenues from advertising declined (due to the shrinking market) the companies felt the need to raise the cover price. DC decided to jump from 15 cents all the way to 25cents, while enlarging their books with low cost reprints. Two months later Marvel followed suit making their titles a similar 25cents. But after one month, Marvel reduced the price down to 20cents and shrunk their size back down to 20 pages, giving the impression that they were reducing the price while in reality they were raising the price for a smaller package.

What this did was allow Marvel to offer a larger percent to the dealers giving the retailers more profit for the same size book, and more of an incentive to push Marvel’s titles. So not only were Kirby’s new books fighting for actual space in a shrinking market, the dealers were actively pushing the competitor’s goods for a few cent’s more an issue. Plus, the kids could get more titles for their buck; a win-win for Marvel.

This changeover happened about the time of the fourth issue of the main titles, At a time when the books were desperately looking for new readers, the retailers had another reason to either not order the books, or to minimize the amount and the prominence of the titles. The really sad part is how long it took for DC to react to this maneuver. The 25 centers lasted about nine months before they were reduced to 20 cents. By this time the Kirby titles sales had dropped as had all of DC’s books, and the writing was on the wall. Some have charged that Goodman’s ploy was sleazy, but it wasn’t Goodman’s actions, but DC’s inaction that hurt so much. Just as today, these behind the scene industry games point out just how little quality matters if the product can’t get to market, which brings us to another aspect that actually may have been the most damaging to Kirby’s series.

#4 was serious. With the huge proliferation of Marvel’s reprint books, Kirby’s new DC books were in direct competition with Kirby’s old Marvel books. From the very beginning of Jack’s DC tenure, Marvel actually had more Kirby covers and more Kirby pages published each month than did DC. So for any new or casual reader, which was still the lifeblood of the industry, the appearance was that Jack Kirby was still pumping out titles for Marvel, on popular characters, at a cheaper price. If one accepts the premise that a new generation of comic readers occurs every five years, these reprint books were just as new and topical as the Fourth World books.

For examples, let’s look at certain periods. Between Oct 1970 when Kirby’s first DC book appeared and Feb, 1971 when the New Gods and Forever People started, Marvel released 25 books with Kirby work, and 10 sporting Kirby covers, that’s 3 DC books as compared to 25 Marvel books. In the next two months, Feb. and March 1971 when New Gods, Mister Miracle and Forever People hit the stands, Marvel countered with 13 books and 6 covers. This makes a total of 38 books and 16 covers for Marvel as opposed to 7 new books by DC; over a 5-to-1 ration just when the new books sought to make their most dramatic impact.

August and September of 1971, when DC introduced the new 25cent format, Kirby did 4 books for DC, while Marvel released 10 books with 6 covers; over twice the output, at a lower price, and usually with well known characters as opposed to new untested and untried characters.

An esteemed editor for Marvel told me that these policies were not aimed at Kirby, and I think I agree. Of course that editor was not there when these occurred, and I think it’s possible for an objective person to look at the data and come to the opposite conclusion. Either way, the negative results for Kirby’s new books were just a sad collateral damage inflicted by the larger comic industry wars.

Let’s look at the data for the complete run of the Fourth World books.

Not counting the last 7 issues of Mister Miracle, which veered away from the Fourth World format, we have 48 titles for DC against 106 titles for Marvel, over a 2 to 1 ratio for the life of the series.

In the months immediately prior to Kirby leaving Marvel, there were three reprint titles regularly spotlighting Kirby work; Two active (Where Creatures Roam, Where Monsters Dwell) and one on hiatus (Marvel’s Greatest Comics) Within four months of Kirby starting at DC, the number had swollen to seven. The previous three (Marvel’s Greatest Comics had restarted) , two new titles (Fear, Special Marvel Edition) and two old series downgraded to reprints (X-Men, Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD) The timing coinciding with Kirby’s new releases does sound more than coincidental.

Within 6 months another two series would be retrofitted and highlight Kirby reprints. (Monsters On The Prowl, Creatures On The Loose) plus 7 super-hero Annuals (FF, Thor, Avengers, Hulk, X-Men, Iron Man, and Captain America) would feature Kirby reprints with 3 sporting Kirby covers.

To new customers, those known quantities must have been preferable to chancing an unknown one. It actually got worse later in Kirby’s stay at DC. In 1973, Marvel would unleash a third wave of reprint titles including such series as Marvel Double Feature, Marvel Spectacular, SHIELD, Tomb Of Darkness, Human Torch, and Journey Into Mystery, in addition to the continuing titles such as Marvel’s Greatest Comics, Marvel Super Heroes, Special Marvel Edition, and Mighty Marvel Western, all frequently featuring Kirby covers and stories. There was never a time in Kirby’s 5 year stay at DC, that Marvel wasn’t publishing more Kirby work. This was the problem that Dick Ayers had fought about so incessantly. With reprints, the artist was basically in competition with himself, without the benefit of getting paid for one half of the work.

The fifth reason I feel the Fourth World books failed was that Kirby extended himself and his talent too far. His tale was told over four separate, yet interrelated books, forcing the buyer to spend too much. It was very hard for anyone to casually pick up an issue and understand who the characters were, where the plot was going and what was the central theme. The cast was so large and overwhelming with new characters jumping in and out at the oddest times. The books had a strange non-linear plotline, one never knew where one issue fit into the others. The idea of picking up a new book, enjoying it, and tracking down back issues was not yet plausible, so the readers needed a scorecard to keep track of what was going on previously. While in retrospect, these features highlight just how far ahead of the curve Jack was, at the time it must have been off-putting to the readers used to short self-contained stories with a small cast and no overarching interconnected plot. At a time when the casual reader was still the bread and butter of the industry, Kirby’s extended epic format was too unwieldy and sprawling. It was just too large an undertaking at that time.

Kirby’s talent as a writer has been a topic of much debate. One side claiming that Kirby’s dialogue was very weak. Some use the term stilted and awkward, saying that compared to Stan Lee’s words, Kirby’s were odd and out of place. Kirby did have his own voice, often bombastic, out of date, and in your face. Kirby lacked grace and subtlety. This continued over at Marvel where many complained bout Kirby’s voices in his later Marvel work. I personally don’t have a problem with Kirby’s dialogue—nobody says that aliens and super-heroes must sound like poetry and songbirds. My problem was that I often found Kirby’s plots and continuity lacking. He was always so full of ideas that he would include them without explanatory accompaniment and a sense of timing that made them more natural and less jarring. There was too much on the plate at times. The New Gods offered too much in too little time. Stan Lee often told Jack to spread out his ideas better and make the others more fully realized. The Black Racer is target #1 for me. A good idea perhaps that came at the wrong time.

It is interesting that later, when Kirby returned to the typical self contained, small cast adventure format with Kamandi, he would have that long running success that Infantino hoped for, but it was too little, too late. By then, Kirby felt betrayed and resentful, his epic had been cut short and while he enjoyed doing Kamandi, it was not where he had envisioned his career at DC to be.

So were they a failure? Yes and no; not everything that Kirby had hoped but more than Infantino ever dreamed. If one deems them a failure, don’t look for scapegoats or conspiracies; there aren’t any. It was a simple case of the stars being aligned against them: A new style series, at a struggling company during a shrinking market, overpowered by a shrewd competitor. It’s a wonder that the series lasted as long as it did. But as usual, Kirby left the company with a treasure trove of characters and concepts that are still in play today.

Previous – 22. Allegory Of His Life | Top | Next – 24. Once More Into The Breach

Previous – 21. Brand New World | Contents | Next – 23. Why Did The Fourth World Fail?

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

ALLEGORY OF HIS LIFE

But what was it all about?

“There came a time when the old gods died! The brave died with the cunning! The noble perished, locked in battle with unleashed evil!” New Gods #1

Thus Jack Kirby launched his most personal opus. A wonderfully evocative phrase, full of both horror, and promise, for when something ends, something new must emerge.

But just what was Jack Kirby‘s new epic about? Kirby called it a novel about “ourselves”, a visualization of modern man seen through the milieu of the fantasy artist. Utilizing the symbolism and concepts of the super hero genre, to idealize, and entertain, yet at its heart, it was a history lesson, Jack Kirby’s history. Part biography, part subjective observation, but mostly, a sly treatise of 20th Century sociopolitical history as deep and true as any written by scholars steeped in academics and PHD’s.

“The New Gods was my own attempt to create a comic book epic, and this I did. I used four books in which to do it…I filled it with a cast and creations that were highly innovative for the period, and I tried to be as creative as I could. I used the young people of the times, the times themselves became the backdrop of my stories.”

In the manner of Swift, and Twain, Kirby took an art form founded in entertainment, and low expectation, and transformed it into something unique, “graphic allegory”, in fact, I call this “Allegory of his life”.

One has to wonder, knowing Kirby’s haphazard approach to telling stories if Jack had the wherewithal to scope out a story so connectedly. His m. o. was usually one story at a time and let it come to him organically as he sits at the board. I doubt if he purposefully sat down and outlined it straight through, obviously as we are told of how Black Racer came about, he didn’t. But I do think that with the time he had before DC gave him the go ahead that Jack had a basic cohesive structure to the tale. The latter historical type issues seem to have been conceived and executed to tie things into a neater package and the back history might have been subconscious and just a part of Jack’s psyche. But it’s too intertwined to be a coincidence.

“I’ve noticed that throughout the years, each civilization had its own historical facts, its own historical legends, and its own historical ways of storytelling. I began to ask myself the question of “What were the ingredients of our own storytelling- of the storytelling we see today all about us, in the various materials that we read?” With comics as my vehicle for telling a story, I began to set down the kind of thoughts that were common to the period in which I was raised. You’ll find that the elements are mixed, but they have validity and they have the potency of truth.”

The best allegories work on many levels, the big picture, the personal picture, and as entertainment.

So what do Kirby’s opening lines have to do with his life? Jacob Kurtzberg was born in a period marked by the end of “old gods” Gone were the Czars, the Archdukes, and Kaisers, left powerless were the Kings, and Emperors, whose legacy of absolute authority had stretched for centuries. The age of the feudal gods, lording over personal territories had for all intents and purposes ended. This was Kirby’s birthright.

On a more personal level, in 1970, Jack had just ended a period highlighted by the creation of a universe populated with Gods, and gods. What better way to show the break from his personal past to a new chapter than to literally “kill the old gods”? Few were the readers who didn’t “get” the irony in this audacious beginning. The splash page of New God’s #1 echoes a page Kirby did in the Tales of Asgard stories concerning Ragnarok—the end of the gods.

The next part of Kirby’s opening tells of a…”Final moment came with the fatal release if indescribable power—which tore the home of the old gods asunder—split it in great halves”

When World War 1 ended, the socio-political landscape had been turned asunder. And from the resulting chaos, the world split into two ever-conflicting political spheres, two ideological philosophies at odds with each other. Rule by the people vs. rule by the state. Democracy vs. the ‘isms; one side led by freely elected leaders, the other by the philosophical dictators of Fascism, Communism, Nazism, and Militarism.

Some might say that my description is simplistic, maybe even jingoistic, that the differences between the two sides is far more complicated and nuanced than I make it out. I agree, but this was Kirby’s viewpoint. I don’t think he would make those types of distinctions. His was a more simplistic nature, Nazis were bad, Americans were good. Commies were bad, though he might not be able to say exactly why. He knew of the gulags, he knew of the Berlin Wall, and he knew that they were anti-religious. He didn’t need much more to make up his mind.

Personally, Kirby’s life had always been divided into two camps. Have’s vs. have nots, swells v regular Joe’s, tall v. short, boss v worker, good v evil. Why should Kirby view the larger universe any differently?

Jack Kirby, in his most dramatic fashion boiled it down to its essential. “The fatal release of indescribable power….which tore the home of the old gods asunder…split it in great halves” “In the end there were two giant molten bodies, spinning slow and barren…clean of all that had gone before” He then shows how the two new bodies evolved, one, New Genesis, into a world of light, and enlightenment. Orion calls it “a true place of peace!” where individuals are encouraged to fulfill their own destinies. The other, a demons pit called Apokolips, ruled by an iron fist, and the population, little more than worker drones in service to the state. Never has this concept been more visually powerful, than the contrast between the colorful utopia of New Genesis vis-à-vis the gray, barren, smoke belching pits of Apokolips.

“My conjecture- which is part of good storytelling, I think- still had to do with good and evil, and therefore I contrived an evil world with an evil family, and a good world with a good family.”

Did not World War 2 end in a sudden burst of light and energy, and the victors soon divide the spoils into 2 different worlds?

In Kirby’s personal life, isn’t this how Kirby described the latter years at Marvel where he was treated as one of the cogs in the corporate structure? The new owners who had no idea what he had done for the previous regime, treating him like any other artist in their service. Until in a sudden burst of energy, DC freed him from the drudgery. Didn’t he feel that his new position at DC afforded him a chance to be in control of his own creations and destiny, as compared to his time with Marvel where his creations were taken from him and controlled by the dictates of his corporate superiors? Though this may be overly dramatic, we do know that the loss of control of his characters was paramount among the reasons for Kirby leaving Marvel. Kirby’s view of Marvel had become an “us against them” situation. As an aside, unfortunately, DC was not to prove all that “free” where Kirby’s creations were concerned.

From this historical epilogue, Kirby now shows us the world of 1970,a modern world, where a warrior is sent to an unlikely planet to stop the spread of evil by the Deadly Darkseid. The planet Earth has been chosen as the “third world” upon which New Genesis and Apokolips would wage one of their skirmishes in a Cosmic cold war? In the real world, the West and East were locked in an indirect skirmish of their own, our soldiers sent to a small insignificant patch of land called Viet Nam, one in a long list of indirect battles between democracy and Communism known as the Cold War. Jack had jumped forward to a world well recognized by the readers, a battle raging not of our making, and we are helpless to end it.

Kirby, realizing he must first and foremost also tell a riveting adventure builds his suspense by hinting at what happened between the birth of these two great worlds and the cold war that exists today. By not telling it linearly, he allows all the participants little secrets and big secrets that push the tension and draw in the reader He hints at a prior conflict and some unholy maneuver that presents the parties from direct contact. When Kirby does get around to telling the story of Highfather’s and Darkseid’s rise to power, he fills in a history that was all too real for him and mankind in the Forties.

The prior war between New Genesis and Apokolips begins when a small raiding party from Apokolips, led by the Germanic Steppenwolf, attacks an unsuspecting New Genesis couple, killing the woman. We find that this attack was actually suggested by the more cunning Darkseid, in an effort to start a wider war. Did not World War 2 start when the forces of Germany attacked and captured several neighboring countries, all with the backing and connivance of the Soviet Union.

It turns out that Darkseid has actually planned the raid and the man thought killed survives. Izaya the warrior than sets his troops upon the soldiers of Steppenwolf and thus a great war is begun. This war goes back and forth as technology and counter technologies take their bloody toll. When the scientists of New Genesis create a”planet killer” bomb called the Impacter, Darkseid realizes that the continuance of the war is futile, so he asks for a truce. Izaya in horror over the destruction being caused flees into the wilderness until he comes across a great stone monolith. Izaya screams in defiance “If I am Izaya the Inheritor—what is my inheritance? And in a great blast from a fiery hand, the answer comes—The Source. Knowing further battle is futile, Izaya accepts Darkseid’s proposal of a truce.

Though not exact, the parallels between this and WW2 are easy to spot. The two sides battle to an ever increasing mutual destruction until the Allies create a planet killer of their own. After the destruction of Hiroshima, Japan sues for peace. In reality the atomic bomb did end the war with one side victorious, but history has shown that dropping the bomb was as much to signal the Soviet Union to cease aggression and hostilities as it was to defeat Japan. And in reality, the bomb only increased the Soviet will to control.

At Potsdam, the combined forces meet to carve up the remains of Europe. To settle differences between the feuding sides, a Pact is proposed where Germany would be cut up and divided between the nations. Each must give in a little to get something. Thus is achieved a shaky peace.

In Kirby’s tale, he simply changes the exchange of land into the more Biblical and literarily dramatic exchange of sons, but the result is the same; a cessation of hostilities and a promise to maintain their own secure areas. By compromising and allowing some to live under a despot so that some could live under the banner of freedom, the larger war was averted. But just as Kirby railed against Chamberlain’s acquiescence at Munich, Highfather knew that the Pact could never last. It is the nature of the despot to seek to expand their influence over the rest. It was just a matter of time before an attempt into the neutral territories would create tensions and open conflict result.

“Good and evil are always in contention, and each will forever try to cancel out the other. This lies behind the path we all tread. We live our lives out making the decisions that will clear up the dividing line between good and evil.”

This brings us back to the present day stories of the Fourth World where we see that the cold war between New Genesis and Apokolips has expanded into a neutral territory, the planet Earth. Darkseid had kidnapped some humans in the hope of finding the anti-life equation, and Orion of New Genesis is sent to stop him, and the fate of Earth is insignificant. Yet they do not face each other directly. Not unlike Korea, Viet Nam, Cambodia, and other small countries caught in the philosophical war between the East and the West. One side makes a move and the other side must retaliate in an endless chess match cycle that eventually destroys the host country.

In an allegory, many times people are merely symbols of real people, events, places or concepts. This humanization gives them form and depth with which we can easily recognize and react in the manner that the author wishes us to.

“There’s got to be a variety of characters in order to make clear and evaluate your own social values. So I had my own cast.”

As was common at the time, almost any mention of a cruel dictator would raise the specter of Adolph Hitler, and Kirby’s tale was no different. Jack often spiced these stories with Nazi codewords and quotes. But Darkseid in my opinion wasn’t a Hitler. Steppenwolf was the standin for Hitler, and like Hitler died at the end of the middle war. Drakseid was much more philosophical and Machiavellian than Hitlers’ straightforward boorishness. Steppenwolf was the fist in the face, while Darkeid was the shiv in the back. He reminds me more of Joseph Stalin, and the network of Soviet duplicity, and it seems that Kirby’s references are more Soviet style despotism than Hitler’s nationalistic fervor. Hitler was trying to raise Germany, while Stalin’s evil was much more personal and ideological. Nowhere do we get the feeling that Darkseid cared one whit for Apokolips and its people, they were simply cattle for the slaughter in the service of Darkseid himself. He didn’t want land, or wealth, he wants control of the very thought process of his subjects, this strikes me as more in line with the way Kirby would view Communism. When Khrushchev said “we will bury you” he wasn’t talking militarily, he was talking from a rot emanating from our insides; the destruction not of our homes but our way of life and philosophy of freedom and independence. This is a big difference between Darkseid and Kirby’s other great megalomaniac Dr. Doom. Even Dr. Doom had a soft spot for his beloved Latveria.

“Darkseid is what we mean when we say “the powers that be”; not satanic, not merely the devil. He is what we mean when we say “them” but what we really mean is “us”. Darkseid is what happens when everybody is asleep. Darkseid catches you off guard; he isn’t reckless he is far from being a raving lunatic with his finger on the trigger. In fact, he is just the opposite. He is the perfect rational man that we put into power because we are either too lazy to pay attention or we’re too occupied to worry about such details.”

Though Jack did pepper his tales with Nazi allusions, such as comparing DeSaad’s Happyland camp to the Nazi concentration camps, the actual methods used were more similar to the mind breaking techniques used in Korea or the Soviet gulag system. The idea was to break the will and spirit more than the body.

In allegories it’s not always easy to pigeonhole every actor and point to his real life counterpart-either a person or a country or a concept. Darkseid is easy, we all recognize the bad guy and the role he plays, Kirby said think of him as “the dark side of the moon.” Good guys are sometimes more nuanced. Does Orion represent a specific country or person or concept? I don’t think so, he is clearly the hero, but he is an imperfect hero. He doesn’t represent the American way of life, his calling is more emotional than patriotic, though I do think Kirby saw America as an imperfect concept. Orion was a junkyard dog, complete with floppy ears and a snarl. He is a warrior born, not one forced by circumstance. He shares aspects with the East European freedom fighters, in that he came from a place of madness and wants to get out. His battles are internal, a rage boils in him and he can only control it thru a mechanical construct. His battle is a search for identity, to see just where he really fits in, the fight to reconcile his opposing natures without flying apart. He is one of Kirby’s more complicated characters, there are no easy answers. But his instincts are good and he knows right from wrong. Through the years many of Kirby’s heroes have been aspects of Kirby himself. Is Orion part Jack Kirby? the battler fighting to get out? Perhaps somewhat, but not so one can clearly say he is Kirby personified. Maybe he was Jack’s father.

“Orion is your old man. He was half monster and half good guy. How many scars does your old man come home with at the end of his day’s work? Orion is a reflection of that. A guy who was scarred, but wouldn’t show you.”

He does share inner rages with Jack, but from different sources. Perhaps Orion’s warrior face is Kirby trying to show the messiness of war. His way of letting people know that war can’t be prettied up and made palatable. As Robert E. Lee said “It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it.”

“The key element of my story was Orion, who left his evil world to find his true roots, which were embedded in the planet of Highfather. “….Orion went to the place he thought he belonged, and he tried to find the people to whom he really meant something” “…I believe, in every person. There comes an inner explosion which gives us the strength of ten; and nobody is prepared for that-even Darkseid.”

Orion’s constant companion was Lightray; as brash, exuberant and optimistic as Orion was sullen and dour. Lightray was Kirby’s ode to unbridled enthusiasm and hope. He had an innocent and trusting spirit. His job was to show the other side to Orion and offer another choice away from Darkseid. Darkseid hated his cheerfulness and optimism. Lightray was the angel of our better nature Lincoln espoused.

“Lightray, of course is a light-hearted character, and enjoyed life; and we see people like that every day. They cause no harm, and they devise and make use of all the wonderful diversions that lighten our lives. What they can’t find for amusement, they will create for amusement. They will not live their lives in vain; they will try to enjoy life.”

Highfather is another interesting character. First seen as the warrior king Izaya, he makes a Biblical trek into the wilderness and returns the philosophical leader with a direct connection to the well of knowledge known as the Source. The graphics are straight out of Cecil B DeMille’s Ten Commandments. The black hair and beard now turned white and the long flowing robes and shepard’s staff of a flock leader- a Moses. The Source is shown as a flaming hand much like the one that wrote the commandments. He, more than any character, was Kirby’s vision of goodness. But he was not perfect, which reflects Kirby’s Jewish roots. The Jewish kings were always presented as good, but flawed.

“Highfather is our conception of a being who gives us our total goodness, and of course that being comes with many names, in many languages on our own earth. Highfather- the opposite of Darkseid–receives Orion, who is his own true son. Of course that heightens the situation and makes it ready for adventure.”

Does that make Highfather a rabbi? Perhaps to some extent, but I see him as more of a warrior king like David or Saul. He definitely draws from Kirby’s religious nature, but Highfather was not a weak, pacifistic Mahatma Ghandi type, no, he was more of a Jefferson, secure in the knowledge that “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” Highfather knew and understood war, and he didn’t flinch from his duties, and that was to send Orion into the dragons’ mouth.

“..but, as good as he is, Highfather is betrayed by his own overconfidence that peace is everlasting. Like Prime Minister Chamberlain. Highfather learns that wisdom and kindness are not always good positions to keep in the face of a mortal enemy. Highfather failed his own people because he could not conceive that Darkseid would go to war again. In his mind a pact is a pact, but to Darkseid, it is a means to accomplish an end.

I think if Highfather symbolizes any one thing, it is that man can rise above his barbarian/warrior persona and become unto a God, but it must be thru a rite of passage that leads him to faith and goodness; perhaps a little Franklin Roosevelt battling thru paralysis to become an inspirational leader. Only one person in the Fourth World saga actually had direct contact with the Source, while others, such as the evil Darkseid, and the faithless Metron were stopped from reaching the Source by a barrier. Is this Kirby’s way of saying that power and knowledge have limits and the next step can only be achieved through absolute faith? Is this not the most basic tenet of most religions? Unfortunately Highfather was never fleshed out by Kirby so he remains unfinished in my mind.

Into this dysfunctional family is thrown a fourth element, the son of Highfather given over to Darkseid to raise as his own. Scott Free is man’s eternal desire to be free. He has a love of freedom that no ideology can bend to its will. This is the power that would bring down the Berlin Wall piece by piece. This is the strength of will that all dictators know must be tamped down and destroyed if they are to hold power. His is the purity of consciousness that draws people to him, and transforms evil and doubt into purpose.

“Mister Miracle, the magician, became his own magic. He was the one Orion was traded for, and he would never be the kind of character Darkseid would ever consider an ally.”

Himon is another iconic creation; part liberator, part mentor, part revolutionary. As a liberator, he seems to mirror the brave religious underground of Central Europe who helped ferry people under the bridges and around the barb wire. He was the hope that springs from religion at its most basis level. And the fervor with which Darkseid’s troops track him remind me of the fear that faith can undo despots and tyranny. Kirby uses a similar setting when Wonderful Willik tells the lowlies that “they have cornered a worm among you.(Himon) “eating at your lives and spirit and meritorious work.” Note the connection between spirit and work and remember that Communists believed that man was fulfilled only thru work and that religion was an “opiate of the masses” that dulled their enthusiasm and destroyed free will. Kirby seemed to be reaching for a Judeo-Christian vibe in the Himon story. Himon is shown as being pacifistic in his response to attempts at executing him. He never physically fights back, he simply vanishes. When Himon takes Scott to his den the group image resembles the Last Supper of Christ, even to the point of having Kreetin (a great name) deny his allegiance to Himon- much like Peter of Christ- after Himon is captured and led away to be tried. . Is this a real intent of Kirby the Jew, or simply dramatic license? The mentor aspect is easier. Himon plays a large part in Scott Free’s life, he encourages the kids to blossom and seek their freedom, and it is Himon that shows them the path to hope. How similar in nature to how Jack Kirby described his mentor, Harry Slonaker.

“He thought that if he gave kids responsibility it would give them hope, and there was so little hope then.”. “We learned responsibility. For the first time it was in our own hands, and we learned how to deal with it.”

How similar to Himon’s last words to Scott Free. “If he leaves Apokolips, he will find the universe.” Revolutionary in that he taught the children of his coven that there was a different life available, but they would have to fight for it, and he taught them how to create the machinery needed for this fight, not of the warlord but of the mystic and dreamers as seen in Aurelie’s “mind-video” that allows her to dance and play. Himon says that “Auralie’s thoughts are beautiful! She creates beauty! Imagine doing this on a world like Apoklips. Himon knows that to defeat tyranny one must first free his or her own mind of evil ideas. John Lennon said it best “You tell me it’s the institution Well, you know, You better free you mind instead”

There is a cryptic side to Himon. Several times he bemoans the fact that he somehow created Darkseid, or at least the factors that led to his rise. “I fostered Darkseid’s power! I must be here at its end” was just one example. Kirby never showed a specific connection between the two so we can only speculate as to what he meant. I wonder if this was Kirby’s way of acknowledging that the factors that led to Communism were noble, and no one could have seen that it would be much worse than the rule of the Czars. The people who overthrew the Czar wanted freedom just as much as any other people. Was there a back story that would show that Darkseid’s family came to power when Himon and the people overthrew another evil dynasty? I don’t know.

Himon was also a wonderful foil to the cold calculating Metron, Even the physical differences where Himon is soft and cuddly vs. the icy Metron’s angular and rigid form. Metron was one of Kirby’s unemotional observer archetype, but he was more, he was science run amok. He was the fear that science was moving so fast that we could no longer control our human side. Metron was amoral- he cared not which side he was making weapons for, or what the consequences. Metron was based on the cold aloof Dr. Robert Oppenheimer, director of the Manhattan Project who once famously said; “When you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb.” To Metron the time to worry was after the barn door was opened. Yet Kirby was also aware that for humanity to grow, Metron’s knowledge was essential, so Highfather kept him close, and somewhat restrained. Eisenhower’s Military Industrial complex speech might be a good example of Kirby’s concern. Metron was also Jack Kirby’s unending search for answers; he always turned to Metron when highlighting the philosophical/spiritual context for the Fourth World. Robby Reed, on his essential blog “Dial B for Blog”-now at 600 posts– took this Metron as Kirby idea even further.

The Newsboy Legionnaires remind me of Jack the person, but the character who reminds me most of Jack the visionary artist is METRON of the New Gods. It might seem strange to say that — but think about it. Metron is a man who sits in a chair that can go anywhere in time and space. Isn’t that just like JACK KIRBY sitting at his drawing table, on his own private “mobius chair”?

The resemblance grows stronger if you know that Jack did a sort of prototype for Metron’s Mobius Chair in Alarming Tales #2, November 1957, in a story called “Donnegan’s Daffy Chair.” In this story, Donnegan is a janitor who borrows a “daffy” magical chair that takes him flying far beyond earth, and into outer space.

As you can see below, Donnegan is a dead ringer for young Jack Kirby, and his “daffy” chair comes complete with its own built-in mini drawing board! Metron should consider adding one to HIS chair. Or at least a seat belt.

So you see, Jack Kirby IS alot like Metron! When Jack sat on his chair, pencil in hand, he could travel anywhere and everywhere. And, as we all know, Jack Kirby not only “could” — Jack Kirby DID!

Wherever his characters went, Jack went there first in his imagination. He knew those people first. When he put them down, they had already lived, both in his imagination, AND in his own real life. Jack Kirby — THE TRUE ARTIST — used the medium of comic books to envision different periods of his life, creating new worlds each time he refined that vision.

• 

• 

Robby Reed’s favorite action figure

Glorious Godfrey is an enigma. We know he was based on both Billy Graham, and Arthur Godfrey. While Billy Graham was the great evangelical of the middle century, who wheedled his way into the very seats of power-a harbinger of the religious right. Godfrey was the most famous pitchman in America- the man who sold America everything from cigarettes, to shaving cream. A man trusted by the mothers of America because he had a pleasant manner and calm voice. But in reality he had a bad attitude and a penchant for firing on a short fuse. He was also accused of being anti-semitic, though it seems unfounded. Kirby had an innate fear of Christian leaders who sought political power. His view towards Christianity was similar to many elderly Jews. He loved the teachings and the philosophy that are the bedrock of Christ’s teachings, but he feared an organization that once it obtained financial and political power has been easily swayed by the current powers that be. A philosophy too easily swayed to fit into whatever mandate sought by the ruling party. Many Jews remembered how long it took for the Pope to speak out against Hitler, Mussolini, and the holocaust or how easy it was for Southern preachers to find arcane phrases in the Old Testament to buttress the rights of slave holders. Jack seemed to fear that a smooth talker with fanatical religious beliefs might come along and take control; a fear that echoes even today.

Terrible Turpin, is obvious – he is us. A common man who reaches a turning point when he says enough is enough. He is the collateral damage of wars between super powers. He is also the spirit of survival. He is the undying spirit of humanity, as much as Captain America or Sgt. York. In reality he is the fireman running upstairs as the tenants are running down the stairs; the cop on the beat who puts his life on the line everyday, or the soldier who jumps on the grenade to save his buddies. To many, Ben “Terrible” Turpin was Jack Kirby as everyman. It was Kirby who stood up to the cosmic mayhem, just as he did the Nazi’s. Bruce Timm, when animating the Fourth World in the Superman cartoons, spotlighted this idea.

TJKC: Was Ben Turpin based on Jack?

Bruce: Oh, definitely. Absolutely, it was based on Jack. That’s something DC Comics had been doing for a while anyway, using the stuff that Jack created: The Fourth World characters, Intergang, an all that stuff. They’ve really been introducing that stuff in the Superman comics recently. We thought that’s a natural; we love Jack’s stuff anyway. The Turpin character in the comics didn’t look anything like Jack but I decided it would be kind of fun, kind of a little throwaway tribute to Jack, to make the character look like Jack.

“Now no soldier in his right mind would face a battalion of Panzers (German tanks) alone; even one would be suicide, and I just said that like I myself had done it. Some people think I’m crazy, but I never did anything like that, but there were guys who did. You can read about them in history books, and that’s who Turpin is. But still, he is the essential character of all mankind, to stand up against all odds because nobody else would do that job. There’s always one who will, and when we run out of people like that, that’s when we’re all going to be in trouble.”

I should mention Superman, though not a Jack Kirby creation, Jack does involve him into the Fourth World aura. To Jack Superman was not an invulnerable do-gooder standing outside the world looking in. Superman had great powers but to Jack they made him lonely, isolated and questioning as to his rightful place in society. Jack gave him a depth no other artist/writer managed. When asked about his Superman Jack answered.

“The bottom line involves choices.  Neither gods nor humans have ever stood calmly in a minefield forever.  Good or evil, they are bound to choose.  And when they do, you will see the truth of all that motivates us.  As a thinking being, you have the obligation to choose.  If the fate of all mankind were in your hands, what would your decision be? “As a writer and an artist, I’ve drawn my answer.”

I hesitate to mention the Black Racer, but I guess I must. The hesitancy is because I have never figured out what role, what symbolism or what exactly Jack was getting at. Obviously he represents death but what aspect. In other mythical tales death played a role in separating heroes from the rest. Hela took the heroes to Valhalla while sending the rest to Hades. Judeo/Christian myths are similar with a separate heaven and hell. But Jack never shows us any reward in his tales for a valiant and glorious life, or punishment in the hereafter for the evil. Death was as random as it seems in real life. Perhaps Jack was becoming existential in his later years. His battle scenes remind me of a lyric from the Broadway Show “Civil War”.

”And the heroes and the cowards look the same when they have fallen by the gun”.

But I don’t see Jack as existential, he was an optimist, The use of a paraplegic Viet Nam Veteran as the personification of death makes me think that Black Racer was his reaction to seeing the constant rain of dying youth on our TV’s at news hour. The few times we see the Racer offers no clues as to his purpose in the tapestry. He is intriguing but I think I may agree with Mark Evanier when he told Jack that it was a good concept, but probably not at this time. Of course Kirby had his own reasons, and I’m sorry I can’t divine this one; it’s probably a good one. His costume needs to go; a Black skier in medieval armor is too much even for me.

Several players seemed to be fevered images of real people from Kirby’s life. Funky Flashman and House Roy were obvious spoofs of Stan Lee and Roy Thomas, and their evil doing was hucksterism in the service of Darkseid. While some, their natures were revealed just by their names: DeSaad, Vermin Vundabar, the Justifiers, Beautiful Dreamer, Simyan and Mokkari.

From this point on it seems that the stories were observations and morality plays based on Kirby’s response to world events and social currents of change swirling around him. In the very first Jimmy Olsen story Kirby shows us a mysterious Wild Area populated by long haired mystics, and motorcycle thugs, and a wild psychedelic underground government research center conducting crazy experiments. Is this not Kirby responding to the hippies, and counter culture, and the backyard motorcyclists who bothered him incessantly and the scientific research that was changing the landscape, some for the good and sometimes not.

Kirby spends a lot of time detailing the differences in the educational facilities of both New Genesis and Apokolips. New Genesis children are shown outside in a casual almost Platonic setup with flowers and birds and a happy exchange of ideas, while those on Apokolips are shown huddled in the clutches of Granny Goodness, a sadistic warden beating the children into strict obedience and indoctrination into the ways of Darkseid. Many are the stories of the time showing experimental open classes in enlightened US schools as compared to the harsh, Soviet model where children were taken from their parents and trained for specific tasks, and indoctrinated into Communist philosophy. Kirby wasn’t always subtle, his rendition was much more graphic and terrifying, but no less obvious to its template. It should be noted that New Genesis seems more of a hippy flower power commune than a real world cityscape. Perhaps Jack bought into the love, peace and happiness claptrap somewhat. Apokolips for its template think more of the coal pits and slag heaps torn into the side of the West Virginia mountains combined with huge burn pits belching smoke and brimstone into the smog filled Ukrainian rubble.

The control of the media and by its nature the access to knowledge also gets the full Kirby treatment. The first of Darkseid’s fifth columnists was Morgan Edge, who has taken over the Daily Planet and controlled the news network. Several attempts at mind control and Manchurian Candidate style stories appear, only to be defeated by New Genesis’ agents. Kirby even takes on the right wing religious ascension by the likes of Billy Graham and right wing hucksters with characters like Glorious Godfrey and Funky Flashman. The Funky story is also a not so subtle jab at Stan Lee and Roy Thomas. Instances where Jack threw in personal swipes were few but obvious.

Perhaps in response to Israel promoting the role of women in their military, Jack introduced a fighting squad of “female furies”. Led by Kirby’s most intimidating female character Big Barda, an example of East German style chemically induced Olympic athlete. Originally a fighting force for Darkseid, they switched sides and joined Mister Miracle in his battles against Darkseid’s minions. With the likes of dominating Lashina and lunatic Mad Harriet they were as nasty and as formidable as any Kirby military group ever seen. It’s a close call whether it was safer to be a friend or an adversary of this group. They bickered more that the Thing or Torch ever did. Big Barda was Nick Fury in drag, with a body by Jayne Mansfield, a face modeled after songbird Lainie Kazan, and a disposition like Alexander Karelin, she was heads and shoulders above any fighting female drawn by Jack. She was the Goddess Sif, on steroids. Amazingly she didn’t smoke a cigar. Her protectiveness of Scott Free was eerily reminiscent of Roz and her Jackson.

The real female furies of Israel

“Big Barda is the female star of the story, and a girl who is both vital and brave, and has everything we might want to find in the perfect female. I tried to create a female vision of this sort, and I think I found it in Big Barda.”

The antiwar movement received Jack’s attention, not only with the pacifistic Forever People, but in one of Kirby’s best stories. In New Gods #6 entitled the Glory Boat he presents a family broken apart because of the inability of a hawkish father and a peacenik son to unite. Thrown into an Apokoliptian nightmare, the son proves his courage and the father faces his fears in a poignant story faced by many American families with sons hiding in Canada, and thrown in jail for refusing induction into the military. Kirby fought this same battle.

Neal tells of Kirby’s feelings on the Viet Nam war:

“You’d classify him (Jack) as a liberal Democrat. During Vietnam he was very much against the whole thing; right from the start. It was no mystery to anyone in the family how he felt about it. I had some friends over, and we were all watching the draft lottery on TV. He told me. “Listen, if you draw a low number, and want to finish school in Canada we’ll support you 100%.” He didn’t want me to go at all.”

• 

• 

Terrible Turpin aka Jack Kirby – Playing with matches

The sadness and bravery of freedom fighters around the world bent on defying both East and West gets its due in Kirby’s best tale, “The Death Wish of Terrible Turpin” from New Gods #8. It tells of a Metropolis cop who finally can’t take anymore of these two super powered foes battling it out in his town, leaving death and destruction behind them. He says enough is enough and wades in to stop the fight barehanded. Despite his being human and the enemy super powered he holds his own until the battle ends. with Turpin looking much less for wear. His bravery is never maudlin or phony, his rage is understandable and his action laudatory. For once the super powered beings realize that their fight impacts others and not in a good way. Nothing reminds me of this story as much as the photo of a lone Czech patriot standing up to a Soviet tank in the middle of a square. Is there anything more powerful than one person standing up and saying “no more”? The bracketing scenes of Orion spilling his guts to Lightray are gut wrenching and provocative.

The country was burning over a fight for equality, and Kirby had to address it head on.

The East would point to the race problem in America whenever the hypocritical West would belittle the East for the living conditions of its people. In “The Bug” from New Gods #9 Kirby presents a view of New Genesis’ racist underbelly. While the elites live on a beautiful floating city high above the planet, a lowly group of scavengers and worker bees live on the surface. They are hated by the swells in the sky. They live off the refuse from above and one of them yearns to be free and better himself. It is hard to read of Orion and other New Genesians spitting out their hatred for this race, and call for an ethnic cleansing, but Kirby needed to show that no one is 100% good or evil. New Genesis was a planet just like ours populated with people who were super in power but capable of smallness in their hearts. This may even be a nod to the internment of the American Japanese population during World War 2 (including his letterer extraordinaire Ben Oda) and the easy bigotry shown during our fight to free other people bent and broken by prejudice and bigotry. Surely Kirby’s pride as a Jew helped him out during his darkest hours in Europe.

The art ranks right at the top of Kirby’s long career. He used the whole canvas, the backgrounds and the location scenes were astonishingly dazzling. His machinery, especially in Mister Miracle was awesome to behold. His characters had mass, and depth. There doesn’t seem to be any throw-away panels, every inch is used to tell the story. Jack took a new interest in fashions, where all too often during his Marvel days Kirby would fall back on drawing fashions from the Forties, Kirby seems determined to keep these series topical and up to date. When he does do a throw back, such as Terrible Turpin, and his derby, it seems like a perfect choice for the old-school personality of the bulldog policeman. His characters had the ability to shock you, yet still remain true to their nature. In the final issue of New Gods, while Kalibak and Orion are fighting, we see Darkseid watching from afar. When he realizes that DeSaad has unfairly assisted Kalibak, Darkseid confronts him and in his anger wishes DeSaad out of existence. Is this Paternal feelings or just a semblance of fair play from deep within his evil bowels, we really don’t know. Perhaps it is simply that Darkseid can’t abide someone else playing god. That is reserved for Darkseid alone. Whatever the reason, it shows another side to his evil. Kirby explained that this new found depth came about because the story propelled him to new heights. Kirby’s background characters and figures took on greater importance and energy.

“In the New Gods, (short hand for all the titles) I became aware of the amount of detail that was important in telling the story. By detail, I mean environmental detail, background detail, the crowds, the buildings, the feeling for the times. In doing so, I found my drawings tightening. I found my drawings becoming more illustrative and better than I’d ever done them before. I have the New Gods to thank for that.”

The one overarching problem with talking about the Fourth World is that Kirby never had a chance to finish it. The Hunger Dogs, done much later seems too slapdash and cartoony to me to be of real help. It doesn’t even deal with Scott Free, and Metron and the Forever People and the fate of so many others. Could Kirby have worked out the anti-climatic fall of Communism of the Soviet Union to fit his need for a climatic ending for an adventure tale? Could he envision Darkseid acknowledging defeat due to failure of his philosophical convictions? Would Intergang, and the other thugs go underground like the Russian mafia? This is of course a weakness in making people symbols of philosophies; an individual can easily adapt and accept change, ideologies can’t.

It’s really hard to overstate the role that the immediate times played on the tapestry that Kirby was weaving. The social upheaval and the scientific changes occurring almost daily was the fodder that kept Kirby’s epic so enjoyable. It was like we were looking into some psychedelic mirror that turned and twisted the world and then broke into a thousand different shards reflecting aspects back at us. The final words on this should probably be Jack’s.

“I wouldn’t say my drawings were illustrations of any kind, but they were great comic drawings, and they fulfilled the kind of goal I was reaching for in all my years of doing comics. In doing Captain America, I’d concentrate on doing a few figures, and tell the story correctly. The figures were active; they bounced all over the page, but they needed very little background. In telling the story of the New Gods, I told an entire story. I gave the entire picture of the events which transpired. In that way, I feel I have made a giant step in dealing with my own creative ability, my own feelings for people, and my own vision of the future…. So I consider this a great accomplishment, in the field itself. It was a story that was fully rounded, with people, with backgrounds and with the satisfaction of innovation.”

“To bring this to a conclusion, I’d like to say that I felt the New Gods were our gods. They were not the gods of the medieval ages; not the Greek gods; nor the gods that came before them. The New Gods were the kind of people that made our own millennium. We live in the age of the New Gods, and the New Gods are still developing. So I felt they represented you and I, and the people we know; the people of our time. They represented the 1970’s and they’ll probably go on from there.”

I lied; the final word will be by Willie Shakespeare, who said a few words about us and gods. “What a piece of work is man, how noble in reason, how infinite in
faculties, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action
how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god!”

Jack Kirby gave us our Gods.

But interpretation is not for me alone. Artist James Romberger wrote some words on the New Gods and its follow-up stories.

Undiscovered Particles

by James Romberger

from the Jack Kirby Quarterly #15, 2008

A young mind is blown, from Forever People #2

The Fourth World is Jack Kirby’s grand concept, the project in which he invested the prime of his skills as well as his highest hopes and ambitions. Kirby’s saga debuted in 1970. He hit the ground running; within a few issues his writing became more confident and he began to draw with unmatched clarity, grace and power, brought into focus by Mike Royer’s exemplary inking. Kirby put forth a very thoughtful and humane writing that helped form many of his reader’s views of the world. In this way he transcended the entertainment realm of comics to create something much more meaningful.

He filtered his own experiences with violence into a philosophy that extended across his epic, from Orion’s attempts to overcome his aggressive nature and the examination of the principles of conscientious objection in “The Glory Boat,” to Mr. Miracle and Big Barda’s rejection of their military programming. In Kirby’s comics pathos is contrasted with irony to create relief, a classical formula he used effectively. The best stories of the 4th World read as literature.

For a variety of reasons, the 4th World was cancelled by DC before the end of 1972. The loss of his developing masterpiece as he was just reaching a career peak of performance hit Kirby like a hammer blow, according to those close to him. He went on to create other significant works, but rarely again touched the glorious synthesis of story and art seen in the best of the New Gods. DC owns the characters and concepts and uses them in combination with their other corporate properties. In 1982 DC’s Jenette Kahn and Paul Levitz offered Kirby creator credit and a percentage of royalties for the Fourth World for redesigning it for use in the Super Powers TV cartoons and toys, a gesture that meant a good deal to Kirby and his wife Roz. DC also offered him twenty-three pages to write and draw a conclusion to his story in the final issue of reprints of his original New Gods comics. Within the limitations he was given, Kirby produced one of his last great stories, “On the Road to Armagetto”. Unfortunately, it was rejected by DC. Kirby amended the story, and it was inked and lettered by Mike Royer. Its pages were later distributed in altered form throughout Kirby’s 1985 graphic novel, Hunger Dogs. Sadly, with DC’s recent reprinting of Hunger Dogs in their 4th World Omnibus Volume 4, that story remains unavailable to be read as he intended.

For his conclusion, Kirby chose to focus on something meaningful that was possible to bring to succinct resolution. One of the most significant themes present in Kirby’s complex, interwoven plotting in the 4th World is that he absorbed the aspirations of the psychedelic movement, and recast it in his own image. In 1970 Kirby was aware that a key demographic for his work was the college-age kids that had embraced his Marvel work. He created characters for DC that were geared to and reflected that market. The first of Kirby’s new comics completed on his board was The Forever People #1. The dreams of the flower children had been occluded by Charlie Manson and Altamont the year before but you couldn’t tell from the optimism Kirby invested in his super-freaks.

The Forever People is about a small unit of young New Gods who join their planet’s war, but deal with crises using technology, compassion and their individual skills. The Forever People as superheroes are an idealized version of what hippies should be: calm, gentle and intelligent. In cases where they are unable to cope, they join to form the Infinity Man, an entity of indeterminate power and personality, however, this device was diminished as Kirby progressed. Simultaneously, Kirby took over a staid DC title, Superman’s pal, Jimmy Olsen. Square Jimmy suddenly seemed truly young, hurtling at breakneck speed into Kirby’s ominous interzone of psycho-cosmic warfare. Kirby came up with many inventive ideas from the world around him, distilled from current events, hit films, and scientific magazines. He explored the then-nascent science of genetics with his “DNA Project,” a U.S. Government operation that could endlessly generate the types of imaginative Jimmy mutations the title was notorious for, and also created “The Hairies,” a commune of technologically advanced “DNAlien” clone hippies who travel a tunnel complex called the “Zoomway,” in a dragon-decorated missile carrier known as “The Mountain of Judgment.”

The Hairies’ Mountain of Judgement, 1970

Kirby’s hippie characters may have been inspired by the real-life pioneering exponents of psychedelia, the Merry Pranksters. This may be supported by the fact that the Pranksters were, like the Hairies, the result of a Government experiment. Prankster founders Ken Kesey (author of One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest), Ken Babbs, and Stewart Brand (later editor of the Whole Earth Catalog) all attended Stamford University in the late 1950s and there participated in tests of LSD by MK-ULTRA, a long-running mind-control program overseen by scientists under the wing of the CIA. Kesey and his fellow subjects were so impressed by their experiences on acid that they became advocate distributors of the drug and facilitated the rapid spread of psychedelic culture. They believed that LSD could change the world. They threw the earliest public Acid Test parties in San Francisco in collaboration with the Grateful Dead. The Pranksters’ acid-proselytizing tour of America on their psychedelic bus “Further” was reported by Tom Wolfe in stream-of-consciousness style in his famed 1968 book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.

Kirby’s Thor on Acid Test flyer, and the Merry Prankster’s bus Further, 1966

Kirby’s work figures into the Prankster’s saga: Wolfe writes that Kesey is frequently consumed in reading Marvel Comics, and a Kirby drawing of Thor is prominent in a Prankster poster for an 1965 Acid Test. Kirby is one of the most important psychedelic artists of that era. It has rarely been suggested that Kirby took LSD himself, but his combinations of solid spatial and figurative composition with abstract technorganic design in the eidetic pageantry of comics like Thor bear up under scrutiny magnificently whilst tripping. Kirby’s assistant at the time, Steve Sherman, laughingly said that Jack’s young staff “gave him lots of pot” (The Jack Kirby Collector #6). When interviewed, Kirby cautioned about drug experimentation: “I believe that any sort of stimulant or irritant used for any sort of motivation…it’s kind of a wild thing without guidelines…I won’t hang anyone up on a gallows who uses drugs, but I won’t respect them, either” (TJKC #42). For his family-friendly DC comics, Kirby’s cosmic consciousness catalyst is not LSD but the Mother Box, a technological link to “the ultimate mystery, The Source” that must be built, and its wisdom earned, by its bearer. Mind-expanding effects are also exhibited by Forever People member Serafin’s Cosmic Cartridges, all of which have properties relating to “all there is.”

The Forever People’s driver is Big Bear, who resembles aspects of both Kesey and Neal Cassady, the Beat legend who joined the Pranksters as navigator. Another key Prankster figure, Cassady’s friend Carolyn Adams, known as “Mountain Girl,” has a 4th World equivalent in the Daisy May-outfitted Beautiful Dreamer. The magic bus “Further” can be seen reflected in The Mountain of Judgment of the nomadic Hairies. Jimmy Olsen witnesses several manifestations of the Acid Test music-lightshow multimedia events in the Hairies’ dance concerts and projections, one of which (Jimmy Olsen #134, p.12) incorporates a Kirby collage cut from photos of Jimi Hendrix that appeared in Life magazine (issue dated 10/03/1969). The Hairies are allied with the motorcycle gang the Outsiders, who might have reflected the Prankster’s brief involvement with the Hell’s Angels, but were also acknowledged by Jack as referencing the bikers who frequently ripped up the canyon below the Kirbys’ California home. In the end, Kirby’s characters are melds of many different sources, and even if Kesey’s crew were not a direct inspiration, Kirby’s origin for the Hairies mirrors the Pranksters’ covert genesis.

