Category: Comic Books

A Tale of Suspense! A Tale to Astonish! A Strange Tale!

As a sensitive 10-year-old kid, the first time I saw Jack Kirby’s art it looked, well, scary. As I liked to tell my dearly departed buddy Joe Sinnott, his “friendly faces” on Kirby’s art got me started buying the Fantastic Four.

My first comic book from the Marvel Comics Group was Daredevil #19. It was drawn by John Romita, who had previously worked for DC, drawing romance comics. In hindsight, this made the art less intimidating for me.

Daredevil #19, 1966, John Romita (penciler), Frank Giacoia (inker).

As a kid I thought of Stan Lee as a sort of Walt Disney, but saying that to anyone in Hollywood would have, at best, elicited a loud laugh. I say “at best” because that would have at least meant the person laughing knew who Stan Lee was. Much more likely would have been a puzzled expression and “who?” Forty years later, after Disney bought Marvel, that’s where Joe Sinnott’s retirement money came from. Joe would joke with me that he’d finally arrived as a Disney artist.

For most of my life, the question of who did what in creating the MCU (Marvel Comics Universe), as it’s now called, was a topic of heated debate only among comic book fans and the True Believers of the M.M.M.S. (Merry Marvel Marching Society). How times have changed. The New Yorker is weighing in with an historical analysis. I haven’t read it yet, so I don’t know what conclusions it reaches.

Getting Back to Getting Rid of

Yesterday I received my copy of Atlas at War!, an excellent collection of pre-Marvel war comics. The book includes six stories illustrated by Joe Sinnott, whose passing continues to sadden me.

I am enjoying the Atlas war book, and the recently released Marvel mini-comics book, and the new CD compilation of psychedelic singles from the defunct White Whale record label. I am looking forward to an upcoming graphic novel illustrated by Colleen Doran and, most of all, a companion book to Peter Jackson’s long-anticipated re-release of Let It Be in a greatly expanded edition.

But I have a problem with all of this enjoyment by acquisition. It goes back to everything I had to do after my father’s death, nearly three years ago. One part of that was the monumental amount of work clearing everything out of the house. It was a painful process, from first shipping the items that were wanted by my siblings, through making the threat of legal action to get money from the company that ran the estate sale. Dealing with the Kia dealership in Peoria, Arizona that bought my father’s 2014 Soul was a comparable nightmare.

My point is that, being an old retired guy, I want to begin the process of de-cluttering my possessions and, in turn, my life. Buying more stuff isn’t the way to do that.