This cover was Kirby’s return to Thor after five years, and he definitely came back swinging, if you’ll pardon the pun. I wonder if he’d been watching some old Harryhausen movies prior to drawing this?
Disagreement on sources as to the inker here. Kirby Checklist has Mike Esposito, and the GCD, via frequent commenter Nick, has Frank Giacoia. I’m leaning towards Giacoia. Are there any indisputable Esposito inks on 1970s Kirby to compare?
Published 1975
To me, it looks almost like Gil Kane did some retouching in there… mainly the arms.
There are areas of the cover that remind of Romita’s inks over Kirby but the brushwork doesn’t seem quite right for Romita. I’m guessing Giacoia inked that piece.
Someone certainly significantly redrew the Thor figure…
The cover pencils appeared in JKC at one point. I believe the only change was some retouching on Thor’s arms (I think Kirby drew Thor’s Hammer in his right hand) apparently correcting by Giacoia in the inking stage. Yes, I believe this is Giacoia inks. Esposito did ink some Kirby covers. Avengers # 148 (?) the Squadron Supreme cover and a few Machine Man’s.
I’m sure Kirby was inspired by Harryhausen.
Nick Caputo
The inking of the cape and the “shine” lines on the bridge show an uncertainty I don’t associate with Giacoia. It reminds of some of Esposito’s mid 70s inking on things like MOKF. I’d also have thought Romita had done something to the face, presented with this cold.
This was when Marvel cared about Comics.
I can’t say that now.
I’m not as much an expert as some folks in the discussion, but based on the right hand and the styling of the muscalature on the arms, I’d venture to say that Buscema did the inks. Wasn’t he pencilling Thor at the time? Anyway, I could be wrong.