Kirby’s original series deliberately left many of the boundaries between his heroes and villains ambiguous. The Pact that secured the truce between Apokolips and New Genesis that would be broken by Scott Free and precipitate the events in Kirby’s storyline is itself a cold business: Highfather traded sons with Darkseid. Family values are strangely inversed in the 4th World. All along, Darkseid seems very concerned with the fate of his son, Orion, but strangely, Highfather seems disinterested in the concerns of his progeny, Scott Free aka Mister Miracle, who is raised in the hellish orphanage on Apokolips. The youngest of the New Gods is Esak; he appears to be at most nine years old. He does not seem to have parents, and is allowed to roam space and time as apprentice to the amoral scientist Metron in New Gods #4. In one of his other few appearances in the original comics in FP #7, Esak must beseech Highfather to save the Forever People; it is one of Jack’s gentlest scenes.

The clear view of Esak, from Forever People #7

But, Darkseid allows the Forever People to escape repeatedly, saying, “Greatness does not come from killing the young” (FP #8). When the hammer came, Kirby exiled the Forever People to a distant, verdant world and left the seemingly inevitable final battle between Darkseid and Orion hanging. Shorn of Jack’s fire, Mister Miracle limped to his belated wedding with Big Barda, presided over by a noncommittal Highfather. There was no acknowledgement of unresolved traumas such as Scott Free’s sacrifice for the sake of peace. Kirby was already elsewhere.

When in 1983 Jack was asked by DC to complete his saga in one chapter, he looked at what he had done more than a decade before and, out of all possibilities, chose the theme of the betrayal of ideals to close out his saga. The overriding theme that he saw in the New Gods tapestry is that he had hoped and believed that the young could and would tackle the evils of their day with ingenuity and compassion. As the promise of the sixties faded, these aspirations were not borne out. He watched expanded consciousness give way to drug addiction, sexual and racial equality slow in coming, wars beget more wars, the environment steadily worsen because of individual and corporate greed and exponential population growth. America was sliding through the Reagan Years. Jack’s initial, thoughtful response was a short allegory that left the mystery of his unfinished epic intact, but that condemned, with little equivocation, the failure of the generation in whom he had invested his hope.

Kirby did some of his best late-period art for “On the Road to Armagetto.” By this time Jack no longer drew supple, idealized figures; his characters seem compressed, reflecting his own physical aging, but for all that his drawing is no less vigorous. Despite the cartooniness Jack was veering towards, due in part to his most recent animation design efforts, there is none of Kirby’s usual humor in this piece. It’s dead serious. Kirby’s blackspotting becomes abstract and patterned, and the open outside borders create a vignette effect, as if the entire story is a nightmare. And truly, as much is hidden as is revealed in this oddly cinematic fever dream. In Jack’s finale, the enraged Orion is only seen in flashes as he infiltrates Apokolips’ capital Armagetto and incites the slum-dwelling Lowlies to revolution.

Darkseid watches his WMD experiments, postures, mugs, and spars with Himon. An obviously significant but out-of-panel character responsible for Micro-Mark nano-bombs is revealed to be a horribly disfigured, swollen-headed Esak. Metron has deserted the child for years to study in solitude. After an accident mutilates the boy, he is thoroughly corrupted and goes over to work for Darkseid. As the mob approaches, Darkseid turns tail and escapes, leaving Esak to face the killing machine Orion. Esak attempts to murder Orion’s posse, then testifies to his misfortunes

The Lowlies rise, from On the Road to Armagetto, 1982

• 

• 

Esak’s fall, from On the Road to Armagetto, 1982

The story Kirby originally submitted ended with the splash on page 23 of Orion on top of a pile of corpses, shooting the off-image Esak. This is Jack’s “holocaust borne on flowers”, his answer to the “nature vs. nurture” questions he had brought up with his DNA Project and the Pact. Orion’s upbringing is completely negated by his Apokoliptic genetic baggage. The flower children do not save the world, perhaps because New Genesis doesn’t care about or keep track of its children. This was intended to be Jack’s final word, then: a fatalistic burst of ultraviolence more akin to Sam Peckinpah and the Druillet books that he admired.

No doubt Kirby felt it was his prerogative to finish his epic in his own way. Over a long career he had proved time and time again that his ideas and instincts were sound. His problems occurred when he was being second-guessed. Still, after DC rejected the story, a second denial of his New Gods, Kirby persevered. The “piece of the action for redesign” deal DC gave him was unprecedented, so he did what he could to satisfy their wishes. The story mutated into an intro to Hunger Dogs. He added two moving pages wherein Orion regains his senses and absolves Esak, mitigating the darkness somewhat. The “child, fallen upon cruel days” grew away from the Source, but is forgiven. Orion witnesses the Source do a cosmetic makeover of Esak’s ravaged husk, saying, “Judge him as he was, not as he became.”

On one level Kirby apparently came to grips with his disappointment with the Hippie generation, on another, with the interruption of his opus. On yet another level he is still defiant, in effect disclaiming to the reader all of the presumptions made on his characters by others, and perhaps even what was to follow in the adulterated Hunger Dogs. The final printed graphic novel has its own merits, but reflects much interference with Kirby’s creative process. “On the Road to Armagetto” is Jack Kirby’s dark codetta to the New Gods, an apotheosis of unending conflict.”

The end

Previous – 21. Brand New World | Top | Next – 23. Why Did The Fourth World Fail?

Previous – 20. Bullpen? Bullshit!! | Contents | Next – 22. Allegory Of His Life

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

BRAND NEW WORLD

By 1970, thousands of Americans were actively protesting the Vietnam War. There were numerous reasons why these protests took place. Some of the prominent ones included revelations that former President Lyndon Baines Johnson had misled the American people about the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, which led to the escalation of American involvement in Vietnam in late 1964. The ending of college deferments, which previously had exempted most college students from the draft and service in Vietnam, further contributed to the protests. On April 30, 1970 President Nixon announced that the war was spreading into Cambodia, a neighbor of Viet Nam. America erupted. Colleges across the country staged a strike and shut down campuses, streets, traffic and commerce. On May 5, a stunned nation watched in horror as a small, and fearful band of National Guardsmen opened fire on a large group of boisterous and threatening group of coeds at Kent State University. For 13 seconds they fired round after round, and when the smoke cleared, four young Americans lay dead, dozens wounded and a nation staggered. Ten days later two more Americans were killed at Jackson State.

Moment of horror

On April 10, 1970, the music, and counter cultural world was staggered when Paul McCartney announced that after a yearlong period of dissension he was leaving the Beatles due to undisclosed “personal, business and musical differences.” The greatest songwriting team in history had come to an end. John was mad because he wanted to announce the split first, but had been talked out of it. His reaction to Paul’s announcement was “Shit, Paul’s a bloody f**king great PR man—maybe the best ever–to tie it into his own album’s release.” I think Jack might disagree with John as he considered Stan Lee the best PR man ever.

All good things must end – The new team

And like a rifle shot to the gut, Kirby’s defection likewise staggered the collected comic universe. Fanzines and comic conventions were ablaze with speculation as to Marvel’s continued success without Kirby. The comic creating team that dominated the Sixties had parted in discord. Kirby’s move to Los Angeles took awhile to settle out. After initially landing south in the land of Mickey Mouse, Jack soon moved north of the city to a place on Sapra Rd. The worst problem was the house was high on a hill, and below the house was an open area where motorcyclists practiced their sport. Despite numerous complaints from the hard-pressed Kirby’s, the owner refused to stop the noise. In his own way Kirby worked these motorcyclists into his tableau. The cycle riding Outsiders of the Wild Area were based on his abusive neighbors.

Jack and Roz finally moved pot, pans and drawing table to a new home in Thousand Oaks on Lynn Rd, high on the hills overlooking the valley to one side and the ocean on the other. Kirby loved the swimming pool. Despite the distance, fans and assorted kooks found their way to spend time with their king. Lisa would joke that “if Charles Manson came calling, Jack would let him in.” It was at this house that Jack, Mark, Steve, Neal, and Mike would hatch their schemes and act out their wild stories.

New Gods prototypes – New Gods #1

John Romita worried about the continuation of Marvel Comics. He thought Marvel might go under sans Kirby. “Kirby was doing more than artwork: he was bringing all sorts of things to the table.  He was bringing characters, plots and inspiration to Stan.  He was making Stan ten times a better writer and there’s no way to limit what you could give a guy like Jack.  I would have given him whatever he wanted, but businessmen don’t see things that way.” Unknown at the time, Jack asked John Romita to join him at DC. John pondered the question, but when he asked his wife, she told him that if he went, he would always be in the shadow of Jack Kirby. John chose to remain with Stan Lee and not surprisingly was always viewed as Stan Lee’s lackey. John Buscema was more direct; “I’ll never forget when I walked into Stan’s office and heard that Jack left. I thought they were going to close up! (laughter) As far as I was concerned, Jack was the backbone of Marvel. John offered up another amazing anecdote of Kirby; “Well, Jack Kirby was very fast. Martin Goodman was upset that Jack Kirby was making so much money. He felt, “Kirby’s turning out so much work, let’s cut his rate.” That’s when Jack left Marvel and went over to DC.” Sounds like the logic of a bean counter.

The falling sales figures were scaring Martin Goodman. None of the new titles were catching on. Roy Thomas told Stan that he had received mail from readers asking for a sword and sorcery genre book. Nothing else was selling so Stan told Roy to write up a proposal for Martin Goodman to read. First, in the back of a horror title they threw in a sword and sorcery trial story. The story was written by Thomas and drawn by Barry Smith. Smith had returned to England due to his visa problem. Yet Marvel still sent him scripts to keep active. Goodman gave Thomas the ok on a new series and told him to get the rights to a property as cheaply as possible. After being disappointed with several properties, the rights to Robert Howard’s Conan practically fell into his lap. Goodman’s fear of the new title made it so that Thomas could not have his first choice of artists due to their high page rate. Thomas had wanted John Buscema, but ended up getting Barry Smith due to his being at the bottom of the page rate scale. Barry was put right to work on the new title. Coincidently, the first issue hit the stands the same month as Jack Kirby’s new titles at DC. Despite some poor initial sales, they stuck with it until it became Marvel’s sole success story of the early 1970’s. Its success did nothing to stem the loss from the other titles. Marvel continued down the hole of failure.

Jack Kirby roots to neo-romantic classicism – Barry became Windsor-Smith

Barry Smith was still living in Great Britain; working on his papers to return to the U.S. He found out about Kirby leaving Marvel from his friend Roy Thomas. It began; “There’s no way to say this but straight: Jack Kirby has left Marvel.” “Jack’s departure was cataclysmic to Stan and Marvel as a publishing entity. It affected me in no way whatsoever, I just wished him well. As to being treated fairly by the company that he co created, I’m not privy to the internal goings on that existed between Jack and Marvel management, but I would hazard a guess that if Jack was less of a romantic and more of a business man, he could have had anything he wanted from Marvel at the time that Jack felt the urge to split the “House of Ideas”. It’s a pretty good shot that Jack could have written his own ticket. But then again, if Kirby had more of a head for business, he probably wouldn’t have been the genius artist we have all benefited from. There’s a tragedy of some considerable proportion right there, Know what I mean?”

The failure in this case was not Kirby’s lack of business sense, in fact, with the facts we have Kirby made all the right moves. He used the little leverage he had and came out with the better contract. The failure was Marvels. The new management and some of the old failed to realize the real set-up and chose Stan Lee as architect rather than who many would consider the actual architect—Jack Kirby. They ended up with a new leader who could provide nothing to make a company grow, while Kirby continued his history of providing his employer with salable concepts. I have had people tell me that Marvel managed just fine after Kirby left. All I can say s that they should look at the sales charts and realize that for the next 8 years Marvel would flail about approaching bankruptcy. While the ten years earlier, while Kirby was there, the sales were a consistent rise to prominence.

Jack was busy organizing his characters and concepts for his new series. His first move was to contact Mark Evanier and Steve Sherman. After explaining that he was moving to DC where he would be in charge of a series of comics and he said he wanted them to be his assistants. They quickly agreed though they had no idea of how they could assist Kirby–but they certainly wanted to be a part of it. They also hoped their friend Mike Royer could be a part of Kirby’s new venture. Mike Royer remembers; “A few hours later I got a call from Jack saying he’d just landed at LAX and he wanted me to know that he had switched to DC, and that he wanted me to ink the books but they had to control them back East. So he couldn’t designate who he wanted to ink for him.”

Wally Wood learned of Kirby’s defection and hurriedly went to Carmine. He asked if he could be the new inker but DC stuck by their guns and stayed with Vince Colletta.

Alan Kupperberg was a production man in DC’s studio when Woody came to see Carmine. “When word first ricocheted around the business that Jack Kirby had decamped for DC Comics in 1970, Woody contacted DC publisher Carmine Infantino and virtually begged for the Kirby assignment. If I recall correctly, Wood even offered to take a cut in his page-rate. Carmine declined. I assume DC sought a continuity of the “Marvel Style”, in Colletta. Plus, garrulous Vinnie was always “there,” in the DC office. Woody was withdrawn, almost a hermit and, probably unfairly, not always considered reliable with deadlines.”

This would allow New York the final say as to what was published. . DC’s brass wanted Kirby to take over an ongoing series so that Kirby’s magic might be quickly integrated with the DC Universe. Kirby’s response was to ask for a series without a steady artist so that he wouldn’t deprive a fellow artist of work. This was resolved when the artist on Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen was assigned to another strip. Kirby had pleaded with Carmine to create a series of books based on his concepts, and guided by Kirby, but drawn by various artists such as Don Heck, John Romita and Steve Ditko. Carmine had hired Kirby so that Kirby’s art would be seen under the DC brand. Carmine, probably considering the additional cost of more artists quickly put the kibosh on that idea. It was decided that Kirby’s new concepts would be broken into four separate but interconnected series, drawn and written by Kirby and published bi-monthly.

Jack was ready to start up at DC Comics, but some house cleaning first had to be done, When Carmine Infantino announced to DC’s editorial staff that Jack Kirby was joining their ranks, the response was not all positive. Here’s Carmine’s recollection;

“I inform Mort Weisinger he has a new artist/writer on JIMMY OLSEN and it’s Jack Kirby. Well, the fact that I just acquired Marvel’s hottest talent didn’t impress him. All he could think about was that Kirby had sued his friend Schiff, and that Kirby should still be blacklisted from DC. Mort went to Irwin Donenfeld to complain. Donenfeld called me in and I really had to go to bat for Jack. I told Donenfeld I wasn’t interested in personality problems; I was only interested in business. Donenfeld said okay and that was the end of the discussion”.

With that distraction out of the way they now had to decide just what Kirby would do.

shape of things to come

DC’s publicity dept. went into overdrive. In large bold heading’s the phrase KIRBY IS COMING adorned their regular books for months. No mention of the new titles, just the name to build up the suspense or sometimes just a premise. The uninitiated probably thought Kirby was a new character being introduced, but those in the know had no doubts what was coming. Kirby had become a brand unto himself, no “and Simon or Lee” to share the credits and accolades. Kirby’s newfound solo status also meant that Kirby was now responsible for all facets–no Joe Simon to help rein in Kirby’s intensity and wildness, and no Stan Lee to wrap Kirby’s concepts in pithy dialogue and pop sensibilities. For good or worse, the public would now see pure unadulterated Jack Kirby. Autuerism was forced on Jack.

Jon B. Cooke, a noted Kirby expert put it mildly:

“What is important is that Kirby arrived at DC Comics with guns a’blazin’, his imagination unleashed as never before. If we thought his mid-Fantastic Four run was fertile — and it was one of the most creatively productive eras in comics history — we were still unprepared for the awe that was yet to come… Darkseid, Super-War, the Anti-Life Equation, Infinity Man, Scott Free, Glorious Godfrey, Granny Goodness, the Pact, Himon, Bug, Kalibak, Glory Boat…”

To which, I would add, Whiz Wagon, DNAliens, Intergang, Dubbilex, and Bugs, ad infinitum.
Over at Marvel, Stan Lee wasn’t taking Kirby’s defection quietly. Kirby’s penchant for leaving lots of inventory meant that Marvel would have Kirby stories to print for at least 5-6 months. It would be several months before new artists would be needed for the Fantastic Four, and Thor. Plus Kirby had drawn the first couple stories for new series featuring The Inhumans, and Kazar, several horror stories for the horror anthologies, and the last Silver Surfer issue. In fact, Fantastic Four #102 was the last Marvel story drawn by Kirby and it wouldn’t see publication for 5 months. Fantastic Four #103 had been drawn by Kirby, but Stan reconfigured the whole story and it was printed at a later date with extra pages to connect the cut and pasted story. Martin Goodman had instituted a new round of reprint titles. Rare would be the months when Kirby’s new titles had a larger newsstand presence than Marvel’s reprint books meaning that the average reader would see more Kirby art by Marvel than by DC at the retail level. Right or wrong, Kirby was at war with himself. But it should be noted that Marvel’s sales started to plummet.

With the release of Jimmy Olsen #133 cover dated Oct. 1970 the readers got their first look at pure Kirby, and it didn’t disappoint. The cover let it be known this wasn’t your father’s Jimmy Olsen. There’s Jimmy riding a motorcycle with a bunch of hairy bikers and running over Superman while Jimmy’s yelling “RUN HIM DOWN! Superman was so important that he was featured front and center on almost all Olsen covers. Kirby’s name proudly displayed at the top of the covers. On the first page, Kirby let the reader know that his past and future are one. We get Jimmy walking into a secret garage amazed to meet the famous 1940’s era Newsboy Legion who are working on a huge souped up vehicle. Now it turns out these are the children of the original Newsboy Legion, but it’s obvious the Kirby was bringing the wacky with him. Could the Guardian be far behind? No. in a burst of creativity one of the underground research facilities was perfecting cloning, and the first person cloned was none other than policeman Jim Harper, with a slightly larger moniker.

Kirby begins in the past

He wears flippers why????

Perhaps more interesting is that Jack added in a new member to the Newsboy Legion. In a time well known for inclusionary actions—such as every sitcom having at least one black character–Jack Kirby integrated his decades long group by adding in Walter Johnson, a young black kid as a full member. But Walter wasn’t quite ordinary, or playing with a full deck. He was obsessed with scuba diving and deep sea exploration to the point that he dressed-even on dry land– in an outlandish scuba diving outfit, huge flippers and a large mask perched on his head–and went by the nickname of Flipper Dipper. (Flippa Dippa) What Jack did was take that outlandish picture of Cleavon Little in the play Scuba Duba, and retrofit it into a crazy young boy working and playing with the Newsboy Legion. Jack never seemed to throw away a visually arresting idea. I have never really understood just what role Jack expected for the new character as he was never a lead character in the story arcs. He remained just a filler character meant to show tolerance and inclusion rather than a full-bodied A-list part of the group.

Flippa Dippa at work, He didn’t do much, but he did it well except explosives expert

I think the same can be said for all the other black characters found in the Fourth World. Vykin-the Black, Shiloh and even the Black Racer never had roles or even story arcs that played up their “blackness”, yet I don’t feel them as tokens. They did their parts and participated in the tales. Flippa was never all that important, but he was as important as Big Words, or Tommy. Scrapper seems to have been the only real standout in the Newsboy Legion. Perhaps it is to Kirby’s credit that he never made their blackness a part of the series. They were accepted as equals –though minor- by everyone. To Kirby black characters were as normal as Asian (Sonny Sumo) Indian (Wyatt Wingfoot) dwarfs (Oberon) or any other minority, yet he never made a spectacle or pointed fingers at their differences. They had become just another element to his tableau, a little color perhaps, but regular Joe’s. The face of villainy was all its own. He was an indifferent species-neither black nor white, Eastern or Western, evil stood alone, just hard and nasty. Jack did make an important issue of race, and prejudice, but it was at the expense of a totally new race living on New Genesis called “the Bugs” and kept down by the supposedly superior race of super-beings led by Highfather. –Kirby’s nod to the curse of America. For the rest of Jack’s career, he managed to always fit in black characters into his bigger stories. From the Falcon, to Black Panther, Big Masai, and Major Klavus, Jack’s world was multi-cultural. (of course one could say it was multi-special also as he used many anthropomorphic characters as well)

Starts out with a bang and a laugh

Oh relevancy!!! Has ever a good word been so abused in mainstream media? Whenever journalists, or reporters try to explain the evolution of comics they always spout that the newer comics have become relevant—a reflection of the more complicated ways of real life, and acknowledging the dirty underbelly. It’s not that they are wrong, but they always back up their assumptions by pointing out mega-steroidal hulks or hyper-pneumatic women that fly and are invulnerable, while wearing underwear and cut-out tops. As if that’s reality. On May 2, 1971 an article appeared in the prestigious New Yorker magazine dealing with the new depth and relevancy of comic books, written by Saul Braun. While spotlighting a harrowing Joe Kubert-drawn Sgt. Rock story and Stan Lee’s battle with the censor board for a Spider-Man arc, and O’Neill’s and Adams’ Green Lantern/Green Arrow tales, it also interviews Jack and talks about the New Gods. The article was poorly titled “Shazam! Here Comes Captain Relevant.” I think Jack liked the spotlight, but Jack wasn’t overwhelmed with comics taking on deep problems. He thought they lacked the space and timing to do it right. Graphic Novels were not around yet.

A decision was made to introduce Kirby’s new series in Showcase Comics. Cover artwork was even readied. Kirby objected because it would make it seem like this was a try out series, rather than a 100% full confidence project. Carmine relented. Kirby began unleashing his new books from scratch, rather than an insert in an existing series. The early issues of Jimmy Olsen would introduce Jack’s larger tableau. It seems that Jimmy has uncovered evidence of Earth becoming a pawn in a larger war between two distant worlds. Jimmy and the Legion and the Guardian would take the fight to aliens working underground to sabotage the world. In the background running the show was the ominous Darkseid (dark-side) from the planet Apokolips, who was infiltrating Earth to

Stan in full hairsuit regalia – shades of My Lai a year earlier

find what he called the anti-life equation. With this formula, he was hoping to be able to enslave the universe with its mind control ability. As a subplot Jimmy has uncovered a secret military research base which is working on top secret projects alongside aliens and other assorted weirdoes. Jimmy Olsen threw out more concepts per page than any other comic in history. Kirby’s mind was in overload and Kirby’s kitchen sink attitude made for an amazing journey. Don Rickles the legendary insult comedian even made a cameo appearance. Jack must have been laughing his tuckus off while drawing this series, and we were the hockey pucks.

A video world pre-MTV

Trouble arose almost immediately, when the DC office received the first Jimmy Olsen pages someone remarked that the faces of Superman and Jimmy looked like Jack Kirby drew them and this wouldn’t do. The public was used to seeing Supes and Jimmy in a certain manner and that couldn’t change. Their first idea was to have Vinnie Colletta, the inker make them on model, but were dissatisfied with his version so they had longtime regular Al Plastino redraw the figures. Thereafter others like Murphy Anderson or even Neal Adams would make the corrections. Jack was furious, why hire him if they don’t want him to do his style. But this wasn’t aimed specifically at Jack; other DC artists had their figures changed for the same reason–to keep a character on model. While at Marvel, Stan had Wally Wood draw the Daredevil figures in an issue of Fantastic Four, and Jim Steranko drew Nick Fury’s head in a Captain America issue. John Romita would often ghost Spider-man in issues he was guesting in. Though the practice was accepted as standard procedure, Jack didn’t like it. With hindsight it doesn’t appear that Kirby’s version were way off line, the characters seem perfectly identifiable, but image was everything back then and Kirby had to accept it. To the readers it must have seemed strange with Kirby’s hard bulky forceful images next to the soft, cheeky old style Superman. Jack learned early that a change in location didn’t mean an end to outside editorial interference. It should also be mentioned that DC expanded the Fourth World into Lois Lane’s series.

The first new series to hit the stands were New Gods, and The Forever People, followed a month later by Mister Miracle. All played important roles in fleshing out the cosmic war that was taking place, but each came from a different angle. The New Gods represented the frontal, direct battle between the two worlds that chose Earth as its battlefield. The New Gods starred the dark brooding Orion, raised on the peaceful world of New Genesis, but tasked by their leader Highfather with the fearful role of the warrior who must take the fight directly to Darkseid.

Forever People #1 redrawn Superman – Carmine Infantino editor

But Orion lives a secret that will affect everything. Orion is of two natures, the gentle scion of New Genesis, and a horrible unmanageable beast given to berserker type rages while in battle. This dichotomy is controlled by his “mother box”; a small computer like machine that becomes literally a part and presence with the person who owns it. Orion is often partnered up with the personable Lightray whose bright personality stands in stark contrast to Orion’s dark warlike traits.

The Forever People were a group of young kids who decided that they wanted to sit this war out. They decided to stay above the fray much like a large sector of American youth decided to sit the Viet Nam War out. But unfortunately, Darkseid wouldn’t let them. The series also featured what I thought was a huge contradiction. These children of peaceful coexistence could meld into a singular entity with a bad disposition and ass kicking attitude. It always seemed silly to on the one hand to show conscientious dissenters suddenly morph into a militaristic personality to wrap up the villains. Was this secretly Jack saying that peaceful methods don’t work, and brute force will always trump evil when peace fails? Interestingly, this character The Infinity Man disappeared after just a few issues. Jack did have plans for this group, but I think he lost his way.

Mister Miracle Lightray and Big Barda round out the New Gods
“I had a black man, Vykin the Black and he was part of the epic. I filled it with the people of the Sixties, and I called them the Forever People, because they seemed like Forever People to me. They were a new step, a new social event in the epic of America. The Forever People were the young people of their time; beautiful, active, highly intelligent and wonderful material for stories, I used the young people of the times; the times themselves became the backdrop of my stories.”

It seemed that one of the kids, Beautiful Dreamer, had a connection to the anti-life formula and Darkseid wanted it. Chasing Darkseid and Beautiful Dreamer to Earth, the group makes a rude and noisy landing that attracts the attention of Darkseid’s minions, plus those of Jimmy Olsen and Superman. Superman catches up to the group just as Darkseid’s underlings attack the group.

Aid comes with the help of Superman and a guardian entity that is formed when the group members touch a mother box and call out “TARRU” This entity known as the Infinity Man is stronger even than Superman and he easily dispatches the villainous monsters. Yet Superman has caught a glimpse through a Boom Tube of a far off world known as Supertown, and wonders if he has a past connection with it.

Kirbytech borders – a happy group

When he requests a doorway to Supertown the kids try to talk him out of going, they tell him that the coming battle will be on Earth and he is needed there. Yet he is determined to go. So the group opens a “boom tube” –a portal across dimensions and Superman enters, but as he nears his destination his doubts take over and he realizes that he can’t abandon Earth, and he returns. Jack’s Superman was one of doubt, and questions. He was sort of a stranger in his own land. He was truly an alien in search of his own history. This short synopsis can’t even begin to relate all the crazy concepts that Jack packed into these stories, but they were never ending and breath taking. All these characters from the two warring worlds had super powers. Despite their attempts at pacifistic avoidance of the war, the Forever People were constantly drawn in and forced to choose sides.

The third book, Mister Miracle revolves around one Scott Free. Born in freedom, yet raised in Apokoliptian slavery, he dreams of escaping from that horror world to a place he can live in peace. This book mirrors the many refugees from Communist countries who faced death to escape to the West. The book opens with Scott actually escaping to Earth, where he meets up with an itinerant entertainer who magically escapes from imprisonments of all kinds. Much like Harry Houdini, this man challenges death daily, and miraculously escapes. But Darkseid is never happy about losing a disciple and he continually attempts to trap Scott Free and return him to Apokolips. When the elderly magician is killed, Scott Free takes up the mantle of Mister Miracle the great escape artist and using his “mother box” he starts his own show where he escapes from the most mind dazzling collection of death dealing devises ever seen, while also escaping from the crazy traps that Darkseid and his underlings set for him.

Steranko – man of many talents

It was not a coincidence that this character was inspired by young Jim Steranko who once had a stage show where he escaped from manacles, and chains and other imprisonments. In a private New York dinner, Jack teased Jim Steranko about what he had started. A surprised Steranko was shocked when a DC editor showed him the proofs of Mister Miracle and informed Jim that Scott Free was indeed Jim Steranko.

“Mister Miracle would have to join Orion in his battle to forever rid themselves of Darkseid in some way.” “Oddly enough, it was Darkseid, the most evil of the characters that brought the others together. It was Darkseid’s dealings with all of them that became the manner in which I could demonstrate how we all deal with evil. I made it as realistic as possible, and the reader could identify with the characters. The book itself blossomed into many others, and became an epic in itself for years.” Good guys usually triumph over bad guys. Bad guys, no matter how clever they are, operate outside our laws. Sooner or later, they must make a mistake that will bring them in contention with that law, and then they will fail.” Jack told an interviewer.

Jack Kirby’s Ricky and Lucy – It wasn’t always love and roses

The four books intersected, but rarely connected directly, the main connections were that Darkseid was the common villain and the search for the anti-life equation concerned them all. There was never anything like this done prior to Kirby’s effort. Kirby had a vision for this series as having a definite conclusion rather than an on-going endless series of books. There would be a reckoning. More important, Jack had added passion and justification to his palette.

Rock hard and nasty – fully articulated

Just after Kirby started the Fourth World series, his son Neal graduated from Syracuse with a Business Degree. He moved back to California and brought with him his young wife. Neal and Steve and Mark hit it off immediately. After the debacle at Marvelmania had ended, they were still excited about the possibility of marketing items relating to Jack’s art. Over the dinner table they decided on putting together a portfolio of Jack’s art through the years, plus add in a simple biography. The result was Kirby Unleashed. It featured many examples of Jack’s early art, most of which had never been seen by the public before. Plus it had rejected pages, and production pages from recent series, and a preview of Jack’s new New Gods books. With a biography by Mark Evanier, and the graphic work by Steve Sherman.

Neal did the marketing under the business name Communicators Unlimited. It was a well packaged product that did well at first, and eventually made a little money. It wasn’t perfect, there are mistakes in the bio, and the art choices are questionable at times, but it is and was a great introductory item to the world of Jack Kirby.

They followed this up with another portfolio called The Gods, which represented the Norse Gods in a different way than the Marvel versions. These were inked by Don Heck and colored by Jack. Jack mistakenly claimed credit for inking when he misunderstood a question by Greg Theakston and confused inking with the coloring—since the colors are called inks.

New versions of old characters

With the two portfolios in hand plus other small items they had made up, they attended a Comic Convention in New York. The convention gave them a private room and they opened for business. Neal said they were amazed, the stuff was flying off the shelves. They thought they had struck it rich.

Working at DC had its stodgy side—one called it an almost mausoleum in its efficiency, but there was one item that always woke them up. Alan Kupperberg was a utility man helping out in inking, and production chores. He remembers;

“… normally, only two events in the staid course of the DC universe would, like a giant rogue comet or invading singularity, disturb the magisterial and usually unalterably eternal orbits at DC Comics. The arrival of a new Joe Kubert Tarzan book; and the other JK– Jack Kirby’s — latest “special delivery.” Even hardened and cynical long time production department grunts Morris Waldinger and Joe Letterese would join the gaggle and goggle in appreciation as each new Fourth World episode unfolded.”

“Funky Flashman absolutely made waves the moment it arrived in the office. If my memory serves me, within a day or so of its arrival, a certain Houseroy had paid an undercover visit to DC and had a chuckle reading this now “infamous” tale.”

But all was not love and kisses at DC. Along with Jack’s new forcefulness on inkers, he also started making demands of the colorists. DC’s coloring crew had worked with a strict independence, and the choices had been left up to Jack Adler and his crew such as Jerry Serpe, etc. But Kirby had his own ideas about coloring that had evolved over the years as he had occasionally provided color guides for selected covers. There had been a huge dustup when Mister Miracle #1 was printed with the wrong colors for the uniforms. This resulted in a heated battle over the phone between Jack and Jack Adler. Perhaps Jack’s demands had been ended with an “I am the editor and what I say goes” type of statement. Jack Adler was a nice guy, but did not take interference well. Jack’s insistence and interference with Adler reached the point that Adler called him an “egotist” –though probably not the correct term Adler was looking for. Jack’s demands were not made from ego but from his own artistic vision. It wasn’t Kirby pushing his auteurness, it was the director looking at all techniques and processes. He wanted a better, perhaps more personal product, not more acclaim. Adler was somewhat contentious and possessive about the coloring aspect and hated artists interfering with his realm. Good thing he never worked with Jim Steranko who wanted 100% control of the process.

Kupperberg notes.

“Wonderful, funny, patient Jack Adler ran DC’s coloring department, among his other duties. When Tommy Nicoletti, Jerry Serpe or Paul Reinman would deliver the color guides for a Kirby book, Adler would review it, as he did all their efforts. Adler would often “throw” a YRB2 (red brown) or a YBR2 (dark green) into a panel behind a three-quarter character close-up with an open background. A touch as small as this would invariably make an already sizzling Kirby page pop like a firecracker.”

Kirby started to collect a small group of admirers who came to visit often at the Kirby casa. Like moths, this group of young men was drawn into Kirby’s flame. Among this group was a budding artist named Dave Stevens and his best friend Scott Shaw. Dave grew up loving dinosaurs and spaceships and drawing them on anything. He would hang around Jack, and while the others would pester Jack about office politics, and company ways, and the latest story, Dave peppered him with questions about art materials, and tools, and the nuts and bolts of creating comic art. Jack began mentoring Dave and encouraging his work. Dave would proudly show Jack the things he was working on—such as toy designs, appliances, and other sundry items. Jack boasted that he should be doing commercial art for magazines, but Dave protested that he wanted to do sequential art like Jack.

Mark Evanier recalled seeing Dave at Kirby’s:

“Dave was truly one of the nicest people I have ever met in my life…and the most gifted. Our first encounter was at Jack Kirby’s house around 1971 when he came to visit and show Jack some of his work. As I said, Kirby was very encouraging and he urged Dave not to try and draw like anyone else but to follow his own passions. This was advice Dave took to heart, which probably explains why he took so long with every drawing. They were rarely just jobs to Dave. Most of the time, what emerged from his drawing board or easel was a deeply personal effort. He was truly in love with every beautiful woman he drew, at least insofar as the paper versions were concerned.” (Dave was married once…for six months to the prolific movie actress Brinke Stevens-another Bettie Page look-a-like– and she retained his last name after they divorced.)

Dave’s career wandered into another area when he began doing work for movies, such as storyboards and some design stuff. He also picked up some animation work with Doug Wildey and would join the Wildeys and Kirbys at social functions. Russ Manning gave Dave some work on Tarzan. But his favorite was the few times he would ink Jack’s cartoons for the San Diego Comic-Con. Dave often sat with Jack at the con and marveled at Kirby’s patience. When asked what he remembered most about Jack, Dave said; “ (His greatest lesson) was probably about being gracious to fans; to people who really impose, and don’t go away and don’t have a clue—and yet Jack would always take the time, and he was never rude to anybody. He treated them all with respect.”

Kirby had some other ideas he wanted to try. He was interested in breaking out of the 20 page, small pamphlet mode and expand into larger magazine sized books where he could have more freedom to make the stories more adult. Since the comic code authority had no control over other magazines, the artists had the ability to venture into more adult territory. Warren Publishing was having success with Eerie, Creepy and other mags. Even Marvel had ventured in with a couple Spider-Man magazines. Other publishers stuck their toes in also. Jack proposed a handful of concepts from which two were given the go ahead. The first to see print was titled “In The Days of the Mob”, where once again Jack would venture into depression era crime. The stories were eerily reminiscent of his Crestwood books like Headline and Justice Traps the Guilty. The second book returned Kirby to his horror days as Spirit World retread Jack’s Black Magic and Strange World of Your Dreams. The books were published by Hampshire House, a small imprint of DC and received a very low distribution and virtually no visibility on the stands and died after one issue each. It has been speculated that DC had no real desire to see these books succeed and made sure of the low distribution. Their chosen genres certainly ran against the current graphic tide. Horror and Crime had both lost their lustre.

The books were very well done and the art was superb Kirby, but the subject matter and themes were purely old school– been there done that–and really offered nothing new or exciting to the readers. For wanting to hit a more mature audience, the actual content was Ivory Snow pure.

In The Days of the Mob splash, no loss of dynamics – Spirit World eerie and atmospheric

Kirby had produced stories for a second horror issue and with the cancellation; they turned up in several of DC’s horror titles. Several other concepts such as Soul Love, an African American centered romance book, and True Divorce Cases were rejected as unsellable by the company. There was even a pitch for a magazine tentatively titled Uncle Carmine’s Fat City Comix – a sort of underground/ Rolling Stone / National Lampoon pop culture rag. It also was aborted.

Unpublished attempt at more risque adult fare – Was Kirby responding to Jane Fonda?

NASA was planning a huge step in man’s cosmic exploration. With the launch of Pioneer 10, we would be leaving our small solar system. Man was going to worlds unseen. A science writer named Eric Burgess came up with an idea that Pioneer should carry a message to any alien intelligence that might come across the spaceship. He approached Carl Sagan, a fellow scientist and writer, who had lectured about communication with extraterrestrial intelligences at a conference in Crimea. Sagan was enthusiastic about the idea of sending a message with the Pioneer spacecraft. NASA agreed to the plan and gave him three weeks to prepare a message. Together with Frank Drake, the founder of SETI, he designed the plaque, and the artwork was prepared by Sagan’s then-wife Linda Salzman Sagan. The first plaque was launched with Pioneer 10 on March 2, 1972, and a second followed with Pioneer 11 on April 5, 1973.

The design of the plaque was not unanimously accepted, and The Los Angeles Times ran an article asking other notable artists and writers for their preferred version of the plaque. Among those asked were Peter Max, and underground artists Victor Moscoso and Robert Williams, Virgil Partch and Brit Allen Jones. Jack Kirby was one of those asked. In a Sunday supplement called West Magazine, dated Sept. 10, 1972 they published the results. Jack’s submission showed a man and woman as colorful happy super beings. Kirby wasn’t thrilled that such an important concept was left to just a few individuals, instead of a national debate. He explained that he was wary of sending any information about humanity. His fear was, as he put it, “who would come knocking, the trader, or the tiger?” So it was better to show man as capable of defending itself.

Kirby Kolors watch out tiger!

Early on all the DC books were inked by veteran Vince Colletta. Colletta came out of the Alex Raymond school of romance illustrating and he was known for a very fine line and scratchy textured feel to his inks. His specialty was texture, he wanted the readers to fell the difference between cloth, and leather, or fur or skin—he gave each its own technique—that’s why his work on Thor, with its naturalism seemed so successful. He had been inking and drawing romance books, and then Thor for years at Marvel. Many readers felt that this was the wrong style for inking over Kirby.

Vince the Prince

Kirby had reached an impressionistic style full of hard slashing lines and expressionistic squiggles and bold backgrounds full of dynamic bursts of energy named Kirby krackle. Truth be told, Jack had long since stopped worrying about texture, it seemed all materials were treated the same way. It didn’t matter if the person was wearing a natural material or a metallic suit, Jack drew folds, or sinew the same way—hard slashing squiggly lines that dissected the body. It was left up to the inker to decide whether or not to differentiate between skin, material or metal. Colletta’s lightweight inks never seemed to capture the full dynamics of Kirby’s boldness. Colletta also had a maddening habit of erasing background characters and simplifying architecture by turning Kirby’s magnificently ornate architecture into little square grids and checkerboard facades. He also would simplify faces and make all the women look the same; beautiful, but plastic. But Vince was not without talent and fans—chief among them the editors –who often called on Colletta and his band of merry inkers when jobs were behind schedule.

Mark Evanier, and Sherman would look at the stats and compare then to Kirby’s originals and blanch at the changes Vince made. They would show them to Jack and campaign for Jack to fire Colletta. Jack was wary, he hated that type of confrontation and the thought of taking food out of a fellow artists’ mouth reviled him. But finally he had enough and made a visit to New York and confronted Colletta. Vince made it clear that he wasn’t changing his operation of coached associates for anyone, and perhaps Jack should simplify his pencils so that an inker could do them faster. The outraged Kirby went into the DC offices and demanded of Carmine that he replace Colletta with Mike Royer, the inker he had met in California. Carmine commiserated with Jack, but Colletta was a very valuable inker. He was the inker that the editors turned to when they were behind schedule, as Colletta and his team could do a whole book over a weekend. A compromise was reached; Colletta would remain on Jimmy Olsen, the in-house book while Royer was given the other three titles.

The results were so dramatically different–like night and day. But the response was mixed. Many people loved the softness and textures that Vinnie added, while others wanted the full abstractness of Kirby’s new style. The initial reaction was negative, and in one of the few arguments between Kirby and Evanier, Jack blew up and blamed him for the response since he was the one who pushed for Royer as a replacement. His anger soon passed; personally Jack was thrilled with Royer. Having the inker so close allowed Kirby to make sure that what was inked was what he drew, it also meant less art changes from New York. One time Royer prettied up the face of Big Barda; a female warrior that Jack drew solidly. When Jack saw the pretty face he immediately cut it out and redrew the face he wanted, scolding Mike and telling him never to change anything. Royer understood and is considered the inker most true to Kirby’s pencil. Unfortunately, Mike was not the most fluid inker at the time and his early works seem messy and overwrought. The demand to never change anything meant that little mistakes and bad perspectives that more mature and competent inkers would have corrected remain in Mike’s inks. Over time Mike improved drastically to where his precision almost rivaled Joe Sinnott.

Greg Theakston’s second edition – deluxe death defiers redux

Yet it should be noted that the early 70’s saw the introduction of a new breed of pencilers, with a style of exquisite illustration. These artists such as Mike Ploog, Bernie Wrightson, Jeff Jones, and others grabbed the attention and superb cartoonists like Kirby, or Ditko and Beck suffered with the young buyers. The change in styles made Kirby seem old and outdated. In the fans eye, Jack Kirby was becoming passe; a victim of time and tide. Some pros took to unfavorably comparing him to the then hot Neal Adams, and saying Jack was the past while Neal was the future. (It should be mentioned that Neal Adams, while unique never had a successful run on any given comic, while Kirby never failed. Neal drew pretty pictures, Jack told stories.)

But Jack had his fans. Carmine once admitted; “The kids at Yale think Kirby’s new books are more tuned in to them than any other media.  They’re reading transcripts from NEW GODS over their radio station.  The Kirby books are a conscious attempt to show what things look like when you’re out where the kids are.  The colleges, the influence of the drug culture.  We’re showing them basically what they’re seeing.  We’re tuning in to what they’re experiencing.”

It is interesting that at this time Jack Kirby finally became picky about his inkers. Inking has always been a part of the process. But Jack always figured that his ability as a penciler was so strong that an inker could not destroy his meaning. His many inkers over the years had many styles and techniques that they added to Jack’s drawings. Whether it was Joe Simon’s dark and scratchy hay, or Al Williamson’s beautiful light airy illustrative flourishes, or Wally Wood’s dramatic shadow/sheen, it seems Jack’s stories shone through. At Marvel, Stan paired Jack up with a varied crew of fellows and told them to add their personalities to Jack’s pencils and make the finished product collaboration. To Stan, the inkers were as important as the penciler to the final product, so a Dick Ayers added a roughhewn organic line, while a Steve Ditko made everything dark and creepy, a Vince Colletta softened and texturized as Joe Sinnott hardened, and intensified the work with clear, hard, shiny lines. None of these were wrong, though some might say that Colletta’s softness was not what Jack drew. It should be emphasized that for most of Jack’s career, the inkers were chosen by the editors; they were controlled and judged by the editor, not the penciler. Their job was to prepare the work for coloring and printing, not to impress Jack. Later in life Kirby worried about inking, and coloring, and preferred those that followed more precisely what he drew. He wanted trueness, not added personality. So we see him going more to Mike Royer or Berry. Jack had earned this right though some may claim that the product lacked style and personality that came from inking flourishes. Did not the FF look better under a Joe Sinnott rather than a George Roussos? In fact, Jack Kirby actually took little flourishes from the inkers to make his work look better. These arguments will continue for all times. And the answers will always be subjective–purely dependent on the individual’s preference. But inking does have some fundamentals that all the inkers depended on. Artist, friend and occasional Kirby inker, Greg Theakston explained in an article in Amazing Heroes #100. Titled “A Look at Technique”, Greg tried to explain what an inker needed to do over Jack Kirby; he used a drawing of a god, Heimdall, done by Kirby and Don Heck in the late 60’s as a guide.

“As a basic rule, the inking is broken into three strokes.

1) “Holding lines”- Heavy lines that define the overall shape, with accents to move the eye, and at the same time, strengthen the form. To see the holding lines, squint at the drawing. (Chic Stone used the heaviest holding lines, they have been called coloring book drawings because the lines were so distinct – Colletta’s may have been the finest. – ST)

2) Decorative lines- Medium lines that define secondary shapes on a major form, or lines that decorate the major form. (such as costume lines and muscles)

3) Detail work- Fine line-work used on important intricate forms; also used as textures. (note scales on tights, detail work can be heavy where the detail is more prominent)

What amazes me is the weight of the “holding lines” on the legs, hip, and cape. How many of today’s inkers/artists would dare to use such a line? It is heavy but not crude, and it also manipulates our eye back to the head. The blacks are spotted in the cape, and really push the figure forward (called spotting- it really refers to mass blacks of any shape that can be used to highlight and direct the action) Rather than black spots, Heck has given the shadows a fur texture. All the fur work leads your eye to the warriors head.

The shadow work on the right leg is very strong, and adds extra support to the lower leg. Well-spotted blacks within give an object strength and support. (make the leg appear strong enough to carry the figures weight)

The composition is the “big O” helped by the cape, stripes on shoes, outer axe blade, strap, and up to the head.” – Greg Theakston

While I might agree or disagree with some of what Greg put forth, I think he captured the main points. ( I tend to put less weight on the “leading” role Greg thinks is so important, I might also have talked about the role of cross-hatching as opposed to feathering, or blocking as an inking choice for shadows) Inkers must constantly choose the weight and thickness of their lines to help shape the character for proper coloring. The inkers must also decide how to interpret the pencilers gray areas. An inker like Colletta would always choose to make shadows soft and shapely rather than Royer’s choice of solid black areas. The important thing, as Gil Kane and John Romita noted was that Jack supplied all of those answers, the inkers job was to follow Jack’s choices, not add in their own personal choices. Jack wanted someone to follow his suggestions, not come up with their own. Basically, it’s a philosophical question. Is the inker a facilitator or an equal partner in drawing this picture? It’s a question that for most of Jack’s career he didn’t care the answer, but as he got older, he considered inkers as facilitators-just part of the printing process, not the thinking process. Jack would explain that all the storytelling choices were made before the drawing even starts, after that, it’s all process.

Mike Royer gave Jack what he wanted- some bad, extraneous and sketchy lines and all. To many people, they would have preferred seeing some of Mike’s style and personality also. Stepping out of the authorial role, my preference has always been the collaborative method where the inker is considered an equal person in the process- give me a Wally Wood, or Joe Simon over an aper anytime. It is interesting that at an even later time, Jack allowed Mike Thibodeaux to ink. Mike always added in his patented circular, florid lines to the drawing. He couldn’t ink without adding his personality to the mix.

More Kirby art and Green Arrow plays along

In the early Seventies, Mattel , the toy company came up with a series of comic related puzzle games. They would feature the Lone Ranger, Tarzan, and Superman. Alex Toth was scheduled to supply the graphics, but when he couldn’t do them he recommended his California neighbor Jack Kirby. The art was classic Kirby doing three characters that he had never really done previous, except for a few panels of Superman in the Jimmy Olsen comic. Mike Royer inked the drawings and on Superman they once again had the head redrawn by Murphy Anderson. One of the Superman drawings appears to be Superman on Super Town. What an amazing chance to see Kirby on Tarzan, and Lone Ranger. There had been other chances where Kirby might have done classic pulp, and radio characters, but this was one of the few times to actually materialize.

Impostor heads and an early Devil Dinosaur

Another interesting commission came from Pro! Magazine– an in-house magazine for the NFL. Kirby was asked to do two drawings of a cosmically charged futuristic football game. These magnificent works of art also feature Kirby’s unique color palette. The art is surreal, and garish, and futuristic.

Kirby throwing the bomb

In most lives, especially that of a freelance artist, there are those strange projects that come along and for a period take up ones time and creativity, and then quietly disappear for reasons of their own. The little work product created gets thrown into the dead drawer where it sits until many years later, an inquisitive family member comes along and reopens that long lost drawer. In 1971, American International pictures released a horror movie called the Abominable Dr. Phibes, a scary, slimy gothic horror film of revenge—notable only for the scene chewing vitality of Vincent Price, and the Phantom of the Opera rip-offs. It was a modest film of no real repute, but it managed to make the studio some money so a follow up was ordered. The second film released in 1972 was called The Rise of Dr. Phibes, where Price reprises his role of the horribly scarred Dr. seeking revenge on those who killed his wife. Most of the writing was by William Goldstein, though the second feature was bastardized by other writers. This sequel also made money and Goldstein tried to sell the premise for a TV show.

Jack Kirby was hired to produce some presentation art for the show to be called The Sinister Dr. Phibes. Only one sheet exists and that was found years later by Jeremy Kirby going through his granddads things. Jeremy speculated that it was a possible presentation piece for the movie which would put it circa 1971.

Vincent Price under the mask

Historian William Maynard places it after the second movie for a re-named TV pitch which would place it in 1972-73 which seems more likely given the name change. The piece was partially inked and lettered, most likely by Mike Royer who had taken over most of Kirby’s inking by this time, plus the lettering and logo design match up to Royer’s pattern. The piece was never finished as it most likely was shelved in mid-production-much like a later Prisoner series. It’s not known if this was a for gratis piece or if he was paid for his participation though short lived.

Later, another artist, Jay Stephens, after seeing the rough sketch finished the work; he re-did the title back to the original blood dripping movie title and formatted it to the Kirby style of the early 70’s. He added some muted coloring and produced a very nice sample of quasi-Kirby art. The corner accents are not something Kirby would have done—his decorative bits were more geometric and technical. I do like how the new artist re-used the black cloud letter background behind the new art in a more muted color. The new inker was very faithful to Jack’s original pencils and he captured the creepiness of the characters-though I wish the mask was more Vincent Price-like, and the added teeth to the monster weren’t necessary. Placing Jack’s name in a circle was something Jack did often in the early 70’s. All the details of how this piece came about will probably never be known, but it is an interesting look into the often crazy world of the freelance commercial artist. Hopefully other one-off pieces will show up and help fill in the magical career of Jack Kirby.

The initial sales returns for the Fourth World books were encouraging. It seemed that many a Marvel Zombie crossed over into enemy territory. It’s been reported that the first issue of Kirby’s Jimmy Olsen set a new company record for most improved sales from one issue to the next. Unfortunately the sales did not continue to impress; they slowly slid southward. Some of the problem was DC’s. They got into a price pissing match with Marvel and got burned. Their higher pricing caused a great drop in the whole DC line and almost cost Infantino his job.(similar to what happened to Dell) Other problems might have been Jack’s, such as never giving a new reader a comfortable place to jump in at, and not giving the characters back stories and histories. (I’ll talk about this in more detail later)

In 1972, a small toy company leased the rights from both DC and Marvel to create a new line of action figures. Mego Corp. was a little known company that had offered an 8 inch fully poseable doll named Action Jackson. The toy made no ripple in the market, but Mego was convinced by a merchandiser that the body cast could be used on a new line of super-heroes. They paid $50,000 for the rights to 4 DC comic characters and released them in 1973 to much acclaim. Batman, Superman, Robin and Aquaman were a whopping success. Mego quickly acquired the rights to several Marvel characters. Spider-Man and Captain America appeared later in 1973 using Jack Kirby art on the advertising.

The next couple years would see the addition of more old DC and Marvel characters such as Hulk, Iron Man, Thor, and the Fantastic Four-many using Kirby’s artwork on their packaging. This series title World’s Greatest Super–Heroes became a marketing miracle that catapulted the company to the height of toy companies. The quality of the sculpting and the costuming was top rate and the packaging was colorful and eye-catching. They added to their line with a series of banks, and play sets, and accessories. The action figure became a staple of the toy industry. Despite the great fees, the artists never saw a penny. At the same time Marvel was using Kirby art to sell their merchandise, they released a series of hard backed books telling the history of Marvel Comics with the claim that all the characters were created by Stan Lee. If any mention of Jack Kirby was made it was as the lucky artist chosen by Stan to illustrate his characters. Jack Kirby was officially a non-person- as the cash registers rang upward. Kirby angrily took his copy and tore out all the text by Stan Lee. Roy Thomas commented; “I think once Jack left, there was a natural tendency to mentally downgrade his contributions, just from a practical viewpoint. Otherwise you’re giving a competitor credit. I won’t say how much of that was conscious and how much was unconscious, but it’s a natural tendency. At that stage, you’re doing it for hype, for publicity purposes and to do that, you don’t necessarily play up the guy who quits and gone to the competition.” It seems sad that DC did nothing to push Kirby’s new concepts, while Marvel kept regurgitating unaccredited, Kirby’s old characters and art. An Orion among the Mego figures would have been staggering.

I think DC told Jack his sales were slipping, and Jack responded by trying to make the books more dramatic. He attempted a cinematic technique that made the introduction of the stories jump out with dynamics. It has been called the opening triptych. The splash page is a beautifully rendered introduction to the hero in a dramatic fashion. Page two and three become a fabulous two-page splash that introduces the locale and wild environment that the hero is caught up in. These wide angle shots are simply beyond the pale; full of movement, details, and drama that immediately pulls the readers in. The quiet but dramatic opening splash page erupts into a maelstrom of action as all hell breaks loose. I can’t think of any other artist who has so confidently and imaginatively given us a peek into their nightmare visions. Jack actually used this on a couple Marvel books but increased use of this technique on and off for the next 5-6 years. These two page splashes leave no corner untouched as Kirby fills the whole page with action.

Kirby opening triptych – see the hero – see the hero in deep shit dramatic detail

Around the time of the seventh issues, there appears to have been an editorial decision to make a change in focus. In New Gods #7 Kirby presented the back-story for the whole cataclysmic civil war taking place. He showed how the two worlds had always been at war until a pact was made between Darkseid and Highfather of New Genesis. This peace pact was sealed by a trading of the two offspring. Thus Orion was actually born of Apokolips, and Scott Free was originally of New Genesis. The great secret of Orion’s personality dichotomy was revealed, and Scott Free’s ingrained desire for freedom was revealed. Over in Mister Miracle, Kirby gave us Scott Free’s life as a child on Apokolips, taught by the sadistic Granny Goodness, trained to be a military man and shown the light by Himon, the leader of the underground freedom movement and quite the escape artist himself.

Takes us back to the beginning

In Forever People, they decided to bring in another long time DC character to try to draw in the longtime DC fans that were still resisting Kirby’s magic. In 1967, DC had originated a new character named Deadman. He was a circus performer killed in action by an unknown assailant with a hook for a hand (Borrowed from the TV’s Fugitive) He was reanimated as a ghost by an occult being and quested with finding his murderer. Although created by Arnold Drake and Carmine Infantino, it would become recognized as a vehicle for Neal Adams’ dramatic art. Deadman became a fan favorite immediately winning Alley awards as best new strip and character. Despite its impressive art, the character failed to find public acceptance and soon was dropped as a series. But the editors constantly tried to find avenues to showcase this character. In 1972 the editors asked Jack Kirby to throw him into the Fourth World. Jack was not happy, but he relented and Mark Evanier used a quirk in Deadman’s history as a means to work him into Jack’s epic. But Jack had no knowledge of this character and asked for help.

Alan Kupperberg was Johnny on the spot:

“Deadman was to make his appearance in the Forever People and word came back to DC via Jack’s New York liaison, E. Nelson Bridwell, that Jack needed Deadman art and story reference. Being, at that time, the buttinsky of ALL time, my ears opened wide. “

“I volunteered to loan Jack my own personal collection of Strange Adventures.   Off they went to California. And you’d better believe I got them back in pristine shape and in a timely manner. And you’d better believe I’ve still got them.”

“Of course, as a dyed-in-the-wool Superman fan, I’d long dreamt of a Kirby Superman. So I was as disappointed as everyone else when DC had artists Al Plastino and then Murphy Anderson, bring the famous Kryptonian physiognomy into line with the DC house style. Sometimes Superman’s face was “whited-out” with Sno-Pake and Vinnie Colletta’s work was re-inked. Sometimes the inked face was pasted over. Sometimes it was literally cut out of the page and patched in. Sometimes Vinnie left the face uninked and it was passed on to Anderson. Murphy regularly worked in the tiny, airless room DC set aside for freelancers use.   Why ever and whatever way they were accomplished, I still feel these alterations were a sad mutilation.”

“In that same cramped room I watched Neal Adams as he inked, among others, the Don Rickles cover of Jimmy Olsen #141. I also marveled as Neal did his own covers for the book, and his glee in having a crack at his conception of “being” Kirby on the cover of Jimmy Olsen #148.”

“After business hours, Adams would often invade the deserted production room and pore over the latest Kirby originals, professing awe at the King’s raw power and artistic versitility.” Adam’s would exclaim. “I get overwhelmed at seeing that gutsy, ballsy thing, (Kirby’s iconography) I want to do that but I can’t.”

It seemed that none of the attempts helped and sales continued to decline. Some have hinted that it wasn’t so much as sales declining but the failure to reach good sell thru of the print runs. This doesn’t make a whole lot of sense since print runs are easily reduced when called for. If an issue sells regularly at the 300K level than readjust your print run from 400K down 325K and you suddenly have a profitable print run. Publishers are always adjusting print runs as sales rise or decline. Sometimes a small sell through is evidence of an over-optimistic print run.

Whatever the true reason, Kirby was taken off Jimmy Olsen soon, New Gods and Forever People were canceled with issue #11. Mister Miracle was changed from a piece of a large intermingling jigsaw puzzle to a typical super-hero title and continued for another year and a half. But this didn’t mean the end of Kirby at DC. As one series was canceled, he immediately produced another. Carmine wasn’t anti-Kirby, he was anti-Fourth World, he was looking for a breakout series from Kirby.

Kirby was devastated, he had given his all on these books, and couldn’t understand how they could have failed. There were rumors of DC editorial intrusions and back stage shenanigans that killed the books despite decent if not great sales. Kirby was afraid that Carmine was reverting back to his pattern of cancelling titles at first sign of bad sales. It was well known that Carmine was on a short leash, and Kirby thought he was jumping the gun. No matter what the actual figures, they were no threat to Marvel’s dominance. Rumors and articles in some fanzines actually claimed Kirby was leaving. In reality, Kirby had thoughts of jumping ship, but he had a contract.

Book writers Will Jacobs and Gerard Jones have another theory on the collapse of the Fourth World books and Jack response.

From The Comic Book Heroes (1985 Crown Publishers)

“Sometimes, perhaps, Kirby’s imagination went a little too far out (especially in Jimmy Olson, where vampires, Scottish Sea Serpents, and even comedian Don Rickles traipsed through the pages) ; but even then, all of his work blazed with the unmistakable Kirby verve. The Fourth World provided one of those rarest and most meaningful of moments in comic book history; a truly individual vision, free of trends and fads, of editorial policy and the demands of mainstream fandom. In those pages, full of archetypal power, explosive action, and bizarre invention, Jack Kirby—the man who had been both workhorse and maverick, street fighter, and mythic poet, Salesman and creative genius during all of comics most critical junctures—brought his tumultuous career to a dazzling consummation, and in the process created 3 of the finest series of their time.”

“For a while there seemed nowhere to go but up. The titles were apparently selling well, Kirby was committed to them, and their promise seemed boundless. Thus it came as a stunning blow both to Kirby and his fans when DC inexplicably canceled New Gods, and the Forever People after 11 issues(Nov 1972) and Mr. Miracle after 18 (Mar 1974) having already turned Jimmy Olson over to editor Murray Boltinoff (Apr 1972) The “titanic” struggle of New Genesis and Apokolips was left unresolved (With these cancellations Kirby felt a growing discontent with the standard business of comic book production, in which all of his great ideas remained the property of DC, and he gained only a freelancer’s fees; he thus began, like Neal Adams and Mike Freidrich to be a force for legal and financial, as well as creative change in the field.”

Their theory sounds okay, but I don’t entirely buy it. First, I am not sure that the series was selling all that well. I also think Kirby had some idea it was coming. I also don’t consider it the end of Kirby’s fine career. More important, I don’t quite buy the Kirby as social leader because of the cancellation idea. Jack had begun some of the changes such as demand for artwork before the Fourth World. I see no evidence that the idea of copyright or ownership occurred and was fought for by Kirby at that time. Kirby never asked for any of his DC creations, nor the later ones when back at Marvel. The copyright law changes were still several years away, so I doubt Kirby ever thought he had any right to the copyrights at that time. Kirby never joined up with Neal Adams in his brief quest for creative rights. At some later point I do think Kirby became aware and fought for those creative ideals, but not at this time because of this failure. I think the ideas were simply fragments in the ether at this time for Jack.

Seamless end of one and beginning anew

When he was immediately given new series, he swallowed his pride and continued to soldier on. First was The Demon, a curious blend of Arthurian legend and modern mysticism. The Demon is in the real world Jason Blood, a relative of Merlin’s who, when danger intrudes transforms into a hellish demon formed from one of Merlin’s spells. The book was very atmospheric and a vehicle for Kirby to mix monsters, mythology and sci-fi as only he could. It was another case of a conflicted character, neither all good, nor all bad. Speculation this was to venture into the gothic horror market Marvel was cultivating. Mark Evanier explains that it was a Kirby creation done while waiting for a Turkey dinner at Howard Johnsons. The visual effect was stolen from a long ago Hal Foster Prince Valiant story. Again it started with great promise but its energy and dynamism soon eroded and became mundane and anti-climatic. It started out creepy yet soon became camp and tacky.

Foster becomes Kirby

Perhaps it was age, or energy level, but Kirby’s series seemed to have fallen into a predictable pattern. They would start off at a high level as Kirby was energized by the new concept, but after the initial concept was done, the series would then fall into a formulaic, and banal episodic dreariness. Jack couldn’t maintain his original fire in the belly for the series.

Kirbytech border

Next followed Kamandi; a dystopian tale of a future world where animals were in charge and humans were mindless beasts, except for one boy who had survived the great holocaust and finds himself adrift in a world that he doesn’t understand or control. If this seems reminiscent of Planet of The Apes, that’s because it was inspired by the movie. When DC couldn’t get the rights Carmine decided to make their own version. But this isn’t a simple remake of the movie. Kirby had done something similar many years before in a fantasy comic from Harvey, and his stories share more thematically with that short story than they do from the movie. The name Kamandi was also borrowed from a long lost newspaper strip Kirby had proposed in the 1950’s. Jack retrofitted the name and made the research facility that Kamandi lived in Command D. The physical appearance seems to be a continuation of the long flowing blond hair, devil may care adventurer template as earlier seen in Angel of Boy’s Ranch and Thor. We would see it again in Captain Victory. The child took the name of the facility as his own. Kirby took the kernel and produced a different and more wondrous world than Pierre Boulle ever considered. Kirby’s Kamandi was allegorical, topical, philosophical and just plain simple fun. This was what Infantino wanted and needed, the series would last for over four years and well after Kirby left the series. As per Jack’s history, he gave the child a mentor named Ben Boxer –who can transform his body into a nuclear reactor.

In late 1972 Jack had an idea. He approached DC to try to sell it. Jack had always loved C.C.Beck’s version of Captain Marvel. DC was now the owner of the property since the Fawcett lawsuit. Jack suggested bringing the character back and having Beck once again draw it. DC liked the idea, but turned it over to Editor Julius Schwartz to pursue. Beck would return to draw the strip but the results were less than satisfying. The DC writers could never match or understand Otto Binders self-parodying and innocent essence from the original strip. The book, titled Shazam,though widely anticipated soon floundered. Beck retired once again. Yet DC was able to sell a TV series featuring the intrepid family. After Beck left after issue #11, DC tried to force fit the series into the regular DC Universe to no avail. The series soon folded. Likewise Berni Wrightson introduced Swamp Thing in the back of a fantasy anthology book to great acclaim. The character soon received his own book as Berni provided beautiful artwork and the stories even included Batman, yet Berni soon left and the series was cancelled soon after.

Mike Kaluta made a wonderful attempt at reviving the old pulp character the Shadow-again to much acclaim, but little sales. DC was fighting for new successful series, yet was unable to find the right formula with old or new characters.

Marvel wasn’t doing much better. The downward spiral that started when Kirby stopped plotting hit freefall when Kirby left. Stan Lee had given up the day to day , and the editor position became one big musical chair. Jim Shooter said; “sales were bad and falling.  It was almost all newsstand sales then, by the way.  This was before the Direct Market was a significant factor.  The comics overall were breakeven at best.  Upstairs, the cheesy non-comics magazine department was losing millions.  It seemed like the company as a whole was in a death spiral.” This, despite a few books like Conan, Master of Kung-Fu, and Tomb of Dracula selling very well.

Amazingly, on their bestselling book, Conan, Barry Smith—the low rate artist had become a super-star. Despite wanting only to work at Marvel, he had become disillusioned with their plantation mentality. In disgust, he left the comic industry to try out for fine art immortality. Suddenly in a book that they had wanted a low wage penciler was given their top rated artist, as John Buscema took over for a long run.

Smith would join several other disgruntled comic artists and create a fine art studio called “the Studio”. Along with Jeff Jones, Bernie Wrightson, and Mike Kaluta left comics to varying degrees to produce large prints and posters, and some book illustrations. Comics bad business design had lost some more talent at an already low point.

Jack created whole new worlds

Jack was known for his spontaneity, his willingness to react in an instant if a story came to him. In Kamandi it was no different. In 1974 the United States was living through a Constitutional crisis. In what has become known as the Watergate Affair, President Nixon was accused of participating in a cover up of a criminal break-in of the Watergate Hotel. In late 1973, we found out that Nixon had installed listening devices and recording capabilities in the Oval Office. When Congress learned that Nixon had recorded his conversations they subpoenaed the existing tapes, which led to a Supreme Court decision that forced Nixon to give up the tapes. When reviewed a mysterious segment of the tape was erased.

The boy showed good taste

While this was going on, Kirby came up with a Kamandi story about a group of apes who lived in the ruins of the Capitol in Wash. D.C. These apes were inspired by the words of the lost tapes that controlled their lives. The apes have formed a sect named the “bugs”. The hunters were called “plumbers” in honor of the mythical Nixon leak stoppers who broke into the Hotel. The sect’s society was built around mysterious spirit voices from the past heard thru the Watergate Sound-maker- a sonic device that can communicate, and destroy thru its amplified noise. After a tough battle, Kamandi and the Tigers are successful in beating back the apes and after dismantling the machine find that the source material was the lost Watergate tapes. When they attempt to play a tape they hear a short message and then a break. The message was “I want to make this perfectly clear”. This strange story appeared in Kamandi #15, dated March 1974. Seven months later Richard Nixon would resign the Presidency. One wonders if Jack received any blow back from such a political spoof during the height of the Country’s crisis. DC was a conservative operation and may not have liked such a partisan political statement.
Jack wasn’t one to usually let his politics intrude in his stories, but Richard Nixon brought out the worst in Kirby. Kirby had a political side. Jack’s son Neal reminisced in an interview for TJKC.

Pre-Kamandi Kamandi – God he hated Richard Nixon

TJKC: Would you consider him socially conscious?

NK:  Oh absolutely. One thing I remember when Cesar Chavez was leading the grape boycotts in California. My mother came home with some grapes in a shopping bag, and he goes, “You can’t have those.” and he picks them up and throws them out the kitchen window. I remember we went to a cousin’s Bar Mitzvah. It was a simple affair, they had a meal set up. There was an old homeless man standing near the door looking in. My father took the guy by the arm brought him inside, sat him down at the table, and made him a plate of food. (ST note: Just as the Torah commands: When we see a guest, we should see an opportunity–an opportunity to teach, embrace, and learn. It is only through welcoming the stranger that we can truly fulfill our mandate as the children of Israel who left the desert and dwelt in Sukkot.)

After the first 15 episodes, Kamandi started the irrevocable tumble into sameness, schmaltz, and childish silliness with only the occasional burst of Kirby greatness coming through. Jack’s art stayed strong but slipped into a little parody of Kirby grandeur when Jack seemed to be trying too hard for the amazing. The stories suffered from over relying on the graphic end rather than the literary merit. Too often the scenes are too big—they lost the smaller plot cohesiveness needed for a good story.

Days of future past – DC did exist

Kirby was given an ongoing war series called The Losers in a struggling DC war book Our Fighting Forces, and provided 12 issues. Kirby took this lemon and made some of the sweetest lemonade ever seen in funny books. These were some of the most personal stories Kirby had ever written; torn from his war time hell and the pages seemed to be written in blood. The Losers were a collection of DC’s small impact World War 2 heroes, whose own series had been cancelled. The series was very odd. There’s a pretty unhealthy dose of self-loathing within the Losers when you think about it; it seemed like every issue’s cover featured one or all of the Losers in very dire straits, with one of them yelling “Just another reason we were BORN to LOSE!” or something to that effect. However, none of that self-hatred is on display in the Kirby LOSERS stories I have here. Indeed, at a Kirby Panel in San Diego, Mark Evanier commented on how the very title of the feature must have rubbed Jack Kirby the wrong way, as “he would never think of a U.S. serviceman as a loser.” Kirby himself had been drafted in the fall of 1943 and served in the Third Army combat infantry. The series seemed to be rudderless until Kirby took it over. The hard core war themes are so different from the irreverent nature of the earlier Sgt. Fury books. The dangers are so magnified and the horror more pronounced. Yet Jack still found a way to make them enjoyable reads. One of the characters was Captain Storm, a P.T. boat skipper who had lost his boat and his leg in an attack. Storm got around with a wooden leg, and Jack could never figure out which leg was real and which was wood. One panel it would be the left and the very next panel it might be the right. Kirby’s penchant for details was never worse, but it didn’t matter.

The Losers meet Patton

The real question is what was a gimpy P T Boat skipper doing marching around in an infantry brigade? Many consider this short series as the best work Kirby ever did in mainstream comics. In #152, Kirby tells a tale of tired soldiers coming upon a shelled out town and trying to secure it. It ends when the squad runs into Gen. George Patton himself and receives a dressing down. It’s not your usual everybody’s happy at the end tome.
It is of course relevant to remember that the real soldier Jack Kirby did have a run in with Gen. Patton and it too was not pleasant.

Kirby’s war wasn’t pretty

Just as this occurred, many of the young artists joined a new group; the Academy of Comic Book Arts. This quickly served as a vehicle for the artists listing their grievances. The new group was led by firebrand Neal Adams, and Archie Goodwin. Their demands had found no immediate ear among the companies.

After Martin Goodman sold Marvel, it was with the intention to keep his son Chip working at Marvel. Soon, Marvel summarily let Chip go in order to expand Stan Lee’s authority. So Martin financed a new venture for Chip that he named Atlas Comics. He hired indy vet Jeff Rovin as editor. He raided and filled his bullpen with ex-Marvel people like Larry Lieber, Steve Ditko, Wally Wood, and Neal Adams. Filled with great hopes and praising press coverage they started out with a bang—copying every genre and character that Marvel sold. Their aim was gutsy-take on No.1 straight up.

How Atlas decided to do this was revolutionary; they overthrew the whole dynamic of how comics were done. They offered the artists, complete return of original art; copyright ownership for the characters, and a higher page rate. This guaranteed that the hot artists and writers would flock to the new company.

Despite these crumbs, there were problems. The young writers did not bring great innovations, they brought carnage. These Marvel clones outdid the competition in only one way—body count, and nothing Martin demanded could stem the blood flow. Martin’s demands to match up with Marvel were too much. Lieber and Rovin explained that Marvel’s growth was organic over a long period of time and couldn’t be duplicated in just a year or so. Martin’s continuous demands finally led to Jeff Rovin leaving as it was left to Larry Lieber to run the business—but Martin had lost too much money and there was no way to recoup. Sadly, while Lieber was on jury duty he received a call to see Chip Goodman. He knew what was coming. Martin decided against throwing good money after bad.

Atlas Comics made no lasting mark on comics; they produced nothing of consequence, but their impact was unimaginable on the industry itself. As Jeff Rovin said when asked of any significance; “One was an ownership/profit sharing contract for artists and writers on any character(s) they created, and the other was the return of all artwork. Neither of these were being practiced at the time, and Martin grudgingly agreed to do so when he realized that that kind of arrangement, coupled with high page rates was a means of getting talent to work for us.” No one knew just what was set in motion would one day overwhelm the working relationships on the industry as a whole.

Jack Kirby was under contract to DC and never even considered heading to Atlas. When his contract ran out, Atlas was already floundering. It’s a fun what-if for Kirby to finally reap some of the rewards he had fought so strongly for.

They even stole the logo blurbs

Unfortunately at DC, Kirby threw concept after concept against the wall and nothing else stuck. OMAC, a wonderfully cynical idea, failed despite a plethora of sci-fi concepts and dazzling art. Manhunter (a continuation of the early S&K concept), Atlas, the kid group Dingbats of Danger Street all failed when offered in First Issue Specials—a test market book.

OMAC: Kirby at his most cubistic – A throwback concept a poor man’s Conan

An oddity came about when Joe Simon approached Carmine Infantino with a proposal to update the old S&K Sandman series. Carmine liked the idea but had an even better one. Why not have Joe write it and Jack Kirby draw it, just like in the old days.

Jack wasn’t entirely thrilled with the idea but agreed. The result was perhaps the most hyped book in DC’s history; the return of Simon and Kirby. The book was no great shake, Joe had lost his mojo a while back and this story didn’t recapture any of the zaniness one might expect. Kirby’s artwork was Kirby’s modern artwork, with no attempt made to recapture the wartime S&K fluidity and zaniness. Didn’t matter a whole lot, the book was a smash. Joe says it was DC’s best seller of the year. The series was given the go ahead for more issues, without Jack, though he did do the covers. He did return to draw the books with issue #4, but the series written by a DC hack regular was lackluster to say the least. Don’t know if it helped, but the cover of No.4 spotlighted Jack’s name as doing interior work.

Sandman #4 Jack returns Justice Inc. #2 – Even on hack books, Jack never hacked it—interesting take on stereotype

Kirby filled in a few other titles as he was working out the last couple months of his contract which called for a certain number of pages; but there was no there there. Kirby’s mind was once again thinking about starting fresh at a new/old home. He had run into Roy Thomas and when the subject turned to his time at DC, Kirby informed him that his contract was running out and he was available if Marvel would have him back.

Jack’s time at DC was short, and it’s hard to categorize. It wasn’t a failure; Jack produced some of the best work of his career, and enjoyed his modicum of freedom, and was paid his best rate ever while never missing a day. It was personal, powerful, intriguing, and cumbersome. It resonates just as strongly today. The characters have been revived time and time again and are now vital parts of the DC canon.

Simon and Kirby together– once more names on the cover – inks by Royer

Darkseid has become one of the great arch villains at DC, alongside the Joker and Lex Luther. But it also wasn’t a success; Jack would always tell anyone who would listen that his job was to make sales for the company. That’s how he judged his work and on that basis, his work never found the deep audience it deserved. I think it galled him that his most personal work wasn’t accepted. He knew they would eventually find an audience. There are many theories as to why; some claim behind the scenes machinations by editors, some blame lying sales reports, some blame DC’s business decisions and some blame Marvel’s business decisions, they may all be part right and we’ll never know the whole story, but taken for what it was, the comic world was better off for his time there.

Just as Jack was leaving, he received another commission from Pro! Magazine. This time they wanted a couple of illustrations to adorn an article on legendary quarterback, Fran Tarkenton.

Why is the quarterback wearing Heimdall’s cape?

Previous – 20. Bullpen? Bullshit!! | Top | Next – 22. Allegory Of His Life

Previous – 19. Spider-man: The Case For Kirby | Contents | Next – 21. Brand New World

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

BULLPEN? BULLSHIT!!

On March 16th 1965, an 82 year old German Jew, who had escaped the horror of Nazi Germany, had run out of alternatives. Alice Herz’s campaigns to end the war in Viet Nam had proven fruitless. In a final act of desperation Alice went outside and on an urban Detroit street doused herself with gasoline and set herself on fire, thus becoming the first American to self-immolate in protest of the war. She wasn’t the last. This human torch didn’t fly or throw flame balls- she died a horrible painful death. Herz wrote a last testament, which she distributed to several friends and fellow activists before her death. The testament specifically refers to her decision to follow the protest methods of the Buddhist Vietnamese monks and nuns, whose acts of self-immolation had received worldwide attention. Confiding to a friend before her death, Herz remarked that she had used all of the accepted protest methods available to activists—including marching, protesting, and writing countless articles and letters—and she wondered what else she could do. Later in March, Martin Luther King would lead a civil rights march on Selma, Alabama. In April, 25,000 people would march on Washington D.C. in protest of the war. The perfect storm of civil disobedience had arrived and America would never be the same.

• 

• 

Working away – Hot day in Detroit

Meanwhile, back in England, the Beatles were awarded MBE’s (Member of the Order of British Empire) at Buckingham Palace; much to the dismay of the stodgy aristocracy. Prime Minister Harold Wilson explained, “I saw the Beatles, as having a transforming effect on the minds of youth, mostly for the good. It kept a lot of kids off the streets. They introduced many many young people to music, which in itself was a good thing. A lot of old stagers might have regarded it as idiosyncratic music, but the Mersey sound was a new important thing. That’s why they deserved such recognition.” – That, plus the millions of pounds that the Beatles and their imitators had brought to the British economy.

America was on fire! Los Angeles was ablaze, In perhaps the worst rioting in American history the black residents of the Watts section of L.A. said enough was enough. For 6 days in August 1965 they burned and rioted in defiance of a police force they felt had a long history of brutality and prejudice against the black populace. Seen as part of the civil rights movement that had been active and growing for decades, these riots were the resultant explosions of a long simmering animosity. After the Watts riot, inner cities boiling over became commonplace with it being a rarity for a major city to be spared.

The U.S. was at war with itself. To Marvel this wasn’t enough. They needed a real villain, one that made our little worries seem silly. Suddenly, the Universe was against us. From out of the stars came a monster so vast and omnipotent that the Earth itself was of no more importance than the latest buffet at Golden Corral. This was God, and he was hungry. But Jack’s pacing was such that our danger was doled out a little at a time. First we get introduced to God’s herald, a cosmic being whose job it was to go out and rustle up happy meals for God. Jack’s answer was the Silver Surfer. A chrome covered humanoid who surfed the cosmos like Duke Kahanamoku on the shores of Oahu. Surfing was the hot new sport filling up teen movies like Gidget, Ride the Wild Surf, and Beach Blanket Bingo, while Wild World of Sports began showing surf competitions, and Rock and Roll led with the Beach Boys and Jan and Dean. The sport was graceful, dynamic and centered on the perfect human form.

The Surfer was the ultimate comic character—constant movement, no clothes, and could go where no man had gone before. The surf board was a wonderful accessory; it swooped and dove, and lead the action. The first chapter of the saga was the FF vs. Silver Surfer, who treated them with disdain as he checked out this world as a main course. The FF had been warned by the Watcher that the end was near, since Galactus was an unstoppable force. Their every effort against the Surfer was swatted away as insignificant. Yet The Thing strikes a telling blow that sends the Surfer falling into the studios of Alicia Masters.

• 

• 

• 

Size – strength – and grace

While the Surfer is down, Galactus lands and begins assembling his world-eater. Knowing man has no defense, the Watcher ignores his pledge of no-interference and sends Johnny on a space trek to find a weapon to cause Galactus pause. The other FF members try to disrupt and delay Galactus plans only to be swatted away by his minions.

The Surfer recovers in Alicia’s studio and begins to understand that this civilization has purpose and reason. For once he realizes that he must stand up against his master. The last chapter is the Surfer battling and aggravating his boss, only to be swatted away as easily as the FF had been. Time is running out and even the Surfer realizes he can do nothing to save Earth. Just as Galactus is ready to operate his machines, Johnny Storm returns with a weapon to fight Galactus, Reed takes this weapon—the ultimate nullifier– and soon figures it out and confronts Galactus. Galactus realizes just what this weapon

• 

• 

Bite this Michaelangelo – comics x10

could do in the hands of a lower civilization, and backs off. He agrees to leave this world untouched, but as a parting sense of pique, he imprisons his former herald on this world. This mixture of “The Day the Earth Stood Still” and the biblical fallen angel was worlds above anything ever offered to the public before. Jack’s visuals sent this series into a whole new stratosphere. Never had raw power been so explosive and effectively drawn before. His pictures of the Surfer and Galactus surpassed any artistic representation ever done before, Jack’s art entered the realm of the Greats—not even Picasso or Goya would ever present such raw power graphically. It was doing what no artist had ever done. It gave form to unsurpassed power and relegated man to insignificance, yet still showed man at his most godly. Jack took the comic book to a whole new level, so high that it may never be equaled. The Silver Surfer became a symbol of questioning and humanity and haunted belief never seen before in comics. Stan Lee so loved this character that he forbade others from using him. Yet Stan Lee admits that the character was completely created by Jack Kirby. Stan says he was shocked when he first saw this flying icon. Jack had his own ideas, but was usurped from letting him grow. Whenever people talk about what is best about comics, The Fantastic Four #48-50 is always raised. If FF #25-26 stand as the best all-time fight issues, than The Galactus Saga stands supreme as comics as philosophical treatise. My one complaint is that the ending was a little too contrived, Jack had used a similar “Watcher gives the FF an unearthly machine” idea back in The Fantastic Four Annual #3. But it does add another wrinkle to have the Watcher disregard his oath not to interfere. Yet Jack wasn’t finished showing just what comics could do. Jack’s next step was to go to the very soul of what America was about; to take America where it had never gone before. Jack Kirby took comics into the mythological realm of Joseph Campbell’s “monomyth”. Or, as he put it “The Hero’s Journey” Comics had become adult reading.

• 

• 

This isn’t Archie or Casper – Even as action figures they’re mythic

The boys become men

The Beatles let go of the average and took pop music into the mythic when they released Rubber Soul in Dec. 1965. They actively melded pop with Dylanlike lyrics, Byrdlike harmonies, world music and a more sophisticated, worldly, and at times ambiguous message. It seems like a huge step into maturation that left teenage pap far behind. Nowhere Man is a searing portrait of man as an inconsequential character in a larger tapestry. While Norwegian Wood made a single man’s search for love into a cosmic quest of mythic importance. Suddenly rock music became a journey of growth rather than dance steps and stolen kisses. The Beatles threw off their teen mantle and announced they were serious adults.

Positive black characters had been a rarity in mainstream comics. Stan and Jack figured it was time to end that lunacy. Their first attempt was in making one of Sgt. Fury’s Howling Commandos an African American. Gabe Jones was a bugle playing GI in the multicultural commando unit. His race had been a focal point of several plotlines in the early stories and his bravery and dignity –like Jackie Robinson–never faltered. But Gabe was still a minor character in a book full of unique characters. It was time to create a major character strong enough to stand on its own and where else would Lee and Kirby introduce him other than the Fantastic Four- the comic where most of the important new characters were introduced. In issue #52 July 1966, the Fantastic Four meet up with the Black Panther and his home country of Wakanda in darkest Africa. The Black Panther is the chief of the Wakandans –a small independent country made rich by a natural mineral called Vibranium. T’challa, the Panther’s given name, had used this wealth to promote education and modernity on his small nation and has created a miraculous scientifically advanced country, deeply hidden in the African jungle. But Wakanda had an enemy, and the Panther had to test himself to see if he was ready to take on this enemy. The final test was to see if he could defeat the greatest team of superheroes imaginable. Though he did not defeat the FF, he certainly held them to a stalemate. The idea of heroes testing themselves against each other was a common plot line for Marvel. The heroes fought each other as often as villains. The fight against the villainous Klaw–Master of Sound -would showcase the Panther’s bravery, physical prowess and human decency. He was a perfect fit for admittance to Marvel’s pantheon of heroes. Later we would learn the unique process used at Marvel when we see the actual steps used to create this character. He started out being known as Coal Tiger a very unwieldy name.

• 

• 

Jack always helped out – Intro to a black super-hero

Some have complained that the concept was weakened by making the Panther a super-rich, European educated, African monarch, instead of an American from the inner city. Others disagree saying that making T’challa an African was even braver by introducing a new hero from the emerging continent of Africa, rather than making him an American. Africa had never had a particularly positive image in American culture. More of an after thought used mostly for Tarzan movie backgrounds where the black populace was useful for carrying bags and feeding the lions. Lee and Kirby transformed Tarzan into a black native- the equal to any white hero.

On his blog, Julius Chamblis writes; “The Black Panther provides the visual cue of difference that broke the barrier of white heroic privilege, but not the cultural perspective that created it. Removed from the U.S. experience by national identity, personal history, and individual motivation the Panther’s appearance did not directly address the stifling effect of racial prejudice. The Panther looked different, but like Kirby, his actions affirm his right to inclusion.  Like current debates about post-racial thinking, Kirby was not beyond racial identification, he merely attempted to devalue it.”

• 

• 

Black panther logo – brother Stokely

The earliest use of the term Black Panther was for the heralded tank crew fighting in the 3rd Army during WW2. As a World War 2 veteran, Jack was certainly familiar with Patton’s Panthers, The Black Panther all-black tank battalion which led the battle of Lorraine and Metz and was a favorite of Gen. Patton.

• 

• 

The Black Panther symbol predated Kirby’s use of the title. The all-black tank group that led the march into Metz were known as the Black Panthers. Another earlier but not well known use was as the sporting logo for historically black Clark College in Atlanta Ga. It was used in 1965 by the Lowndes County Freedom Organization to help signup black voters in Lowndes County Alabama. Formed by oft-arrested radical Stokely Carmichael and his Students For a Non-violent Coordinating Committee, the LCFO was on the cusp of the rising black power movement.  There was national coverage by Life magazine.

A couple months later in Oakland California a group of black nationalists would form a new group espousing Black Power in all things, chief among them the end of police brutality, full and equal black employment, and self-realization of all black people. This group would transform into perhaps the most radical black organization of all. The name of the group was the Black Panther Party. Three black Californians, Huey P. Newton, Eldridge Cleaver and Bobby Seale, asked for permission to use the Black Panther emblem that the Lowndes County Freedom Organization had adopted, for their newly formed Black Panther Party. Stan Lee worried about the name being appropriated by a radical group and changes were suggested. Ideas were passed. But luckily none were accepted. The Black Panther stayed the Black Panther and he became a part of the Marvel Universe.

• 

• 

Great first effort but no gloves – Kirby on the cover

1966 saw the first appearance of a new toy; Captain Action from Ideal Toys continued the evolution of the articulated doll such as Barbie, and for the boys, G.I.Joe—complete with multiple costumes and accessories. Comic characters had crossed over to toys. Action’s gimmick was that he could morph into well known fictional characters as diverse as the Lone Ranger and Flash Gordon. With interchangeable masks, and costumes the Captain could become Superman, Batman, The Phantom, Flash, Aquaman, Steve Canyon, Lone Ranger, Flash Gordon, and from Marvel, Captain America, and Sgt. Fury. Marvel was paid well for the licenses yet never shared with Jack Kirby. Not even for the artwork that accompanied the boxes. Further series expanded on the Captain Action retinue with the likes of Spider-Man and Green Hornet. Captain Action got his own comic book by DC, got his own powers, but lost the ability to change into other characters. As Captain Action’s universe expanded, his son joined in, he even received his own archenemy. (Dr. Evil) The merchandising of Marvel’s characters was exploding upon the masses. And no benefit filtered down to the artists. Cartoons, T-shirts, toys, Halloween costumes, rings, pj’s, puzzles, games of all sort sported recognizable art from the bullpen.

Too generic just a GI Joe costume – no half beard – Should have ripped up uniform

Roy Huggins created and produced a new series Run For Your Life; with perhaps the epitome of the hero with a problem meme. Ben Gazzara played Paul Bryant, a lawyer who has learned he has but two years to live. An anthology style series with each episode in a different location and different people in moments of personal crisis, which the hero helps resolve.

Ben Gazarra legging it

1965 would see the Beatles receiving their own cartoon feature. The adventures were little vignettes based on Beatle songs, plus a couple sing-a-long tunes for audience participation. Produced in Australia, the animation was quite good.

• 

• 

Hysterical local TV host for the cartoons with better costume than the movie Cap – Find this baby!!!

In 1966, Marvel sold the rights of several characters to Gantray-Lawrence to produce cartoons for afternoon viewing. Thor, Submariner, Cap, Iron Man and Hulk hit the airwaves in late ’66 to good response. Spidey appeared in 1967. The animation was of the lowest order–barely stats from comic pages with moving lips and arms and legs. The best aspect might have been the cheesy opening songs lovingly remembered even today. There were a couple commercial tie ins. (note Captain America card blurb) In 1967, The FF got their own cartoon series with much superior production values due to Hanna Barbera’s larger budget. As a publicity campaign for Marvel, they were a resounding success. Jack was taken by surprise with the cartoons. “If I’d known they were gonna do that with it I would’ve demanded to be paid a lot more” Jack went to Martin Goodman and complained. Goodman told Jack that the company wasn’t making anything off the cartoons, they were great advertising for the comics. Kirby had heard that before, but there was nothing he could do about it.

• 

• 

• 

1966 was a good year

At the time, very few managers of pop groups needed to worry about how much money music merchandising could generate as very few artists survived long enough in the pop domain to be a viable investment. As far as Epstein was concerned it was merely good public relations, and any revenue that arose from the sale of Beatles-endorsed products was regarded as merely found money that supplemented the Beatles’ individual incomes from live performances and record sales. “We did our best; some people have said it wasn’t good enough. That’s easy to say with 20/20 hindsight but remember that there were no rules. We were making it up as we went along.” In America Epstein had met the well-known divorce lawyer, Nat Weiss, whom Epstein later asked to take over the merchandising affairs of The Beatles and NEMS. Weiss would later state, “The reality is that The Beatles never saw a penny out of the merchandising. Comic books artists, much less publishers had even less skill and knowledge about the merchandise possibilities.

Jack’s dream came true! His son had graduated high school, and was going to college. Neal had been accepted to prestigious Syracuse University, the same college that Jack always erroneously said that Joe Simon attended. Neal said that growing up it was considered a Jewish tradition. The son grows up and goes to college; it was never an option, it was expected. But Neal knew of his father’s shame at not finishing high school, and he knew how proud his dad was that his son had surpassed him.

In August 1966 the Beatles headlined a concert at Shea Stadium before 56,000 screaming fans; at the time, the largest attendance ever for a rock concert. Coincidentally, the Fantastic Four and Thor hit perhaps their highest peak of creativity.

Late in 1966, in another outside commission, Jack drew a promotional poster for a new TV show. Captain Nice was an NBC comedy series featuring William Daniels as a mild mannered police detective who becomes a super hero when he discovers a secret formula. He fights evil in a homemade costume his mother devised. The series was created by Buck Henry, who had also created Get Smart, a spoof on the spy genre. Jack’s part came about when John J. Graham, the Director of Design for NBC, was told to come up with an advertising poster for the new series. John’s son, Bruce was a big Kirby fan, and when his father mentioned the job, Bruce suggested Kirby for the artist. The poster shows the good captain flying over the town while assorted bad guys take pot shots at him. A second drawing showing a close up of three cops looking out a window was added into the commercials. Kirby’s poster was shown on commercials using a fast cut animation style jumping from image to image, promoting the new series.

Chic Stone supplied the inking for the poster, and Kirby colored. Jack rewarded the young Bruce Graham with a personally signed Captain Nice sketch. The series premiered in the fall of 1967. Chic remembers the circumstances. Jack’s sense of timing was sometimes askew. He and his daughter awoke Chic in the middle of the night. He was carrying a huge piece of illustration board which was covered with brown paper. Chic noted; “Jack lifted the brown paper, and I was awestruck by the most magnificent Kirby pencil I had ever seen. It was for NBC and a new show called Capt. Nice. “I couldn’t believe my ears when he asked me to ink it. We negotiated a price, but Jack never knew that I would have been thrilled to do it gratis. When I put my brush to that drawing, it knew just where to go. It was a marriage of pencil and ink. I would love to see that artwork one more time.” The show debuted in Jan. 1967.

• 

• 

Kirby reaches out

In an outside commission, in late 1966, Jack Kirby had been asked to draw a story for Esquire Magazine. Issue #402, dated May 1967 focused on the Kennedy assassination, and Kirby drew a 3 page tale of Jack Ruby’s life immediately before killing Lee Harvey Oswald. The art was also finished by longtime inker Chic Stone. The art was more realistic than Kirby’s comic art, and he told the story in a straight forward manner with lots of legal testimony added to the text. A few months earlier Kirby had provided some illustrations for an article about the rise of Marvel Publications at colleges. (#394, Sept. 1966) The magazine made quite a fuss about how Marvel had taken over the colleges. There was a mix-up in cover choices and money so the magazine promised Jack more work to make up for it. As usual, Jack got screwed. A later promised job never came to fruition.

Jack Kirby and Stan Lee had done their job well. At a time of declining readership, Marvel was unique; its sales were rising and the books were reaching markets never imagined. Colleges were going bonkers over Marvel’s characters. They formed clubs and set up classes to study the phenomenon. As the public face, Stan Lee was suddenly BMOC and hosting seminars and talks on major campuses. Stan was on radio, and in newspapers and major magazines, always touting Marvel and himself. Martin Goodman’s once lowly comic division was now spewing forth dollars. Merchandising such as models, and T-shirts were bringing in unexpected profits. Martin Goodman’s company was a red cape flapping in the bull’s faces.

• 

• 

Afternoon cartoons were bringing in new fans, who bought more books. Martin began rewarding the comic division by paying higher, more competitive page rates, which in turn brought in more artists and better inkers, but not voluntarily. When asked if Marvel offered Kirby rate increases, Kirby states: ‘No, no. I had to ask for them. There’s a class system in comics.” “I had to make a living. I was a married man.

• 

• 

Kirbytech at its pinnacle – Kirby’s super cocoon + child becomes master

I had a home. I had children. I had to make a living. That is the common pursuit of every man. It just happened that my living collided with the times. Circumstances forced me to do it. They forced me. There wasn’t a sense of excitement. It was a horrible, morbid atmosphere. If you can find excitement in that kind of atmosphere the excitement was fear.”

• 

• 

• 

• 

Reprints galore

• 

• 

1968 Marvel gets the gold ring – Jack got tired of correcting covers and working over other artists work for little or no pay

The Marvel method of creating the stories was becoming a problem. Some great artists could not adjust to the idea of self-developing the story from a short synopsis. They came up working from complete scripts, and in some cases were simply not good storytellers. For others they needed a bit of guidance to adapt to the new methodology, and dynamics. Unhappily Kirby began doing layouts to help these artists, such as George Tuska, Werner Roth, and John Romita, to get used to the new in-house dynamic style. There was little or no extra pay for this assistance.

Gil Kane recognized Kirby’s contribution;

“Jack was the single most influential figure in the turnaround in Marvel’s fortunes from the time he rejoined the company … It wasn’t merely that Jack conceived most of the characters that are being done, but … Jack’s point of view and philosophy of drawing became the governing philosophy of the entire publishing company and, beyond the publishing company, of the entire field … [Marvel took] Jack and use[d] him as a primer. They would get artists … and they taught them the ABCs, which amounted to learning Jack Kirby. … Jack was like the Holy Scripture and they simply had to follow him without deviation. That’s what was told to me … It was how they taught everyone to reconcile all those opposing attitudes to one single master point of view”

The artists who were creating these plots and stories were becoming disillusioned at Stan claiming sole writing credit. They wanted more money for doing more work. They began questioning and demanding what they thought was only proper. It was their storytelling talents that were selling more books and they wanted a larger slice of the pie. At an earlier time, this would have been inconceivable. The feudal setup of the comic industry made it impossible for the artists to make any kind of demands on the owners. The imbalance of power was so great that even the creators of the largest money maker in comic history were unable to demand credit, or royalties, much less ownership of their creations. Siegel and Shuster, the creators of Superman had been embroiled in a protracted legal conflict with DC comics over the ownership of the Big Guy.

At every turn they had been rejected by the courts. The other artists had kept a keen eye on the proceedings and with each loss, they felt their power diminish. The idea of credits, and royalties, and reprint fees, and copyright to creations was an unimaginable goal. Such was the power of the publishers. Several writers of note over at DC tried to organize, and when the company found out they were summarily released and replaced overnight.

From Kirby in an interview with TCJ:

“The artist is the lowest form of life on the rung of the ladder. The publishers are usually businessmen who deal with businessmen. They deal with promotional people. They deal with financial people. They deal with accountants. They deal with tax people, but have absolutely no interest in artists; in individual artists…They pat you on your head and say “How are you Jackie?” Things like that…..Their accountants are more important to them than you are, and yet you’re making the sales that they depend on. It’s an odd setup, but it exists…..Superman is the classic example, see? All these businessmen are the top of the pyramid, but the entire pyramid is resting on two little stones, and the pyramid denies the existence of these stones because it’s so big. It’s loaded with officials, but the little stones are the ones that are holding it up because that’s where the support is coming from, and I was in the same position.”

But this was the Sixties, a time where every long held assumption was questioned. The first crack was not by the comic artists, but by another group of underpaid and unappreciated artists. In mid-1960, screen writers, represented by the Writers Guild of America went on a long strike.

Mark Evanier; professional writer and comic historian notes;

In 1951, the Guild began to represent the writers of that newfangled thing called television, and in 1955, a number of regional and smaller groups that represented writers’ interests were absorbed and reorganized. We wound up with a Writers Guild of America, West and a Writers Guild of America, East.

From then on, the WGA’s history is largely a series of strikes or threatened strikes, each of which resulted in the establishment of some new right or principle. They won the right to residuals when TV shows were rerun; they won the right to screen credits, setting up a system of rules and arbitrations that stopped the guy who ran the studio from slapping his nephew’s name on your script. The strike of 1960 – which lasted 151 days, making it the longest strike in Hollywood until the Writers Guild later bettered its own record – was the one that secured a pension plan as well as residual payments when a movie was run on television.

The history of TV credits and creative rights and comic books have many parallels. At Warner Bros, the spiritual parent of Martin Goodman’s Marvel, Roy Huggins, the creative genius who guided all the interlocking series, had been constantly thwarted by William T. Orr, the President of WB TV division. Orr once switched the order of the first two episodes of Maverick so that Huggins couldn’t claim credit for creation purposes. Even more famously, Jack Warner deliberately had the pilot to 77 Sunset Strip screened briefly at movie theatres in the Caribbean in order to legally establish that the television series derived from a WB film, rather than, as was actually the case, several books Huggins had written in the 1940s. Since this was not the only occasion on which Warner had found a way to circumvent Huggins’ creative rights, Huggin’s left the studio soon thereafter. Following this experience, he increasingly demanded ownership of all television concepts he authored. By the mid-1960s, he had added this demand into a standard part of all contracts into which he entered.

“I was getting paid my royalty and my fee whether I did the show or not. If I conceived the show, and got it on the air, anyone could produce it and I would still get paid just as if I was doing it . . . That became known as “the Huggins Contract”. Every producer in television would say ‘I want the Huggins contract’, and some of them got it”.

—Roy Huggins, interview with the Archive of American Television, July 21, 1998

Sadly, comic artists would never unionize, but there was a mounting belief that they deserved more credit and payment for their works. Stan’s personal affection for his artists led to his predilection for listing credits, this would come back to hurt him. Stan was a caring man caught in an uncaring process. First, with the hard headed Wally Wood, whom Stan had heralded on the cover on Daredevil #5 as the next great thing. Wally took to the Marvel method as a duck to water; he personally raised Daredevil’s profile from a low tier character to a top line character with some great stories to match the dramatic costume change. Suddenly the character was allowed access to the top tier villains. Daredevil’s battle with Submariner in Daredevil #7 is considered one of the seminal comics of the Marvel Age. Yet behind the scenes, Wally and Stan were in a constant battle over credits.

If Wally was to plot and pace the stories, he wanted credit as a writer. For Stan’s part the writer credit was sacrosanct; it belonged to him alone, and the money that came with it. It’s important to note that though Stan was the editor, his writing was as a freelancer and he got full writer’s pay for the stories he was co-plotting. There could be no compromise and Wally left after less than 10 Daredevil stories. In an article many years later Wally would write “”Stanley” came up with two surefire ideas… the first one was ‘Why not let the artists WRITE the stories as well as draw them?’… And the second was… ALWAYS SIGN YOUR NAME ON TOP… BIG!!” And the rest is history…Stanley of course became rich and famous … over the bodies of people like Bill and Jack. Bill, (Everett) who had created the character (Submariner) that had made his father (uncle) rich wound up coloring and doing odd jobs. And Jack? Well, a friend of mine summed it up like this. “Stanley and Jack have a conference, then Jack goes home, and after a couple of month’s gestation, a new book is born. Stanley gets all the money and all the credit… And all poor old Jack gets is a sore ass hole.” This was the first of many breaks in the façade of a Merry Marvel bullpen, but the fans never knew. Stan’s bullpen bulletins spun a tale of nothing but jocularity and solidarity among the artists. Yet Stan’s bullpens made superstars out of the artists.

If the Emperor’s new clothes were beginning to fray at Marvel, the Beatles were suddenly naked. Despite a three year run of unparalleled chart dominance and critical acclaim the public had turned against them. A manufactured American band knocked the Beatles off the top rung. The Monkees were Hollywood created to take advantage of the new sounds and popularity pioneered by the Liverpool lads, but dismayingly they started to sell more records. Even worse, an offhand, but not untrue, remark in a small magazine interview by John Lennon comparing the Beatles to Jesus Christ had escalated into a full blown revolt by Churches and youth groups that started to burn Beatles records and ban them from radio play. Cynthia Lennon in her biography says. “In an interview John likened the Beatles to Jesus Christ. His truly honest assessment of their popularity offended the God-fearing, clean living Americans who lived in the Bible belt of America. His views were perhaps misconstrued. John was very bewildered and frightened by the reaction that his words created in the States. Beatle albums were burnt in a mass orgy of self-righteousness indignation. Letters arrived at the house full of threats, hate and venom. Finally to try to squash the revolt John Lennon offered a somewhat tepid apology. “If I had said that television is more popular than Jesus, I might have got away with it. It’s a fact, in reference to England, we meant more to kids than Jesus did, or religion at that time. I wasn’t knocking it or putting it down. I was just saying it, as a fact and it’s true, more for England than here. I’m not saying we’re better or greater or comparing us with Jesus Christ as a person or God as a thing, or whatever it is, you know, I just said what I said and it was wrong, or was taken wrong, and now it’s all this!”

• 

• 

Shades of 1955

It helped that in August of 1966 they released their most refined album. Revolver is their finest collection of songs minus some of the over production of their last couple albums. But cracks had formed. John went off to Spain to film a movie while George left for India to visit the Maharishi and study with Ravi Shankar. At an art gallery in London John Lennon meets Yoko Ono. Suddenly the single minded purpose of the lads gave way to individual needs. Egos were taking over. I tend to think this is a natural progression seen in many successful collaborations. Two being one can only last so long.

• 

• 

• 

The racks were rocking in Aug. 1966

Steve Ditko and Jack Kirby had followed keenly the rise of Marvel, and they constantly hit up Goodman for a raise in page rates. Marvel had slowly risen close to the industry leader DC. They also noted that their graphics were being used to sell T-shirts, toys, clubs, games and even bed clothing, and that they got nothing extra for their graphics. They confronted Stan and Martin and were told that when the comic division started making a bigger profit, that they would be taken care of.

Steve Ditko had built Spider-Man into Marvel’s best-selling book. Steve was also in the process of developing a very rigid personality enthralled with the philosophy of Ayn Rand’s Objectivism. The black and white nature of this belief made it hard for Steve to compromise, and Stan increasingly found it hard to work with him. This is ironic as it was Ditko whom Stan loved writing for most of all. Ditko, like Wally Wood, also demanded credit for what he considered the writing since he was providing the plots and pacing for the book. Spider-Man was too important to the line and for once Stan relented and in issue 26 the credit for co-plotting was added to Ditko’s name. Despite this band aid, pretty soon things became so bad that Stan and Steve no longer talked and all communications were passed through a go-between.

To give an example of Stan’s disconnect with the anger of the artists not receiving proper credit, the consummate pro Dick Ayers tells of his growing animus with not getting credit and confronting Stan. One day Dick approached Stan; “Stan, I think I should be paid for co-writing your stories….you don’t even give me credit…you just sign your name as writer!” To which the unconvinced Stan replies. “My-oh-my you do have an ego! Okay, I’ll add a couple bucks to your page rate! But not your name as writer…”

Even on the girl books cracks were forming. Stan Goldberg, the longtime Millie the Model artist told interviewer Jim Amash; Stan would drive me home and we’d plot our stories in the car. I’d say to Stan, How’s this? Millie loses her job.” He’d say, ”Great! Give me 25 pages.” And that took him off the hook. One time I was in Stan’s office and I told him, “I don’t have another plot.” Stan got out of his chair and walked over to me, looked me in the face, and said very seriously, “I don’t ever want to hear you say you can’t think of another plot.” Then he walked back and sat down in his chair. He didn’t think he needed to tell me anything more.”

For Kirby’s part, he was old school. Credits were nice, but he worked to care for a wife and four children. As long as he could get higher page rates, the secondary demands would stay on the back-burner. The Marvel method was its own reward for it meant that Stan would mostly leave Kirby alone to take his series where he wanted them to go. Jack’s trips to the Marvel offices dropped to once or twice a month.

The most aggravating part was Stan’s little niggling demands for page redos and doing layouts for competent artists who Jack felt needed no help from him. Worse yet, Kirby got little extra money for redoing and laying out pages. Kirby’s pride also started taking a hit as more and more, in all the articles and interviews it was Stan who was credited as the main creative force on the books. Kirby knew how the system worked, but it smarted when in an interview for the New York Herald-Tribune, Stan was presented as a creative visionary and Jack Kirby as a drooling toady in an ill fitting suit. This so enraged Roz that she personally called Stan to demand he get a retraction of some sort. Stan played the aggrieved and ignorant party. Jack soon became tired of being told by Stan to redo his first cover and come up with a new one. The time it took to make a new one was never compensated by the company. Similarly, whenever he went into the studio, Stan would gladhand him to correct parts of other artists covers for no money. Stan’s charm was running thin. And Jack’s ego was roiling.

In 1966, Harvey Publishing contacted Joe Simon about jumping on the bandwagon of Jack Kirby at Marvel. Harvey had Joe put together a couple issues that featured heavily Jack Kirby art from old Harvey inventory. In Blastoff, Joe assembles stories originally scheduled for Race For The Moon #4 with a Kirby collage type cover. In Fighting American Joe put together some unpublished Kirby stories from Fighting American and padded it with old inventory plus a newly drawn story by George Tuska. The requisite Kirby cover is a doozy. Joe also put together two issues of Will Eisner’s The Spirit. Joe also created a new super hero universe for Harvey, hiring a young newcomer named Jim Steranko to help create it. Jack was competing with perhaps his best art ever, Moody, strong, and an endless imagination.

• 

• 

• 

The songwriting style of Lennon/McCartney had started out as a seamless symbiosis of the two artists; a smooth combination of style and inspiration, a blending of strengths and weaknesses. But with the release of “Can’t Buy Me Love” a song written solely by Paul, the team began a new process and a friendly rivalry began where they began writing separately and fighting for who would get the next single. This competition also affected George Harrison, who was becoming a strong songwriter himself. Yet he always found himself the odd man out when it came to singles. He did manage to usually get one song per album, but never the prize. It wouldn’t be until 1969 and the release of “Something” that Harrison’s talents would be rewarded. The competition led to an outpouring of superb songs. George Martin’s producing never allowed it to get out of hand. In the studio all players added in bits that added to the final product.

In 1967, the Beatles released their most lavishly crafted LP yet. Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band would become the record against which all others would be judged. Its success was so astounding, and the production values so leading that none could ever live up to it. Even future Beatles albums couldn’t live up to it so that they specifically chose a lower fidelity retro rock and roll feel for their records.

• 

• 

Rock and roll kitchen sink – awe inspiring

At the same time Jack and Stan released the ultimate FF books. #66 and 67 has Jack give the world the ultimate creation, Him. Rising from a manmade cocoon, the creation is so above humanity that it realizes it must leave mankind alone. Though not by Kirby, this creation would become the super being Warlock. No creation was ever left behind. It was not without problems. Stan missed Kirby’s meaning and changed the whole story. It lost a lot of the deeper philosophy of Kirby’s original story. Some say it was Kirby’s stab at spoofing the new absolute philosophy of Ayn Rand and her “perfect heroes”. Stan’s ideas would continue long after Jack’s involvement with the character. Him made an appearance over on Thor, but it turned into a typical battle royal and an unfulfilling ending. It would be a couple years before he was reincarnated as Warlock.

Stan was not a fool, he knew he couldn’t afford to alienate Kirby, so Jack’s credit were upgraded almost to an equal of Stan’s in the Fantastic Four when it switched from separate and unequal to a combined “Produced by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.” Several more times Jack and Steve would remind Lee and Goodman about their promise to share in the greater profits, (perhaps in response to the Wall Street Journal article) only to be shined off with further promises.

Stan Lee has been quoted far too many times not to believe that there is a thread of truth to it. “It’s a little trick I learned; instead of paying people money, I gave them a little credit line in the books. This went on for a couple years before they got wise.”

For his part, Steve Ditko had finally had enough; the quiet, philosophical bachelor made a choice, and after 39 consecutive issues of Spider-Man, two annuals, and dozens for Dr. Strange, he gave notice. After Woody, this was strike two. Stan Lee to his everlasting shame still denies knowing why Steve Ditko left, while Steve made it very clear in a telephone interview with comic journalist Bob Beerbohm in 1969 that he was tired of being put off by both Goodman and Lee over the subject of residuals.

“Steve Ditko told me and my friend Steve Johnson that he and Jack had been promised royalties if their new creations took off. They were told by Martin Goodman (picture a fellow putting his arm around the back of your shoulder, voice sounding very sincere) “Don’t worry about a thing if the books sell well, we’ll take care of you.”

That ‘we’ included his relative, Stanley Lieber, long time editor of Goodman’s comic book division. Just a division, mind you. Goodman was also a major publisher of a lot of those “men’s adventures” magazines popular to a lot of vets back in the 50s and 60s plus yet other areas to make a buck in.

When the first merchandising on Spider-Man, by this time already one of the main titles, came along, Steve started making noise about the extra dough. So did Jack. They were told that the company was still not making enough money, to wait. Promised contracts never seemed to be completed to be signed, carefully verbal in nature.

By early 1966, Steve walked, he said to us, and he urged Jack to come along.”

One might think with two strikes, Stan would become more cautious about losing the artists, but I think Stan began believing his own press. He thought that it was he that had imbued the Marvel Universe and the artists were simply his tools, despite leaning more and more on them. Increasingly Lee’s input dwindled to where there were some stories with not even a basic plot by Lee. On a Sgt. Fury story Stan told Dick that he had no ideas for the next issue. Dick drew a blank also and it was Dick’s wife Lindy who came up with the plot. When Dick suggested a onetime credit for Lindy, Stan summarily dismissed it. Another time, on a story without any Lee input, Ayers was adamant about receiving the writing credit. Lee was just as adamant that he would not receive the writer credit, but instead, Lee would give Ayers credit as letterer and Ayers would get that additional pay; Lee would still get the writer’s credit and pay. Lee laughed this off and claimed that Ayers was getting an ego without realizing his own, this is a screaming indictment of how the work place relationship at Marvel had devolved; and then to try to buy him off with a couple gold pieces. A victim of their own success; once again Kirby and the other artists were reminded just how low their place was in the Corporate scheme. The ones doing the creative work received the least reward.

One of the newcomers was John Romita, an artist who had made his name with DC’s romance books. He started working over Kirby layouts on Daredevil. He was given the Spider-Man series after Steve Ditko left, and changed that book from a dark, serious series into a lighter, more reader friendly series and the fans responded. One day, he took Jack to the Playboy Club for lunch. There John told Jack of a long ago tale. During the Crestwood days, Joe and Jack would advertise for new artists to work for them; mostly as inkers and “in-between artists” who could take some of Kirby’s layouts and expand them to fit a story. Young John Romita responded to one of the ads, and was given a penciled page to ink as a test. John took the page home and inked it; looking at the page he was disappointed, so he did it again and again. Never satisfied he threw it away and never returned to Simon and Kirby. “I told him I chickened out. I should have brought back the inked page and let him (Kirby) tear it apart. I would have have learned more, but I was embarrassed at the work I did”. I said to him “Gee Jack, we could have been working all those years,” and he said “That’s a shame John, I could have turned you into a dynamo.” “If I had worked with Jack, if I had the guts to go back, I would have been a different artist, a much more confident and freewheeling artist” Romita lamented.

To help replace the lost work from Steve Ditko leaving, Stan hired an old pro from Atlas days. John Buscema had come to comics in the mid-fifties while Atlas still had an in-house bullpen. With the changeover to all freelancers, and the Atlas Implosion, John had abandoned comics in a huff. Stan could now offer John full employment and stability. But John’s skills had rusted up from non-use. His first work was stiff and uninspiring, John worried if he could cut it. From an interview in Jack Kirby Collector;

JB: “I would not have been able to survive in comics if not for Jack Kirby. When Stan called me back in 1966, I had one hell of a time trying to get back in the groove. You can do illustration, you can do layouts, but that doesn’t mean you can do comics. It’s a whole different ball game. Stan gave me a book to do; I think it was the Hulk. I did a pretty bad job – Stan thought I should study Jack’s art and books so he gave me a pile of Kirby’s comics. Well, everybody was given Jack Kirby books! (laughter) It was the first time I’d seen his work. I started working from them, and that’s what saved me.

TJKC: What did you learn from them?

JB: “The layouts, for cryin’ out loud!” I copied! Every time I needed a panel, I’d look up at one of his panels and just rearrange it. If you look at some of the early stuff I did – y’know, where Kirby had the explosions with a bunch of guys flying all over the place? I’d swipe them cold! (laughter) Stan was happy. The editors were happy, so I was happy.”

Dick Ayers also tells of a might have been story. Starting out, he would take his portfolio from publisher to publisher looking for work. Getting nowhere, his list was down to two more services. He was close to the Vin Sullivan studio so he dropped in. As fate would have it, Vin recognized the talent and immediately put Dick to work; a partnership that lasted a long time. Getting work, Dick decided to ball up his list and toss it. One last quick look and Dick realized that the next name on his list was the Simon and Kirby studios. He always wondered about the what if. Did he have what it took to work for Simon and Kirby. He did get the chance to work with Joe Simon years later when Joe resurrected the old Black Magic title, and his career was always linked to Jack when Marvel came to the fore. The comic biz was always a small world, where most talents eventually meet and connect.

Comic readers come and go; they age and move on to other pursuits; girls, jobs, cars, girls, school and the other symbols of maturation, did I mention girls! It’s been said that every five years produces a new class of comic readers, unaware of the legacy of the artform. It had been just about five years when Marvel started reprinting their original tales. They sold well as the rise of Marvel’s fandom meant that most new fans had never really seen the earliest Kirby and Ditko/Lee stories. While Goodman and Lee were happy with the results, the artists were livid. Perhaps even more odious than the lack of credit was the reprint fee controversy. The idea that the company can make unlimited new money by reusing existing art without ever reimbursing the artist was never even broached. Why should the companies continue to make new money using existing art, yet not offer the artists, new money? In the movie and TV industries, this subject had been resolved for quite a while, always in the artists favor, residuals for reruns were mandatory, but the comic industry was a dinosaur, and reprints had long been a common way of cheap revenue. Worse, the artists were in reality competing against themselves for sales off the stands.

From the AFTRA rule book:

Residuals are paid to actors when their performance is used AGAIN, or in a new way that was not intended when you originally worked. For example:
* A re-run of a television show
* A feature film that was released in the movie theater, but is now being released on DVD
* A television Movie of the Week that is now being sold on DVD
* A second use of a commercial (or a third use, or 300th use!)
* A TV series that is now being used on the internet as a “Webisode” (a.k.a. “new media”)
* A TV series that is sold into syndication
* A network TV show that gets shown again on a cable channel

The really great news? This process goes on FOR LIFE. You will continue to get paid smaller and smaller amounts each time the film is shown, forever.

The rights won by actors had no impact on the graphic artists.

It wasn’t until the 1990’s that some artists won the right for residuals, and even then, not for all occasions. It certainly wasn’t back-dated for the original 1960’s books. DC paid some small residuals for merchandise to Jack in the 1980’s, but it was done as a gift, not a right.

Dick Ayers was so devastated by the constant reprints of his work that he began sending Marvel a bill for each reprinted story-which Marvel ignored! Once Dick confronted production Manager John Verpoorten about the increase in reprints and John made it clear. “the old stories sell as good as the new!” Dick retorted, “I should be paid for each reprinted page! How am I to support my family with such a low income while Marvel profits reprinting and selling my reprinted art- and don’t share that profit with me?!?” Dick Ayers quit working for Marvel, and was later blacklisted for suing for those same reprint fees–he lost.

• 

• 

• 

The company laughs while the artists seethe – New cover-same story by Kirby – Lots of Kirby for 25 cents

Of all the artists, it was Kirby who was most affected by the reprints since he had contributed so much of those early stories, but Jack was stoic and just kept working in the dungeon-as he called his basement studio. And the work was the best ever done for comics-by far. The FF hit a pinnacle of unequaled creativity that covered about 20 issues where every issue brought forth new characters and concepts that would resonate for years. Stan was more astute. “Jack is a storyteller in pictures. After a while, I only had to give him a couple of words on what I thought the plot would be and he would do the whole thing. He was so inventive, He kept getting new ideas, and whenever he’d get one he’d put it in the next story. And I’d say “Jack, save that for the next issue or the one after that. It’s too much.” Instead of new books, Kirby kept introducing new heroes in the Fantastic Four. The Inhumans, the Silver Surfer, the first black hero, the Black Panther, and Him-soon to be Warlock, as well as new villains such as Blastaar, Galactus, the Frightful Four, Klaw-the master of sound, and Quasimodo- the villainous machine made man. Perhaps the pinnacle was reached in what became known as the Galactus trilogy (FF#48-50) which introduced a new villain- Galactus- a godlike being to whom the Earth held no more significance than a McDonald’s Happy Meal. His herald, (the Silver Surfer) who searched for just those planets that might satiate his master, is transformed by the loving humanity of Alicia Masters and turns against his master to try to intercede in the Earth’s behalf. Even the power of the Surfer is nothing to Galactus and he continues his work to drain the world of all life essence until the Human Torch returns from an intergalactic search with a weapon of such magnitude that even Galactus relented, but not before banishing his traitorous herald to remain imprisoned on the Earth.

• 

• 

Enter Norrin Radd – Silver Surfer gets the prize

No series could ever come close to matching this outburst of creativity found in the FF -except possibly Kirby’s Thor. During this same period Kirby introduced Hercules, Tana Nile, Ulik, Ego-the living planet, the High Evolutionary, and in perhaps the grandest story arc ever done, the Ragnarok epic with Mangog. Not to be outdone, Captain America would reunite with the Red Skull, and meet Them, Batroc-the leaper, Modok, the Sleepers, and Zemo. It was such a burst of creation that Stan Lee became lost for words in his feeble previews of coming attractions blurbs. “I’ll create a concept just to keep from getting bored.” Kirby noted when asked in an interview with The Comics Journal about this ramped up cosmicology.

TCJ: …back in ‘65’and ’66, you started to get on this mythology-fantasy kick. Who was responsible for that –you or Stan?

KIRBY: “Both of us, in a way. I researched it and gave my version of it, and Stan gave his version of it. Stan humanized it in a way where, for instance, I might be concerned about Thor’s relationship to the other Gods, I might bring up a Ulik or I might bring up something out of the wild blue yonder, like the Oracle-that great big thing which nobody knew anything about. I try to fathom it myself. And Stan would come back down to Earth and find Thor’s relationship with Earth people. In other words, we go up and down the spectrum always trying to find something new in it.” In another interview Kirby explained: I’ve been a student of science fiction for a long long time, and I can tell you that I’m well versed in science fact and science fiction. I’m 71 years old and so I’ve seen all this new conception. I used to read the first science fiction books, and I began to learn about the universe myself and take it seriously. I know the names of the stars. I know how near or far the heavenly bodies are from our own planet. I know our own place in the universe. I can feel the vastness of it inside myself. I began to realize with each passing fact what a wonderful and awesome place the universe is, and that helped me in comics because I WAS LOOKING FOR THE AWESOME. I found it in Thor. I found it in Galactus.”

As glorious as the concepts, the execution was even better. To many, Kirby’s art in the mid-sixties has never been rivaled. That bulkiness that Jack began adding to his characters now reached an apex. His characters looked like they could leave footprints in solid concrete.

Yet they maintained a sense of movement and fluidity. It was unparalleled in its power, grace, and grandeur. Kirby created universes, and constructs of such dynamics and imagination that they are still the measure which all else is compared. Stan Lee in perhaps his greatest accomplishment paired Kirby up with his finest corps of inkers. The Fantastic Four got Joe Sinnott, the most precise, clean and expressive inker to ever grace a Kirby pencil, with all deference to the great Wally Wood. Vince Colleta, the most maligned inker to ever work on Kirby added an illustrative texture and archaic feel to the mythical milieu of Asgard that is still unrivaled. And Syd Shores, and Frank Giacoia both gave Captain America a grit and sheen combined with a Golden Age solidity and weight that worked well with Kirby’s more Earth bound warrior. In a three year period, Kirby equaled the grace and power of Alex Raymond’s space opera, and the mythical epicness of Hal Fosters Prince Valiant, and the exotic locales and thrill-a-minute adventures of Caniff’s Terry and the Pirates.

• 

• 

Jack found the awesome and showed it to us

Though it’s doubtful that Kirby had consciously mimicked his childhood idols, it is a might coincidental. Kirby became the artist and inspiration that the next generation of artists would emulate. When asked about his changing styles, Kirby replied. “You’re goddamn right, and it might change again if I live that long.” “I won’t live or die by what any man made up. I live or die by what I see, that’s all.” “I feel I see a lot because I analyze a lot. I see the same things you do but maybe I get more time to analyze it whereas you might not. So I sit and think and it’s as simple as that.” “I feel I’m God because these things are living or moving to my concepts. Good or bad, that’s how they come out. I can even punish them by erasing them but I’m not that mad yet. I like to make them as perfect as I can, and I feel now that’s what God is doing with us.”

The reward for all this hard work was obvious. Sometime in 1966-67 Marvel took over as the sales leader among comic publishers. While DC was mired in a decade long slump, Marvel’s sales had improved on a consistent 45% angle. This improvement started just as Jack Kirby had entered the picture. There really isn’t any other way to look at it except as starting when Jack Kirby took over. The rise started in the late 1950’s, before Stan and Jack collaborated on the super-heroes. Marvel as a company hadn’t made any changes that could account for the rise except for hiring Jack Kirby. The most noticeable increase started in the monster books; it really took off with the coming of the super heroes. As Marvel grew, the new artists continued this trend. The one constant was Kirby’s other worldly imagination, which kept the books fresh and new.

Jim Steranko talked about Jack and a memorable meeting with Jack while Jim was working for Joe Simon at Harvey.

“The more we talked, the deeper my understanding became of the man and his work. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Kirby efforts clearly transcend writing, illustrating and storytelling. The enduring quality of his comics and career are testimony to the multi-faceted approach apparent for half a century.

From Blue Bolt to the Forever People, Kirby functions as architect, satirist, and philosopher, as a pop media visionary with extraordinary range and depth.” ….”Like the great artists of every age, Kirby and his work has continued to change and mature, appropriately evolving through each decade. He has changed too. By example, he has proven the imagination knows no bounds by taking us to countless fantastic worlds that would not exist had Kirby not created them. He has spent a lifetime turning two-dimensional comic book clichés into surprisingly fresh situations with wit, intelligence and style…..The shockwave of Kirby’s creations will continue to resonate as long as heroes resist oppression and champion the quest for freedom. Perhaps more than any other 20th century artist, Kirby is responsible for a modern mythology that has touched millions of readers on every continent. No artist has ever done as much, as quickly and as masterfully as the man who has justifiably been christened by his peers. “The King.”

In the late 60s, a young artist wanna-be from Detroit had contacted Kirby for a local fanzine. Greg Theakston would later graduate high school and move to New York. Once there he would join Neal Adams little band of crazies. Yet he would always maintain contact with Jack. Jack seemed to enjoy this contact with the younger generation and he shared many confidences with the young man. Greg Theakston would take it upon himself to showcase Kirby as the primal genius of the comic book industry. His reproductions of Jack’s earliest work and his personal reminiscences helped form Jack’s legacy. It’s hard to understand Kirby’s place without Greg’s publishing. Jack rewarded his loyalty by giving him inking jobs, and a chance to paint Kirby’s covers.

Kirby’s pencils were entering a new phase of expressionism. Musculature that defied human description, Machines and buildings that defied belief, but they worked. In fact, JimSteranko asked Kirby about his machines and said; “Jack confirmed my suspicion that every weapon, vehicle and device in his stories was designed to work, not merely appear workable.” Most of the Kirby iconography that defines the greatness of Jack Kirby can be first found in this later period. Kirby krackel, Kirby dots, Kirby squiggles, Kirby architecture, Kirbytech as well as the most expressive forced perspective ever. Kirby’s costume design was at its most expressive. Kirby began experimenting with collages-using them as backgrounds for other dimensions and worlds without limits. His women were a perfect mixture of grace and strength, unrivaled in their power, beauty and femininity.

His multiple Universes dazzled the young minds and ignited the imaginations of all the readers. Just as Kirby’s lithe, loosey-goosey characters and Art Deco backgrounds came to symbolize Golden Age comics, his new blockier, more powerful figures with full psychedelic vistas and photo montage came to represent the Marvel Age of comics. This stuff wasn’t found in nature—it emanated from Kirby’s brain.

• 

• 

Strength, looseness, and a pyschedelic dot pattern background – all symbolism and surrealism

Jim Steranko inked Kirby on a few issues of Strange Tales. He recalls, “Unlike many pencilers, Kirby put everything on the page, yet never even short-cutting black areas with the common practice of indicating them with an ‘X.’ He felt a page was incomplete until a certain dramatic and visual balance was achieved. His pages rippled with integrity, crackled with the kind of power that was best expressed by his pencil line as it touched the board—much like a jazz musician blowing an improvised passage. Capturing the magic of that pencil line in ink is almost an impossibility, especially by another artist with a different sensibility,”

Mike Esposito had inked over everybody, and was considered a top talent. Yet he had his problems. He told an interviewer;

“Kirby was dynamic. When I inked Kirby, Stan would bawl me out and say ‘What are you doing? You’re drawing a real nose, it’s not supposed to be a real nose! They’re two little holes.’

“I was taking things too literally, and was trying to draw a real nose, but that was not Kirby.

“Frank Giacoia came by one day and said ‘Mike, just paint by number.’

“Frank inked all that stuff. He said ‘Don’t try to create your own look, just follow the lines, and it will all fall into place like a jigsaw puzzle.’ He was right. You don’t draw on top of Jack Kirby, because it won’t work.”

John Romita, the consummate pro, who became art director explains at a Kirby panel about inking Kirby’s new expressionistic style.

“Jack Kirby did a formularized, direct, explicit pencil technique. …a lot of pencilers are so vague and do three lines and give you (the inker) a choice of one. Some of them do greys on their pencils and you have to decide how to make them black and white. Jack Kirby never left you that problem. Every single thing was there, including Kirby’s Cosmic Crap.

Even the colorist understood majesty

I remember all the cosmic effects he made. I used to spend days trying to explain that to some of my trainees at Marvel, how to do that and what the pattern was. Because they thought if they did a lot of big, black blobs, they were going to get Kirby’s cosmic effect. And they couldn’t understand. I said, There’s a pattern there. Just look for it. There’s a pattern he used. He’s not creating black spots. He’s creating white areas by putting black where there’s no light” Nobody understood it. Jack did. He created it. He made it work and he made it graphic, and he could produce it in a split-second, without any mess and clogging. It was wonderful stuff. But what Herb (Trimpe) is passing up is that only a few guys, like he and Frank Giacoia, and Mike Royer could understand that explicit direct black and white style. And the only reason I put Vince Colletta down was because he used to put a lot of lines where there didn’t need to be lines. There didn’t need to be a lot of hatch (cross-hatching) All he needed to do was the blacks that Jack inscribed. It was a diagram, it was a natural gold mine, and a lot of guys overlooked it.”

But it wasn’t just the changes that Stan Lee begged Jack to do, plus the layouts and corrections for others. Stan also had a habit of having his studio art director John Romita make silly changes that Stan thought would help the storytelling. The problem was more that Stan couldn’t always follow Kirby’s plotlines.

John grudgingly remembers;

“ Stan wasn’t down on anyone’s artwork. He never changed anybody’s artwork because he disagreed with the artwork; it was the storyline that he changed. The artwork had to be changed because he was changing the storyline. I changed a lot of Jack Kirby, but not because the artwork was wrong. Stan wanted a new expression, or he wanted to change the position of a character, because he was always changing a storyline. What Jack would send in was always invariably different than what Stan had asked for. Stan would write another story, and I would have to do changes to make it work. People think that because I was art director, I made that judgment, but I never did. I wouldn’t have changed Jack Kirby’s artwork if my life depended on it! But when Stan wanted a change in story, I had to change the artwork. I changed Colan, I changed Barry Smith — did you ever see those embarrassing Barry Smith covers with my faces on them?”

Romita, in an interview was asked about when he became the official art director, his answer is very enlightening.

Romita replied; “It was never official. It was a handshake. It was so unofficial that Stan used to be paid as art director. I never got a penny for being art director.

That’s not a very good arrangement at all, replied the interviewer.

“I used to say that Stan would give titles instead of salary increases. He would call a person an assistant editor, but not give them a raise. He used to give us nicknames instead of raises. [Laughter.] That’s why I got so many nicknames.” (Stan would say the same thing)

So Stan was getting the editor’s salary, the writer’s salary and the art director’s salary, while having others do at least two of the jobs.

Arlen Schumer noted art designer, critic and pop culture observer notes;

Kirby was probably inspired by the first quasar photographs published in scientific journals around 1965 to create his patented energy field of patterned black dots that has become affectionately dubbed “Kirby Krackle.” One of the first major displays of Kirby Krackle emanated from Galactus’ hands in the full-page panel found in FF # 50 (May 1966). But it was seven months later, in FF #57 (Dec. ’66), that Kirby codified all of his graphic power and energy ideas (including his trademark background “burst” lines) in the four-panel sequence of Dr. Doom transferring the Silver Surfer’s “power cosmic” to himself, climaxing with the staggering full-page portrayal of a triumphant Doom, aswirl in Kirby Krackle, astride the fallen Surfer: the most dramatic definition, in a single image, of victory and defeat in the history of comics – if not art itself.

Kirby’s machinery – a.k.a. “Kirbytech” – was never drawn to look functional; the moebius strip-like masses of mazed metalwork that were a mainstay of his oeuvre were simply stylized designwork, as much a recognizable architectural motif as Alexander Calder’s mobiles or Louise Nevelson’s abstract, sculptural boxes. The endpapers of the Jack Kirby sketchbook (Jack Kirby’s Heroes and Villains, Pure Imagination, 1987) are perhaps the purest examples of the graphic design of Kirbytech, unfettered by figures and word balloons.

Decorating Kirbytech – and everything else, whether it be flesh or fabric – was the omnipresent Kirby squiggle, a vertical stroke interrupted by, well, a squiggle. It could add shine to machinery or sinew to musculature; it was Kirby’s singular, graphic signature. The oscilloscope-like arrow shapes that Kirby frequently employed as well some say were influenced by the Art Deco designs prevalent in Kirby’s environment during his formative years, while others maintain they had an almost Aztec-like design quality – though how the son of European immigrants raised on the Lower East Side of New York City without a college education could’ve come up with those remains a mystery.

• 

• 

Character made for squiggles

Another recurring graphic device of Kirby’s that bore no relation to reality were his shadows and spotting of blacks: artfully placed circular, curved and arched shapes that served to balance the black and white compositions of each panel and page more than they delineated accurate castings of light. Kirby always bent and exaggerated reality, like his square fingers and blocky knees, to suit his wishes as an artist; yet when he wanted to portray the verisimilitude of real life – like in his autobiographical “Street Code” story (Argosy, 1980), or any of his Earth-interludes in Thor – the results were quietly breathtaking, the converse of his cosmic panoramas.

As a graphic storyteller, Kirby never really bothered with panel shapes and page designs that broke out of the traditional box format; he believed more in the proscenium-arch theory of comic book storytelling, in which what is designed in the interior of each panel is more important than the exterior shape of the panel itself. That stays constant – like a stage’s proscenium arch – so that the reader focuses more on what is happening within; the story itself. At a time when firebrands like Jim Steranko and Neal Adams (and Will Eisner before them) were radically redesigning panels and pages in the late Sixties to make them more “cinematic,” Kirby was content to let his drawing do the talking in standard four-, five- and six-panel pages, interspersed with random full-pagers and double-page spreads, which were often spectacular.

The abstract photo collages that Kirby started to do in Fantastic Four around 1964 (his first collage cover was FF #33, Dec. ’64) were startling to his readers, for they were unlike anything any artist had attempted in mainstream superhero comics before; astute comic historians could recall photo collages used by Eisner in his Spirit stories and Harvey Kurtzman in the pages of Mad years prior, but they were nothing like Kirby’s. His were freewheeling, frenetic photo-fests that often subverted average objects, culled from consumer magazines as popular as Life Magazine, or as edgy as Playboy, into imagery as otherworldly as his own drawings. “Collages were another way of finding new avenues of entertainment,” Kirby said in an old interview. “I felt that magazine reproduction could handle the change. It added an extra dimension to comics. I wanted to see if it could materialize, and it did. I loved doing collages – I made a lot of good ones.” Kirby’s Krazy Kollages led to the development of groundbreaking original designs like the alternative dimension the Negative Zone in the FF and Ego, the Living Planet in Thor

• 

• 

These are among the graphic designs of Jack Kirby that rank him as high on the totem of 20th Century American Graphic Design as his hyperbolic drawing ranks him in the Comic Book Hall of Fame. To consider the latter without the former is to overlook some of the more uniquely artistic attributes that do indeed make Kirby “King.”

• 

• 

• 

In the late ‘60s, fandom had begun to organize. What was once myriad points of light became a focused laser. From local comic clubs, Comic Cons sprang up where fans could meet, and buy and trade old books, and talk to industry pros about their favorite characters. Kirby found his audience. Jack reveled in the attention and popularity of his creations, but something sinister caught his eye. During the Golden Age it was customary for the publishers to backstock the old original art. After it was printed it was thrown on a shelf. Joe Simon tells about how during rainstorms the ceilings would sometimes leak, and they would throw original art on the puddle to sop up the water. Flo Steinberg says that they would store it and occasionally she would grab an armful of art and old scripts and toss them out. Stan frequently gave pages to subscribers and advertisers as gifts. Yet with the growth of the conventions, prized art was even more valuable than the books. Jack noticed on many dealer tables pages of his original art-selling for good money. Fans would bring over pages for him to sign, and Kirby questioned where they came from. Dealers would quickly hide pages when Kirby approached. Many stories began circulating about huge caches being secreted out of Marvel’s offices and offered on the street like drugs to junkies. Other staffers finding stacks by the back door that they “liberated” from destruction. Kirby asked Stan for his artwork back only to be refused blaming the need and habits of the business as the reasons. Jim Steranko also noticed, and when he asked Stan, he was also refused. Jim was not one to take no for an answer. Jim confronted Stan Lee and told him that he was going to the tax board and tell them about this valuable stash of artwork that had no taxes paid. Stan quickly told Jim that he could pick up his artwork after the process was done, but Marvel would not help in any way. Kirby persisted to no end. Jack’s art leaked out in droves. Kirby learned that some of the inkers had received a share of the art, but not Kirby himself. The camel’s back started bending.

Copyright law allowed for the creator of a property to regain control after 28 years with a couple exceptions. The claimant must have been one of the authors, and he must not have been an employee or designated as a “work for hire” freelancer. Joe Simon, who had kept busy doing Sick Magazine and the occasional Harvey editing job, decided that he wanted to reclaim Captain America. It was Joe’s claim that he had created Cap in 1940 while freelancing for Timely. For Timely’s part, they claimed that Simon’s participation was done as an editor and covered by the “work for hire” clauses so Joe was prohibited from making a claim. In 1966, hoping to catch onto the planned Captain America film, Joe sued Marvel and in 1967, the case was moved to the Federal Courts who rule on copyright matters. Kirby could not join Joe in this claim as he was a salaried employee at the time Cap was created. According to Joe, Martin Goodman called Jack in and told him that Joe was suing for Cap and was trying to cut Kirby out of the loop. So Martin promised Kirby that if he helped out Marvel that Goodman would reward Kirby. Joe gives the impression that Kirby stabbed him in the back, but there is no record of Kirby signing anything, or giving a deposition of any kind where Kirby undermines anything claimed by Simon. In fact, there is no record of Kirby doing anything on this case. Amazingly, a simple phone call would have ended any dispute. The case was resolved when Marvel and Simon came to an out of court agreement where Joe would receive an undisclosed sum of money if Simon would end his claim and agree that his work at Timely was “for hire”. Kirby might have received some sort of payment for a promise never to join in a future claim for copyrights on Captain America.

On Broadway in 1967, a small play appeared, written by Bruce Jay Friedman—a writer who worked for Martin Goodman a long time—mostly in his sweat magazine division. The play is called Scuba Duba a witty examination of racial tension and obsession. The titular character was played by Cleavon Little, later renowned for his work with Mel Brooks. This play received rave reviews, and featured quite possibly the first nude scene. Mr. Friedman also wrote the play Steambath and has a long connection to Broadway. The play did not last long, but long enough for Life Magazine to do a write-up and review which featured a photo that by itself meant nothing, but 4 years later would be reinterpreted by Jack Kirby into a continuing character in his most personal work. It showed Cleavon Little as an obsessed scuba attired black guy bounding in his ridiculous flippers with a large mask perched on his head.

Brian Epstein died in Aug. 1967. Unknown to most, this new need to run their own business tore the Beatles apart; unofficially, Paul became the guiding hand behind the Beatles. He organized studio times, and album creating. John went along for the ride, but he says that the times at the studio were no longer group happenings, but rather members of the band playing back-up to individual members’ songs. Togetherness was a thing of the past. In the name of the Beatles, the members were really four solo acts pressed into one album. John was the first to publish a solo product, with the usually diffident Ringo Starr following suit. Paul and his new wife, Linda bought a small four channel recorder and started doodling and creating a private collection of songs. Yet despite trying to stay together, members started moving in and out as egos took over. George left one recording in a huff, and there was actually talk of Eric Clapton being called in to replace him.

Ned Pines had created comic books in the Golden Age. His line became known by the unwieldy name of Standard/Better/Nedor. He had gotten into the burgeoning paperback industry when he opened Popular Library paperbacks. These were some of the schlockiest titles going; pulp magazines without interior spot illustrations.

• 

• 

• 

They loved them some headlights and racy blurbs

In early 1968, Perfect Film and Chemical Corp. bought them outright. Perfect Film was a securities corporation known for buying troubled companies and selling them for quick profits. Perfect Film was talked into lending Curtis Publishing Corp. 5 million dollars.

Curtis was a long time publishing and distributing company known best for its leading account the venerable Saturday Evening Post. Curtis had been hit with a devastating 3 million dollar defamation suit from a recent article about baseball and fixing games. In exchange for the loan, Martin Ackerman, president of Perfect would become head honcho at Curtis. The court case ended up in the Supreme Court which decided that Saturday Evening Post was liable for the 3 million dollar. Sales on Saturday Evening Post were falling precipitously, and combined with the lawsuit, Curtis was unable to repay the loan, and Perfect Film took control of the company. This made Perfect Film a distributor without product to distribute.

• 

• 

1947-07-26: First US article on bikini. – 1964 Beatles on top

What was needed was a profitable publisher with a bad distribution set-up. Perhaps due to the Wall Street Journal article, Goodman’s predicament was well known. He was selling tons of books, but still limited by the distributor to amount of titles he could produce. In a marriage made in heaven, Perfect Film bought Martin Goodman’s Magazine Management Company. Suddenly, Curtis, which had a huge network due to Saturday Evening Post’s worldwide market, had truckloads of material –between Marvel’s comics and Popular Library’s paperbacks. It’s unknown why, but the transition from IND to Curtis would take a year or so, but Marvel ignored DC’s title limitation and immediately instituted a huge expansion. DC probably allowed it in order to maximize money while they were still the distributor.

• 

• 

• 

1968 explosion-big premieres

When Marvel ended the distribution contract with DC they began an expansion. All the super-heroes that appeared in shared books soon got their own book, plus new series like the Silver Surfer, Captain Savage, and Captain Marvel arrived. A slew of reprints titles also filled the stands, offering new readers a glimpse of the earliest Marvel days.

Marvel’s success continued unabated, and the number of monthly publications grew. Stan’s merry little crew couldn’t handle all the new content and Stan was forced to expand his bullpen. Such was the competition for competent artists that DC and Marvel had entered into a gentleman’s agreement not to rob each others stable.

Outside veterans like George Tuska, John Romita, and Gene Colan had snuck in often using aliases to hide their freelancing, as well as former fanzine writer Roy Thomas to assist Stan on the writing end.

Stan’s soap opera style struggled to keep up with Kirby’s grandeur, at times the dialogue was in obvious disagreement with what Kirby drew. It’s almost like Lee sometimes didn’t understand the story that Jack was telling. The magical symbiosis of the earlier Marvel period was beginning to fray as the visions no longer meshed. Stan was having trouble fitting in his touches of humanity among the cosmic epicness in Kirby’s vistas. More and more Stan interfered with Kirby’s flow and demanded pages be redrawn. It appears that Lee was trying to regain his editorial command at Kirby’s expense. Stan had Jack redraw his planned origin of Galactus and insert it into a Thor story. Jack’s plans for Him were dashed when Lee took the character away from him, and muddied the story. And worse, Kirby’s vision for the Silver Surfer was derailed when Lee decided to give the character his own book, with a Lee written origin and had John Buscema draw it. Captain America was taken from Kirby and given to the young upstart Jim Steranko. Jack lost his connection to his children. This loss of control for his characters became Kirby’s main point of contention. Jack could handle the lack of credit, but he couldn’t handle the meddling in his stories. “I created an army of characters, and now my connection with them is lost” Jack called Greg Theakston when Thor was taken from him and said that this was the last straw. With Roz’s urging Jack made a decision to limit the amount of original characters and concepts and force Stan to come up with the plots. “Why give Marvel more Silver Surfers!” she said. This change of method can easily be seen when you compare the burst of imagination before and the lack of same during the late1960’s work. No new characters and the plots simply repeat themselves with the same overworked villains. The books seemed bereft of life and heart. Interesting to see this happen just when Stan Lee was made to plot and write the books. What didn’t degrade was Kirby’s art. He simply couldn’t cheat on the boards. It was strong until the very end. Kirby’s imagination wasn’t quieted; his new ideas were being set aside for another day. Round this time, the comic companies decided to save money by having the artists draw on a smaller art board. This affected the amount of detail that the artist could put into each panel. Kirby also noticed problems with his vision, he was losing acumen in one eye. He struggled to maintain his usual control but the smaller page made him draw in a somewhat more cartoony style, and his work looked simpler. In order to compensate he just used fewer panels per page. He lost a lot of the physical detail and his physiology became blockier and geometric. His muscularity became slashes and squiggles rather than rendered shapes and textured surfaces. His new abstraction helped maintain the flow of action that the lost detail took away.

Kirby loved the expanded stories of Captain America

Marvel’s good fortune was soon overcrowded by the senseless assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King on a Memphis Hotel balcony. Cities erupted once more. The new owner Perfect Film liked what it saw, and was told that Stan Lee was the brains and muscle behind the growth of the company and the artists were simple illustrators of no import. Sometime in the mid 60’s Kirby had signed a personal services contract that bound him to Marvel. That contract was coming up for renewal, yet no new contract was forthcoming. The timing coincided with Martin Goodman negotiating the sale of the company to a new owner in 1968. The value of his company had never been higher-thanks to Stan, Steve and Jack. Jack was hoping for a benefit package and perhaps some action on the long promised royalties. Yet in the changeover period, Kirby’s demands were shunted aside as inconsequential. They paid no nevermind to Jack Kirby’s demands.

Starting in books cover dated August 1969; Marvel had finally started out of DC’s distribution yoke. Jack got the chance to expand the Cap stories and really unleash the action. With expanded two page spreads. The double splashes restored the loss details seen in the single pages. Cap never looked so good, heroic, and unbeatable. Kirby now had three full series. The art was astounding, but the stories had become repetitively turgid. Perhaps Stan Lee had once again stretched himself too far. Having to supply the stories himself, Stan lost any semblance of originality and innovation. Then disaster struck; perhaps coincidentally, for the first time in 8 years, sales of the individual books started falling; almost 15-20% percent. They had ridden an unparalleled stretch of growth; never seen in the comic industry. Remarkably, despite adding in a dozen or so new books, like Silver Surfer, Captain Marvel, Captain Savage, the expanded super hero books, some new fantasy titles, and a plethora of reprints, total sales fell for the first times this decade. I have tried to look for outside reasons for this decline, but could find none. With the new distributor, Marvel books were easier to find than ever, a price raise did occur, but not until a year or so later and I see no affect with the additional .03 raise. One would think that with a dozen new books, these would cover any dip in the other books, but the fall was immediate and across the board. The only change I can figure was the change from Jack Kirby plots to Stan Lee’s plotting had stretched the writer too far, and damaged the brand. That no one ever praises the stories from 1968-1970 is a telling factor of just how low the product had fallen. That late period run of Fantastic Four is considered a dry period of the series with little originality and no drawing power for new readers. Thor had not offered anything exciting, getting by on the likes of the Thermal Man, Kronin Krask, Crypto-Man, or mundane returns of Ulik, or the Wrecker. 1969-70 Marvel had become that “vast wasteland” the same bankrupt literary desert that DC had reached a decade earlier. The decline wasn’t killing yet; Marvel’s freefall actually wouldn’t start until after Jack Kirby left the company. During Jack’s tenure, Marvel’s sales had steadily risen from less than 3 million units a month to a staggering 9 million units, only to see it fall back to 6 million despite Marvel’s attempt at flooding the stands again. Kirby’s foundation was broken and withering. FF lost 60+ thousand copies per month, Cap 50 thousand, and Thor; another staggering 60 thousand issues. During this time Marvel responded by for the first time in recent memory, they cancelled series; Silver Surfer, Dr. Strange, Captain Savage, Nick Fury all bit the dust, X-Men went into reprint mode. The art, by stalwarts like Kirby, Kane, Neal Adams, Jim Steranko remained stellar, but the stories were mindless, rudderless, pap. They lacked the clarity, excitement, and vision that Kirby had supplied the early stories. Stan Lee’s voice was the same, but what was missing was Kirby’s imagination and vision. The bird stopped soaring.

Note the crash starting in 1968 just as Stan was forced to provide stories—new owners– this chart doesn’t show individual books—even worse since this coincided with more titles. Note Marvel’s rise coincided with Kirby’s tenure.

• 

• 

Jack and Joe Sinnott get it right – Jack and Joe finally meet in 1972

As the young Lisa grew, she began to suffer from asthma, just as her mother once did. It was suggested that a move to a warmer drier climate might be beneficial. There may have been other reasons for Kirby to consider moving to California. For instance, it has been reported that Kirby wanted to get closer to Hollywood. Either way, after Martin Goodman sold Marvel to Perfect Film and Chemical Corp. Kirby felt even more estranged as the new owners had no clue as to who Kirby was and what he contributed. So in January 1969, the Kirbys packed up and moved to the West Coast.

Shortly after the move, Thor was scheduled to be given to another artist. John Buscema had been molded to take over the strip. Stan had some other ideas for Jack. Perhaps the new Amazing Adventures that would contain the oft promised new adventures of the Inhumans. Perhaps to help some of the flagging titles, Kirby is given stories for odd titles. Kirby called historian Greg Theakston screaming that this was the last straw. But it wasn’t; finally the new suits at Marvel sent Kirby a new contract. Kirby was flabbergasted, the new contract actually was worse than the previous agreement. No raise, no mention of benefits, and a new layer of legal sanctions against any copyright claims that Kirby might make at some later period. It seemed that Joe Simon’s claim for Captain America had stirred up a hornets’ nest. Supposedly Marvel also worked out deals with Bill Everett and Carl Burgos.

The country was burning! A culture war that began soon after the assassination of JFK became a perfect storm of schism eruptions; Young vs. old, drugs vs. alcohol, hawks vs. doves, black vs. white, feminist marches, even gay rights demands. Fueled by horrible TV news films from Viet Nam, the assassinations of Robert Kennedy, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. the young generation rose up and began burning down a country that had lost its mojo. The cultural centers had become the colleges and Universities, and the rise of the drug culture and anti-war movements led to sit-ins and shut downs that paralyzed and polarized the centers of higher learning.

As a mirror of society it was not surprising that comic books would reflect this cultural upheaval, especially with Stan’s New York liberalism. Captain America was no longer a right wing poster boy; he began to question. Even Spider-Man, had lost his Ditko tight-assed nature; and adopted Romita’s fashionably longer hair and swinging with-it style. With Marvel Comics having such a huge presence on these campuses, it was not surprising that Marvel Comics would come thru this turmoil relatively unscathed. I think it’s the man against society nature of super heroes. While not overtly anti-establishment, the stories had a counter culture ambience that the college age kids felt; their stories always seemed anti-establishment in some measure. Marvel also embraced the multi-cultural make-up of the country, more than its competition. A small group of readers found specific anti-establishment fervor in a budding offshoot called underground comics that focused on the sexual, drug, and anti-war counter culture of the young. This sub genre never made any real splash sales wise, but it did help to ease up the restrictive nature of the comic code and allowed both DC and Marvel to expand their stories into more controversial and “relevant” areas such as racial bigotry and drug abuse.

Mid ‘60’s on, the success at Marvel was staggering, with sales rising exponentially, but this rising tide didn’t lift all boats. The rest of the comic industry continued in a slow funk. Dell Comics was the most successful comic company during the 1950’s. Originally a pulp publisher founded by George Delacourt, it was an early venturer into comic books when it published Popular Comics in 1936. It quickly became a major player when in 1938 it partnered with Western Publishing. Another subsidiary was K.K. Publications, named after Kay Kamen, manager of character merchandising at Walt Disney Studios from 1933-1949. Western Publishing also produced children’s books and family related entertainment products as Golden Books Family.

The corporate structure was unique, Dell was the financing division and Western Publication thru several divisions was the editorial sector – in charge of the actual production of the books. Thus we would find comic stories with several different imprints on them, plus Big Little Books and slick magazines with Whitman or KK Pub. in the indicia.

• 

• 

Dell – The 40 ton bull in the shop

Dell Comics was best known for its licensed material, most notably the animated characters from Walt Disney Productions, Warner Bros., Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and Walter Lantz Studio, along with many movie and television properties such as the Lone Ranger, Tarzan, Howdy Doody, Yogi Bear and other Hanna-Barbera characters; most notably under the Four Color banner. They were considered safe for all readers, and they were so clean, the company never even felt threatened enough to combine with the other publishers under the Comics Code Authority. They had several titles that sold well over a million copies a month for a long time. No barber shop could be found without a stack of Donald Duck, Rocky and Bullwinkle, or Zorro comics for reading.

In 1962, the two divisions had a dispute over money, and the decision was to divide into two separate companies. The end of Four Color in 1962 coincided with the end of the partnership with Western, which took most of its licensed properties and its original material and created its own imprint, Gold Key Comics.

Dell Comics continued for another 11 years continuing with licensed television and motion picture adaptations (including Mission: Impossible, Ben Casey, Burke’s Law, Doctor Kildare) and a few generally poorly received original titles. In response to the burgeoning super hero craze, Dell additionally attempted to do several superhero titles, including, Nukla, Fab 4, and Brain Boy, and a critically panned trio of titles based on the Universal Pictures monsters Frankenstein, Dracula and Werewolf that recast the characters as superheroes. Gold Key had better luck with their super heroes as titles like Dr Solar, Man of the Atom, Magnus, Robot Fighter, and Turok, Son of Stone, produced in California, lasted for quite a while with exquisite art by the likes of Dan Spiegel, and Russ Manning. K.K. Publications appears to have become defunct during the mid/late 1960s. Unfortunately, their fiscal problems meant they could no longer compete nationally.

Though both divisions would continue well into the Seventies, the divided companies had lost their luster and found distribution problems that robbed them of their market position. The young child focus of their books were increasingly aimed at a smaller market share as the general age of comic readers increased from 7-10 to 12-16. The growth of Marvel eroded the natural audience for the kiddie books. The large college age audience found little in Dell’s repertoire for them.

The other colossus of the comic industry DC had a different problem, it was simply getting old, and sailing by on its Golden Age laurels. Though most historians credit DC with initiating the Silver Age, with the re-introduction of Flash in Showcase #4, the fact is that the new books were good, but not great sellers. Flash, Green Lantern and the Atom never had sales that threatened Superman or Batman’s position as the top sellers. Justice League of America may have come closest, but by the early 60’s all were losing readers. The whole DC line was leaking oil. Batman was scheduled for cancellation a couple times. By the 60’s, the romance genre was moribund and on its last legs. Its romance division was near the bottom until DC bought Young Romance and Young Love from Prize Publications. But these were no longer the Simon and Kirby Young Love and Romance. These two titles were absorbed into DC’s lackluster romance line and produced by the same stable of tired writers and artists. Their humor titles, such as Jerry Lewis, and Bob Hope were also struggling. The sixties brought a new audience not readily familiar or in tune with the older slapstick hokey comedians. DC was stuck in the ’50s.

DC’s corporate structure had been intact for almost 20 years, and the lack of new blood was showing. All the editors were in a holding pattern busily redoing the plots and stories from the last decade. Batman and Superman repeatedly fighting the silliest aliens ever created. The characters never changed. A story from 1963 could just as easily have been printed in 1955, with no one the wiser. The art was always top notch with pros like Gil Kane, Joe Kubert, Russ Heath, Carmine Infantino and Curt Swan producing solid but uninspiring art. There was a sense of a company set in aspic, with no reaction to new times and new sensibilities. The Sixties was about new and different, and if you gave people the same ole same ole, you would be on the losing end. It took DC almost 5 years before they took the upstart Marvel seriously. They would laugh at editorial meetings about Marvel’s “ugly art” and figure it would pass. But Stan and Jack had done the improbable; they had fed into the new sensibilities and created a groundswell of appeal from the new readers that transcended the old masters. Stan’s innocent condescension of the Distinguished Competiton had become outright derision by the buyers. A new phrase had entered the lexicon of comics- the Marvel Zombie- a buyer of only Marvel Comics. It wasn’t only DC, when Harvey tried to match up with Marvel’s adventure line, and Tower, and Charlton, they all met the same fate, good reviews but a stubborn refusal of the buyers to budge from Marvel.

It wasn’t even for lack of trying, DC did make some weak attempts at emulating Marvel’s hero with feet of clay style when they created Metal Men, Doom Patrol, Metamorpho and some others. All fine books just not game breakers, and by this time DC needed something dramatic.

New companies like Tower, and that old guard Harvey tried their hands at new style Universally connected hero worlds, to good reviews, but lack luster sales. Even bringing in Joe Simon was no cure for Harvey. His new titles never seemed to bridge the gulf from the Golden Age simplicity to Silver Age sensibilities. Tower started with a splash featuring Wally Wood’s artwork. It expanded too soon, and the other hands couldn’t live up to Wally’s promise, plus the new company had money problems.

• 

• 

Wally Wood—never disappoints – Jim Steranko—the genius arises

Finally, DC made a change. It started in 1964 when the editor of Batman, Julius Schwartz teamed with artist Carmine Infantino to update the Caped Crusader. Infantino got rid of the sillier aspects that had crept into the series and gave the “New Look” Batman and Robin a lither and muscular physique, detective-oriented story direction and sleeker draftsmanship that proved a hit combination. The upshot was that a Hollywood producer saw a new Batman comic and had the idea to produce a Batman TV series. The series, starring Adam West as Batman was such a phenomenon that sales of Batman comics became astronomical, with figures approaching Golden Age sales that hadn’t been seen since the early 1940’s. DC had its game breaker, and they once again rode the crest for the next two years. Batman’s sales didn’t cross over to the other titles.

• 

• 

This wasn’t lost on Stan Lee and Martin Goodman; in late 1966 Irwin Donenfeld gave Carmine the job of designing covers for the entire DC line. Stan Lee approached Infantino with a $22,000 offer to move to Marvel. Jack Liebowitz explained that DC would not match the offer, but could promote Infantino to the position of art director. Initially reluctant, Infantino accepted and decided to stay with DC. Later, when DC was sold to Kinney National Company, Infantino was promoted to editorial director. For once DC had an artist in a position of power instead of rejected pulp writers. Carmine’s first move was promoting artists to editorial positions. He hired Dick Giordano away from Charlton Comics, and made artists Joe Orlando, Joe Kubert and Mike Sekowsky, even Vince Colletta editors.

Next, he actively rewarded new talents when Neal Adams and Denny O’Neil were added to the roster. Of all the noteworthy moves that Infantino made, this might have been the most important. The comic industry had been getting by with professionals who first started in the 1930’s. So while there had been several new audiences, the companies were run just like the 1940’s. These men were at an age where they were generations separated from their audience and this audience wanted new and different treatments of their heroes. Marvel’s bullpen featured mostly younger second generation artists like Don Heck, Steve Ditko, Dick Ayers and Larry Leiber, anchored by the rock of Kirby.

Comics needed young blood, and Carmine’s hiring of Neal Adams was their first taste. Neal’s impact was explosive with a natural yet dramatic feeling of emotional intensity. His figures were the opposite of Kirby’s with a strong, but realistic figural structure highlighted by dramatic asymetric layouts and a Wally Woodlike dramatic use of lighting and staging. There was no missing this new approach– so distant from the cartoony Curt Swan, or Sheldon Moldoff pencils seen so long on Superman and Batman. Unfortunately, while Adam’s work was so beloved by the fans and critics, the casual buyers never warmed up to it and he would never have a long and successful run on a character. But Carmine stuck with Neal and his style soon became the in-house DC style, adorning most every cover. Great buzz, but no real improvement with sales.

Stan Lee was not to be outdone; a young artist had debuted over at Harvey Publications when Joe Simon started a new line of adventure titles in 1966. As a teenager, this young artist had sought out Jack Kirby. On a visit to the Kirby household, he and Jack talked comic art for hours with a Kirby made bologna sandwich breaking up the stay. Jim Steranko’s art was equal part pop art intricacy, and Jack Kirby dynamics. It was destined that when the Harvey titles were canceled, he would gravitate over to Marvel with his impressive portfolio in hand.

• 

• 

Kirby and Steranko – Barry Smith ala Kirby dots and squiggles.

With Steranko’s facility with hi-tech gadgetry, Stan placed him with Jack Kirby to work together on Nick Fury- Agent of SHIELD. Jim finished over Kirby layouts for a few issues before taking over complete art duties. Steranko reminisced; “As a fan, I had admired, studied, and collected Kirby’s comics and knew him several years before we worked together on the SHIELD series. That collaboration was one of the high points of my career, not only marking my debut at Marvel, but one with Kirby as my mentor. A dream was fulfilled when I inked the cover of Strange Tales #151 and finished his breakdowns for the first three issues before soloing on the series.” The art was breathtaking in its intensity and dramatics. The combination of Kirby figures and Steranko’s hi-technology and surrealistic op-art backgrounds was staggering. No one–not even Neal Adams so quickly became a fan favorite as did Jim Steranko. Jim was soon assigned to Captain America where he produced three highly regarded issues. When Jim couldn’t make deadline, Kirby stepped in and over a weekend drew a fill-in issue of Cap.

Unfortunately, Jim Steranko was a comet, his time at Marvel was short due in some measure to Stan Lee’s interference, and his own time consuming standards that didn’t jibe well in a book-a-month industry. It’s been said that Jack could do 4-5 pages in one day, while Steranko could do one page every 4-5 days. Ultimately, Steranko explained that his feelings for his own work led to a breaking point with Lee. On a Nick Fury project,(ed’s note; it was actually a horror story, not a Nick Fury) Steranko pleaded with Lee not to alter his work despite his authority to do so.

“Don’t touch this work, I’ve put too much time in this work, if you tinker with it you’ll screw it up,” Steranko paraphrased on his encounter with Lee. “It’s the only time I’ve ever seen him angry, it’s the only time I’ve known him to be angry,” said Steranko, explaining that Lee effectively stood his ground telling him he couldn’t tell his editor how to do his job and firing him on the spot. “Stan really had every right to take that attitude. I was really wrong. I shouldn’t have taken that attitude, but I didn’t want him to change that story,” said Steranko. “Stan was the editor, and I was just some geek who walked in out of the night. So at this late date, Stan, forgive me.”

Next up was an English émigré whose work impressed Stan so much that he immediately gave him fill in work. Barry Smith was initially a Kirby clone, impressing with extreme figural posturing and a touch of pop art sensibilities. Smith didn’t gravitate towards Marvel, he attacked it head on. In an interview Barry was asked: Did you seek out Marvel because of Jack’s work? Smith responded: “Yes. Marvel was my only interest because of Kirby’s work”. With early work on X-Men, Nick Fury, and Avengers, the young Brit worked tirelessly at his office on a park bench. Unfortunately his visa problems caught up and he had to go back to Great Britain, but not before leaving a mark on the industry. Others like Dell alumni Herb Trimpe helped out on westerns, Bernie Wrightson and Mike Kaluta would be added.

Barry Windsor-Smith said, talking about his Kirby influence: “Each panel and page was so filled with energy and wonder that, as with the Beatles’ work of the same time, I knew I was honored to be alive and aware at these epochs of such undeniable genius.”   “The extraordinary fluency of the figure drawings took my breath away; I’d never seen anything like it, ever,” he said. “I have always had a bright star by which to navigate my dream of trying to be one one-hundredth of the galaxy that was Jack Kirby.”

Smith says getting the work was easy.

“There was no pitching required, really—Stan loved my stuff because although it was pretty amateur and klutzy, it had the essence of Jack Kirby about it, and that was what sold Marvel Comics in those days. Stan wanted every penciler in his employ to draw like Jack—not necessarily copy him, I must point out, because that has been misconstrued for too long—but, rather, to adapt from Kirby’s dynamism and dramatic staging. Many pencilers pretty much had their own styles wrecked by Stan’s insistence in this matter. It was horrid watching Don Heck—a perfectly adept illustrator of everyday things and occurrences—struggle to create a dynamism in his work that simply was not a part of his natural capabilities. Herb Trimpe, John Romita Sr. and others were all twisted away from their own natural proclivities to adapt the Kirby style—disastrously affecting their own artistic vision or needs. I doubt whether Stan pushed Steve Ditko to be more like Kirby because, after all, Ditko’s style was already dramatic in its staging and pacing.”

Once DC had been sold to Kinney, the gentleman’s agreement as to raiding the artist stable ended, and Stan soon convinced Gil Kane, and Neal Adams to switch teams. Marvel was now the work place of choice.

Barry Smith tells one of the great anecdotes about working close quarters at Marvels studios.

“The offices were no bigger than an average NYC apartment. Areas were sectioned off—the Bullpen itself could hold four people sort-of comfortably, with liberal deodorant use. Stan had the only office with a door. The atmosphere was quite merry most of the time. Marie (Severin) was a constant source of laughs with her wonderful cartoons of all of us. I remember one afternoon in the late summer of ’68, the radio was playing the Beatles latest song and as it came into the long, chanting coda one by one each person began singing along—Herb Trimpe, John Romita, Morrie Kuromoto, Tony Mortarello, Marie and a few others—all singing at the top of their lungs, Naa—NaNa NaNaNaNaaa—Hey Ju-u-ude… It was wonderful, gave me chills of pleasure.”

From the moment he took over DC in 1967, Infantino set out to launch one
new book after another. He abandoned DC’s traditional method of giving a new
feature two to four issues of Showcase (or Brave and the Bold) and waiting for
sales figures, instead giving features only one or two Showcase appearance and
immediately spinning them off into their own title. But most didn’t last
beyond seven issues. They included Beware the Creeper and The Hawk and Dove (both by Steve Ditko), Bat Lash (an innovative Western series), Brother Power the Geek, Prez, and some romance titles (by Joe Simon).

Jim Simon, (Joe’s son) in a personal communication explained.

“Fans should keep in mind that Prez, and Power reflected the times—the hippie and youth movement. It’s hard to relate to today but at the time he (Joe) was having a ball with the concepts.—I think these could have been better if Dad had worked with a different artist. Jerry Grandenetti was a neighbor and Dad gave him work but I never liked Jerry’s comic book work even though he did interesting “shots”. I also wrote some of these stories and that could also have been a problem! In fairness to Jerry Grandenetti, he was a wonderful war and horror artist, but his style was old school and worked against the hipper nature of the new comics. I have always felt that it might have been easier to reach a younger audience if the books weren’t written by a 50+ ad man.

Unknown to both Joe and Jim Simon, there was also a cancer killing his books from the inside. Mort Weisinger, Simon and Kirby’s old tormentor during their early DC days was not happy with Joe Simon coming back, and he made a personal plea to Donenfeld to cancel Prez, which he claimed as anti-American and unpatriotic.

• 

• 

• 

• 

D.O.A.

Carmine was under the gun, nothing he threw against the wall was sticking. The new owners were not pleased. In late 1968, a fortuitous event happened when Jack Schiff, the veteran editor at DC retired. The old guard was giving way. With his retirement, a large obstacle for Jack Kirby disappeared. Jack had been persona non grata at DC as long as Schiff was still at DC due to the Sky Masters fiasco.

According to Carmine in his biography he and Kirby had remained good friends from when he had worked at S&K.

“Jack Kirby and I were old friends. We had done that strip that never sold and, in the ’50s, I worked for him and Joe Simon. While Jack was at Marvel, we would talk from time to time. In ’69, I was flying back and forth to California overseeing Hanna-Barbera’s work on DC’s SUPER-FRIENDS TV show. I called and said, ‘Jack, I’m coming out to California for Passover. Do you want to get together and have a drink?’ “He said, ‘Absolutely.’

Jack recalled Joe Simon’s old axiom “when you make a proposal to an editor, have a tangible project, not an ephemeral idea. Don’t let them evolve the project-or worse, steal it. Infantino joined the Kirby’s for Seder.

“And when we talked, he showed me these three projects. They were FOREVER PEOPLE, NEW GODS, and MISTER MIRACLE. “I said, ‘They’re sensational. When is Marvel putting them out?” “He said, ‘They’re my creations and I don’t want to do them at Marvel. Would you make me an offer?’ “I said, ‘Absolutely.’ He wanted a three-year contract. I said, No problem, you got it. So I made him an offer, which was more than what he got over there, and then I gave him a contract. It was that simple. He was very unhappy at Marvel and wanted to come over to DC. Marvel wouldn’t pay him for writing and I would, so he made more money with us.”

Infantino left the Kirby household without a firm ok by Jack.

Jack would often say that for the best affect, his sci-fi concepts should be placed 5-10 years in the future- far enough to amaze but not so far as to be unimaginable. In July, 1969, Kirby’s and Kennedy’s dream became a reality. Neil Armstrong, in one small jump made humanity a Cosmic traveler. Only 6 years after Jack first had the Fantastic Four step on the moon. Now Neil didn’t run into any Commie super apes, or find a large solitary observer of the human race, but that’s not an indictment of Kirby. It just shows that God didn’t have as well developed an imagination as Jack Kirby.

After a short period of looking, the Kirby family settled on a mountaintop in Thousand Oaks, just a short trip Northwest of L.A. On clears days, Kirby could see the Pacific Ocean. He had traveled about as far from New York’s Lower East Side as humanly possible.

While in California, Jack had been assigned to assist a small company called Marvelmania International in producing some Marvel related collectibles. Marvelmania was started by a gentleman named Don Wallace, who had convinced Marvel that he could take over their marketing concerns. Don was kind of shifty and working on a shoestring. Getting paid was iffy, but Kirby provided a whole slew of drawings for the company. Jack drew and inked eight gorgeous posters for a fine art type printing. Marvel decided that eight was too much Kirby and they canceled four of them-without payment. Then they had Herb Trimpe redraw the Hulk poster using Kirby’s backgrounds and his figure as the template. Again, Kirby was not paid, plus it was Herb Trimpe’s name on the poster though Kirby had effectively laid out the figure and provided the backgrounds.

While working at Marvelmania Int. Jack met several young men. Steve Sherman and Mark Evanier were long time comic fans who had organized the L.A. Comic Club and hoped to find a job in comics. The only major comic company located on the West Coast was Western–a division of Gold Key Comics. When the boys learned that Kirby had moved west, they soon tracked him down and became constant house guests. While still at Marvelmania Int. Evanier sold some comic scripts to Western. This was the first in a long ongoing career. Evanier was also a friend of Shel Dorf, a comic enthusiast who wanted to create a major West Coast Comic convention. In 1970, at a San Diego Hotel the inaugural San Diego Comic convention was held; the headliners were Forest Ackerman, a legendary sci-fi publisher, and Jack Kirby, the King of Comics. Another new acquaintance was Mike Royer, an artist from Oregon who had moved to California to get into the animation industry. Mike was also doing some work for Western Publication, mostly inking over Russ Manning, when he met Jack Kirby who asked him to ink the classic self-portrait for a Marvelmania magazine.

Mike recalled with great clarity;

“One night in the late ‘60s, about 8:00 in the evening, the phone’s ringing in the kitchen, I pick it up and the voice says “Hello, Mike Royer? This is Jack Kirby. Alex Toth says you’re a good inker.” And Jack says there’s a bunch of stuff he’s doing for Marvelmania and he wanted to know if I’d be interested in inking them.

Royer would always marvel since he had not worked for Al Toth, and had no idea Toth even knew who he was.

Mike Royer’s first inking

• 

• 

Jack and Steve – The new team – Mark

Interesting, Royer was faithful, but no squiggles

In late 1969 Jack received a phone call, a college producer, Sheldon Feldner asked Jack if he would prepare some production drawings for a play based on Julius Caesar put on by the Santa Cruz Theatre Company. Jack, who could never say no, agreed and did almost 2 dozen drawings, one of which was used as the cover for the playbill.

The director, Sheldon Feldner, a Marvel fan, wanted a comic artist to design the costumes. He contacted Stan in New York about his proposal and Stan suggested Kirby since he had recently moved out there. “An assistant and I drove down and stayed at Jack’s overnight. We watched Spartacus on TV and talked about Roman armor. But mostly, we listened to Jack talk about Julius Ceasar.” After Jack watched a rehearsal Mr. Sheldon asked him if he (Jack) wanted to play Ceasar? He laughed and said “not to worry- we couldn’t afford him.” Jack explained the production was by college kids and Jack felt he owed them.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

This is Jack’s little help

While at Marvelmania, Mark Evanier was finding getting paid tougher and tougher; he noticed bills being paid for with Kirby original art. He realized it was going under. He contacted Jack and explained that his artwork was being given away, and arranged for Jack to come and pick up his work. Jack and Neal drove up and absconded with all the original art they could find, but many pages sent over from New York were missing. With the company failing, Don Wallace started scapegoating, picking Mark Evanier as the likely culprit; he even went so far as calling Evanier’s home and threatening him with legal measures. The young assistant was despondent and feared for his livelihood. Jack noticed how upset Mark was and when Mark explained what was going on Kirby responded angrily. Mark remembers: “Jack immediately went to the phone, called my harasser, and though it was Saturday, caught him at his office. All I heard Kirby say was ”If you ever bother Mark again, I’ll come down and punch your goddam face in.” Nothing more was ever heard from Don Wallace.

Back at Marvel in January 1970, they continued to badger him about the unacceptable contract, until Jack considered their terms as a take it or leave it proposition. Stan was playing games with some new titles requiring reworking by Kirby plus the new Silver Surfer title was in trouble and Stan turned to Jack to rework the series. Stan’s new vision for the new Silver Surfer as an avenging angel was even more at odds with Kirby’s and Jack was angry. Stan in an attempt to calm down Jack had actually allowed him to write–with full credit–a few stories at the end, but on one of these Stan still couldn’t resist the urge to change Kirby’s ending. Martin Goodman, perhaps as a ploy to force Jack to sign the new contract, said that Kirby was making too much money and threatened to cut his pay. This disrespect had to stop and in March 1970, Kirby called up Carmine Infantino and said that it’s a go, and then he called Stan and tendered his resignation.

Stan Lee recalling Jack’s leaving says he was shocked and caught unaware, just as he was by Ditko’s departure. Roy Thomas says that everyone knew there were problems, but even Roy was shocked and dismayed when it actually happened. The art staff was stunned. John Romita, the art director didn’t think Marvel could handle the loss of Kirby. Rumor has it that Marie Severin tacked a cigar stub up on a bulletin board with the words “I quit” written underneath, and that’s how most of the Marvel staff learned of it. The king had abdicated the crown, and moved to a new country. One decade ended, and another began. Strike three.

Previous – 19. Spider-man: The Case For Kirby | Top | Next – 21. Brand New World

Previous – 18. New Beginnings | Contents | Next – 20. Bullpen? Bullshit!!

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

SPIDER-MAN: THE CASE FOR KIRBY

In Feb. or March of 1962, Stan Lee pulled Steve Ditko aside, he explained that the next issue of Amazing Fantasy (#15) would feature a new super-hero. “He would be called Spider-Man. Jack would do the penciling and I was to ink the character” “Stan said Spider-Man would be a teenager with a magic ring which would transform him into an adult hero-Spider-man. I said it sounded like the Fly, which Joe Simon had done for Archie Publications.” Steve recalled.

“Stan called Jack about it but I don’t know what was discussed. I never talked to Jack about Spider-Man, so I don’t know what his ideas concerning the characters actually were.” Later at some point I was given the job of drawing Spider-Man. Why, exactly? Stan and Jack also have to clear that up.”

Stan Lee says that Spider-Man came to him one night when he saw a spider walking on a wall, and the name Spider-Man derived from a favorite pulp fiction character from his youth- The Spider.

Not surprisingly, Kirby has a different tale to tell. In an interview with Will Eisner, Kirby described the genesis thusly: “It was the last thing Joe and I discussed. We had a strip called The Silver Spider. I believe I said this could become a thing called Spiderman, see, a super-hero character. So the idea was already there when I talked to Stan. He would also explain that at the time he was very busy so after a few introductory pages they turned the character over to the planned inker to pencil and ink. “Stan Lee gave it to Steve Ditko because I was doing everything else; until Johnny Romita came in to take up some slack. There were very few people at Marvel; Artie Simek did all the lettering and production.” When Ditko took over, he and Lee added in their own take on the character. Of the three, only Kirby provided any specifics as to where the inspiration came from.

There was heavy blowback and discussion about Jack’s claims though they weren’t new. As early as 1968 Jack claimed design aspects of Spider-Man as being taken from his earlier work. His portfolio Kirby Unleashed, (1970) had this to say in the biography by Mark Evanier. “Spider-Mans beginnings, however date back to when Simon and Kirby had their own publishing company and were devising new characters for it….they had a projected character named Spiderman…recalling the name, Kirby suggested it to Marvel..” Even in a Marvel in-house article from FOOM #11, (1975) the writer Alex Boyd says; “It’s not generally known that it was Jack Kirby who designed Spider-Man’s costume.” I have read, many strange attempts at twisting those words to refute what was written, but they can’t change the date and now make the claim that Kirby’s claims were made during a period of great anger at Marvel. It was always Kirby’s claim that Jack presented the idea of Spider-Man to Stan Lee. I think the clearest evidence came from an article from Comics Scene magazine#2 (March 1982) by Howard Zimmerman. Jack says; “I did a mess of things. The only book I didn’t work on was Spider-Man which Steve Ditko did. But Spider-Man was my creation.”

Several different versions, at odds with each other, how do we find out the truth? The first thing is to remember the routine that Lee and Kirby had established. Jack was responsible for the characters and plot elements. And Lee the personalities and human attributes. Is there any evidence that Spider-Man should be any different? No, in fact it makes sense with Ditko’s memories of Jack Kirby being involved before he was, and as the preferred penciller.

• 

• 

Who you gonna call?

It was also Jack’s method to refer back to previous recent creations for inspiration. He had done this for the Rawhide Kid, The Fantastic Four, The Hulk, and Thor, Ant-Man and Sgt. Fury. There is no reason to expect anything different with Spider-Man. The best clue may be Ditko’s observation that the original concept was identical to Archie’s Fly- created by Simon and Kirby just a couple years earlier- though Ditko had not remembered Kirby’s participation. And what do we know about the Fly? That the Fly evolved from a Kirby drawn character called Spiderman, which evolved from Joe Simon’s Silver Spider.

• 

• 

• 

What’s the diff? Fly Spider Fly?

But it’s not very scientific to just pick Ditko’s reminiscence and accept it at face value, or Stan’s or Jack’s. If we can’t rely on first-person testimony, what can we do? The Confessor, in Kurt Busiek’s Astro City said it best, “Look at the facts, look at the patterns, and look for what doesn’t fit. Base your deductions on that.”

It has been said, “an artist is someone who pounds the same nail over and over again.” All artists, graphic or literary, have patterns. They repeat aspects, concepts, a style of punctuation, a brush stroke, lines of musculature, anything that separates their style from the hundreds of others. When trying to identify an unknown artist, one can compare the piece in question with other contemporaneous works to match up these patterns. This method has been used to research everything from Shakespeare’s writings to the works of the Great Art Masters. I have spent a lot of time in this text showing the predecessors to Jack’s creations. This pattern is so strong that it can be found from his earliest work all the way to his final works. Jack built his legacy by continually connecting dots yet keeping it fresh.

Can this be used on comic books? Yes, it can, and has. Martin O’Hearn is a noted comic’s historian who specializes in the identification of unaccredited comic writers. He matches up subject, syntax, punctuation, themes and other identifiable patterns, and has had remarkable success in matching writers to their non-credited stories.

Likewise, Dr. Michael Vassallo, in his never-ending quest to index all Atlas/Timely Publications, spent endless hours comparing drawing and inking styles to identify unaccredited works of comic art. His goal of identifying the unlisted inker on Fantastic Four #1 & 2 has led him to amass a veritable mountain of inking examples to compare to the actual comic art. What he didn’t do is blindly accept personal recollections or corporate identifications at face value. If he did, Dick Ayers or Artie Simek would be incorrectly credited with this work. His quest and methods led to the acceptance of George Klein as that inker.

Rather than focusing on un-provable statements- by men with obvious agendas- made long after the creation of Spider-Man, let’s examine their actual concurrent works to see if we can find a pattern of creation that matched up with the concepts, characters, and plot elements found in Amazing Fantasy #15, plus any physical evidence, and testimony from witnesses independent of the three men. I will mention quotes, but not as evidence as quotes are too self-serving. But if a quote provides a specific bit of info, I will try to track that data down to see if relevant, such as Ditko’s quote mentioning the Fly.

Jack Kirby was an amazing man with an endless imagination, but he was also a man who used and reused his favorites themes. I have already mentioned the stories dealing with radio telescopes and looking for aliens, and how this idea bridged several different companies. We also know that Jack did at least five stories using huge rock heads sunk in the Easter Island coast. These stories also crossed at least four different companies, and he did at least 7 stories of robots or other mindless machines getting intelligence—usually by radiation affecting their cores. Alien children running amok causing havoc to the human population crossed many companies and genres. And this was before Quasimodo, Monsteroso or Machine Man. Jack constantly repeated his sources, though he never told the same story twice, he always fit those themes into stories with different takes and details.

For example; One of Jack’s many repeated premises is the Hollywood movie production where the heroes get invited in and once in find the props are not fake, they are deadly traps meant to kill them by their enemies. A version of this shows up even before Jack teamed up with Joe Simon in Wilton of the West, Jack and Joe used it in a wonderful Captain America story, and when they left for DC they used it in a Boy Commandos, and a Newsboy Legion story. An interesting version showed up in Fighting American. Interesting because it was planned for an unpublished issue, and never saw print until 1965, 4 years after Jack used the exact same sequence in a Fantastic Four story. He would reuse it in different versions on Thor, and a later Captain America. This same premise also shows up in an early Spider-Man. No one can deny that it was a Jack Kirby pattern that he used time and again.

So the best way to begin is to break Spider-Man down to its basic elements and look for matches. The basic concept of Spider-Man is simple, a hero, with the inherent physical powers of a spider- he can crawl up walls, and across ceilings, he has the proportional strength and agility of an arachnid. He has an extra sense that warns him of danger. He manufactures a web shooter that can be used for catching prey, and used as a means of mobility. This was described by Stan Lee when first talking to Steve Ditko.

I could find no earlier character from either Lee or Ditko that had any resemblance to Spider-Man, none. As to Jack Kirby, it didn’t take long to track down a pattern match for the physical aspects of Spider-Man, the surprising factor is just how similar the two characters are. The very character that Steve Ditko claims he recognized when told of the conception. Spider-Man was exactly the same as The Fly.

• 

• 

The very last costumed super-hero book that Kirby produced, prior to Marvel, featured an insect hero able to climb walls and ceilings; had super strength, the agility of a bug, and, amazingly, an extra sense that warned him of danger. Steve Ditko has said that all of this was in place before he got involved. If so, then what was changed from Kirby’s Spider-Man? It seems all the changes were made to Peter Parker, so a full half of the premise remained the same. Ditko made no changes to Spider-Man.

• 

• 

Marvel even noticed a resemblance – The most sensational new villain

In The Adventures of the Fly, (Archie Publications 1959,) Simon and Kirby introduced The Fly, a hero with the exact same insect derived powers that show up in Spidey. In fact, the only physical difference is that the Fly not surprisingly, can fly. The most interesting aspect for me is the match-up of a “sixth sense” to warn of danger. While the other powers (wall climbing, etc.) might be considered generic to any insect hero, (though this isn’t backed up by actual evidence) this warning sense, or insect sensitivity as Archie Publications called it is, as far as I know, something totally unique and beyond the norm of the natural attributes of insects..

• 

• 

The Fly – Spidey

With Spider-Man, his Spidey Sense has two different aspects, the first is a direct warning of an unknown attack, as seen when the Vulture swoops down from behind and his Spidey Sense makes him swerve out of harms way, or when The Invisible Girl tried to sneak up on him. The writers have even described it the same way

• 

• 

Spidey – Mirror images – The Fly

The second aspect is a more vague sense of unease that something bad is about to happen. Like when Spider-Man enters the Tinkerer’s workshop. Ditko shows this extra sense with wavy rays emanating from Spidey’s head. So does the Fly. This was not a onetime aspect, as the Fly stories used it many times.

Coincidentally, the Fly’s extra sense has the exact two aspects as does Spider-Man. It warns him of people sneaking up behind him, such as a punk with a gun and also as a vague vibration bringing a sense of dread alerting the Fly to trouble at the Orphanage. When this is shown in the Fly, he is shown with rays emanating from his head. The addition of this unnatural extra sense and presentation showing up in both creations is just too coincidental. Perhaps the silliest explanation was when a reader, in attempting to show a difference, tried to explain the Fly’s ability as super-hearing. The description in the panel belies this, plus in other uses it was called an “insect sensibility”

It should be noted that the addition of the extra sense that warns of impending danger, first seen in the Fly, seems to have been an original Kirby item, since it was not present in either the Silver Spider proposal, or mentioned in the Jacobson memo.

It’s been said that the Devil’s in the details, and it’s these repeated small details that in my opinion, make the strongest case for Kirby being the concept man.

Does the physical similarity between The Fly and Spider-Man correspond and bolster any specific claims made by the three men? Yes.

It backs up Ditko’s memory, plus it backs up Kirby’s claim that it started with Joe Simon’s Silver Spider which we know evolved into the Fly.

Joe Simon’s logo

Let’s review the step by step process that led from the Silver Spider to Spider-Man. When Archie Publications asked Joe Simon to produce some books for them in 1959, Joe called in Jack Kirby to help out. Joe suggested that they rework his earlier Silver Spider proposal into a character called Spiderman. He handed over a file containing the initial Silver Spider proposal to Jack. The file also contained a rejected working logo. and probably the editorial memos, by Harvey Publications, rejecting the initial proposal. After drawing the first story, the name was changed to the Fly, with changes made to the Kirby drawn story.

According to Joe, in The Comic Book Makers (Crestwood Publications, 1990) when Kirby asked him about specific powers for The Fly, Joe told him “Hey, let him walk up buildings, and let him fly if he wants to, It’s a free country. Take it home and pencil it in your immortal style.” Kirby did just this, and the result was The Fly.

Why is the Fly swinging on a web?

Again, Joe saying The Fly evolved out of the Silver Spider proposal doesn’t make it true. It is when we compare the two stories that we see that aspects of the Fly’s origin gimmick is consistent with the Silver Spider’s. (and Ditko’s later observation) In both stories, the young protagonist (both named Tommy Troy) is a beleaguered orphan who gains his powers via a mystical ring that transforms him into an adult super hero. Yet the super hero character is different. Where the Silver Spider has no apparent powers except enhanced strength, and a great leaping ability, The Spiderman/Fly has been granted very specific powers; inherent insect abilities, (wall clinging, exceptional agility, a sixth sense and a stinger gun- none of which was in the initial Silver Spider proposal. It is this character evolution, supplied by Jack Kirby, that is the borrowed ingredients that later show up in Marvel’s Spider-Man.

So there is a pattern match that is consistent with Spider-Man and Kirby’s The Fly, and a paper trail that lends credence to Jack Kirby’s claims concerning the initial Silver Spider connection, and Ditko’s claim about the resemblance with the Fly. As an aside, Simon had rejected a working title “Spiderman” for his Silver Spider project, and showed a logo to Kirby, leaving little doubt as to which of the three people involved with Spider-Man would have been the one to supply that name.

Yet nowhere in either the Fly, or the Silver Spider work up can be found a template for the concept of a web being used as a means of mobility, or as a way of capturing prey. Which brings me to a part of this history that has been overlooked, and in this area lies what I believe to be the only existing contemporaneous written evidence that shows undeniably where the concepts came from, and who brought the basic concept of Spider-Man to Marvel. This is what I consider to be the smoking gun, much like catching the crooks with the blueprint to the bank, and the vault combination.

After Joe Simon submitted his proposal for the Silver Spider to Harvey Publications for acceptance, Leon Harvey handed it over to a young editor by the name of Sid Jacobson for critiquing and approval. In two memos from 1954, addressed to Leon, Sid made it apparent that he was not happy with the proposal. “Strictly old hat” he says, stating that the concept is too generic, with nothing special to set it apart. In the second memo, Sid Jacobson takes the extra step of suggesting just what changes could be done to make this concept more interesting. These memos were in Joe Simon’s, Silver Spider file, they were unearthed, and originally published in Greg Theakston’s Pure Images #1 (Pure Imagination,1990)

Here is the pertinent section of memorandum #2.

EDITORIAL MEMORANDUM #2

TO: LEON HARVEY
February 23, 1954
FROM: SID JACOBSON
RE: SILVER SPIDER

Conclusions on character:
Physical appearance- The Silver Spider should be thought of as a human spider. All conclusions on his appearance should stem from the attributes of the spider. My first thought of the appearance of a human spider is a tall thin wiry person with long legs and arms. He should have a long bony face, being more sinister then handsome. The face of the Submariner comes to mind.

Powers: The powers of the human spider should pretty much correspond to the power of a spider. He therefore wouldn’t have the power of flight (author’s note: something hinted at in Simon’s proposal) but could accomplish great acrobatical tricks, an almost flight, by use of silken ropes that would enable him to swing ala Tarzan, or a Batman. The silken threads that the spider would use might come from a special liquid, from some part of his costume that would become silken threads in much the same way as the spider insect. These threads would also be used in making of a web, which could also be used as a net. The human spider might also have a “poison” to be used as a paralyzing agent.

-end of memo-

There is no ambiguity, vagueness, or doubt; Sid Jacobson suggested that for the Silver Spider to work, it would have to become what we recognize as Spider-Man!

It appears as if Jack took some of Jacobson’s suggestion to heart when he cobbled together the character of Spiderman/Fly, for he added the detail of inherent insect attributes, and a web gun– enabling the Spiderman to travel and catch quarry– which Simon says was changed to a buzz gun when the character became the Fly. “Out went the web-pistol. The Fly now carries a buzz gun, which paralyses his foes with stinging darts. It wasn’t scientific, but who cared? It was good comics.”

Move forward three years, when Goodman decided to go the super-hero route; Kirby is asked to come up with another character, and now the parallels between the Spider-Man creation and the Jacobson memo become undeniable.

Spider-Man would have the natural instincts and powers of a spider; he could walk up walls, and ceilings. He would have the proportional strength, and agility of an arachnid. And more importantly, he could emit a silken thread that he could walk across, or use as a swing. His webbing, a synthesized liquid, which emanated from his costume, was also adaptable as a net in which to ensnare villains, all of this totally identical with the Jacobson memo. Interestingly, later, when Hollywood came a calling, they changed the web from a manufactured liquid shot from the uniform into a natural inherent physical ability. The only mention of a manufactured liquid is found in the Jacobson memo, and the comic book appearance.

Evidence, and m.o.; a series of continuing pattern matches, plus a paper trail that leads directly to only Jack Kirby. And according to Steve Ditko, the origin gimmick (magic ring, transforming into an adult) was originally taken from the Fly also. What are the odds that Stan Lee, working alone, or in collaboration with Ditko, would come up with exactly the same title, the same set of unique powers, the same origin gag, and the same weapon?

Some may imply that if all Kirby did was rework a Simon project, shouldn’t Simon get the credit. As shown, every facet of Spider-Man’s character, that matches up with The Fly, or the earlier Spiderman is an element that Kirby worked on or added–nothing was taken from Joe Simon’s Silver Spider except the original title logo, and that had been rejected by Simon. Simon, on his own, had never used the logo, or acted on Jacobson’s character suggestions. But in any history of Spider-Man’s creation, in my opinion, both Joe Simon and Sid Jacobson certainly deserve a large footnote

All pulp – no super-hero – blazing 45’s

Try as I might, I couldn’t find any prior Lee or Ditko tales that might have been a template for the character of Spider-Man. None. Lee’s oft quoted statement that he had a long fascination with the pulp hero The Spider, may be true, but there is absolutely no resemblance in origin, weapons, personality or powers between the two characters. It should be noted that Stan’s fascination with the pulp Spider never led him to create a spider figure in the Golden Age when Stan was creating so many characters.

It should be highlighted that the addition of the extra sense that warns of impending danger, first seen in the Fly, seems to have been an original Kirby item, since it was not present in either the Silver Spider proposal, or mentioned in the Jacobson memo. It should also be noted that this insect-sense was not a one-time and then forgotten use, The power was in constant use even after Simon and Kirby left the series. It was a consistent part of the characters profile.

Inset from Fly #16 cover – they can’t control their “insect powers” – Still pre-Spider-Man

Ditko, for his part has acknowledged that the original concept was similar to The Fly, yet he says it was rejected, and changed because it was too identical to the Fly. So I tried to see where they might have changed the character. Try as I might, there is nothing significantly different between the Fly and Spider-Man. Every unique power that Spidey possesses first shows up in the Fly. Why, if they recognized the similarity between the Fly and Spider-Man, didn’t Stan and Steve make some changes except for the origin gimmick?

There are some specific detail differences, however, in these similar powers: The Fly’s super strength is never explained, it’s just a given. Spider-Man’s is specifically described as the “proportional strength” of a spider–a rather unique concept, (and surprisingly never used by any other insect inspired hero, i.e. Blue Beetle, Green Hornet, Tarantula ) and specific enough for me to try to track down to see if this might be an addition attributable to Lee or Ditko. But again, the only example I could find of any one of these three men giving a character the proportional strength of an insect prior to the creation of Spider-Man is found in a Kirby story. In Black Cat Mystic #60 (Harvey Publications, 1957), in a story entitled “The Ant Extract,” a meek scientist discovers a serum that gives him the proportional strength of an ant. Because of his new power, the scientist is feared and ostracized by authorities. (sounds vaguely familiar) Another small, but novel detail, that shows the evolution of the concept, and is traceable to Jack Kirby.

The mechanical weapon as first created by Kirby has been described by Steve Ditko as a web-shooting gun, and later modified by Ditko into a wrist-mounted web shooter. Again, not taking this quote as fact, my research found that the only pattern match to a costume emanated webbing, is found in the Jacobson memo that Kirby had. The wrist shooter as designed by Ditko is a wonderful modification and a stroke of genius, but it is still just a modification–the actual idea of a mechanical web shooter, even by Ditko’s account, was Kirby’s. There is also a time when Steve wanted to have a villain replicate Spider-Man and he chose a web gun rather than a wrist shooter yet no one notices the difference.

In review: every unique physical aspect of the character we know as Spider-Man can be traced back to only one of the three men involved, Jack Kirby. Not only amazingly exact pattern matches, but also a written blueprint that only Kirby had seen. Evidence and modus operandi. If the concept of Spider-Man was all that Kirby supplied, he deserves co-creator credits, but it doesn’t end there.

The next aspect is the character of Peter Parker, and while he is Spider-Man, the role of the alter-ego is to present a sometimes opposing character to the heroes. It is this dichotomy that helps create tension and oftimes humor. It is this aspect that keeps the hero and the story grounded in some semblance of reality.

Peter’s character is portrayed as a nerdy, wallflower science whiz, taunted by his peers for his lack of athletic prowess and social skills. He is rejected by the opposite sex.

Surprising as the aspect seems Ditko-like, after comparing the recent works of the three men, I was able to find a pattern match with only one of them, Jack Kirby. And not just one outlier, but several times.

In the late ‘50s, Kirby was looking for work, his comic book work had dwindled and he thought of getting into the syndicated strips. One of the strips he proposed was titled Chip Hardy. Chip was a young college freshman on a science scholarship. A regular ‘boy wonder’ taunted the other kids. Moose Mulligan, the campus jock, teased young Chip about why he didn’t try out for football, instead of “hiding behind a mess of test tubes”. Other students followed suit and mocked the youngster, labeling all science majors as “squares”. Eventually, this taunting escalated into a physical confrontation between Moose and Hardy, with young Chip getting the better of it, mimicking exactly the character template and early relationship between Peter Parker, Flash Thompson, and the other school mates. While this strip was never published, Greg Theakston has published a few panels in the back of The Complete Sky Masters of the Space Force. (Pure Imagination, 2000).

Another amazing pattern match is to be found in Tales To Astonish #22, (Marvel Pub. Aug. 1961) in a tale titled “I Dared to Battle the Crawling Monster”, one of the many Kirby/Ayers monster stories, possibly dialogued by Larry Lieber. (unsigned by Lee) The hero is a high school student, a scrawny, dorky, bookwormish sort, laughed at by the jocks for his lack of athletic ability, and taunted by the girls. Typically, by the end of the story, it is the bookworm, not the jock who is the hero. Even the visuals of the lead character strongly resemble the Peter Parker character as shown in AF#15.

• 

• 

Puts the lie to Kirby couldn’t do nerdy and scrawny – another scrawny abused older teenager

In the Bruttu story from Tales of Suspense #22, the protagonist was a small beleaguered scientist, taunted about his size all through high school and college, and into his workplace. It was this taunting that drove him to mistakenly become a monster. This milksop character who overcomes his limitations had become a standard icon of Kirby’s fantasy stories.

As to Stan Lee and Steve Ditko, I could not find any earlier templates for the harassed, teen-age, academic style hero. And Lee/Ditko had a several years long collaboration where one might expect this plot element to show up. None, and this, frankly surprised me. There is one aspect of Peter Parker that was consistent to Stan Lee, and that is Peter’s personality. Besides being a science geek, (complete with pocket protector) Peter is shown to be somewhat angst-ridden; doubting of his own worth and unable to fit easily into society. His uneasiness with his new- found powers is atypical of Kirby’s heroes. Kirby’s men were fighters, despite their shortcomings. This inner conflict, and sometimes, outer rage is pure Lee, it is this deeper human psychological aspect that Lee imbued into all of Marvel’s heroes. It is the difference between Ben Grimm of the Fantastic Four, and Rocky Davis of the Challengers of the Unknown.

Spider-Man, the alter-ego as an orphan was a constant among Kirby creations. I swear that I can’t think of a singular Kirby hero that had parents. Even those not specifically called orphans never had parents intruding their exploits. Some have said that Uncle Ben was originally a gruff, ex-military man not happy with his milksop nephew. And that Jack would never have done that type of relationship. Yet they seem to forget that the adoptive parents of the Fly (yes, the same Fly) were very hard on the child, even to the point of beating him, and by issue #4-5 changed completely into proud and supportive parents.

The villain of AF #15 is a colorless petty crook who has assaulted Spider-Man’s guardian-his uncle. His sole purpose is to create the crisis, which forces the hero into action. This match up is also found in the Fly’s origin. The Fly’s first use of his powers is to bring to justice, a petty crook who had assaulted Tommy’s guardian. This was both characters’ sole appearance.

J. Jonah Jameson is interesting. He is the adult blustering pain in the ass that constantly harassed the hero that Kirby used all the time, from original Captain America to the Shield, and Hulk on. The role of newspaper editor is an interesting one. Jack Kirby had just recently done a fantasy story (Amazing Adventures #4 “I Am Robot X”) where a blustery newspaper man tries to use his media power to destroy the hero; coincidently his name was also a three part Waspy name with an initial; Charles J. Wentworth. Like Jonah, he uses the power of the press to gin up public anger to destroy his enemy for his own selfish reasons. It was also one of Kirby’s sentient robot stories-another oft used idea. It’s a small detail, but J. J. Jameson’s newspaper was the Daily Bugle; a name that Jack used several times during the Golden Age, he even used this title in a newspaper blurb in Fantastic Four #2. Small detail, but telling as to who provided details.

Before Spider-Man developed money trouble, the Fantastic Four had their own run in with debt. They also had an issue with very bad press and hatred by the public. These ideas didn’t start with Spider-Man. The use of a wrestler as a foe against a super-powered hero was not new. Jack had used colorful wrestlers at least five times as foils in his stories dating back to Golden Age. He also put that bit into the FF, with the Thing taking on wrestlers as a comic touch.

The radiated spider is unique, unique to Kirby that is. Just before the AF#15 story Jack drew a fantasy story that involved a common spider that mistakenly gets irradiated and mutates. Jack used radiated insects several times before Spider-Man. This makes a nice change from the original ring gimmick

As to the characters, are my findings beyond the norm at Marvel at the time? I don’t think so. That Kirby constantly evolved and morphed characters and concepts is not an astounding statement. Just look at the examples. I showed for The Thing, and the Hulk, as well as Thor and Ant Man. Jack’s whole history at Marvel is filled with his taking prior concepts and reworking them to meet current needs.

That Stan Lee would take these stock Kirby characters and give them distinct personalities, foibles, and conflicts, soap opera style melodramatic continuities, and hip dialogue is also not really in doubt. I would go so far as to say that both aspects are equally important as to why Marvels’ sales rose.

That the character of Spider-Man as originally created was a Kirby concept is irrefutable, even without the Jacobson memos the patterns are obvious, with the memos it’s undeniable. There is also strong evidence that, the templates for Peter Parker’s maligned science whiz character, and some of the supporting cast was supplied by Jack Kirby.

The coincidences needed for Stan Lee or Steve Ditko to have come up with these exact elements, absent Jack Kirby, are astronomical. If this was all that Kirby provided to Stan Lee, he would deserve credit, but there is more to creating a character: One must also come up with a story line that showcases the new character, and it is here that the coincidences become positively mind boggling.

The plot of Amazing Fantasy #15 is simple, yet unique: An orphaned teenage boy receives super-powers during a scientific experiment. After gaining his powers, a loved one is killed due to his inaction. This remorse leads him to vow to never let it happen again, thus becoming a hero.
Again, after cross checking stories by these three men, it became obvious that in structure and theme, the basic plot for Spidey’s origin came from one of the three persons involved: Jack Kirby.

The first plot element has to do with an orphaned, older teenager, who gets super powers via a scientific experiment, and this is intriguing. Even though I tried to approach this in an entirely objective manner, I still had some preconceived notions of both Kirby’s and Ditko’s proclivities. One of these was that it was Ditko’s nature to use older troubled teenagers for his heroes, while it was Kirby’s nature to use younger kids. So strong is Ditko’s aura surrounding Spider-Man that I just assumed that it was a Ditko trait, but I was not able to track down a single use of older orphaned teenagers, troubled or not, by Steve prior to Spidey.

What shocked me was how easy it was to find the template for the orphaned older teenaged hero, and a title that would provide key elements in piecing together the puzzle. Surprisingly, it was in a title by Jack Kirby.

In The Double Life of Private Strong, (Archie Publications 1959) (not coincidentally the companion title to The Fly) the hero, Lancelot Strong, aka The Shield, is an orphaned high school senior, and like Spider-Man, his surrogate parents were gentle, compassionate, and supportive. His powers were the result of a scientific experiment.

Around this same time, Kirby was also working on the proposed newspaper strip, Chip Hardy, with a teen-aged science whiz hero. In fact, from about 1959 on, just about all of Kirby’s youthful heroes would be older teenagers, and most orphaned. Johnny Storm, Rick Jones (both predating Peter Parker) and the X-Men all fit into this mold.

The plot of Amazing Fantasy #15 is simple, yet unique: An orphaned teenage boy, raised by loving relatives, receives super-powers during a scientific experiment. After gaining his powers, a loved one is killed due to his inaction. This remorse leads him to vow to never let it happen again, thus becoming a hero.

Again, after cross checking stories by these three men, it became obvious that in structure and theme, the basic plot for Spidey’s origin came from one of the three persons involved: Jack Kirby.

There is also a Marvel romance story drawn by Kirby where a young girl is torn between the shy, nerdy, writer and the BMOC football star Flash Thompson. She chooses the shy guy who saves the prom. It’s interesting to see the name move from one jock to the other. Several fantasy stories by Kirby had older teenagers as protagonists.

The next element is very important: After gaining his powers, the hero loses a loved one due to his inaction, thus providing the impetus for becoming a hero. This may be the critical element that separates Spider-Man from almost all other heroes- yet it’s right there in The Double Life of Private Strong. While rushing off to test his newfound powers against a rampaging alien monster, The Shield, (Lancelot Strong), in his teen exuberance, ignores and leaves his best friend Spud in harms way.

After defeating the brute, the Shield returns to celebrate his triumph only to learn that the monster has killed Spud. The distraught Shield blames himself, and vows that it will never happen again. Similarly, Spider-man, in a moment of conceit and arrogance, ignores a thief, only to learn that that same thief would go on to kill his Uncle, which in turn, spurs him into action. He then vows that it will never happen again.

Harry Mendryk, an Simon & Kirby historian disagrees. From a blog post; “ Some comic experts have tried to equate this with the death of Uncle Ben in the Spider-Man origin story. However it just does not wash. Uncle Ben’s death was the result of Spider-Man’s unwillingness to intercede in a crime while Lancelot was very much fulfilling the role of a hero when he left Spud. Further it is not clear that Spud would in fact die as the policeman says that they will try to save him. And if that was not enough, Lancelot does not seem that remorseful”

I don’t know when I became “some comic experts” but that’s OK. Harry says that the details are different; of course they are, the details always changed, but the underlying concept was the same. The deaths were the result of teen age immaturity. Whether it’s interceding in a crime, or simple exuberance, the hero chose to overlook his responsibilities, and promises to do better. And Harry is wrong, Spud did die, that little blurb looks like a comic code add on, since it doesn’t point to anyone, and Spud never shows up again. Lancelot is shown just as remorseful as Peter Parker; the remorse is shown in the text. The use of the word “if” is how we say remorse. It’s the wish to have another chance to change history. Yes I do accept that Stan Lee’s words are more dramatic, but the meaning is the same. The concepts were the same. A friend is lost, and the hero now learns he must be more responsible.

So in one book, done less than three years before Spider-Man, Kirby used most of the critical plot elements that would show up a few years later in Spider-Man. Certainly Spider-Man’s is more melodramatic as one would expect from Stan’s dialogue, but the basic plot mirrors Private Strong. The panels where the boys mourn the loss of their loved ones are almost eerie in their similarities. So going by pattern matches, it appears we have the hero and villain from the Fly combined with the origin outline of the Shield.

This cross-pollination of a character from one story, and a plot from another is classic Kirby. He had touches of genius, but during the late 1950’s to mid-sixties, his characters and plots were interchangeable. His storytelling was very formulaic. He had archetypal heroes, a small list of stock villains, and, a set selection of plots. He mixed and matched these regardless of genres. His approach to comics was sort of a Chinese take-out menu, one from column A and one from column B. In legal lingo, Kirby was a chronic repeat offender. Kirby’s touches are repetitive and easily identifiable. This pattern can also be found on the Mighty Thor.

For Spider-Man, Kirby took the basic character traits (insect), and the villain (meaningless, petty crook) from the Fly, and the origin gimmick (scientific, older teen), and the dramatic ending (mourning a lost friend) from the Shield.

For Thor, Kirby reversed himself, taking the origin element, (finding of a mystical artifact that transforms a timid human to a colorful hero) and ending, (transformation back to hapless human) from the Fly, and the villain (rampaging aliens) from the Shield, plus borrowing the hero from an earlier DC fantasy story. (Tales of the Unexpected #16)

Thor, and Spider-Man appeared on the stands simultaneously. Thor had the earlier story number. Facts, and patterns says the Confessor, plus look for what doesn’t fit.

Stan Lee and Steve Ditko say they rejected the original plot because of its similarity to The Fly, and created their own. The idea that they would reject one Kirby plot and then replace it with another Kirby plot makes no sense, it simply doesn’t fit. These two men had their own influences and patterns, and if they were to sit down and come up with an original origin, it would not have mirrored a recent Kirby plot, especially if they were specifically looking to avoid the appearance of a Kirby plot. It seems that when Ditko told Lee about the similarity to the Fly, Stan, according to Ditko, called Kirby, who then cobbled together a new origin gimmick based somewhat on the Shield. It appears that Stan and Steve took Kirby’s plot, added in Peter’s personality, some of the supporting cast, and maybe the details involving the wrestler and show business, but the basic plot was all Kirby. The idea that Kirby would plot the origin of a new character is the rule at Marvel in the early ‘60s. It would actually be an anomaly if Kirby “hadn’t” provided the origin.

But it doesn’t stop there. Not only does it appear that Kirby provided the plot for AF #15, it appears that he also assisted in plotting some of the following Spidey stories. The second and third Spider-Man stories have plot elements taken directly from the second and third Private Strong stories. That’s correct; the first three Spidey stories mirror the first three Shield stories. Shouldn’t be a surprise since the evidence of the job #’s show they were drawn in quick succession for future issues of Amazing Fantasy and were shelved when the series was cancelled.

The second Shield story involves the hero tracking down a Communist spy attempting to steal scientific secrets; the villain tries to escape in a submarine that the hero has to put out of action. This is also the plot of the Chameleon story, in Amazing Spider-Man #1. Yes there were detail differences just as one would expect, but the underlying plots are the same. The silliness of an enemy submarine in local waters is too absurd of a detail to think it unrelated.

The villain as a master of disguise was used by Jack Kirby in the first, second, or third story of just about every series he did between 1956 and 1963. (I mentioned he was predictable) It is found in his first Green Arrow story, (Green Arrows of the World, Adventure Comics #250, DC Pub.1958) the second Yellow Claw story, (The Mystery of Cabin 361, Yellow Claw #2, Marvel 1958) the third Dr. Droom tale, (Doctor Droom Meets Zemu, Amazing Adventures #2, Marvel 1961), the second Fantastic Four story, the second Ant-Man story, and the third Thor story, all preceding AS#1, plus numerous fantasy tales.

The specific element of a villain impersonating a hero in order to infiltrate, and/or incriminate him in a crime is one that Kirby used often. Prior to Amazing Spider-Man #1, it can be found in Fighting American, (Three Coins in the Pushcart, Fighting American #7, Prize Comics, 1954) Green Arrow, (Adventure Comics #250) and most recently in Fantastic Four #2. This theme would also be used in the test appearance of Captain America in Strange Tales #114.

In the third Shield, and Spider-Man stories, we are introduced to the recurring pain-in-the-ass authority figure/ nemesis – the one who always gets hoisted on his own petard; a Kirby icon, dating back to Captain America. The harasser being a media mogul personality shows up in a fantasy story a few months earlier. In both stories the adult child of that authority figure gets into a jam and needs the costumed hero to save him or her. In the Shield’s case, it’s the daughter of the general in charge of the base he is assigned to after being drafted. After being trapped in a runaway tank, the Shield must save her. In Spider-Man’s story, it’s the son of the editor of the newspaper who hires Peter Parker, and he is trapped in a runaway space capsule that Spider-Man must rescue. Even after saving their offspring, neither of the authoritarian figures considers the hero a particularly positive force, and both think the alter ego character is a bumbling idiot. In between the Shield, and Spider-Man, Kirby also used this gimmick in the Hulk. The scene where Spider-Man rides the spaceship is replacing a module mirrored closely to a scene in Sky Masters where Sky had to rescue an errant space ship by replacing a module. Even the rescue of the capsule uses a then unknown to the general public procedure that Jack had shown in his Sky Masters strip.

What are the odds, if Kirby didn’t assist on the plots, that the first 3 Spider-Man stories would mirror the first 3 Shield stories, plus elements from Sky Masters? Wouldn’t one think that Stan Lee, and Steve Ditko would have their own plotting patterns?

Astoundingly, the second issue of Amazing Spider-Man continues in this same vein. The Vulture story from AS#2 is interesting because not only does it have plot elements from an earlier Kirby story, the bad guy is an exact duplicate of the villain from that same Kirby story. In the first Manhunter story, (Adventure Comics #73, DC Pub. 1942) Kirby introduced The Buzzard, who, in an uncanny parallel to the Vulture, is a skinny, stoop shouldered, hump-backed, beak nosed maniac, dressed in a green body suit with a feathered collar that encircles the neck. Both men have the power of flight, the Buzzard by flapping his cape, and the Vulture via mechanical wings, and an anti- magnetism unit.

Both men’s schtick is to openly challenge the authorities and the media by boasting of their evil plans before they commit them. The Buzzard goes so far as to actually kill a reporter to deliver his message; the Vulture (in post code times) simply throws a rock through J. Jonah’s window.

The Tinkerer story in AS#2, has a very interesting hook, a plot element where a radio is doctored and infiltrated into scientists and government officials’ houses in order to spy and/or control them. This is not some generic scheme, but a very detailed and specific plot element used by Jack Kirby several times. The earliest use is in Captain America Comics #7, (Marvel Pub. Oct.1941) in a story titled “Horror Plays the Scales”. Kirby again used this element in a crime story from Headline Comics #24, (Prize Pub. May 1947) titled “Murder on a Wavelength”.

The alien aspect of this Spidey story appears adapted from a Kirby, Dr. Droom story. In his third story, (Doctor Droom Meets Zemu, Amazing Adventures #3, Marvel 1961) Droom is following a suspicious character and overhears a plan by aliens in which one will infiltrate humanity and lay the groundwork for an alien invasion. Spider-Man’s capture and escape method seem to be lifted from a Challengers of the Unknown story. (The Human Pets, Challengers of the Unknown #3, DC Pub.1958) All of these stories are structured in typical Kirby style, with little characterization, all out action endings, devoid of any of the subtlety, pathos, or irony usually associated with Lee/Ditko offerings.

It’s a good time for me to mention something I call “Kirby’s silly science.” As identifiable as fingerprints, we all recognize it: scientific plot elements so ridiculous in their implausibility, yet so exciting visually, and conceptually, that it’s immediately acceptable; Mr. Fantastic, reaching up and catching a nuclear tipped Hunter missile in full flight, and throwing it miles away into the bay. The Submariner; in the freezing void of space, leapfrogging, from meteorite to meteorite, only to land on Dr. Doom’s spaceship, unstable molecules, and such.

The early Spider-Man stories were full of this pseudo-scientific stuff. In the story involving J. Jonah Jameson’s son trapped in the space capsule, we first see NASA trying to snare the disabled capsule in a net suspended from a parachute, when this fails, Spider-Man, straddling a jet, snares the space capsule with his web and rides it like a bucking bronco, completely overlooking the fact that space capsules orbit far above the range of a jet, and the extreme heat generated during re-entry would fry a human being, even one with Spider powers.

This feels like Kirby’s silly science to me; in fact, it is reminiscent of a scene in Sky Masters where they try to rescue an errant space capsule with a hook attached to a jet, combined with a satellite repair story centering around the hero replacing a module on a renegade satellite, also found in Sky Masters.

In Amazing Spider-Man #1 the Chameleon comes up with a mechanical means to communicate with Spidey due to his Spider instinct. In the third Ant-Man story Jack shows the villain Egghead unexplainably come up with a way to instantly communicate with the insects– getting to Ant-Man. Ant-Man did the same thing with a screwdriver in his origin. This same unexplained bit also shows up in Spidey #5 when the villain Dr. Doom mysteriously comes up with a way to communicate with the insectoid Spider-Man. Jack’s scientists were fast, handy and smart. It was dumb but effective as a plot element. It was a Jack Kirby bit of iconography.

Another facet of Kirby’s silly science, and plotting pattern, is the anti-climactic ending, where the scientist hero, in one panel, whips up some bit of gadgetry that defeats a villain who has been beating his brains out for the previous 15 pages. Kirby’s monster tales are full of them as opposed to Lee and Ditko’s more cerebral ironic endings.

Challengers of the Unknown’s Professor Haley was good at these instant cures, and the FF’s Reed Richards was the master, but early on, Peter Parker stood toe to toe with them. In the first Vulture story, from Amazing Spider-Man #2, after getting his hat handed to him, Peter Parker, based on nothing but a hunch, theorizes that the Vulture’s powers must be magnetic and whips up, in one panel, an anti-magnetic device with his handy dandy screwdriver. How Kirbyish can you get? Similarly whipped up out of nothing elements occur in the first Doc Ock, (a super acid) and the first Lizard story. (an antidote) The super acid bit was also used earlier in a Challengers story. This kid was good!

Compare this to the atmospheric, cerebral, and quietly ironic solutions and climaxes that Lee and Ditko specialized in on their sci-fi/horror tales of this period. This deus ex machina style ending is not part of their repertoire, it simply doesn’t fit.

To Kirby, scientists were scientists; he made no real distinction between the disciplines. In one story the hero was a physicist, the next a chemist, perhaps a biologist or a metallurgist, whatever was needed for the story. Hank Pym, aka Ant-Man, was equal part entomologist, chemist, cybernetician, and machinist. Reed Richards was master of all sciences, and Peter Parker, though a high school student was equally as versatile. After receiving the spider powers, this kid went home and with his Mr. Wizard Home Chemistry Lab created a formula for a web, and the means to propel it. Then in the Vulture story he suddenly becomes a physics master, and invents an anti-magnetic device. In the Tinkerer tale, he is assisting an electronics genius, and up against the Lizard, Peter’s become an expert in serums and antidotes. This boy was truly amazing! It’s a shame he gave all that scientific ability up to become a news photographer. Kirby’s handiwork is all over the early stories.

Thankfully, these pseudo-science elements soon ended, and I’m thinking it happened when Jack stopped assisting Stan on Spider-Man plots, and Ditko took over. So it seems clear that Kirby’s participation with Spider-Man extended further than just a rejected proposal. It appears that he not only created the character, he also assisted greatly in the origin and early story lines and added many early plot elements.

Again, is this out of character? No. Kirby helped Stan with the plotting of several characters even when not specifically drawing them. We know he helped out Wally Wood on Daredevil and Don Heck on Iron Man. Why wouldn’t Kirby assist Stan on Spider-Man? The early Marvel titles and characters were never considered private domains. Stan certainly had no compunction about Kirby doing the first 2 covers, or a back up story.

Remember Stan Goldberg’s words. “Jack would sit there at lunch, and tell us these great ideas about what he was going to do next. It was like the ideas were bursting from every pore of his body. It was very interesting because he was a fountain of ideas.”

So much for actual research, now let’s speculate a little further. In mid-1961, Martin Goodman noticed that the sales of the Atlas monster books were slowing down, and while looking for a replacement genre, he realized that DC seemed to be having some success with super-heroes. He decided that Marvel should take a hesitant step in that direction, and either he or Stan Lee talked to Jack Kirby, who had a 20-year history of creating super-heroes. They decided on a team concept with a twist, the characters would not always get along. Kirby went home and cobbled together a story using parts of his last 2 team series, the Challengers of the Unknown, and his recent syndicated strip Sky Masters of the Space Force, and he presented it to Stan Lee. Stan added in the personalities, the background details, the speech patterns, and Fantastic Four was born.

Seeing that the FF was selling but still a little wary of jumping full bore into the super-hero market, Stan next talked with Jack about using an Atlas-style monster as a hero. So Kirby went home, matched together a recent Atlas monster with a Sky Masters plot element dealing with a scientist saving a kid from a rocket blast, threw in his radiation-caused mutation concept he had used since Blue Bolt days, and you have the Hulk. Again Stan added in the soap opera, the personalities, the linear continuity, and the human aspects he specialized in.

Martin, seeing that both series were selling, decided to go balls to the wall into the super-hero genre, complete with costumes, secret identities, and all the trappings. Stan again went to Jack and asked him if he had any other concepts lying around. Kirby remembered a recent story revolving around the mystical hammer of Thor and retconned it into a superhero. Kirby, doing just as he had with the FF – went back to the last two pure super-hero series he had worked on, took the character aspects from the Fly, plus elements suggested by Jacobson, mixed it in with the plot from the Shield, used the original title from the unused Simon proposal, et voila! Spider-Man!

It is possible, in fact probable, that when Kirby presented this proposal to Lee, Stan had some reservations because his vision of the character was a little different. It didn’t matter, because Kirby was too busy to draw this feature anyway—Stan, and the new artist could make the changes. They could flesh out, and add their own take on the characters–Kirby was too busy: He was drawing the FF and the Hulk full time, and besides Spider-Man, he had simultaneously worked up Thor, and Ant-Man.

All this fits in with the very first account of how Spider-Man came to be. Remember, Stan said that Kirby was too busy and he (Lee) chose Steve Ditko to draw the feature after the concepts were done, and it fits in with Ditko’s first recollections. What doesn’t fit is Stan Lee’s story of how when he saw Kirby’s version of Spider-Man, that the vision was too godlike, too buffed and perfect physically. Kirby at the time was drawing all his people thin and gangly. (look at the original Thor) If Stan didn’t like Kirby’s version, then why did he have Jack draw the first two covers? And it’s funny, but Jack had no problem drawing a slender, Spider-Man on the covers. But does this fit in with what we know about how Marvel worked in the early 1960s?

I think it does. Marvel had a modus operandi also. Evidence shows that Kirby helped out on just about every new project, even the ones he didn’t draw. (origin plot, and costume design for Iron Man, splash page, cover and plot elements for Daredevil, etc.)

Why wouldn’t Jack be involved similarly in any Ditko projects? There were no separate fiefdoms at Marvel at this time. Ditko worked with Kirby, and Kirby certainly helped out with the first two covers, he provided an advertising blurb in the first issue, he did a back-up story in #8. I would not be surprised if Ditko gave some plot ideas for the FF. Jack did cover retouches and corrections. He also did a Spider-Man crossover story in Fantastic Four Annual #1 in the summer of 1963, and in Strange Tales Annual #2, Fall 1963, both of which appeared before AS#6. The Fantastic Four was intertwined with Spider-Man like no other Marvel series.

In the early days of Marvel, there was no sense of separate books; everyone contributed to every series. It’s amazing, but I don’t think coincidental, that every member of the bullpen was multifaceted: Lee would edit, write, and script; Leiber would pencil, ink, and write; Kirby would pencil, create, and plot; Ditko could pencil, ink, and plot, etc. There seems to have been a true all-for-one atmosphere early on in the bullpen. I actually think this is why these men were the ones picked when Stan Lee regrouped Atlas in 1959. It was this flexibility, and multi talented nature that allowed Stan to create the Marvel method of storytelling.

I think the most important thing to take away from the stories of Kirby helping out Wallace Wood, and Don Heck is that it wasn’t unusual; it was just another day at the office. It was Kirby’s nature to help out.

So, to wrap up, we have the title of the series, which was likely contributed by Kirby. We have the main character of the series surely created by Kirby, with an assist to Sid Jacobson. And we have the origin, and first couple of stories, most likely plot assisted by Kirby. How much more does it take to deserve co-creative status?

Never the less, I am not on any campaign to get Kirby an official credit on Spider-Man. Ditko/Lee works just fine for me. Yet for historical purposes, I do believe that his contributions should be recognized.

So does this mean that Stan Lee, and Steve Ditko are lying? I don’t think so. I think this is an example where each one is telling the truth from their own perspective. Jack Kirby was a conceptualist, an idea man, he felt that creation was the coming up of new ideas. Stan Lee is a writer, he’s a word man, he naturally feels the act of creation starts with the fleshing out of the personality and giving voice to the character. And Steve is an artist, his idea of creation is the giving of form, and texture, and atmosphere to a shapeless thought. To thine own self be true, and I think they are.

In my opinion, Spider-Man is the classic example of a true collaboration, omit any one of the three men involved and you end up with a weaker, or non-existent creation.

If just Kirby and Lee had worked on the title, we would have invariably seen it head into the all-out adventure, or cosmic/mythic realms of Kirby’s other titles, thereby losing out on the gritty, earthiness Ditko added. If Lee and Ditko had created it from scratch, we would have had a hero more like the cerebral Dr. Strange, lacking the action/adventure facet that Kirby added. The combination helped eliminate the individual excesses, while keeping the best of each.

Always together

Because Kirby’s participation ended quickly doesn’t detract from his role in the creation, without his character concepts, and strong action based foundation, Spider-Man might never have found that perfect mix of the psychological and physical aspects. Left to his own devises, Ditko’s characters and stories usually lack the testosterone based fun fantasies, that pure physicality, that the super hero genre demands. His characters thought too much, and acted too little.

And without Stan Lee, in my opinion, we would have been without the single most vital ingredient that made Spider-Man the most unique character in comics. Human frailty!!! More than any other character he worked on, Stan identified with Peter Parker. His vision of the everyman as hero made Spidey the most conflicted, the most human, and the most unique hero ever created. His blueprint was the perfect recipe for a super hero in the post war era. It was an age when the common man, no longer felt in control of his own destiny. Spider-Man was not just fighting bad guys; he was fighting our doubts, our rages, and our feeling of helplessness. He, like most people, (especially the teens reading his books) was looking for their role in society, and was turned away at every stop. Stan Lee made Spider-Man one of us. This is why Spidey not only continued, he thrived, long after both Kirby and Ditko, no longer had any input.

Together we got the perfect blend of Kirby’s solid histrionics, Ditko’s philosophic atmospherics, and Lee’s melodramatic human voice.

It just doesn’t get any better folks.

Who created Spider-Man? There’s room for all three

Previous – 18. New Beginnings | Top | Next – 20. Bullpen? Bullshit!!

Previous – 17. The House That Jack Built | Contents | Next – 19. Spider-man: The Case For Kirby

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

NEW BEGINNINGS

As a matter of policy, Warner Brothers refused to share profits with its television personnel–including Huggins, its most gifted and indispensable producer. Huggins was directly responsible for the studio’s three most successful series, but was not even given credit for having created Maverick and 77 Sunset Strip, which studio executives dishonestly claimed had been based on properties already owned by the studio. After five years, and growing animus Huggins left Warner Brothers, in October 1960 he became the vice -president in charge of television production at 20th Century-Fox.

There were international undercurrents already at work readying to boil up and erupt. The police action in South Viet Nam was threatening to expand. The small Island of Cuba had just become a Communist satellite when Fidel Castro took over in 1959. Blacks were beginning to stage sit-ins against Southern merchants who refused to serve them. In 1960, the Govt. approved over the counter birth control pills, thus ushering in a sexual revolution. A U-2 spy plane was shot down causing the U S Gov’t. great embarrassment. In. Nov. John Kennedy became the youngest elected president.

On Dec. 5, 1960 The Beatles luck in Hamburg runs out: George Harrison is deported for being underage and working in a nightclub; McCartney & Pete Best are arrested for pinning a condom to a brick wall and then igniting it. The two are told to leave Germany. The band returns home, discouraged.

Comic books certainly needed a shot in the arm. Sales were stagnant and companies were still slowly dying—the residual from the culture wars. It’s possible that Jack Kirby didn’t even notice. Jack was delirious, in Sept, Roz delivered Lisa, the girl from left field. She wasn’t planned, but she certainly was welcome. Once again the Kirby household was filled with the laughter of a newborn. According to Roz; “he (Jack) was a very good baby sitter, because he worked at home. So I was able to get out while he took care of the kids. He had more patience than I did! Like at night, if anybody cried, he was the one who got up and walked the floor with them while I slept. He was great that way.’

JFK, and Jack Kirby were the same age, and both were WW2 veterans, both from the Northeast and both had a vision of grandeur and greatness. They both possessed a vigor and energy that brought out the best in their collaborators. And they both knew the future was in the stars.

From John Kennedy’s May 25th 1961 message to the joint Congress:

Special Message to the Congress on Urgent National Needs

Now it is time to take longer strides–time for a great new American enterprise–time for this nation to take a clearly leading role in space achievement, which in many ways may hold the key to our future on earth.

I believe we possess all the resources and talents necessary. But the facts of the matter are that we have never made the national decisions or marshaled the national resources required for such leadership. We have never specified long-range goals on an urgent time schedule, or managed our resources and our time so as to insure their fulfillment.

Recognizing the head start obtained by the Soviets with their large rocket engines, which gives them many months of lead-time, and recognizing the likelihood that they will exploit this lead for some time to come in still more impressive successes, we nevertheless are required to make new efforts on our own. For while we cannot guarantee that we shall one day be first, we can guarantee that any failure to make this effort will make us last. We take an additional risk by making it in full view of the world, but as shown by the feat of astronaut Shepard, this very risk enhances our stature when we are successful. But this is not merely a race. Space is open to us now; and our eagerness to share its meaning is not governed by the efforts of others. We go into space because whatever mankind must undertake, free men must fully share…

First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space;

Now the space race and the Cold War were nothing new, in fact from the moment of Sputnik they were an integral part of the comic books. Jack’s work on Race For The Moon, and as early as mid-1958, in Challengers of the Unknown #3, Rocky (the brawny Chall) volunteers for a space flight in the hopes that it would cut years out of the space race. Rocky would undergo changes while in space and develop super-powers such as flaming on, invisibility, shooting electric bolts, and size changing. Jack’s Sky Masters strip often centered on the space race and geopolitical intrigue. But by the late 1950’s the thrill of the actual space research had lost some of its luster, and JFK saw landing a man on the moon as a rallying cry to reignite our national sense of purpose.

Jack Kirby needed no rallying call, everything he had been doing the last 4 years told him that what the public wanted was a hi-tech adventure strip exploring space and beyond in a positive and imaginative way. Martin Goodman gave him a vehicle.

In Hamburg Germany, the Beatles do their first studio recording when they serve as back-up band to British rock and roller Tony Sheridan. The two day session in June 1961, would lead to their first published recordings.

The Beatles in Germany    At the Cavern.

It’s doubtful that an artform can be considered a part of pop culture without at some time in its infancy it is discredited as being a bad influence on the children who crave it. Comics had their moment in the mid-fifties. Rock music soon followed later in the decade when images of Elvis Presley’s shaking pelvis and Chuck Berry’s leer disturbed the blue noses to apoplexy. By 1961, television had been a staple of mass entertainment for little more than a decade. Yet in that decade it had come under blistering fire for its vapid content. Much like earlier lowbrow entertainment forms like pulp magazines, movies and rock and roll, there were calls for censorship and regulation. On May, 9, 1961 the newly appointed Chairman of the FCC Newton Minow gave what is regarded as one of the most influential speeches of the century when he laid down the gauntlet.

“When television is good, nothing — not the theater, not the magazines or newspapers — nothing is better.

But when television is bad, nothing is worse. I invite you to sit down in front of your television set when your station goes on the air and stay there, for a day, without a book, without a magazine, without a newspaper, without a profit and loss sheet or a rating book to distract you. Keep your eyes glued to that set until the station signs off. I can assure you that what you will observe is a vast wasteland.

You will see a procession of game shows, formula comedies about totally unbelievable families, blood and thunder, mayhem, violence, sadism, murder, western bad men, western good men, private eyes, gangsters, more violence, and cartoons. And endless commercials — many screaming, cajoling, and offending; and most of all, boredom. True, you’ll see a few things you will enjoy. But they will be very, very few. And if you think I exaggerate, I only ask you to try it.”

Roy Huggins’ time at Fox was bitterly disappointing. He managed only one new series for TV- a takeoff of the movie Bus Stop. The titular location served as the focal point for an anthology series featuring the stories of wandering, disenfranchised characters that passed through. After a particularly intense episode starring the teen idol Fabian as a mass murderer, the FCC came down hard complaining about the violence and bad influence TV was becoming for children. Fox caved in and put Huggins on a sort of suspension and cancelled Bus Stop. In a move reminiscent of Wm. Gaines testimony before the House Committee investigating comics role in juvenile delinquency, Huggins criticized Newton. In a memorable article in Television Quarterly Huggins scolded the chair of the FCC and other cultural elitists for allowing their contempt for lowbrow–“their dread of being caught in a profane mood”–to cloud their judgment. Huggins’s essay amounted to a sophisticated and subtle defense of popular culture in an era when television producers did not make artistic claims for their work. “The public arts,” he wrote, “are created for a mass audience and for a profit; that is their essential nature. But they can at times achieve truth and beauty, and given freedom they will achieve it more and more often.” Fox allowed Huggins contract to lapse.

Minow’s description of television’s vapid content could just as easily described comics at the turn of the decade. Void of imagination or artistic flair. The joy had been drained from the artform due to the Wertham witch hunt, and no one had figured how to re-energize it. Most companies were just hanging on as new readers abandoned them wholesale. Jack Kirby tackled it head-on.

Jack moonlighted in 1961 by providing some spot illustrations for the Topps baseball cards. He drew little vignettes spotlighting an interesting fact about the player shown. He shared the duties with other cartoonists such as Jack Davis. One can be sure the extra check was welcome.

In early 1961, in a fantasy story Jack drew a tale of redemption. Headlining Tales of Suspense #22, (Oct. 61) Beware of Bruttu opens the issue; signed by Kirby and Ayers, with no mention of Lee. The absence of Lee on the credits is no small matter; Stan signed his work in the other series. In one sequence his hero, a huge orange brutish monster of a man, with four fingers, and short, ripped pants reacted; unaccustomed to his heft, he smashes through an entrance. The populace panics and he is confronted by policemen who shoot at him. To escape he smashes through the street and flees into the underground mazes. When he reaches his destination he smashes back up to the surface. The hero starts out as a small, timid, milquetoast of a man. Taunted all through high school and college over his size and timidity, he becomes a scientist, taunted even more by his colleagues and his secret love. He fantasizes about becoming large and strong as a fantasy comic book hulk. During a scientific experiment, he knocks into the machine and the resultant surge of radiation transforms him into that same orange, hulking monster. Unable to communicate he flees in desperation as the military is out to kill him. As the army corners him, he realizes that his life would be meaningless if he didn’t see his lost love once again. He wanders back to his home and confronts his girl. Unable to speak, he hears her confess her love for the small scientist and blames the monster for killing him. Shamed into action, he writes a note in the dirt telling her she is safe. He lumbers back to the laboratory and turns the machine up to full. He bathes himself in the radiation dreaming of his former self, and slowly transforms back into the small nerdy scientist. He smashes the machine and explains away the monster as an invading alien. He confesses his love to the girl and they are happy as the story ends. It’s a well written, well paced, and fully charactered story, filled with self-loathing, shame, doubt and redemption. It was published a month before Fantastic Four #1

It’s long been Stan Lee’s contention that the more human, conflicted heroes burst in a blinding flash from his head and started this new trend in storytelling; the result of a suggestion from his wife. Jack always claimed that it was a natural evolution of his patterns that led to the FF. If Jack was right we ought to be able to track down those transitional stories or the missing links from Golden Age silliness to modern naturalistic drama. I think the truth could be found in those issues preceding the FF. One only needs to start at the Challengers of the Unknown and work serially through the monster books.

I mention the above story because I think it answers most of the questions and shows that history of patterns that I rely on so deeply. I think of it as a Rosetta Stone into the understanding of how the Marvel Universe arose. Kirby’s fantasy stories were unique. They were also formulaic. There was always an underlying base of common sensical reality in the human reactions and interactions. The patterns show a multiple use of the small, timid, nerdy meme we find in the super-heroes such as Spider-Man. The human transformation from radiation was the major repetitive element in the super-heroes, first in the Fantastic Four, then the Hulk and Spider-Man. We see Jack evolve from speedo type briefs for his monsters to torn short jagged pants after transformation; as found in the FF, and the Hulk. We see the huge monster unable to communicate and then becomes hunted as a threat to be so much a part of the Hulk. Unrequited love shows up in Spider-Man, Hulk, Thor and as a subplot in the FF. The idea of these humanistic touches only starting in the super-heroes is silly. They don’t begin in the Bruttu story but too many elements converge to be ignored. I find it hard to believe that the two scenes of the large orange brute breaking through the door, fighting the police, and smashing into the underground were the result of coincidence. I see it as the work of a person building on what came before. Yet so many people claim that the personality of the Hulk was so unique and evidence that Stan Lee came up with the hero. They fail to look for the precursors that preceded it; much like the claim that Spider-Man as an angst ridden teen-ager was unique to his origin. The only alternative is to deny that artists build upon their ideas.

Around the same time, Martin Goodman contacted Stan Lee and told him that he had data that told him that DC’s new super-hero team, The Justice League of America -–a group of their solo super-heroes– was selling out its runs. Goodman wanted Stan to do something similar. Stan figured, not another super-hero venture. He cancelled them twice before, but what Martin wanted, Martin got. Stan claims it was at a time of personal crisis where he was lamenting his role in the woeful status of the comic industry. He had always wanted to be a legit writer. But his position was a well-paying one. Stan contacted Jack Kirby and they brainstormed over ideas. They decided that it didn’t make sense to bring back old characters and make a team ala Justice League. Atlas’ old super characters weren’t that memorable, and the last time they were brought back was a failure. They decided to create totally new characters and have them form a team. “I came in with presentations, I’m not gonna wait around for conferences. This is what you have to do. I came in with the Fantastic Four. I didn’t fool around. I said you’ve got to do super-heroes.” Kirby recalls. “It (the FF) was a revolution in the sense that it was now–the superhero had become now…it was everything based on right now and what people saw everyday and might see five or ten years from now.”

Does anyone know if Stan ever read the Challengers of the Unknown?

Stan says his wife suggested that he give this new project his all and write the series as he would like.; a sudden surge of creativity and purpose.

The new team would consist of a brainy scientist, his best friend, a brawny air force pilot, a beautiful woman and her hot headed kid brother; the perfect Kirby team template as evolved from Challengers, to 3 Rocketeers, and Sky Masters; also very similar to Roy Huggins template from the group TV series. The gimmick for the team uniting was to steal an experimental rocket and blast-off in order to beat the Russians into space- similar to the Challenger’s story where Rocky goes into space and receives super-powers. While in space they get bombarded by Cosmic Rays and when the spaceship malfunctions they crash land back on Earth, only to be astounded that they are still alive- just like the origin of the Challengers, with a space ship subbing for a jet plane. Then one by one they notice changes, first the woman astoundingly turns invisible, then the brawny pilot becomes a rocky monstrosity-strong as an ox. Then when the rock-creature swings a tree branch at the scientist, he stretches out of the way and finds he can stretch all of his body to extremes. Finally, the young hot head burst into flames and finds he can fly. Several of these were similar to powers gained by the Challenger who went into space. The idea of cosmic rays changing people is one that Kirby used many times, as early as a Blue Bolt story in 1940. Even Sky Masters had a story arc centered on an astronaut whose personality changes whenever he encounters the Van Allen radiation belt.

Much of the technical data that NASA sent Kirby for Sky Masters dealt with the problems of space radiation. Plus, several recent movies had used radiation as a catalyst for mutations. Kirby said; “At the time, the big topic was radiation. We had recently exploded the bomb and I was looking to create supermen. In all my work, you see the times are reflected. I don’t contrive stories…and I’m not giving you fairy tales. At the time radiation was the big thing and The Fantastic Four came out of those times.” As, it should be noted did several of the Kirby monsters found in Harvey, DC, as well as the Atlas stories. Realizing that it was an act of fate, the four astronauts decide that they should band together and use their powers to help mankind- thematically very similar to the group origin and decision that formed the Challengers of the Unknown. Unlike other super heroes, they at first wore no costumes, rather they worked in jump suits, just like the Challs, and they didn’t hide their actual names behind their team names ala the Challengers. Jack says that if he had stayed at DC working on the Challengers that they would have moved in a similar vein, probably getting super-powers and becoming more cosmic in scale. As it was the Challs fought villains with super powers, and explored the cosmos, and ran into a megalomaniac monarch who wanted absolute power while based in an eastern European duchy. One noteworthy aspect of the Fantastic Four is that each issue would contain one long form story, broken into smaller chapters, instead of the 3-4 stories found in the anthology titles. This was also something Kirby experimented in with the Challengers of the Unknown. No one else was dabbling in this format. No other Atlas title featured one self-contained story per issue. Something Stan had never done before.

Stan named the new group the Fantastic Four and braved DC’s ire by adding it to the schedule without deducting another title. Martin had his team title, and Kirby had his space title. Stan had his soap opera. Fantastic Four hit the stands on Aug. 8, 1961. The issue was inked by George Klein. The author was ten years old that exact day, and bought a copy with birthday gift money. Atlas was ready to explode.

The German Polydor single, My Bonnie b/w When the Saints Go Marching In was released in August 1961 listed as TONY SHERIDAN AND THE BEAT BROTHERS ([Polydor / 24 673) which became a big top-ten hit for Sheridan in Germany. The credit to the Beat Brothers came about because the name Beatles was considered too close to the German word for penis. When released in the UK in early 1962, the credit was changed back to the Beatles. The Beatles had a record! The music world was about to be amazed!

Just as with the Rawhide Kid, it should be noted, the FF’s personality quirks, and love triangle, soap opera-ish continuity seem to come from Stan, and his teen romance background-again the blending of strengths making for a better whole. This also mirrors closely the relationships found in many of Roy Huggins group shows. It’s important to note that when I suggest that a particular detail emanated from one person or the other, it does not diminish either. They worked together as a team, and though one may have suggested an element, the other might well have made modifications and changes to fit the new story. It was a true collaboration, and neither dominated the other. But it is obvious that most of the concepts and themes originated from Jack Kirby, but not to the exclusion of Stan who surely supplied plot elements and concepts himself. Stan’s contributions seem to be more towards the characterization and human interaction, though Kirby’s romance experience certainly provided him with no lack of characterization skills. This focus on the family unit over plot was a hallmark of the series. Many of the early letters to the editor noted the team dynamic and the squabbling and interplay between the characters as the main attraction of the new title, as well as the monstrous hero-the Thing. Most important, after 20 years producing comics, Stan Lee had a bonafide hit—something he never had before. To Jack it was life as usual—just another hit. Ho-Hum.

This collaboration was magical, the sheer exuberance and imagination was unmatched. Flo Steinberg, Stan’s secretary tells of how when Stan and Jack got together to plot the next issues, she would have to sometimes tell them to quiet down. The boys were so raucous, with Stan leaping about the office furniture, and Jack providing sound effects while acting out proposed scenes that they were disturbing the bullpen employees. Jack never had this sort of playful partnership before. Will Eisner and Joe Simon were always businesslike and calm. But once Jack left the offices, he returned to his own little world, oblivious to what he and Stan had discussed. Stan was the editor, but Jack was the writer-despite what the credits said. “In other words, he (Stan) didn’t know what the story was about and he didn’t care because he was busy being an editor. I was glad because he was doing the same as Joe did. He left me alone,” Jack told Eisner. John Romita, a bullpen artist had a unique perspective of Stan and Jack’s working method. “Sometimes Stan would offer to drive Jack and me home and they would plot stories in the car. That was the interesting thing, I would be in the back seat of Stan’s convertible, and these two giants were up front plotting the future of the Fantastic Four and Thor. Or whatever they were working on. And I would listen- absorbing all of that stuff and getting a big kick out of how they ignored each other. Sometimes I could hear that one was talking about something completely different. It was interesting because it appeared that they would finish their conversation, each thinking that they had convinced the other, when it was obvious to anybody else that they hadn’t.”

They would throw the most outlandish plots around and sometimes talk at cross-purposes, but once Jack was home, all was forgotten and Jack would draw his own stories and when Stan saw them, he had no idea what was going on. They didn’t match up to what he and Jack had talked about. But Stan always had the last laugh, as Jack would say “Stan Lee wouldn’t let me put in the dialogue.” Jordan Raphael and Tom Spurgeon explain in their book Stan Lee and the Rise and Fall of the American Comic Book;

“With Kirby handling the basic construction of the stories according to the collaborative method of working together, Lee had more time to focus on the dialogue. Indeed, Lee had to focus on dialogue. It was his main tool for shaping the story in the direction he wanted it to go, a way to infuse some of his own personality back into the intense artwork submitted by Kirby. Lee drew on his skill with romance and humor books to provide livelier and more fulsome dialogue than had ever been seen in a super-hero title. Lee’s dialogue indicated not just character type- good guy, mad scientist, street thug- but helped differentiate the characters among themselves in their closest groupings. At his best, Lee gave each character a verbal stamp of identification equal to the visual imprint made by the artists. Lee’s Thing seemed less educated and generally angrier than Mr. Fantastic, who came across as stuffier and more deeply arrogant than the teenaged Torch, and so on. Each major villain also received his own vocal fingerprint. A comic book reader in the early 1960’s might have argued that the elegant competence of DC’s super-hero artists was somehow preferable to Kirby’s rocket-charged virtuosity, but no one could make a compelling case for writing in broad strokes, with all of the characters sounding alike. Few comics had offered writing that could be enjoyed on its own, and none of them had been super-hero titles. Twenty years of benign neglect and creative contempt for the super-hero now worked in Kirby’s and Lee’s favor. Even the smallest changes seemed radical and daring. “

The sad truth is that for most of the history of comics, the writer and the words were the lowest rung of the creative ladder. The artist always felt they were making a creative statement, they were creating something from nothing, but the writers were a collection of has-beens and never-weres, rubber stamping their crude little lurid tales of good and evil, for pennies a page. Jack Oleck would brag about how many times a single story would be used in different books by different companies.

With the exception of possibly Will Eisner, no comic writer ever dreamed of literary recognition for his comic work, and this includes some very impressive writers, such as Jules Ffeifer, Mario Puzo, and Mickey Spillane, who all dabbled in comic books for a quick paycheck. It was up to Stan Lee to try to lift the literary content of the comic book to new heights; not that that would take much, just adapt long recognized fiction writing techniques of character development, and melodrama to the lowest form of storytelling.

It has also been noted, especially by comic historian Greg Theakston that the FF have an elemental subtext to them, the combination of earth, fire, wind and water. This theme had been used by Kirby before, in an issue of the Challengers, they faced a villain who possesses a mystical object that grants him the elemental powers of fire, wind, water and than the solidity and strength of a being rooted to the earth. The Thing is an interesting and unique character. A monster who looks like a mudslide with unlimited strength and a nasty temperament, though heroic at his core. Of all Kirby’s great creations, the Thing might have been his most personal. Jack has been quoted as saying, “He has my manners, he has my manner of speech, and he thinks the way I do. He’s excitable and you’ll find that he’s very, very active among people, and he can muscle his way through a crowd. I find I’m that sort of person.” The Thing was the embodiment of the old Jewish myth, the Golem. The Golem was a very popular figure in Jewish folklore and legend. The Golem is a clay formed manlike creature that is created by use of mystical powers drawing on an elemental basis that are to be found in Kabbalistic lore. He was mindless, and often uncontrollable. His mission was to protect the Jewish population from blood accusations and false threats.

Rabbi Loew of Prague, (Kirby’s ancestral roots) spoke these words after being told by God to create a Golem.

“Four elements,” he said, “are required for the creation of the golem or homunculus, namely, earth, water, fire and air.”

“I myself,” thought the holy man, “possess the power of the wind; my son-in-law embodies fire, while my favorite pupil is the symbol of water, and between the three of us we are bound to succeed in our work.” He urged on his companions the necessity of great secrecy and asked them to spend seven days in preparing for the work. Earth was the principle ingredient and it was found in a loamy riverbed.

The Golem was the source for several early science fiction movies. One earlier comic character, the Heap, a back-up strip in Hillman’s Airboy Comics fit the organic monster/hero template first seen in the Golem, though not the religious intent.

Again we get the repeated idea of elemental formulation or perhaps the original source. Surely the stories of the claylike Jewish protector were among the Old World stories that Mama Rose regaled her young son with, or perhaps passed on by the Jewish mystics who looked over the Jews of the Lower East Side; the same rabbis and Kabbalah mystics who held an exorcism over the 9 year old Jacob Kurtzberg when he was deathly ill with pneumonia. Kirby remembered; “My mother held much faith in this kind of thing. She could not give me up. She called on the rabbis and they all gathered around my bed and chanted in Hebrew: “Demon, come out of this boy,” they said, “What is your name, demon?” Jewish legend and superstition was a major part of Kirby’s upbringing.

Jack never force-fed his religious beliefs to the readers, but the observant eye can find the Jewish influences and inspirations in his work. There was a drawing of the Thing dressed in Jewish prayer garb, complete with yarmulke and shawl while holding the Talmud in a treasured location on a wall in the Kirby household. The fallen angel, the idea of a godlike mythological super-hero coming in times of need was used repeatedly by Kirby. Other allusions to Hebrew mythology would show up time and again in Kirby’s work. The legend of Samson, Atlas, and the angelic “Watchers” and the Nephilim race born of gods and monstrous races that inhabit the Earth turn up in series such as the FF, Thor and the Eternals.

There were always precedents

Per Jack’s usual methodology, just the month before he had been working on a fantasy story that evolved around a man transforming into a big orange monster due to atomic rays. His fantasy stories never went to waste. The hero was a small researcher picked on because of his size. In Jack’s stories everything changed due to radiation, I like the wide eyes and flattened noses.

It has long been a matter of contention over who created the FF; Stan or Jack.

Lee claims he did, and points to a synopsis that still exists, while Kirby claims that he presented the idea based on his Challengers concept. The synopsis can be quickly ignored. It is obviously an overview of a brainstorming session with him and Kirby. Even Stan has admitted that he and Kirby got together before the synopsis. Jack says; “It was my idea, It was my idea to do it the way it was, my ideas to develop it the way it was. I’m not saying that Stan had nothing to do with it. Of course he did. “We talked things out.” It was Stan’s routine to have his notes from these bullpen sessions typed up for later use when he dialogued the presented art. Likewise there is evidence that while they brainstormed, Stan and Jack would sometimes pace and breakdown the story directly on art pages. There are examples showing action lines and character positioning on the backs of several of the existing pages of early FF stories; nothing by way of specifics or dialogue, just a flow of continuity. These pages were taken home for Jack to refer to. The finished pages show that Kirby followed some of the breakdowns while ignoring others.

Stan also states that at this time, he had an epiphany. He was worried about job security and was thinking of quitting, when his wife suggested he do this new book but do it the way that Stan would do if he was writing for himself. To exit with a literary bang, so to speak. Unfortunately comic books are the wrong business for epiphanies. The market was small kids, and that’s who it was written for. But Stan says he brought a newer approach, a more adult, more dramatic, more literate style than he used on other books. If that is so, we should be able to recognize these new approaches.

The best way to see whose the guiding hand on FF #1 was is to look at the actual story. It is usually easy to spot if a writer is the backbone of a story, especially one purposely trying to write a more literate plot. The plot is unusually tight, cohesive and logical- because writers construct in a fairly logical process connecting each element and filling in plot holes for an easy to follow consistent storyline. The best example is Neal Gaiman’s Sandman. The plots are so thick and the stories so tight that even without seeing the script one recognizes whose brainchild this book is. When one actually sees the script it is no surprise to see the writer leading the artists step by step. Artists on the other hand see things visually- looking for a visual punch that catches the eye and moves the story along. They tend to ignore the wordy little elements that tie a story together logically and make it cohesive. Stan explained; “Jack created characters visually.” An artist’ story might look great, but often lacks the cohesive details of plotting that tie everything together. So let’s study the actual book.

Let’s start with the cover.  Stan says he is working mightily to produce a new, more adult, more hip approach to super-heroes, yet he has Kirby make the heroes secondary to the monster of the week central figure.  And no hint that this was to be a different style book, unlike the companion title Amazing Adult Fantasy where Lee makes it very clear that this book was to be a more adult oriented approach (as evidenced by both the title and the blurb). The Ditko book features several small excellent twisty stories.

The cover of FF #1 is actually one of Kirby’s more mundane covers; the monster even lack’s Kirby’s usual pizazz. The cover doesn’t even present an event found in the storyline. The characters offer nothing dramatic, most are fairly stationary, with no Kirby extreme posing dynamic flair. Mr. Fantastic is shown tied up in ropes- for no apparent reason. There is no one on the cover to have tied him up, in fact, the actual villain isn’t even on the cover; a nice visual effect that has no literary connection

Let’s look at the FF #1 interior to see just what this new, more adult, and more realistic approach to comics looks like.

The story begins with a call to arms, via a flare spelling out The Fantastic Four, very visual, very dramatic, just not realistic.  There is no known flare that spells out phrases. But that’s minor, we next see a fashionably elegant looking woman visiting a friend for a social tea. She spots the flare (from inside) and without warning becomes invisible and departs leaving the “friend” aghast.  She is then “seen” shoving her way into a taxi leaving a trail of disheveled people behind. Unknown to the driver, luckily cruising around at random drives near her destination, at which point a voice tells him to stop, and an invisible hand hands him the fare, which causes the taxi driver to drive away in fear.

Again, visually effective, but plot wise it makes no sense, it’s simple slapstick!  An adult would simply have excused herself from the party, and get a cab to take her to her destination, that way not alarming or hurting anyone, and not leaving the trip to her destination up to the whim of an unknowing taxi driver.  Lucky the taxi driver wasn’t going to Brooklyn! There was no logical reason for her to turn invisible at the first sight of the flare.

Next we see a large hulking figure out shopping for clothes, trying to act incognito, when he sees the flare. So what does he do? He throws aside the clothes and busts through a door, in brown underwear no less, scattering debris and scaring the innocent folk, and when told to stop by a policeman, he runs away forcing the cop to fire at him.  At this time he tears a hole in the street and jumps into the…how to say it nicely…sweet smelling, sanitary sewage system and swims to a point that he believes is near his destination and without warning breaks upward into a busy street and gets hit by an automobile. Apparently unhurt by the collision, he makes his way uptown. The street folk scatter in fear. Undaunted, he goes his merry way.   Why not simply exit the store and return the way he came and not cause a ruckus? Because that would be logical!

Very, very effective visuals, full of energy and power, but in reality, he is now a wanted felon for destruction of private and public property, indecent exposure, resisting arrest, and fleeing the scene of an accident.

Now we cut to another scene.  A typical all-American teenager working on his souped up hot rod, when a friend points out the flare in the sky, immediately the teen bursts into flame, melting his precious car, and flies off to who knows where. Amazingly, his friend say that “you’re turning into a—a—Human Torch” The very name that the lad gave himself when he received the powers; the very type of forced coincidence that a good writer would avoid. He then encounters 3 Air Force jets, armed with nuclear weapons, no less!!   He accidentally(?) melts all three jets–luckily the pilots all parachute to safety– but not before one of the jets fires off a nuclear tipped Hunter Missile (right there over Central City!!!)  Just as the flaming teenager is about to meet his doom, a pair of hands attached to unbelievably long stretched arms shoots up and catches the missile, and hurls it far from the shore where it explodes over the sea; interesting because the man with the stretching ability does not possess super strength. Now the boy has lost his flaming ability and is falling out of the sky.  Quickly the man with the stretching ability bridges several buildings and the boy grabs him and stops his downward spiral. Great action shots, but totally illogical. The section ends with the stretching man greeting the other three and casually thanking them for responding so quickly to his call.  Not one mentioning of the chaos outside the window.

Oh! They have doors!    Don’t writers know nuclear bombs don’t explode harmlessly over the sea?

So the first chapter ends with one member being hunted by the police for various serious charges against humanity, another being hunted by not only the local police, but the FBI, and the military for destruction of Gov’t property, and endangering the lives of 3 pilots, and resisting arrest. And worst of all, a nuclear warhead has just exploded off shore, and the deadly radiation cloud is spreading over the city, and what is the man’s response?  Hi guys, thanks for heeding my call!!!

Is this is the work of a writer hell bent on creating a new, more realistic, more adult, more literate style super-hero book? One where actions have repercussions and the action plays second fiddle to the human interaction? Or one where an artist wants to introduce these characters with a visual bang? Kirby states; “Super powers are a show gimmick. Why does a comedian decide to drop his pants on stage? Or why does a dancer come out and do a certain type dance? The answer is attention. You want the reader’s attention, if you can’t get it with ordinary people; you get it with extraordinary people.”

Maybe the writer is just building up the tension, maybe these run-ins with the local and federal officials will be dealt with later in the story. Guess what, it never happened! This whole chapter is never referred to again; there was no manhunt for the Thing or the Torch, no nuclear radiation to bother the civilians. It’s like it was all a dream. Bobby Ewing behind the shower curtain. Too many things left to chance to read like a well thought out sequence of events.

Maybe this writer with his back against the wall hints at how this was resolved in his synopsis? Nope, not there, in fact there is no mention of any of these happenings in his synopsis.  Where did the ideas come from? Surely this writer who created everything wrote the first 8 pages!!!   This guy with just one last chance wouldn’t leave something as important as the introductions of the main characters up to someone else!

I think why these introductions are visually dramatic, and effective, while literarily incoherent and implausible is simple, they were the creation of the artist not the writer.  A writer looking for natural, realistic, and humanistic plotting would have presented a more logical, coherent plot that lead to, and tied in with the next chapter.    The artist just wants to catch the attention of the reader; the WOW!!! factor.

The next chapter offers a flashback to the origin. Surely this will be more coherent, and internally logical in nature.

It starts out with 4 people arguing about a surreptitious space flight to the stars, a scientist, his lovely girl friend, his best friend, and the girl’s younger brother. The gruff best friend doesn’t want to go, not because it would be illegal, in fact, there’s never a mention of the legal ramifications, but because they haven’t done enough research on the effects of cosmic rays on humans. ( Kirby concern)

So how is this debate settled, not by logic, or reason, but by the woman calling the gruff man a coward, (interesting since the gruff man was a heroic military pilot) and baiting him by way of feigned patriotism into accepting. (very grown up and adult)

Next we see them speeding to the spaceport, and only now do they realize that the woman and the teenager have no training or skills needed for the space flight. This amazingly adult observation is settled by the woman saying “I’m your fiancée, where you go, I go.” And the young boy responding “And I’m tagging along with sis—so it’s settled!”   YEP!!! That always worked at my house, but the Biblical Ruth allusion is particularly nice.

Nonetheless, the 4 slip into the spaceship unnoticed. Amazingly this spaceship wasn’t controlled by a separate control center; this one must have had the pilot use a key and press on the accelerator, because they managed to lift off with no outside help. And wouldn’t you know it, the man seen earlier arguing about cosmic rays was right and when the cosmic rays hit the ship the pilot loses control and the disabled ship crashes back on Earth. The leader is such a dope, for an egghead. The writer was an egghead also. The problem with Cosmic Rays had been solved years before. At least 4 manned space flights occurred before the Fantastic Four. But one man was aware of the wariness of the Space Agency towards Cosmic Rays. Kirby had been receiving data on just that possibility while doing Sky Masters.

Luckily they survive the crash, but they all react strangely, they begin to bicker among themselves while the gruff pilot plays the blame game. Suddenly, the girl turns invisible, the burly man turns into a rock, the teen ager burst into flames, and the leader stretches.  Just as quickly, all hostilities between them end and they decide to band together as a group, give themselves names, and help mankind.  (very helpful, see first chapter  😉  Would a writer present them in such a jarring, disjointed way? Or, would he provide a logical and interesting flowing context to the events?

Of course there is no mention that they are now wanted for stealing a space ship and flying it with a minor on board!!! Not only are they now felons, they are also incompetent, inconsiderate, and irresponsible. If Stan wanted human frailty, he got it. Worse, there are never any consequences for their incompetence.

Is this silly, incoherent, illogical, mess of a plot the work of a professional writer inspired to do the best he can?  Someone once said something about “it’s the Challs with super powers”, I disagree, at least in the Challs the chapters flowed into each other, and what happened in the first chapter tied into the latter ones, and they acted like adults.  It’s amazing that the example most often given for showing that the FF were more adult and real as compared to the DC characters is that they bickered  like children. No, more likely this was the result of an artist trying to amaze the reader with Bam Bam Pow!! Great visuals of the spaceship, the cosmic rays, and the new found powers. Bad plot, pretty pictures.

Then we come to the final section of the story, the fight with the Mole Man.

What happened to the angst and contrariness? – Some varmits live forever

This chapter, if read separately, is at least a consistently constructed story with a beginning and end, but it still follows the formula used in countless Kirby Atlas monster stories. But when read as a continuation of the first 2 chapters, one realizes that there is no connection, nothing from the first 2 chapters plays a part in this one, except their powers. The only nod to the personality squabbles is Ben Grimm wisecracks at Reed’s expense. But there is no bickering or squabbling among the members. This whole chapter feels like it was tacked on as an afterthought.

Even this chapter has major plot holes and inconsistencies that a beginning writer would have caught, much less one driven to do his best work. Yet it does introduce a very compelling villain; the Mole Man and his underground minions. The visual is part Octavius Alexia from Sky Masters, and Batman’s Penguin, wearing 3D goggles, and swinging a staff. This story has some eerie similarities to the film Superman and the Mole Men. (1951) In both stories there are underground civilizations bent on attacking the surface. Kirby provides some great creatures from a three-headed dragon to a hoard of creepy crawlies. One interesting bit is that while trapped underground, the Mole Man has adapted to the darkness by evolving a bat-like radar sense that allows him to see in the dark-something first seen in The Shield during Kirby’s Lancelot Strong days. Strangely when cornered his cave simply destroys itself and the isolated one is even more isolated.

Mike Feldman, a wise historian has opined that the book reads like three totally separate tales spliced together, and I agree, it’s not the work of one person pouring out all his soul and skill in a last ditch effort to write something memorable. It feels like the work of a committee, with different people doing their own little parts, sometimes in harmony with the other, and sometimes at cross purposes.

One man wrote in a fit of frustration; “I’ve enjoyed many a Fantastic Four yarn in my day, but there was always something about them that never sat well with me. They become the top super heroes of the Marvel Universe, the first family of comics, famous and admired (while mutants are feared and loathed) but all they do is make a mess of NYC and cause trouble, because right here from the beginning they were a bunch of rogue squares (maybe not Johnny, he’s a dunce) that like to mess up and super scientists that take revenge against the world due to their shortcomings.”

What holds the whole thing together is not the plot, or the characterization, the only redeeming quality this book has going for it is the Kirby artwork, hiding the plot holes big enough for a Kirby monster to crawl thru. No one cares about the repercussions of melting three jets, and exploding a nuclear warhead over the bay when Kirby’s pictures make it look cool. It’s understandable to steal a space ship when it’s designed by Kirby.

It’s the same thing that made the Kirby monster tales so enjoyable, not the formulaic plots, whether provided by Lee, Lieber, or Kirby himself. It’s the visuals, the Kirby monsters. The Kirby excitement! There is nothing in the writing or the plotting that sets it apart from, much less above typical comic book writing.  The only addition is some juvenile behavior, and some wise cracking added by Stan Lee in the dialoguing stage.

Lifted from Challengers of the Unknown – Kirby back where he started

If one was to novelize this story as produced, it would be unreadable. Without the graphics the story falls apart. This story shows no more thought and nuance than the latest Millie the Model offering. It certainly wasn’t any better written or plotted than the Rawhide Kid stories that Stan and Kirby were doing. In fact, it was worse. The Rawhide Kid stories made sense! When showing how skilled the Kid was at shooting, the Kid didn’t shoot his own horse, unlike Johnny melting his own car, instead of opening the door and stepping out first.

Whoever had the genesis for the title is lost in time, but the result was a hit. Stan immediately started getting mail about the new book. The kids loved it. Many complimenting it for the bickering and family feel to the group. The plot holes didn’t matter a bit. This initial response ignited perhaps Stan Lee’s greatest talent, that of huckstering. By the third issue-even before all the early sales results were in, Stan had a cover blurb boldly announce that The Fantastic Four was the “Greatest comic magazine in the world” What chutzpah! Stan might have been shoveling manure, but he was correct. The improvement in each issue was astonishing; Stan’s writing got tighter, the plots more coherent and the characters more complex and inviting. Jack’s art amazed with each creation, whether it be shift shaping Skrulls, or the Miracle Man’s astounding feats of magic. Mr. Fantastic’s stretching ability evolved to an amazing degree, besides simple stretching his whole body could become pliable and form odd shapes like a tire or key. While the Torch’s flames continued to adapt and diversify in ability. The Thing got stronger and more melancholy due to his inability to become human. Even his skin evolved into a more formed exterior. Sue became more matronly and protective of her brood. And her powers expanded as she learned to control them.

The second issue features an invading alien force, The Skrulls are shape shifters. A small pre-invasion force is sent to Earth to do away with the Fantastic Four by imitating them in the act of committing crimes. Falsely accused the FF are arrested. They do escape and track down the aliens. Reversing tactics, the FF now imitate the Skrulls and convince that Invasion force that they face imminent death because Earth is protected by huge, horrible, hulking monsters. Reed shows them pictures cut from Atlas monster comics to scare them away. Jack’s old bluff gambit to scare away aliens bent on domination. Once again we see a plot with huge holes, and the Thing quick to anger and Reed sulking from self-pity for failing to protect them from the Cosmic rays. This issue also shows the Thing reverting back to his human form, and then sadly back to the Thing, a particularly poignant plot element that would be reused time and again.

Issue #3 has a typical Kirby style hypnotist taking on the team. Not much of a story but the issue does show Sue designing workable costumes for a unified team look. The best thing is that Jack got Sue Storm out of her matronly dresses and into a form fitting outfit. Jack says it was in response to the reader requests. “You’ve got to think of sales, not only of good stories.” This was the issue Stan proclaimed that the FF was “The greatest comic magazine in the world” This was also the issue where Stan first presented a letter page, thus communicating directly with the new fans. Most of the letters are very positive, but Stan does throw in one negative missive from Bill Sarill. “Just finished reading Fantastic Four and must admit to being disappointed. I expect better things from the team of Lee and Kirby. Jack is capable of better art work, and the Thing ought to revert to human form at will as his teammates do. The story also suffers from “Creeping Monsterism” to paraphrase Jean Shepard that has dominated most, if not all your comics for some time.” Bill Sarill would become famous later for his techniques in restoring old pulp magazines and comics that had deteriorated over time. Others disagreed. “I think the Fantastic Four will become a great success. The Thing and Torch are very new and different. I would also like to know what the name of your artist is.” from Alan Weiss. Alan Weiss would go on to become a professional comic artist and work for Marvel. What is important is that Stan proudly listed Jack Kirby’s name on the splash page of every issue, along with his own name of course. Listing credit wasn’t new, but it had gone out of fashion during the 50’s. It was with this issue that Marvel began the new .12 cent price point.

If the Human Torch was a reboot of an earlier Timely character than issue #4 would go one better, and reintroduce an actual Golden Age Timely character. The return of the Submariner in issue #4 connected the new characters with everything that had gone on before the FF came to be. The Submariner was an amnesiac living in a flop house in the Bowery, a low life section of New York (yes Central City had morphed into New York) and soon to be the temporary residence of the Torch after he had quit the team in disgust at the end of issue #3. When Johnny uncovers the bums’ real identity he shocks the Submariner back to reality by throwing him into the ocean. One might question why the Submariner’s memory hadn’t returned while taking a bath or shower or a nice swim in a pool, but such were the plot holes in early FF’s. Unfortunately the Submariner is no nicer than he was in the war years when he and the original Torch would battle endlessly. When the Submariner sees the destruction that mankind has done to the oceans and his lost people he vows renewed vengeance and once again attacks the surface people. The Torch is forced to rejoin with the group in order to fight the threat, and the Thing saves the day when he destroys a giant monster called up from the depths by Subby. He provides a particularly nice scene with the Thing carrying a nuclear bomb on his back. Another interesting subplot is that the Submariner falls for Sue in a big way. This underlying love triangle would last for many issues.

In issue #5, Jack introduced a villain who would become an archvillain for all time, right up there with the Red Skull. Dr. Doom was a twisted genius whom had attended college with Reed Richards. But his talent was warped with a base fascination in the occult, and the nether world. One day while doing an experiment, something goes wrong and an explosion occurs. While he lives, Dr. Doom is disfigured, and worse expelled from school. He then heads off to Tibet to seek more forbidden secrets. Dr. Doom has now returned, cloaked in medieval garb and an iron mask hiding his ravaged face. He kidnaps Sue Storm in order to force the FF to help him retrieve an artifact lost in time. Doom wants Blackbeard the Pirates’ treasure and he has invented a time machine to send the FF back in time to get it. While back in time the FF don less conspicuous clothing and are shanghaied and taken to a ship. There they easily overtake the crew and set out to find Blackbeard’s ship. Once they find it they quickly defeat the pirate crew and take it over. There they find the treasure. After a brief fling where Ben forgets himself, they are returned to modern day and confront Dr. Doom. It turns out that the treasure contains some jewels that belonged to Merlin the magician and contain mystic powers to make the owner invincible. Very similar to the Challenger’s first adventure where they are hired to unravel a puzzling box that the Sorcerer Morelian knows hides a mystic stone that promises immortality. Thanks to Sue’s quick thinking the FF defeat Dr. Doom, but he does escape by the use of a hidden rocket harness.

Issue #9 would see the return of one of Jack’s more popular themes, the movie production where the heroes are meant to die, only this time the villainous producer is the Submariner. There is also a sub plot about the FF being broke and needing money and turning to Hollywood to make a quick buck. #10 would feature another old S&K bit when Jack and Stan become part of the storyline. The inking which had been uneven really steadied when Dick Ayers took it over in issue #6.

In issue #13, John Kennedy’s dream is finally achieved and long before the end of the 60’s. The FF go to the moon, battle with Commies and super apes, and find a quietly powerful being living there. The Watcher is Kirby’s first and best example of a Kirby icon, the passionless observer, (similar in nature to the Jewish Watchers- angels tasked to watch over humanity) whose job is to observe and record, but not to interfere. The Watcher becomes a very important part of the FF’s extended family.

These continuing plot elements and connected issues, and full issue storylines were a big draw to those kids used to 3 stand alone stories from the competitors–which Stan good naturedly called Brand Ecch!!! The plot holes continued, and no error, such as the Torch having two left hands on a cover went unnoticed, but instead of worrying, Stan made them into a rally card when he began offering “No-prizes” for the best explanation for those muffs. After FF#1 was issued Roy Thomas, an editor of a fanzine named Alter Ego reviewed the mag. He was not overwhelmed; he thought Lee and Kirby could do better. But by issue #5 Roy writes a letter to the editor. “FF#3 was excellent! The feud angle made it all the better though, particularly the ending. The continuity in FF is all that could be asked. I’ve just subscribed to FF for two years—I hope it runs much longer than that.” Each month more and more converts were buying the book. It was a smash, Kirby had worked his magic once again, and this time with a new partner.

The audience of comic readers had changed by the early 60’s, perhaps due to the Wertham crisis. It had become an older, more mature audience, after losing a few years recruits during the cultural debates. It was also a smaller audience. Even long time staples like Superman and Donald Duck were losing readers. The smaller audience had developed a clannish feel. EC comics had fed into that fannish base when they formed a club and started direct communications with the fans. It had died down with the demise of EC, but small little groups continued and some even formed clubs and began printing booklets talking about their obsessions. The first may have been Dick Lupoff’s Xero #1 in September 1960. This was more sci-fi based but did feature articles on Golden Age comics. In March 1961, Roy Thomas and Jerry Bails started Alter Ego.

Alter Ego #1 Roy Thomas’ unique pencils – Xero #9 led to All in Color for a Dime

This was much more focused on comic books. It was in this pamphlet that Roy Thomas printed his lukewarm review of Fantastic Four #1. Soon after, Don and Maggie Thompson started Comic Art. While just a small portion of the comic buying audience, they continually communicated with the editors, they had a sway over the editors much larger than imagined. Stan Lee was well aware of them and played up to them. In the first letters page, he notes. “We’ve just noticed something…unlike many other collections of letters in different mags, our fans all seem to write well, and intelligently. We assume this denotes that our readers are a cut above average, and that’s the way we like ‘em.” The letters columns are full of letters from early fanzine members. The aforementioned Roy Thomas, Bill Sarill, Ron Foss, G.B.Love, Paul Gambancini and many others communicated constantly with Stan Lee. Future pros like Dave Cockrum, Alan Weiss, Steve Gerber, and again Roy Thomas were early fans inspired by Stan’s snake oil salesmanship. The fanzines had started an awards program named the Alley Awards, after the early comic strip, Alley Oop. The first few years’ winners were all DC stalwarts, and very super-hero centric, to the point of ignoring all other genres. In 1961 for example, the winner for best book was Justice League of America, and best artist was Carmine Infantino. What wasn’t mentioned was that the results were based on fewer than 200 ballots. By 1963, Marvel had completely turned the balloting on its head. Best comic award went to Spider-Man, top group went to the FF, best editor and writer was Stan Lee, but Carmine Infantino still maintained his death grip on top artist. Whenever Marvel won an award, Stan was quick to publicize it.

To further play to this captive audience, Stan started an in-house club called the Merry Marvel Marching Society. Stan became the ultimate carnival barker. Stan’s letter columns and editorial box was a major part of connecting directly with the reader and making him or her feel like a close family. Stan described the editor and artists as a small tight knit group of happy guys living the Marvel life. The bullpen, as Stan referred to them was led by Uncle Stan, and the artists all had funny monikers like Darlin’ Dick, and King Kirby; they even produced a record that went out to club members where the artists (except for the reclusive Ditko) talked to the listener and joked about Stan. The reality was somewhat different. Kirby recalls the early years at Atlas as a time of desperation; “No, there wasn’t a sense of excitement. It was a horrible, morbid atmosphere. If you can find excitement in that kind of atmosphere—the excitement of fear. The excitement of ”What to do next?” ….It was desperation, but it was a creative desperation because that’s when a man really begins to think hard.”

The whole point was to make Marvel feel like an exclusive, but small, privileged and desirable country club. Nothing appeals to youngsters like being part of an in-club, and nothing was more “in” than Make Mine Marvel!!! Stan was sophisticated and cuddly at the same time. Stan even used the exclamation “Excelsior” from the beat humorist Jean Shepeard as his sign-off. Stan became an irresistible force, and the readers his obedient followers. Unfortunately his bombast which started as we, we, we, soon seemed to become I,I,I. as Stan’s soapboxes morphed into little advertisements for the greatness and majesty of one Stan Lee. Stan Lee went from cheerleader to public face and focal point of all that was good about Marvel.

Success breeds success, and if a comic company has a hit, than they will spawn more of the same. So it has always been. Martin Goodman was happy with the sales figures of the FF and asked for another title. And just as before Stan called in Kirby and they brainstormed. The character getting the most response was the gruesome Thing, so they figured another monster might work. Just a month earlier Kirby had done a Dr. Jekyll -Mister Hyde take off for one of the fantasy titles. “The Midnight Monster” appeared in all his transformative horror in Journey Into Mystery #79. This character drank a serum and transformed from a mild mannered chap into a raging monster. The transformation changed him from a normal looking man into a Frankensteinish monster. Kirby had also used this visual on an earlier Black Magic cover. “I did a story… a small feature, and it was quite different from the Hulk we know. But I felt that the Hulk had possibilities, and I took this little character from the small feature and I transformed it into the Hulk that we know today.” “Of course I was experimenting with it, I thought the Hulk might be a good-looking Frankenstein. This idea seemed to click and with further evolution the result was the Hulk–a name that Stan Lee had used repeatedly on the monster characters. Once again radiation would be the trigger for the transformation. The hero was Dr. Bruce Banner, a scientist overseeing a Gamma Ray experiment for the government. Just before the blast, Dr. Banner sees a teenager driving around the blast zone. He rushes out and throws the lad into a trench just as the blast goes off. Dr. Banner is struck full force by the blast, but survives. This bit with the boy in a blast zone was actually borrowed from a Sky Masters episode where young Danny Martin wanders into the blast area of a missile test. Sky Masters sees him and rushes out and rescues him by throwing him into a ditch.

No wonder the first Hulk is gray – again with the fingers 3 or 4

Later at night, Dr Banner goes through a horrible transformation as he becomes a huge mindless beast and goes on a rampage. The only person who can calm him down is the young lad he saved-Rick Jones. He looks like a slightly handsomized version of the Frankenstein Monster, only gray (soon to be green in the next issue) and bulky. The Hulk becomes a hunted beast but he has a habit of destroying bad guys and Commie villains by accident. Another borrowed gimmick is when the Hulk is wounded by gunfire, and when he transforms back into Dr. Banner he is still wounded. This was taken from a story in The Adventures of the Fly #1 from a few years earlier. The Hulk would be a troubled series early on as the creators could never get a handle on the character. Should he be smart or mindless? Transform at night or when angry? Be a force for good or evil?

Neal lived for these special days watching his dad pull his tricks out of his bag. Neal loved sci-fi too, and shared jacks books ideas. “Our time together was full of moments like this. The early 1960s was the era of atomic monsters and bomb fear, so along comes the Hulk. To Dad, the science of the man-monster was in the realm of “maybe.” Could a Jekyll-and-Hyde monster be created genetically? Jack Kirby thought so. Remember, the structure of DNA had been discovered only five years earlier, and the workings were still a mystery.

The cover inker is a mystery; most credit Paul Reinman, some say George Roussos, but Nick Caputo, who I consider in the cream of Kirby researchers has a different, but knowledgeable idea. “…the sparse quality, including the way clothing is inked on Dr. Banner, the lack of detail on the Hulk’s feet and the singular way the face is inked point to Kirby. There is none of the heavy brushwork of Roussos, or the finer line of Paul Reinman. Ayers also would have had thicker brushwork, so I submit this important cover to be inkd by none other than Jack Kirby.” Nick does not come to this conclusion easily. He has been busy comparing inking styles for many years and has published a much longer list of possible Kirby self-inked Marvel covers @ http://nick-caputo.blogspot.com/2011/09/kirby-inking-kirby.html

When Stan Lee and Jack Kirby brought the Incredible Hulk to life in the early 60’s, their vision for this character was that of a muscle-bound giant with deathly grey skin.

As the comics came off the press however, it soon became apparent that getting just the right shade of grey was difficult. Sometimes the Hulk came out looking pale and dull, like dishwater, at other times he was almost black. With the 2nd issue, it was decided that the Hulk would become an easy to reproduce shade of green.

Third times a charm – count the Hulk’s fingers and toes

One thing that never changed is that he was hunted by the government, in the form of General Thunderbolt Ross–a hard as nails military type and father to Betty Ross, the love interest of Dr. Banner. This was a love triangle doomed to failure. The Hulk’s antagonists were typical Kirby villains. Aliens bent on domination, Commie warlords, and rulers of underworld civilizations. They even formed a kid gang to help out the Hulk. But nothing could really help the Hulk, after 6 issues he was cancelled. But the Hulk didn’t simply disappear, he was next seen in Fantastic Four #12 in what was the first crossover in the now Marvel Universe. Two heroes from different books interacting wasn’t new, but Marvel hadn’t done it before and now made it part of the continuity of both characters, and a basic trait of the new books. The same month had the Fantastic Four visited by Spider-Man. The Hulk was a founding member of the Avengers, yet he is gone by issue #3. After that, the Hulk would take residence in Tales to Astonish and share it with Gi(ant)-Man. The Hulk also was centrally figured in the first issues of The Avengers as an unstable force that eventually had to be ousted. His place in the Marvel pantheon, and his legendary brutish strength, were secured in memorable mano-a-mano slap downs with the Thing in FF #25 (Apr. 1964) and with the Mighty Thor in Journey Into Mystery #112, (Jan. 1965)

Two heroes are better than one –  in yo’ face highpockets

The Roy Huggins influence was both in the tenor and structure of the stories, and also in the physical depictions of the new characters. Johnny Storm seemed to be modeled after Troy Donahue, the teen idol first seen in Surfside 6 and later in Hawaiian Eye. His sister Sue “Invisible Girl” Storm was the spitting image of the perky bubble headed Connie Stevens, Cricket Blake from Hawaiian Eye. Though Jack said that he modeled Reed Richards after Michael Rennie (of Day The Earth Stood Still fame) he actually looked more like Jack Kelly of Maverick. In the Hulk, the hip, jive talking, hot rodder Rick Jones is an obvious homage to Edd “Kookie” Burns, the ginchiest valet ever to work the Sunset Strip. The borrowed elements such as the family type group, the bickering, the shared universe and the soap opera style continuity that the new comic fans rallied to in the Fantastic Four were the exact aspects that made the Warner Bros shows so popular. Just as Orr and Huggins energized and revolutionized the 50’s television genre, Lee and Kirby re-energised and revolutionized the 60’s comic book universe.

Late ’62 found the Beatles at a critical point. Their local fame was growing, but their new manager, Brian Epstein had bigger plans. The first step was to replace Pete Best as drummer. The new member was Ringo Starr, a local itinerant drummer fresh from another band. The group was now set but at a small price. Pete Best was a very popular member and had many personal fans. The outcry was immediate and alarming. More important, Epstein had leased time at Abbey Road Studios and the boy set about recording their own music in earnest. On October 5, Love Me Do is released and on Oct 16, they made their first TV appearance on a small local teen show People and Places. Pre-filmed in the Cavern on August 22, the show’s producer, Johnny Hamp had this to say: “I first saw the Beatles in a club in Hamburg. They were very scruffy characters – but they had a beat in their music which I liked…I got into a lot of trouble over it. Everyone said they were too rough, too untidy. But I liked them. I put them on again and again.”

In with the new out with the old

On Feb. 4, 1963 Love Me Do is released in Canada, the first official Beatles release in North America. Paul White, then Capitol Canada record executive, explained why he decided to release the Beatles first single: “I used to listen to about fifty new records a week. Then one day I put on “Love Me Do” by a group called the Beatles. I immediately sat up and took notice. The sound was so different, so completely fresh. “I’m certainly not going to claim that I could read the future and already knew how big the Beatles were going to be, but I did like them a lot and wanted Capitol of Canada to get in on the ground floor. I decided to release Beatles’ records in Canada”. The Beatles were about to revolutionize rock and roll.

Stan Lee appears on NY Radio to talk about his new creations. He is praised for adding a freshness and energy back to the comic genre. Stan becomes the go to guy.

Even before any numbers came in from The Hulk, Stan Lee asked Jack if he had any more characters that they could use. And in quick order, Kirby supplied three new ideas. The first was Thor, a remake of a mythological character that Kirby used in a DC fantasy book, and a theme Kirby reused ever since 1940. Thor was the mythical God of thunder who had lost his hammer, a mystical hammer that transformed the finder into the God of Thunder. Donald Blake is a lame American doctor on vacation in the Norway. He accidentally stumbles upon an invasion by rock men from Saturn bent on domination. While fleeing them he hides in a cave and stumbles across an old cane. When he takes the cane and taps in on a rock he is magically transformed into the all-powerful God of Thunder. With his new hammer and great strength, he confronts the Saturn people and defeats them in battle. Worried about being found, Thor stamps the hammer on the ground and once more becomes the lame doctor. Typical Kirby hero and typical Kirby monsters and plot, but the art was amazing. No one could do mythic like Kirby. His costume for Thor is possibly the best he ever did. And the whirling hammer provided more action and drama per page than ever before. Thor started out fairly generic story wise but quickly changed when the stories began adding other mythical characters like Odin, Loki (the arch villain) Balder and Heimdal. His son gives eyewitness testimony; “In the spring of 1962, for instance, I remember standing over the drawing board as Dad created a truly cosmic hero — it was a brand new character but I was confused when I heard his name. Thor? The story was “The Stone Men from Saturn.” My first reaction, before opening my mouth, was “Why the hell is a Norse god fighting rock-pile aliens?” Dad explained the whole origin story to me and how he would work in the entire pantheon of Norse deities in the future.” This mix of modern day and ancient mythology was intoxicating. Thor first appeared in issue #83 of the fantasy anthology book Journey into Mystery.

Jack loved the Thor covers – Chic Stone inks a pin-up

The next character was an update of a story from one of the fantasy titles; much like the Hulk, the scientist and concept starts out in a fantasy book. A scientist named Henry Pym discovers a serum that shrinks him down to the size of an ant. Similar to the movie The Shrinking Man, the scientist encounters great hazards from normal items. Other insects hassle him until he befriends one lone ant. While running from maddened ants, the scientist, with the aid of the friendly ant reach his lab and an enlarging serum that returns him to normal height. For the super-hero update Henry Pym dons a costume complete with a cybernetic helmet that allowed him to communicate with insects, and uses the shrinking serum and his new army of insects to fight crime. The first case is against a typical Commie spy trying to steal secrets from a gov’t project that Henry Pym is working on. The Ant Man’s powers are limited and his foes tended towards spies and petty crooks, and the occasional crazed insect. The series and character never made a big splash, but his strip lasted for quite a while as an ongoing tale in the anthology series Tales to Astonish. The premise did allow Kirby to draw some amazing extreme perspective angles that highlighted the size differentials. In time they modified the serum to allow Henry (Hank) to enlarge as well as shrink and at that time he became known as Giant Man. He took on a female partner called the Wasp, and joined the Avengers.

Pre-super hero not so brave – weak villains but a neat cannon – great extreme perspectives

The next book has a unique history: one that will be dealt with in another chapter. Suffice it to say that when Kirby didn’t have the time, Spider-Man, based on the old S&K premise was turned over to the proposed inker Steve Ditko to flesh out. He appeared in the last issue of Amazing Fantasy, the title that evolved from Amazing Adventures, and immediately disappeared. Jack provided the cover. Another character, Iron Man was shelved for a while. Thor, Ant-Man and Spider-man all appeared the same month.

Ant-Man gets a suit – Ant-Man gets a partner the Wasp

Kirby covers – It was a very good month

A few months later, the Human Torch was given his own series in the fantasy title Strange Tales. Often guest starring the other FF members, this series is remembered most fondly for introducing a string of forgettably inept villains, like Paste Pot Pete, Plantman, Asbestos Man, and Living Bomb. Most of the writing was by Larry Lieber and Robert Bernstein. It showed. Strange paradoxes, such as the Human Torch, long known as Johnny Storm takes on a secret identity. This is never explained and ended just as quickly.

Some good covers but lousy villains

Both Stan Lee and Jack Kirby were stretched to the limit. Neither could do all the work on the new titles. Steve Ditko did the artwork on the last issue of the Hulk. Stan turned the writing on Thor, Human Torch and Ant Man over to his brother Larry Lieber, and Robert Bernstein. Robert Bernstein was a long time comic writer, mostly at DC, he was a neighbor of Kirby’s. Bernstein said that he would often time his trips into the city to match up with Jack’s. He would sit next to Jack and pump him for characters and plot lines that he could use for his stories. After a few introductory issues, the art on Thor was given to artists like Al Hartley and Joe Sinnott. Ant Man was given to Don Heck. But it seems that whenever a new important character was introduced, Jack was brought back to pencil. Jack returns to Ant Man to introduce the Wasp, and the first appearance of Giant-Man. On Thor, Jack returned for the introduction of the Radioactive Man. Many of the plots, even when Jack didn’t draw them were by Kirby. They reprise stories from his DC fantasy days.

In late 1962, Lee and Kirby rebooted another old Atlas western hero. The Two-Gun Kid returned in issue #60 totally updated by Kirby with a new alter ego, Matt Hawk. The premise seems to have been borrowed from the popular film, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. This series played more like a super-hero title than a straight western saga. Jack stayed with this character for 3 issues and then turned it over to Dick Ayers.

Also in late 1962 Iron Man was taken off the shelf. No one knows why it had been shelved but the concept was turned over to Don Heck to pencil. Iron Man was basically a huge metallic shell with a man inside working the controls. It should be noted that in one of the final Challengers issues, Prof Haley incapacitates a sentient robot and climbs in and takes over control of the metallic shell. He is jokingly called “tin man” by the others.

Don Heck was chosen to draw Iron Man. This was also at the time that Jack was incapable of drawing more characters. Don recalls with horror being told he was to do Iron Man, until he was told that Jack Kirby had already plotted the story and laid out the cover. Don was ecstatic, he recalls that “the main reason the super-heroes existed was because of Jack Kirby.”

To continue Stan’s heroes with problems schtick, the man inside the machine, Tony Stark, was forced to wear it or die from shrapnel too near his heart. He was a prisoner of his suit. The basic plot is taken from a Green Arrow story that Jack worked on about an American weapons expert captured by a Southeast Communist army and forced to manufacture a weapon to defeat the American naval presence off the coast. The American agrees to help but secretly creates a weapon he can turn on the enemy; in Iron Man’s case an armored suit with high tech weapons and an invulnerable skin, worn by the injured armorer, trapped behind the lines in Viet Nam. Stan Lee constantly claimed that Iron Man’s power came from miniaturize transistors, never understanding that transistors are not a power source, but the kids didn’t care, it was a neat catch phrase.

It should be mentioned that Iron Man was a good reflection of what was happening with technology in the real world. The transistor was invented in the post-war 40’s by Bell Labs. But it wasn’t until 1958 that inventor Jack Kilby came up with the “integrated circuit” that the computer age became personal. It took till 1959 for Texas Instruments to make it usable. With the new integrated circuit, computers and electrics could be made small enough for the individual to use. The next major leap occurred when Texas Instruments perfected the silicone wafer that was easier to produce, and a wider range of uses. Military transistor use in such items as walkie talkies began in the late ‘50’s. In the early 1960s the first electronic integrated circuits were developed and manufactured in the U.S.A. Although initially incorporating just a few transistors and other components, due to the reduction in the size of the circuit boards required they immediately saw use in hardware for the military and the “space race” with the U.S.S.R. Chips were also developed for use in the mainframe computers of the time where they gave increased functionality. For the public these first showed up in small transistor radios, and personal calculators. In 1962 American manufacturers dropped prices of the new transistor radios to as low as $15. The science magazines promised a future full of small personal gadgets for personal use.

Don Heck used the Kirby proposal together with the reduced size and cost. As for the cover; Don Heck tried to explain some of the confusion;

“I did the first Iron Man story. They have it listed that Jack Kirby did the breakdowns, but that’s not true. I did it all. They just didn’t bother to call me up and find out when they wrote up the credits. It doesn’t really matter. Jack Kirby created the costume, and he did the cover for the issue.”

The use of Communist aggressors was prescient. While this story is being produced, the most urgent crisis of modern time was occurring between the U.S., Soviet Union and Cuba. In October 1962, in retaliation to the U.S. missiles in East Europe, the Soviet Union began sending missiles to Cuba. The U.S. threatens to invade Cuba and destroy the missiles. The U.S. and the Soviets went eyeball to eyeball for three days until the Soviets blinked and a negotiated settlement was worked out. The crisis would be the low point of the cold war with the closest the two powers would come to direct conflict. The perceived win sealed JFK’s legacy. Marvel would use the Commies as enemies in all their new series. Stan Lee says he based the personality of Tony Stark on the wealthy industrialist Howard Hughes. The story appeared in the March issue of Tales of Suspense #39.

Jungle crude – sleeked up in the home front

Kirby drew some stories and almost all the covers. Curiously, Don Heck says that on Iron Man the covers were drawn first and Kirby designed the costumes for most of the villains. No other Marvel artist has ever said the covers were done first. The original iron suit was a clunky plain mono-colored suit reminiscent of deep water diving gear, but consistent with what a creator might make with the limited access to hi-tech machinery in a forced labor camp. After a dozen or so issues, Steve Ditko redesigned the suit into a modern sleek colorful suit that looked great. Shell head, as he was commonly called, was a long running member in the fantasy title Tales of Suspense, plus The Avengers.

By early 1963, the Viet Nam War was heating up and probably in response to DC’s Sgt Rock series, Martin Goodman asked for a new war comic. Stan, feeling his oats says that his new formula would work on any genre and contacted Jack Kirby. A few years earlier during the monster days Jack Kirby had run into John Severin, his old friend from the Prize years.

Jack was still pushing ideas for newspaper strips and he asked John if he wanted to collaborate on a war based newspaper strip. Severin explained; “The story would be set in Europe during World War 2; the hero would be a tough, cigar smoking Sergeant with a squad of oddball G.I.s-sort of an adult Boy Commandos.” Now Jack, never one to forget a project told Stan about the premise, and sure enough Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos became the new series. The formula continued; Kirby supplied the premise, and Lee added in characterization. Sgt. Fury expanded upon Jack’s group template, yes it had the stoic hero, the brawny Irish second in command, a hot head, and a Jewish mechanical wizard, but it also had a black bugle player, an Italian lothario, a Southern good ole boy, and a stiff upper lipped officious Brit. Black characters were so rare that the colorist mis-understood on the first issue and made Gabe Jones pink! Perhaps he knew there were no integrated units in WW2. Though their tales were as outlandish as the Boy Commandos, they also had a serious side where reality could intrude by way of occasional death in the field of battle. Kirby’s battle scenes were as electric as the ones he drew for Foxhole. The stories had a breadth not seen in the other Marvel series. They dealt with serious topics like racism, and cowardice, and camaraderie in the face of death. The Nazis were as mean in Sgt. Fury as they had been in the wartime books, and took their job seriously. These were no buffoon Nazis-no Colonel Klink and Sgt Schultz, these were the real deal. The predicaments that the Commandos found themselves might be humorous, but never the enemy. When relating war stories Jack was quick to tell everyone that the Nazis, especially the SS, were professional in every way, they were not to be toyed with. Kirby says that several tales and elements were loosely based on his experiences in Europe, perhaps none more than the depiction of war torn Britain.

For his part, Stan had enlisted in WW2, but he never saw combat as he was stateside writing training films. Stan’s dialogue on Sgt. Fury may have been his most evocative and sympathetic. Stripped of the bluster needed on super-heroes, Stan captured the tone and frailty of real humans. The forced humor in the heat of battle, the braggadocio needed to hide the fear of death, and the true patriotic fervor found among the vets were all dealt with by Stan in a manner opposite the heavy-handedness of the hero titles. The emotions were real, and the feelings were well captioned. The Howlers were fully developed individuals.

Kirby always found ways to get them on the same page.

Fury’s love affair with the veddy British Pamela Hawley was particularly well done, never forced or unduly melodramatic, even when she loses a family member. This series was also a hit, lasting many years. Dick Ayers took over fairly quickly.

Flo Steinberg tells of a chilling coincidence between Kirby’s Captain America experiences during WW2 and Sgt. Fury. It seems that not everyone was thrilled with the jingoistic anti-Nazi nature of Sgt. Fury, and one person sent a letter to the bullpen threatening to kill them. It turned out to be nothing, but the FBI was called in. Shades of Simon and Kirby!

After a short hiatus, Spider-man returned in his own title. Kirby did the cover for that also. It seems that Ditko was another artist who flourished with the freedom to plot and pace his own stories. He took to the Marvel Method with ease. Steve Ditko was doing wonders with Spidey. The first issue was boosted by guest stars the Fantastic Four. Stan was having a blast intermingling the new characters and storylines. But Ditko was also creating another character. Dr. Strange, Sorcerer Supreme was everything Dr. Droom wasn’t. Though sharing a common origin gimmick, (dying Tibetan mystic passing on his secrets to an American doctor to continue the fight against evil mystics) the new Dr. actually fought beings of the occult and figments of the human psyche. His battles took him to unknown dimensions, and into battle with Nightmare, and other psychic entities. Ditko’s talent for rendering strange dimensions and unreal vistas bordered on the surreal. They had never been so extraordinarily rendered before, or since. Many readers mistook him for one of the new breed of artist using mind expanding drugs for inspiration. Nothing could be further than the truth. Steve was as grounded in reality as the next person, maybe more. Drugs were anathema to him. Sales were never great on this feature.

If it wasn’t drugs, you explain these scenes

Jack would also co-create 2 more series in 1963. The first was what Martin Goodman had asked for back in 1961; a collection of recognizable heroes thrown together as a group. All of Jack’s solo heroes, Thor, Hulk, Giant Man, Wasp, and Iron Man banded together to form the Avengers. Their villains were the worst and most powerful, and required the combined might of the assemblage. The Hulk was problematic as he was uncontrollable. He was in one of his paranoid rage periods and by issue #2 stormed out when he felt slighted by the other members. While searching for the Hulk, the Avengers ran into and up against the Fantastic Four. In issue #25 and 26 of the Fantastic Four, The Thing was engaged in a mano-a- mano battle against the rampaging green behemoth. In what might be the greatest battle issues ever drawn, Kirby pitted his two monstrosities against each other in a no holds barred match for the ages. (Years later those issues were voted the greatest battle issues ever created) It was the Hulk’s pure might against the pride, the grit and determination of the Thing. In this case pure might won as no matter how valiant, and intelligent the Thing fought, the Hulk just got stronger and meaner. In the end the combined might of the two groups chased off the Hulk, but the Thing was beaten, and broken; a chilling tale of courage, the brittleness of pride, and the resiliency of man. While still hunting down the Hulk, the Avengers run into the Submariner, and battle him to a draw. The crossovers were omnipresent.

The Avengers – The great two

On the books issued with a cover date of May, 1963, the little company without a true name found one. From then on every cover proudly carried the MARVEL name and logo. The Marvel universe was now official. In Strange Tales #115 Nov 1963, Marvel test marketed a new hero. The Human Torch faced a villain dressed up as the Golden Age Captain America. The story ended asking the readers to let the editors know what they thought about Captain America. This might have been Marvels first attempt at polling the readers.

Even heroes and villains crossed over note corner images – Forced crossover 

In 1962 Roy Huggins launched one of his most successful creations. The Virginian was another western this time modeled after his group template seen in his detective shows. Comprised of a group of brave cowboys led by an elderly mentor, and a stoic boss, a feisty brawling sidekick and a young hot headed female for eye candy, this show would run for nine years. Lee J. Cobb was tabbed as the elderly mentor; he was another Lower East Side resident who fought his way out. An early member of New York’s Group Theater founded by great director and admitted Communist Elia Kazan. He dabbled in the burgeoning Communist party and had his fights with HUAC. He was called to testify before HUAC but refused to do so for two years until, with his career threatened by the blacklist, he relented in 1953 and gave testimony in which he named 20 people as former members of the Communist Party USA. Later, Cobb explained why he “named names” saying:

“When the facilities of the government of the United States are drawn on an individual it can be terrifying. The blacklist is just the opening gambit—being deprived of work. Your passport is confiscated. That’s minor. But not being able to move without being tailed is something else. After a certain point it grows to implied as well as articulated threats, and people succumb. My wife did, and she was institutionalized. The HUAC did a deal with me. I was pretty much worn down. I had no money. I couldn’t borrow. I had the expenses of taking care of the children. Why am I subjecting my loved ones to this? If it’s worth dying for, and I am just as idealistic as the next fellow. But I decided it wasn’t worth dying for, and if this gesture was the way of getting out of the penitentiary I’d do it. I had to be employable again.” He had seen some friends die due to the harassment. John Garfield, a colleague and friend at The Group with Cobb died a year earlier.

The perfect Kirby template: the stoic leader, the garrulous hot head, the elder mentor

After the horror at Fox, Roy Huggins went back to school to get his PH.D. To pay for this he decided to sell an idea to an independent producer and sit back and collect residuals. The idea became The Fugitive, and the producer was Quinn Martin who bought the rights after ABC turned it down. The premise deals with Dr. Richard Kimble, falsely accused of murdering his wife; given a reprieve when a train transporting him crashes and sets him free from his jailer. Dr. Kimble must constantly move and share adventures with people caught up in interesting moments of crisis, all while being tracked by a relentless pursuer. This Les Miserables-like template would become iconic and copied by writers of TV series and comic stories alike. Huggins has said what he was trying to do was update the iconic western heroes by placing him in a modern milieu. Dr Kimble’s constant tension between pursuit and capture was unique to TV and the reaction was immediate as The Fugitive became a smash. The show aired in the fall of 1963. What set the Fugitive apart from other Huggins series was a distinct lack of humor. The series was relentless in its seriousness, and somber tone. As bad as Dr. Kimble’s situation was, the lives of the people he interacted with were just as sad. Huggins claimed this was a response to what he called “America’s cult of optimism. Some have speculated that it was in response to the assassination of President Kennedy and the cultural upheaval starting in the early 60’s. So great was the mystery that the final episode uniting the two was the most watched show in TV history. Spider-Man with his constant harasser J Jonah borrowed its tone from this show. A one-armed villain played a big part in Deadman- a new series from DC.

The hunter and the hunted – a nation gripped looking for the one-armed man

In Sept. ‘63, George Harrison visited his sister Louise in Benton, Illinois in the USA. While there he would buy a guitar and also sat in at a few clubs performing with a local band called The Four Vests. George also went camping with the family and took in some points of scenic interest in Southern Illinois. Anxious to get the Beatles known in America, George and his sister visit a local Benton radio station one Saturday and met up with a very young DJ named Marsha Schaffer who hosted a 1-hour rock and roll program. There they persuaded the DJ to play “Please Please Me” along with another Beatle single. Marking the first time a Beatle song was played in the U.S.

On Jack’s birthday in 1963, the family got Jack a new color TV. Jack gave Neal his old 10” B&W to cannibalize. “My father couldn’t stop laughing. There was a lot of superhero history flying across his drawing board around that time — remember, September 1963 was the date on the first issue of “The Avengers” and “The X-Men” — but it all took a backseat that day to the mysterious return of Caesar Augustus. Dad had no idea how that coin got inside the television but he did know how it first reached America.

Beatles in 1963

While plotting Avengers #4, the world changed. On Nov. 22, 1963 the world wept for a young lost leader. America lost its innocence that day, Jack and Roz sat glued to the new color TV set like all Americans, sobbing for the end to Camelot. It has been said that Jack Kennedy’s murder robbed us of our innocence. Comic books seemed to become a little harder in the immediate future. Flo Steinberg—the Marvel gal Friday remembers. “It was the first time I ever saw everyone at the whole company listening to the radio. It was a very sad time. Things changed.” America needed a diversion.

On Dec. 10, 1963, CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite aired a segment about the Beatles phenomenon in England that was filed by their U.K. correspondent, Alexander Kendrick. This was the first official commentary on the group in the U.S. The story contained a clip of the band performing “She Loves You” along with some interviews.

This clip created a strong and favorable impression on Marsha Albert, a 15-year-old girl from Silver Spring, Maryland. She would later be acknowledged by the Washington Post as the Beatle fan that kick started the whole “Beatlemania” craze on USA radio.

However, Walter Cronkite recalled it differently: “In the wake of the [John F. Kennedy] assassination story, nothing else was happening in the world, at least in the United States — stuff that was important, that is. So we actually had an opportunity to use it. “I was not entirely thrilled with it myself, to tell you the truth. It was not a musical phenomenon to me. The phenomenon was a social one, of these rather tawdry-looking guys; we thought at the time, with their long hair and this crazy singing of theirs, this meaningless ‘wah-wah-wah, wee-wee-wee’ stuff they were doing.”

On Feb. 7th the Beatles land at Kennedy Airport in the USA. The young Liverpuddlians are greeted by 3,000 screaming fans. A reporter for the Saturday Evening Post noted: “Anyone listening to a pop radio station in New York would hear a Beatle record every four minutes and anyone listening to a juke box might hear one right after the other.” Beatlemania had arrived!!

If Uncle Walter said it, that’s the way it was – They didn’t listen The Ed Sullivan Show

Feb. 9, 1963, the Beatles debut on the Ed Sullivan Show in New York; 50,000 fans apply for 728 available seats. An estimated 73 million viewers watch that night. America’s mourning period has officially ended. The collective mindset has been diverted. The country was caught up in a new craze. Camelot gave way to Liverpool. Paul recalled the feeling the band felt while taping. “FEAR, FEAR, FEAR! ‘Cause you know, if somebody made the mistake of saying, ‘Oh, you know how many people are watching this?’ If someone had mentioned 73 million – Ohhhhhhh! So it was very very nerve racking. But you know, by then we had so much practice, that the nerves didn’t show. I can see them when I watch it. I can remember it.”

Avengers #4 hit the stands in Feb. 1964. It opens with Submariner in a rage, he throws a huge block of ice bearing the body of a man into the sea-simply because some Eskimos were worshipping the figure in the iceblock. Caught in the ocean currents, the huge iceblock began to melt and when the Avengers cruised nearby they saw a figure floating in the ocean. When they rescued the figure they recognized the costume the figure was wearing. It was the long lost costume of WW2’s greatest hero, Captain America. But Cap wasn’t dead, just frozen in a state of suspended animation and the

thawing revived him. This was the real Cap, not a pretend villain. Cap awoke in a fright, reliving the last few seconds when his partner Bucky had died when a plane exploded. The connection between the Golden Age Timely, and the new Marvel universe was now complete; Cap, Torch and Submariner had all returned, and this time for more than 3-4 issues.

Hero on the rocks  – not real: test market strategy – follow him anywhere

As the Avengers explained to Cap what had happened in the last 18 years, he regained his full strength and fighting form. The Avengers asked him to join, thus Simon and Kirby’s iconic hero was once again brought back, this time to be drawn by the only hand to ever do him justice- Jack Kirby. One leader lost, and one reborn, once again Captain America coming to America’s rescue in our darkest hour.

Interestingly, this issue might have been the first straw on the camel’s back. On the splash was a blurb introducing the reappearance of Cap to the public. In typical Stan bluster he announces; “The Mighty Marvel Comics Group is proud to announce that Jack Kirby drew the original Captain America during the Golden Age of comics…and now he draws it again! Also Stan Lee’s first script during those fabled days was Captain America— And now he authors it again! Thus the chronicle of comicdom turns full circle, reaching a new pinnacle of greatness.”

Stan Lee was a huckster, but this blurb seems to claim that Stan Lee was a scripter of Cap’s tales and he was returning to this job. Yet Stan never scripted a Cap story, that was Joe Simon, Stan simply wrote a separate two page text piece (probably plotted by Joe) thrown in for issue #3 and of no interest to anyone. I have asked others who said that Marvel didn’t want to praise Joe Simon because he was trying to get the copyright back. This is absurd since there was a 3 year gap between this reboot, and Joe suing for the copyright. This happened again a short time later when Cap got his own series and when they retold the origin, (with no change from the 1940 series) again there was no mention of Joe Simon as Stan again seemed to be credited with the tale. Similarly there was no mention of Bill Everett when Submariner returned or Carl Burgos for the Human Torch. It seemed that early on that no credit was too absurd for Stan to take or Marvel to hide. And one wonders how Jack Kirby felt.

After a run of 19 straight victories, on February 25th 1964 Cassius Clay is offered a shot at the championship. Though a large underdog, Cassius used his great speed and pinpoint jab to defeat Sonny Liston, a large lumbering giant of a man. Though he had joined the Nation of Islam, he was loath to make it a public affair. Yet within a week, standing next to Malcolm X the new champion announced that he was throwing off his slave name and taking a Muslim name—given to him personally by Elijah Mohammad. Cassius Marcelus Clay was to be known now and forever as Muhammad Ali. The heavyweight champion of the world was now a lightning rod for all the social ills the U.S. was living through. He used his membership of the Muslim religion as an excuse to refuse induction into the military. He was the most recognized draft dodger in the world. In words never to be forgotten, Ali explained his refusal to join the service. “Man, I ain’t got no quarrel with them Vietcong,” he says to reporters who called him at home in Miami. He later explains … “no Vietcong ever called me nigger”; the perfect joining of two distinct social causes; civil rights, and anti-war revolutionaries. Soon Martin Luther King Jr. who was loath to bring in foreign affairs to his civil rights campaign is forced to merge these different causes into one larger movement. For this, Ali would lose his license to fight. He would have his time in the wilderness. With his new national stage Ali attracted all the leaders of the cause; Malcome X, even Martin Luther King Jr. would come together with the champ. Emmett Till’s legacy was now complete.

The Viet Nam War had been a large part of the early stories at Marvel, but at this time they changed alignment, and with Stan’s liberal sense and pop culture tastes of Jack Kirby Marvel was soon adopted by the counter culture. They managed to ignore the starkest divisions and vile specifics while embracing the rainbow finery of the new generation. Stories of Gabe Jones overcoming bigotry, Black Widow fighting slum lords and the Silver Surfer finding peace, love and understanding led many to think of Marvel as radical and left leaning. Yet this was not unanimous. Stan Lee would face a tug of war in the bullpen. He says he was too liberal for Steve Ditko, but too conservative for the left leaning Jack Kirby.

Within a few months, Cap got his own series, sharing Tales of Suspense with Iron Man. Kirby’s splash pages for Captain America could serve as posters for the personification of bravery and leadership. Jack always saved his best cover poses for Cap. (see Avengers #4, Sgt. Fury #13, and Captain America #100) Neal witnessed it all; “Sgt. Fury was Dad, big cigar and big action, the only difference being about 9 inches in height and 50 pounds of muscle. These days there’s a view that a liberal Democrat can’t be fiercely patriotic but my father was exactly that. Captain America, Sgt. Fury, the Boy Commandos, Fighting American and “Foxhole” were all born of that powerful love of country.”

The other title is sort of an enigma. The X-Men are a group of teen aged mutants-born with an evolved gene- and being trained by a mysterious mentor to fight against evil mutants. Their mutations have given them each special powers. The kid gang genre suggests Jack Kirby, and the template sort of fits; the quiet leader type in Cyclops, the brawny sidekick in Beast. The hot headed Iceman, and the rich snobbish Angel mixed in with a young girl of indeterminate mental power, led by an older mentor/guardian, also with great mental powers. But the stories and ambiance aren’t typical Kirby. There is no obvious recent earlier template as in the other characters. This may have been a Stan Lee created group. Both men had done stories about groups of mutants, but the silly sci-fi of Kirby isn’t nearly in evidence. The relationship between Prof. X and Magneto the leader of the evil mutants doesn’t feel like a Kirby relationship. Parts of it, like the training room, and Cerebro seem all-Kirby, but not the overall feel. The stories never captured the Kirby flair, the villains, except for Magneto were second rate, perhaps Kirby was just burning out, or Stan was feeling his oats, but this one seems more guided by Stan’s fascination with relationships and dialogue; the group talked …a lot! The tales seem more plot heavy and full of narratives and exposition as might be expected from a writer’s book. Though there is one gimmick that Jack had used before. There is a scene where Magneto has unleashed some Hunter missiles on the X-Men. One is homing in on the Angel, (the flying member) when the Beast miraculously catches it, and Marvel Girl telekinetically tosses it into the sea. Very similar to the sequence where Reed Richards saves the Torch from a Hunter missile in FF#1.

And the girl does what? – Together again – Thor by himself

The month after X-Men and Avengers debuted, another magical wrinkle appeared when Journey into Mystery, which had still been serving fantasy tales as back-up strips to Thor began a new strip. Tales of Asgard featured stories of Thor’s childhood and his secret life in Asgard, the home of the Norse Gods. This delved into the mythological base of Thor and separated the two sides of the character. Son Neal says that this was a idea Jack had from the beginning. With this strip, Jack Kirby would finally release his inner Hal Foster, and dazzle with his sense of wonder wrapped in Viking garb and Old World sensibilities. Coupled with Stan’s quasi-Elizabethan dialogue this strip quickly became superior to the main Thor story dealing with typical mobsters, mad scientists, and Loki’s mechanizations. In a rare off-hand moment, Stan told an interviewer that Asgard was 90% Kirby ; he knew all that Norse religious stuff much better than I ever did.

Jack worked in solitude at his house; his trips to the Marvel offices became fewer. But they were not without excitement. Once a month, Jack would pull Neal out of school and take him into the city with him. Neal would usually sit in an anteroom while Jack collaborated with Stan. Fabulous Flo would offer young Neal a soda, and after the brief meeting, Jack and Neal would head over to Central Park or to a museum for the afternoon. Mostly historical type museums filled with ancient historical artifacts, Egyptian mummies, suits of armor, things like that, which both Neal and Jack loved. Rarely to a modern art museum; “I don’t have any recollection of him being interested in Modern Art whatsoever. He never made the suggestion to go to the Guggenheim Museum, or anything like that.” Neal recalled.

You can’t touch this – EPIC – Foster on steroids

Yet Jack was always trying to find unique techniques to help tell his stories, from double page splashes, to the confessional splashpages, and in late 1963 he began adding collages into his panels. The first one appeared in Fantastic Four #24 March, 1964. Little dioramas made from cut and pasted magazine photos and newspaper advertisements. The layered and complex surreal vistas were perfect for showcasing Kirby’s new dimensions and outer space perspectives. Kirby’s use of collages was not an example of art used to reflect reality, but as an escape mechanism to the unreal. “Collages were another way of finding new avenues of entertainment. I felt that magazine reproduction could handle the change. It added an extra-dimension to comics. I wanted to see if it could materialize and it did. I loved doing collages. I made a lot of good ones.” Jack told an interviewer. Collages had become part of pop art in the ‘50s, by artists as diverse as George Grosz and Robert Motherwell. In 1961 the Museum of Modern Art had presented a show called Art of Assemblage with over 250 samples of collages. The show was very well received. In 1963-1964, Romare Beardon, the prolific artist spawned from the Harlem Renaissance also had a well received show of collages called Projections. Perhaps one of these shows sparked Jack’s interest in the technique. Jack’s collages would show up in comics for many years. Jack would also produce large collages for his own amusement. Following art styles wasn’t anything new to Jack. He had used abstraction, cubist and Dadaistic techniques before to present other world dimensions. Jack even swiped techniques such as melting landscapes and curvaceous vistas from Salvadore Dali to represent the Fourth Dimension in a Harvey fantasy story. Jack kept up with modern art techniques. He was not a hermit living in a secluded cave. He just never let them overwhelm his own art.

The final core super-hero character of the Marvel Age was Daredevil. Though it doesn’t appear that Jack provided much input into the genesis of the character, artist Bill Everett says that he did ask Jack for some plotting and design assistance, and the cover is taken from a Kirby presentation page. After a couple issues of revolving artists, Wallace Wood came on board and brought his considerable gifts to the character. Wallace Wood, a second-generation comic artist from Minnesota, had gained great renown for his time as an EC artist, mostly on the science fiction stories. He was also the original inker on Kirby’s Sky Masters newspaper strip. His art was very detailed and dramatic. Unfortunately the early 1960’s had not been kind to Wallace. He had struggled and took on comic work as part of the low paying Vince Colletta’s studio working for Charlton. Stan Lee introduced Wallace on the cover of Daredevil #5 thusly. “Under the brilliant artistic craftsmanship of famous illustrator Wally Wood, Daredevil reaches new heights of glory” For once, Stan was actually correct in his huckstering. In issue #7, Woody totally reworked the two-toned costumed into a solid red, with deep black shadows and more pronounced horns making the character appear devilish. The fight with Submariner is a high point of Daredevil’s mythos. Wallace Wood would last but a few issues more than leave in a huff—a result of his stubbornness and inability to compromise.

Daredevil comes into his own

Mark Evanier provided an anecdote which shows the exact nature of Kirby’s relationship with the other artists and his willingness to share concepts. “Jack designed new characters for a number of books where he did not work directly on the interiors. Sometimes, he did this by designing a new villain (or someone) on a cover and then Don Heck (or whoever) would use that cover as a model for drawing the interior. Jack also sometimes whipped out a sketch for a character. Wally Wood told me that one day, he and Stan were trying to figure out what could happen in the next issue of Daredevil they were going to do. Jack happened to walk into the office and he was dragged into the meeting, whereupon he suggested Stiltman and did a little sketch…and then Wood expanded on that sketch. We don’t know (and will probably never know) how often this happened and which characters had uncredited Kirby input.”

Kirby helps Woody repays favor

Stan Goldberg, the Marvel colorist tells of a story that shows Kirby’s import to the company. “Occasionally, we (the freelancers) would come in after delivering our stuff at noon or so. At that time, a lot of the artists were coming in and out, walking with Stan–it wasn’t just the two of us–Jack would be there, maybe Frank Giacoia would come by. And maybe one would say to the other “if you’re in no rush to get home, let’s have lunch” The office was on Madison Avenue and walking with Frank and Jack, we had to cross the streets, and Jack had been doing all that great stuff. So we devised a little thing where we’d cross the streets. Frank would stand on one side of Jack, and I would stand on the other side, protecting him from the traffic. As we said, if we lose him, we’re all out of work!”

Kirby does Ditko.  yeah yeah yeah – The Howlers meet James Bond

On Aug.7,1964 after new President Johnson had informed Congress and the country of a supposed attack on U.S. ships by North Viet Nam naval units, the Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which granted President Johnson the authority to assist any Southeast Asian country whose government was considered to be jeopardized by “communist aggression”. The resolution served as Johnson’s legal justification for escalating American involvement in the Vietnam War. Many consider this as well as the Kennedy assassination as the impetus for the anti-war movement and the hippie revolution. Stan and Jack, always the monitors of pop culture noted the rise of the Beatles when the Human Torch and the Thing meet the Beatles in a Strange Tales story. Beatle wigs soar in popularity.

The rise of the Beatles was unprecedented, toy companies swarmed to take advantage. Revell was a small time model manufacturer started in the late ‘40’s. By the sixties, they switched from wood to plastic. Most of their inventory was airplanes, and cars. By 1964, they took a chance by venturing into pop culture. They got the license to make replicas of the hottest act in the entertainment. Soon they ventured into cartoons, and toys. Rock and roll branched out; the Beatles soon sold games, books, magazines and toys. They may have been the first action figures. They even sold records.

Pop culture had its first phenomena. Merchandisers soon branched into other genres. Soon, TV, radio, movies, and comics would find life and money outside their boundaries.

Comic books survived by following trends, and no trend was more obvious in the early ‘60’s than Cold War spies. James Bond had spawned the greatest movie series ever. And in 1965, Moonraker was in the top ten as well as more realistic spy flicks like The Ipcress File, and Spy Who Came In From The Cold. On the small screen, I Spy, Man From Uncle, and Get Smart represented the genre well. Comics couldn’t sit back and let this slide by. Marvel jumped into the genre when they updated their WW2 hero and made him the head of a modern super hi-tech spy agency. Kirby explained: “Now when I did SHIELD, I had to go five to ten years beyond James Bond. I couldn’t accept Bond, but he was the big rage….that was my job. I had to experiment with things, I had to take one leap beyond James Bond. Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. took over The Human Torch’s slot in Strange Tales. Jack Kirby’s virtuoso machines and gadgets dominated this fast paced strip. From an impressive floating headquarters in the sky to souped up cars and mechanical duplicates, Kirby’s imagination never waned. The villains were a network of evil crime syndicates that gave Stan plenty of room to bring in the other heroes to help out. The series was custom made for cross-overs.

Neal was a high-school student and he remembers that “Dad needed a James Bond-type car and came to me (At that point in my life I was more interested in cars than girls). With just a little bit of research into my stack of Road and Track magazines, I found the perfect car, a Porsche 904D racer.”

“We knew we needed to go a step beyond machine guns hidden in headlights so we stuck some missiles in the fender wells and, of course, wheels that flip and whisk the car through the air.” Neal always loved cars and planes and filled his room with models. Jim Simon told me that though they weren’t close, he loved to visit with Neal just to see and play with his models.

Jack was doing more pages than ever before; he was juggling 5-6 strips plus all the covers and various layouts and plotting elements. His time was stretched and his visits to the office became rarer; his meetings with Stan fewer. “Well, I didn’t exactly work with Stan Lee. I worked at home and I wasn’t at the office much. I’d come in maybe once or twice a month to deliver my drawings. Stan Lee would usually be pretty busy, being the editor there, and I’d deliver my stuff and that would be all there was to it. I’d tell Stan Lee what the next story was going to be and I’d go home and do it.”

In the early 1960’s, a theory evolved wherein a film’s director, if the movie was personal enough should be considered the movie’s author. This concept, “Auteur Theory” named by critic Andrew Sarris started in the late 1950’s by the French New Wave school of filmaking that saw film as a means of personal expression. For this group, the film’s director controlled every aspect so that the final vision was seen as a singular viewpoint. They often considered Welles’ Citizen Kane as the first such movie, but perfected by Ingmar Bergman, Francois Truffaut, and Jean Renoir, and in America, by Alfred Hitchcock, John Ford, and up through Spielberg and Lucas. Others, like critic Pauline Kael thought this theory as too dictatorial, and ignorant of the true collaborative nature of film making, where the screeenwriters, cinematographer, and studio heads added in their two cents worth. Kael noted how Sven Nykvist was equally as important to Bergman’s film as the director at portraying the milieu. Notwithstanding who was right or wrong, we did see films entering a much more personal style as the directors took control of most facets of the films they made. Often the director’s name was as important as any cast member in selling the movie to both the studio and the public. Stanley Kubrick’s name was much more important than the actor’s seen in 2001, A Space Odyssey. Fans started following the artists rather than the characters and comic artists started demanding recognition.

In pop music, acts like the Beatles, Dylan and Beach Boys took over complete control of the production of their records, producing some of the most personal works of musical art ever. Rock music was entering the Auteur stage as songs became personal statements.

It was only a period of time to where comics were suddenly seen as personal productions rather than corporate mish mash. Perhaps it was Stan Lee’s thrusting of the creators to the fore that suddenly made them so important. Either way, suddenly a book with “by” Jack Kirby, or a Steve Ditko held its own cache, rather than the book’s characters or company name.

My own theory is that there is room for many theories and milieus. Just like novels, films, songs and comics, these media serve many different purposes. They can be pure entertainment, or deep philosophical treatises. I see no reason to try to pigeon hole the whole medium into one narrow theory. There’s room enough for a Teen Titans thrill ride, and a Steve Ditko political diatribe; a Kirby epic or a Jack Chick tract. I think proportionality plays a part as the roles seem to have changed over the years. Also there is an egg vs. chicken role as one must look as to where the original thought comes from. It seems that shortly after the series started, we see Jack take over the role of originator of the new stories and Lee simply added in dialogue blurbs after Jack had told the story. Does one consider the man who wrote up the dialogue blurbs in the silent films as the author, or the genius comedian who conceived and acted out the role? Personally a shared credit is fine to me.

A true rarity turned up when historian Nick Caputo questioned Stan Goldberg-a teen humor artist – about a questionable piece of art. Nick showed Stan the cover to Modeling With Millie # 45 Feb 1966. This featured a smiling facial shot of Millie that Nick had problems believing Stan had drawn. Stan’s eye lit up. Nick asked Stan if the face was drawn by someone else. With a twinkle in his eyes he say “Jack Kirby drew that face” This fortified Nick’s faith in his work as he had told others that he thought Jack Kirby had drawn this face. Stan told him that Stan Lee wasn’t happy with the original face and asked Jack to make a quick correction- something Stan says was not unusual. He said Jack even inked some work for a small book Stan Lee published on golf.

When Jack began drawing the Fantastic Four, his figural work was still in the naturalistic phase as seen in his westerns and romance stories. The people were realistic in proportion and his heroes tended towards scrawniness. Mr. Fantastic was downright skinny, but this sort of fit in with his stretching power. The Torch was a scrawny teenager, and The Invisible Girl was a slender model type, dressing in Jackie Kennedy clothes. Even Thor was more lithe than muscular. Only the monstrous characters, such as The Thing and the Hulk were huge and bulky. Within a year, Jack’s natural instincts and more personal style towards superheroes took over and they all started to bulk and buff up and become imposing as compared to regular humans. Sue, became more fit and curvaceous, but never zaftig, more Raquel Welsh than Jayne Mansfield. Jack regained his touch for extreme posing and foreshortening. Biceps became semi-circles rather than long arcs, and forearms looked more like Popeye with each new issue. Neal Adams would talk in awed terms of Kirby’s style of sinew as hard slashes and bold lines. He says “I couldn’t do that”. The difference between issue #1 and #10 of the FF is about thirty pounds of muscle per person. The Thing became bulkier and more defined, almost ripped as his hide became rocky and cracked.

Skinny heroes to super buff

Despite this added bulk, the characters were never stiff. They still had Kirby’s patented looseness, and fluidity. As the writing became sharper, so did Kirby’s details. The machinery and the backgrounds filled in with remarkable detail. The vistas became epic in scope. On the FF, Marvel’s flagship series, Dick Ayers maintained a natural, organic line over Kirby, never prettifying it or over embellishing, until #21 when George Roussos took over in a scratchier, over-wrought Golden Age style that made the work look dirty. Roussos could never come up with an acceptable Thing. It didn’t matter; nothing could hurt Kirby’s pencils. They were that strong and inspiring. Kirby had reached a point where his art was bulletproof. And more to the point, Marvel had reached a point where it became bulletproof. Chic Stone soon became the regular Kirby inker. He remembers how it began. “Just before 1964 I was pounding the pavement, going from one publisher to another, picking up jobs at random. At the time I was penciling Batman, and inking Superman covers for [editor] Mort Weisinger at DC. I happened to walk into the Marvel offices at the time [editor-in-chief] Stan Lee was editing a Kirby pencil job. Looking over his shoulder I was totally awestruck by the magnificent penciling. Stan looked at me and asked, ‘Chic, would you like to ink this?’ My knees turned to Jell-o; all I could murmur was, ‘You’re kidding?’ [After I turned in the assignment,] Stan was exceedingly pleased with my rendition of Jack’s work, and from that time on I would finish one job to have another waiting. There were times I’d be working on three stories at once; working 12 to 16 hours a day was not unusual. The page rate for inking was not that great, but being able to work on Jack’s pencils was a substantial bonus.”

In FF #28 (July, 1964) for the first time Stan Lee titled Jack Kirby as “the king” in the credit box. A title he would wear proudly, yet humbly the rest of his life. After a so-so start, Lee and Kirby had so enthused the readership to where anything they threw out was immediately accepted. The rise of Marvel had become irreversible. The media began to take notice of Marvel. The Village Voice ran an article in 1965. The “Super-Anti Hero in Forest Hills” spotlighted Spider-Man as an example of how the Marvel characters were the first super-heroes to evoke the “Real” world. Esquire magazine cover featured the Marvel line and listed the Hulk as one of 28 “people who count” on college campuses. The Wall Street Journal ran an article talking about how the new books had rejuvenated Goodman’s company.

Early in the super-heroes, Jack added a storytelling technique to the Marvel stories that was very effective. He would end his stories with a series of three small panels that wrapped up the emotional core and used the dramatics of changing perspectives that focused the readers on the emotional details. Colin Smith, in his blog called this epilogue Jack Kirby’s closing triptych. The main action has stopped, and the participants add their parting thoughts to the story. Note the close up progression that adds tension and focus and leads into the next story. These final 3 panels would often be the lead in to the next story. It actually replaced Stan’s preview blurbs. This concept started just as Jack started doing stories with serial continuation. I wouldn’t be surprised if Jack added this in response to Stan’s text pattern.

Leave ‘em wanting more

Marvel was an unstoppable tsunami overwhelming the competition. They had captured the minds of a new generation of reader, while holding on to the older, fannish base.

In early 1965, black firebrand Malcolm X had been exiled by Islam head Elija Muhammad. Originally a shining beacon, he was now called a traitor and during a speech he was cut down in a hail of bullets by his own people. In a bit of equipoise, Jack drew a story for Fantastic Four #37 where the duplicitous Skrull villain, an accepted national hero, is suddenly called a turncoat and killed by his own people. We know it is prescient or coincidental because Jack would have had to have drawn these months before the actual event. Sadly, for Malcolm X had recently undergone a transformation from bigoted, angry revolutionary to preaching a new peaceful and optimistic resolution of our race problem.  Following a transformative visit to Mecca, Malcolm X stated; “The true brotherhood I had seen had influenced me to recognize that anger can blind human vision,” he said. “America is the first country… that can actually have a bloodless revolution.” In the FF story, Reed noted as the enemies reach a new cohabitation. “Perhaps we’re not really so different from other…either on Earth…or in the endless void of space! And the days all of mankind realizes that lesson–we shall come a step closer to brotherhood– and Universal peace!” Malcolm X’s spoke of his own act of prophesy just 2 days before his death. “It is a time for martyrs now, and if I am to be one, it will be for the cause of brotherhood. That’s the only thing that can save this country.”

To the comic buyer, there was Marvel and then everyone else. Kirby had a new secure home, and he built it himself from the ground up. The paint job and the drapes were Stan Lee, but the foundation was pure Kirby. Unfortunately, the salesperson was also Stan Lee, and therein laid the first cracks in the foundation.

Previous – 17. The House That Jack Built | Top | Next – 19. Spider-man: The Case For Kirby

Previous – 16. Kirby’s Kosmic Mystery | Contents | Next – 18. New Beginnings

We’re honored to be able to publish Stan Taylor’s Kirby biography here in the state he sent it to us, with only the slightest bit of editing. – Rand Hoppe

THE HOUSE THAT JACK BUILT

The young black man from Louisville had become a man. As a teenager he had thrown his life and talent towards boxing. He rose through the ranks of amateur boxing to reach the heights. In late 1960 he defeated a Polish fighter to win the gold medal in the 1960 Olympics. Flush with success, he became a professional and rose undefeated towards national acclaim. Yet his heart was still dark. He returned a conquering hero to the deep South only to find that he was unwelcome to sleep in white’s only hotels, and to face white street gangs. In disgust, Cassius Clay threw his gold medal into the Ohio River. He sought out inner peace and understanding by attending religious speeches by the emerging Nation of Islam. He met that young firebrand named Malcolm X. and was soon taking lessons in the Islam religion. He found peace and a purpose in his new religion.

After the horror of his time at DC, Jack sought peace and a new resolve at Atlas, he found his purpose at Atlas. After a couple months doing space opera, he embraced the new style post-atomic BEM story. The Atlas monsters were powerful, and plentiful. Once Jack settled into the Atlas fantasy books, the monsters were endless; 3 or 4 a month, for a couple years with odd names like Googam, Monstro, and Grottu, or simpler like Sandman, Colossus, or Hulk; many names that would be reused at a later date. The six fantasy titles soon were reduced to four totally interchangeable titles. Journey Into Mystery, Strange Tales, Tales to Astonish and Tales of Suspense all opened with Kirby monsters tales, and Kirby covers. They were loud, colorful and eye-catching. Every issue’s cover was a beautiful monster poster reaching out from the newsstands grabbing those dimes from the grubby little fingers of kids returning empty bottles for 2 cents deposit.

The formula was easy; big monster in the center surrounded by humans scurrying away in fear. Kirby remembered: “The monster books gave me the opportunity to draw things out of the ordinary. Monster books were a challenge–what kind of monster would fascinate people? I couldn’t draw anything that was too outlandish or too terrible. I never did that. What I did draw was something intriguing. There was something about this monster that you could live with. If you saw him, you wouldn’t faint dead away. There was nothing disgusting in his demeanor. There was nothing about him that repelled you. My monsters were lovable monsters. I gave them names and some were good. They made sales, and that’s always been my prime object in comics. I had to make sales in order to keep myself working. And so I put all the ingredients in that would pull in sales. It’s always been that way.”

Atlas as a company was still reeling from the forced downsizing, with only 8 titles a month there was no way to get traction. Goodman wanted comics done on the cheap, and that’s what he got. They continued to cut page rates until many artists would no longer work for them. But by 1960, they seemed to right the ship, or at least find a balance. The work force had been cut to the bone, but the core of pros left was very flexible and could fill many roles. So they each got an acceptable amount of work. But they were not equals, people like Don Heck, and Dick Ayers and even Steve Ditko filled in their penciling work by inking, while Jack Kirby‘s role as lead penciler kept expanding. The 7-8 page opening story grew to 12-13 pages, plus Kirby was given romance, and back-up western, and war stories.

Atlas must have been happy; Kirby’s storytelling was always PG. His horrors weren’t horrible. His monsters were gruesome without being gory, his heroes never had erections at the wrong time (or the right time) and his heroines, no matter how busty never had costume malfunctions. It seems the Comics Code had no effect on Jack Kirby. Kirby wanted to entertain, not shock.

Stan Lee was working with a smaller crew, paying less for work, and he was still despondent. It seems that without fail every month or so, Martin Goodman is threatening to close down the comic division. Stan’s office is now a small cubbyhole at the end of a long corridor, as far from Martin Goodman as possible. Jack Kirby didn’t become the dominant force because Stan suddenly realized his genius; Jack became dominant because he offered Stan what Stan needed most—time and product, plus his comics sold better than the others.

Dick Ayers says that during one of the down times, Stan Lee called him into the office and told him that the industry was all but finished, and that they needed to jump the sinking ship. Dick says he took Stan at his word and quit. He found a new job with the Post Office. Once again Stan let many of his people go like Al Williamson, Jack Davis, John Forte, and Joe Sinnott. Long time inker Chris Rule was let go. Downgraded were pencillers like Vince Colletta to an inker along with people like Steve Ditko, and Don Heck who took on inking jobs to fill it their income. Soon, Stan called Dick and asked him if he would help out by inking some of Kirby’s stories, that plus occasional filler stories brought back Dick to the fold; another legend born of need.

During this Atlas’ mini-implosion, production man Sol Brodsky was let go. He wound up as founding editor for a new humor magazine Cracked. Cracked was another in a long line of Mad Magazine clones, this time published by slick magazine publisher Robert Sproul’s Major Publishing. Sol hired many of the Atlas cast-offs, such as Al Williamson, Bill Everett, Syd Shores, and Al Jaffee. Sol managed to get Jack Kirby to provide one story. It appeared in the 14th issue dated June 1960. It was a 5-page spoof of the then popular TV panel shows such as “What’s My Line” Jack’s caricatures are spot-on, and he was again doing Hollywood Kirby style. Jack used duo shade paper for added shading tones, giving a more commercial art effect to the drawings. It’s unknown why Kirby only produced the one story—perhaps Stan Lee wasn’t happy with the moonlighting for Sol.

Though Stan had fewer titles to produce, he also had almost no support people, plus he was no longer buying scripts from outside sources, so Stan was forced to write much more than he was used to. While Stan focused on the teen humor titles and a few creepy fantasy stories for Steve Ditko, for the adventure titles, he turned most of the fantasy writing over to his brother, Larry Lieber. This only worked because Jack Kirby was able to plot most of his own stories, and it showed. Jack’s tales had a formula and feel all their own. The themes, and plot elements were often borrowed from fantasy themes and concepts he had done at DC or Harvey—sentient robots, mythological beings like the Roc, or Rock Men from Easter Island, childlike aliens, all made new appearances at Atlas; radio astronomers and personality changes taken from Sky Masters; and mutants, sorcerers, and inter-dimensional travel galore reoccurred frequently, and of course, recent movies. Jack recalls; “Monster and superstition stories were a necessary thing. Comic historian Nick Caputo has studied them. “The Yellow Claw stories have stylistic traits that point to Kirby as writer. Each story opens with a prologue, something Kirby used in later stories he wrote himself in the 1970s. There are other traits as well, but I’m fairly certain that Kirby initially wrote his own stories at Atlas, and many early ones when he returned in 1959”. Sometime later he began working over Leiber scripts, although how much he may have changed in the pencil stage is undetermined.” Many of the monster stories share the same confessional nature as his romance stories. Titles like “I Created Mechano” and “I Was a Decoy for Pildor,” personalized and humanized the stories. Jack says: “I enjoyed producing them. The work was fun and I could come up with new ones very quickly. They were easy to do and the fan mail was very good. Although they weren’t as challenging as the other stories I had done, they gave me a chance to work out a few ideas.” The filler stories penned by Lieber and drawn by Heck or Reinman were more in the space opera mode reminiscent of pre-Atomic sci-fi. And the Lee/Ditko closing story had a creepier, more ironic style similar to the TV show Twilight Zone that was taking the watchers by storm. Another factor that made Kirby so valuable was that Kirby’s pencils, even when stretched to the limit, were still tight enough for these artists/inkers to finish easily. The pencils were tight enough to follow but not so tight that the inkers couldn’t add in and embellish with their own techniques. Dick Ayers explained that when he once simply traced a Kirby western that Stan called him in and made it plain that he wanted the inkers to add in their personalities. “Do with Kirby’s westerns what you do with the monster stories! If I wanted someone to trace Kirby’s penciling I’d hire anyone off the street! More important, Kirby’s stories were just so much better. The action was unparalleled, and the covers unrivaled. The loss of Joe Maneely must have been a huge personal blow to Stan, but as luck would have it, Kirby’s personal problems at DC landed an even more productive creator into Stan’s lap. Stan had a stallion and this horse wanted to run. After the DC debacle, Kirby had every reason to want to shine for Atlas.

Silly yes, but they sold

On the adventure strips, Stan had left Kirby alone or partnered with his brother Larry Lieber, but the romance titles were Stan’s bailiwick, and when Stan assigned Kirby to the romance books they were suddenly partnered. It is there that Stan and Jack began to work out a method to maximize both talents. It was common at S&K’s studio for the writers and artists to have story conferences where they all traded forth ideas and stories. It became unnecessary for a writer to supply a complete script since the artists already knew the plotline. The pacing of the story was also left up to the artist rather than the writer to work the story into the page count needed for the comic. This was followed by adding in dialogue. This was how Kirby produced thousands of stories back in the days of the S&K studios. Very quickly Stan’s and Jack’s work practice became the Simon and Kirby model. This allowed Stan to write and edit more books due to not having to pace out all the stories for the artists. After they discussed the stories, Jack would draw them and Stan would then dialogue them according to Kirby’s panel structures, and the bare plot. The Marvel Method, as it became known as, was simply the Simon and Kirby method, placing a large amount of responsibility on the artist to tell the story within the editor’s parameters. As Walter Geier had described it at Mainline; ‘They were Jack’s plots. I just supplied the dialogue”. It also freed up Stan for more stories.

In a moment of clarity Stan Lee admitted; “Mine was the task of originating the basic concept, and then writing the dialogue…However, I’ve long been privileged to collaborate with some of the most talented artists of all, artists who would take my rough-hewn plots and refine them into the illustrated stories…Heading the list of such artists…is Jack Kirby.

Don Heck had returned to Marvel at the same time as Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko. He recalled one difference; “I’d been so used to working from scripts, but when I returned to Marvel Stan said, “I’m going to give you a synopsis.”  Jack Kirby was used to something like that because he was also a writer.  Some people might not have liked the stuff he did later, but he did some terrific stuff with all of his different characters, like back when he was doing Fighting American and all the rest of his early stuff so it was easy for him.”  …”After a while Stan Lee used to give you the first three pages, tell you who the character was fighting, and give you the last couple of pages so you’d know how it ended. And in between you’d put about fifteen page of stuff.  And at the time, I thought, “Oh, my God! This’ll never work!” ….. “It’s a freer way of working.”

It was during this monster phase that an unusual thing happened. Sales began to rise, and management took notice. The most amazing was that it wasn’t happening at DC, Dell, or the other companies. The idea of expansion became possible.

Borrowing from Prize       Credits appear a new team

It’s not surprising that several romance stories at Atlas were knock-offs of Kirby romance stories from Prize.

In early 1960, Martin Goodman cancelled a long running western title and asked for a new one. Wyatt Earp had run for 29 issues starting in 1955, based on the real life lawman made popular due to movies and a TV show starring the dashing Hugh O’Brian. The early issues were drawn by an assortment of Atlas regulars, Joe Maneely, John Severin, and Norman Maurer, but by issue ten Dick Ayers came along and made it his own. It was one of the few titles that survived the implosion unscathed. While other titles relied on inventoried stories, Dick Ayers continued creating new stories for Wyatt Earp. Jack Kirby started providing covers with issue #22. Issue #25’s cover featured the first collaboration of Jack Kirby and Dick Ayers on the inks. Issue #29, dated June 1960 was its last. Though the TV show would last thru 1961, the comic title had run its course, perhaps due to an over abundance of Earp titles from other companies. Dick Ayers, who had been on this strip longest, lamented as to how he was being paid less in 1959 as it ended then he was in ‘56, when he started.

The new title was to be The Rawhide Kid. This was an update of an earlier Atlas cowboy title, which was caught in the implosion crunch. The Kid was one of dozens of generic cowboy heroes that Atlas published in the 50’s. All of them seemed to be a “kid” of some sort. Dick Ayers was told by Stan Lee that he would be the artist on the new series. Dick was thrilled to be given a new book so soon after the last one was cancelled. Things had been tight for the Ayers family with Dick struggling with filler strips and the low paying inking jobs over Kirby. He says that one day he ran into Jack Kirby while delivering some Sky Masters pages and told Kirby how excited he was about getting the Kid gig. Kirby paid him for the SM pages, congratulated him on the Kid and made his leave. What happened next is pure conjecture. In his bio, Dick Ayers says that later he gets a call from Stan Lee. “Dick? Stan here, I have to tell you…I’m having Kirby pencil the Rawhide Kid and you do the inking. You’ll make Jack’s western look real good!”

The Rawhide Kid by Jack and Dick     Cobra looking for Thor?

If true, one certainly can’t blame Dick for feeling that way, but the reality is that only Stan Lee could make that call. Kirby had no sway over Stan to get assignments. He was a freelancer just like Ayers and the others. But is it possible that armed with the knowledge of a new title, that Kirby went into Stan’s office and made a winning pitch for a different type of western, one more to Kirby’s style; a more entertaining approach; perhaps a tossed bone to stop Kirby from working for Sol over at Cracked Magazine. Stan was certainly happy with Kirby’s results. It’s very possible, and if true, it shows another facet to Kirby’s Atlas tenure. Jack’s new ability to pitch ideas to Stan and Stan’s willingness to follow Kirby’s lead would become important. But this shouldn’t shock anyone; Jack says that he had been pitching ideas to Stan from the very beginning; a return for super-heroes as an example. “I felt I had to regenerate things. I began to build a new line of super-heroes…I was at the stage now where I had to fight for those things and I did. I had to regenerate the entire line. “I felt that there was nobody there that was qualified to do it” Jack told Will Eisner in an interview.

Tom Spurgeon and Jordan Rafael in their book Stan Lee and the Rise and Fall of the American Comic Book talks about the genesis of Lee/Kirby partnership.

“By audaciously combining genres and ignoring the limitations that had settled in on the super-hero, Lee and Kirby were free to foist on their readership a fantasy setting better realized than anything that had come before in the American comic book. Lee and Kirby were presiding over the kind of world-building that would become commonplace in movies and television.”

Stan and Jack never really pointed out the specific influences that went into creating this new universe, It’s hard to even know if they had a big picture, or if it grew organically as they went along, but I suspect they did not go into it without some blueprint and yes it was a world-building template taken from TV. In the late 1950’s television was dominated by a series of shows unlike any produced before. They shared a studio, they shared a producer, they shared a writer and they shared a personal vision. These were the shows produced by Warner Bros. Television Division and watched over by William T. Orr, and Roy Huggins. They came in two distinct genres. The western genre was covered by Cheyenne, Maverick, Lawman, Sugarfoot, Colt 45, and the Alaskans. And then there were the modern day detective/adventure stories as found in 77 Sunset Strip, Bourbon Street Beat, Surfside 6 and Hawaiian Eye. What was unique was the irreverent tone, the personal bickering, romance, the self-deprecating humor, and the odd little insertions of pop culture. They also shared a self-contained universe where they would cross-over into each other’s shows.

Roy Huggins explains how he built up Cheyenne by recycling scripts from Warner Brothers movies such as Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), often simply inserting the character of Cheyenne Bodie (Clint Walker) into familiar stories from the studio vaults. These elements brought the series a sense of gravitas and a measure of respect as an “adult” western, as opposed to the typical sing-a-song, shoot-em-up, and kiss the horse goodnight, and made it the studio’s first full-fledged hit. Similarly Stan and Jack energized Rawhide Kid by recycling old S&K western stories and old Atlas western stories plus added in a more modern sense of character and morality.

As with all success, the mimics are sure to follow. Huggin’s westerns were so successful that soon every studio was pumping out copies. The most successful was probably The Rebel, starring Nick Adams as Johnny Yuma, a troubled, brooding ex-Confederate soldier trying to find peace in a fractured post war country.

Nick Adams was short in stature, and insecure in his image, a factor that he felt kept him from superstardom. As Johnny Yuma, he was a fast to anger avenger, bent on seeing justice is done for the oppressed. The tales are as gritty as would be found on TV.

It is with The Rawhide Kid that for the first time we get to see the evolving Lee/Kirby symbiosis in action. In a pattern that would play out repeatedly over the next few years we see the two talents blending in a specific template. Kirby supplying much of the plotting, in fact, the origin gimmick is a direct retelling of the origin of Bullseye, the Simon/Kirby western scout of a couple years earlier. The series also borrowed heavily from the Rebel TV series. A young orphan named Johnny Bart is taken in by an older relative who teaches him to become the best shot in the west. When the relative is murdered in a cowardly fashion, the young man goes after the villains and avenges the murder. Later, both Bullseye and the Rawhide Kid are mistakenly branded as outlaws, so they must travel a lonely road, avoiding the law and evildoers as well. The Kid’s short stature, and shorter fuse, is also used to good effect and his image never matches the reality; an aspect used effectively on The Rebel.

What is also apparent is that the Rawhide Kid has more personality than Bullseye. Like Johnny Yuma his back story has more drama, and more pathos than found in earlier Simon/Kirby characters. He shows regret, and longing, and my god does he talk to himself. This is not a stoic Kirby hero, this is a brooding emotional volcano. The dialogue is snappier, the back story more developed, and the pacing a bit slower and more dramatic. The stories are more complex and dramatic. We see a true blending of talents, one making up for the weakness of the other. Stan was never really good with big picture concepts, while Kirby, in his adventure tales was never strong in the small, personality traits, and human interactions that make for a more fulfilling story. Much like the best blending of lyricist and tunesmiths, the sum was stronger than the individual parts.

Likewise early on John Lennon and Paul McCartney began collaborating on writing songs. They would cut school and head over to Paul’s house where they would exchange lyrics and work out basic tunes on the piano. Many of the songs they wrote between this time and when Beatlemania began to take off in 1963, were co-written equally; as Paul said, ‘eyeball to eyeball’. Compositions from this period include ‘She loves You’, ‘There’s A Place’, ‘From Me To You’, ‘Thank You Girl’, ‘I’ll Get You’, ‘I Wanna Be Your Man’, ‘Little Child’ and ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’. John explained “All the better songs that we have written – the ones that anybody wants to hear – those were co-written. Sometimes half the words are written by me and he’ll finish them off. We go along a word each, practically.” Individual qualities become obvious; McCartney’s easy going harmonies, and John’s cutting iconoclastic personality, but the finished product has its own flavor and feeling blending both influences seamlessly creating its own oeuvre.

Rawhide Kid #17 had a cover date of Aug. 1960. Kirby would provide 3 stories and 18 pages for this new title. This was Kirby’s first cover to cover comic at Atlas, since the pre-implosion days. This time the series would continue for 19 years. Kirby would slip in sci-fi bits, and pseudo-super-heroics in the series, just as he did in Bullseye. Later adventures would also swipe from other Kirby plots, but often they would steal plots directly from the Rebel TV series. Stan assigned Dick Ayers to maintain a oughhewn look to the inking. The team was set. Jack needed some more work.

First issue #17 I’m confused              Rawhide Kid origin looks mighty familiar

One of the few comic companies not bothered by the 50’s Wertham witch hunt was Gilberton Publishing. They had been publishing Classics Illustrated since 1941 and never a discouraging word was heard. They were a class act putting out clean literate comic book adaptations of classic literature, a young man’s best friend when in need of a quick book report. But they were also somewhat stodgy and hard to deal with due to their desire for historical accuracy and obeisance to the source material. Kirby started working there in late 1960 doing a long 45 pg. adaptation of The Last Days of Pompeii. He followed this with 25 or so pages on the Civil War for a Classics illustrated Special. It’s easy to see Kirby’s natural inclinations being muzzled by the strict grid layout and need for accurate details like clothing and architecture. The artwork lacks any sizzle, and even the inking by Dick Ayers is muted and dull. The presentation more resembled a text book than a comic. Gilberton was not a good match for Jack, whose strength was in improvisation and spontaneity, but it filled in a couple hundred pages of Jack’s time. Kirby also supplied some filler material for several issues of Classics factual series World Around Us. The best work he did for Gilberton was some spot illustrations for a Guy de Maupassant short story, The Duel. This appeared in issue #30 of World Around Us titled Undersea Adventures. Strangely, the story has nothing to do with any undersea adventure. It is about boastfulness, cowardice, lost honor and a subsequent suicide, a very depressing and dark story for a Gilberton comic. Kirby used a very heavy, almost woodcut style, that added to the weighty subject. A discouraged Jack left Gilberton very quickly.

Jack broke out the heavy pencil     typical Classic’s panel

Besides the monster tales in 4 books, Jack now had a couple romance titles, a complete western title (18+ pages) plus the odd back-up western story, another nice rebound from a down period. Stan Lee had been true to his word and given Kirby all the work he could, and in return, Atlas was getting a personality facelift. And that facelift was thanks to Jack Kirby. Atlas books had taken on a rugged, powerful and easily recognizable product look, and sales were slowly growing. Atlas had become a recognizable brand. The next attempt at something new was different. Looking back, it could be called a failure, but it was the first faltering step leading to what would become an onslaught.

In late 1960, the eyes of the industry were turned inward. The .10 cent retail price of a comic had held steady for 30 years. Yet the price of raw materials, labor and shipping had gone up. Dell Comics, whose kid centric books made them an industry leader decided to make a change. They decided to raise the cover price to .15 cents an issue. This fifty percent increase shocked the industry; many saw only bad things following. The owners of Dell sent a letter to retailers and selected magazines to help the public to understand.

BY WILLIAM F. CALLAHAN, Jr.,
Executive Vice President, Dell Publishing Co., Inc.

“Dell To Back The New 15 (cent) Comic Price With The Biggest Nationwide Consumer TV And Radio Advertising And Promotion Campaign In History!” In 1929, when Dell Publishing first introduced the four color comic – at 10 cents – candy bars, cokes and ice cream cones were 5 cents. Hamburgers and yoyos were 10 cents and cigerettes and movies were 15 cents. Today every one of these items has at least doubled or tripled in price.” EVERYTHING’S UP BUT COMICS!

“Yet the comic alone of all these popular items has remained at a dime. This despite the fact that kids’ allowances have increased to keep pace with higher prices. The average weekly allowance in 1939 a week – and nowadays the going rate for doing odd jobs and babysitting is at least 25 cents an hour. Meanwhile paper and printing costs have gone up…you are paying much higher salaries and overhead – in other words, the time has come, indeed it is long overdue, for the comics to be put on a more profitable basis. We feel that Dell, as the leader in the comics field, should take the first step. Since 1929, Dell Comics have published well over 5 billion copies. WALT DISNEY COMICS alone passed the one billion mark last year! In sales dollars and cents comics are a $5,000,000 a year business – a big money industry. Yet the publisher, the distributor and the newsdealer are no longer reaping commensurate profits. Therefore, Dell, the leader of the comics field, is taking the initiative to improve your profit picture and to put new life in comic sales. Effective December 15 (1960), all new Dell comics will be raised to 15 cents. In a few months all Dell Comics will be selling at the more profitable price. This means 1 1/2 cents more for you on every Dell comic sold -a whopping 60 percent increase in profits! Better yet – this new 15 cent price will give you a 26.6 percent margin of profit – a greater profit than you now make not only on 10 cent comics, but on any periodical you sell! We are convinced that customers will continue to buy our comics at 15 cents. Dell’s world-famous “character” comics have been the backbone of the comic industry since comics began – the famous Walt Disney family, the Warner Bros family, Little Lulu, Tarzan – and the more recent TV sensations, Huckleberry Hound and Yogi Bear. These and many more television and movie comics are the PRE-SOLD favorites which have become household words to both parents and children, appearing exclusively in Dell Comics. They are certainly powerful enough to command the increase in price!”

”We are confident that this new profit picture for publisher, distributor and dealer will help stimulate a whole new attitude toward the handling of comics. It was only ten years ago that paperbacks were all 25 cents and lumped together indiscriminately. Today best-selling paperback titles are handled as individual items of merchandise, priced two or three times higher, and paperback profits are soaring accordingly. The same revolution is now due for comics. They too are “books” and should get the individual treatment they deserve. Dell Comics tested the 15 cent cover price on the West Coast last year. In some areas sales increased…in others there was a decrease. We learned from this test that a major promotion campaign would assure its complete success. Therefore, Dell Comics has prepared a mammoth comics advertising-promotion campaign, the like of which has never been seen in this industry. Detailed plans will be announced shortly. The period of price change is the time of challenge – the time to get to work for greater profits! Give your 15 cent comics prime space… set up better-than-ever comic displays… promote the pre-sold characters to the kids, and the high-quality of the Dell Comics to the parents… play up the TV tie-in titles and movie hits… reorder the best sellers… show off Dell comics for what they are… there’s no better buy for 15 cents in your store today!”

William Callahan was an optimist! And he was wrong.

That’s about as good a face one might make for a 50% increase. It has been speculated that the Dell price increase was a major failure; one from which they would not recover. Dell had been the dominant company, yet when the price increased, sales fell horribly. Some consider this one reason for Marvels rise as buyers were actively looking elsewhere to spend their dimes. DC and Marvel split the difference and raised their prices to .12 by late 1961. Dell continued the .15 price for a year, and then dropped it to .12 when the other companies raised theirs. This led to interfamily problems between Dell and partner Gold Key that drove them to separate, thus increasing the decline of Dell and the Gold Key comic lines. They also failed to notice the genre changes happening in 1961. They were no longer major players by the mid-sixties. It has been said that the sales of the .15 centers was so bad that their scarcity puts them into a whole different ballpark for collectors.

In late 1960, the United States elected the youngest President in history. This would end a long 8 year stretch of psychic stagnation and re-energize the country.

A bad beginning     Beatles take Germany

The end of 1960, maybe as late as Jan. 1961, Stan ordered up a new title. Amazing Adventures was by all appearances, another generic Atlas monster title. It would feature the ubiquitous Kirby monster on the cover, and a Kirby lead story, a 13 pager with monsters like, Torr, Manoo, Robot X, and Monsteroso. But tucked away in the back pages, a new recurring character appeared. Doctor Droom was the new ongoing heroic character. He was a master of the occult and mysticism. Like any number of earlier characters he received his powers as a bequeathment from an old lama, slowly dying in his monastery in the Himalayas. This take off of the novel/movie Lost Horizon is not particularly original; Kirby had used a Shangri-la type locale in stories of every genre along the way. The hero, Anthony Droom is an American doctor who is compelled to treat a dying Tibetan lama. But first he must pass some rigorous and frightful tests. Once he passes the tests, he meets the lama, who explains that he was brought here to take up the mantle of protector against the evil forces of the occult. The first story, the origin issue is ok, especially thanks to some interesting effects by inker Steve Ditko. At the end Dr. Droom is transformed from a normal white American to a bald Asian with heavy eyeliner. With each new issue, the stories floundered and failed. The biggest problem is that this battler of the occult never meets any occult villains. The villains of his tales are an underground alien civilization, an alien hidden among men trying to gain political power, and another alien visitor who is defeated by a demolition ball. Dr. Droom’s only obvious power is that of hypnotism, as that is how he conquers the bad guys. This failure of imagination and promise is unlike anything seen from Kirby. And it appears that Kirby is solely to blame here. There is no evidence in the plotting or dialogue of any Stan Lee influence. This seems to have been a solo Kirby project, with perhaps some assistance from Larry Lieber. The premise is interesting enough, and Kirby could do occult and mysticism, but he was caught up in his Atlas alien monster sci-fi mode and couldn’t break free. This can also be seen in some other tales dealing with sorcerers, like in the first Challengers story where though the villain is a sorcerer, the actual tale is straight sci-fi. But a series built on the premise of magic and evil darkness can’t survive without actual magic. But once again we see evidence that Stan Lee allowed Jack Kirby the freedom to try new concepts on his own. Dr. Droom is considered by most historians as the first Marvel super-hero, though others disagree since he showed no real powers other than hypnotism.

On Feb. 25, 1961, the last daily of Sky Masters was published. Jack’s newspaper strip career ended. Jack cobbles a story from pre-existing art and the strip limps home.

Jack was again producing at breakneck speed. The monsters continued; even diapered ones. Roz would tell of Jack’s routine of starting around noon and working almost non-stop til 4-5 in the morning, with the occasional all-nighter where she would awaken at 7:30 and find the other side of the bed vacant. She would physically go to Kirby and force him to go to bed, yet after just a few hours of sleep; Jack was back up and at the board. Jack was busy, but never too busy to ignore family. Weekends would find them at the beach or Coney Island. Every year they would take a couple weeks vacation to Aunt Anita’s in Liberty, New York. On odd weekends, family members would visit their home in Long Island to get out of the city. Uncle Dave was like a second father to the kids; visiting almost every weekend, taking Neal fishing, or Susan to the zoo. It was a close family. Kirby never missed a family affair, whether it be a kids birthday or a school project that required parental assistance. Kirby used to wow the elementary kids by drawing caricatures and funny pictures for them. The one great advantage of working at home.

Life on the road for a band was tough, the hours were killers. Paul remembers his time in Germany when the English kids were set free from their grey boring British middle class upbringing. “Most important was sex…was one of the first things ’cause we were kids just let off the leash, you know. And then there was like, the amount of music we played — we played — the sheer amount of music. Some evenings I think we probably…we played eight hour periods ’cause you’d come on and another band would take an hour and you’d take an hour, so we probably played four hours but we had to stretch it over an eight hour period. And that’s an awful long time, man, to play.”

Despite the learning experience the hoped for breaks didn’t come. They returned to England and returned as just another house band.

Previous – 16. Kirby’s Kosmic Mystery | top | Next – 18. New Beginnings