A New York City street renamed in honor of Jack Kirby?
Joe Sinnott said Stan Lee struggled with the introduction of Black Panther in Fantastic Four #52. Was it because of the potential controversy resulting from having a black leading character in Marvel Comics? Nope, it was simply that Stan kept changing his mind about the character’s costume. Full face mask like Spider-Man, or a half-mask like Captain America? Short cape or no cape?
There is little to go on, regarding the influence that Jack’s stint at the Fleischer animation studio in New York had on his later work. But I can infer something from the fact that, besides Kirby, Carl Barks, Walt Kelly and Hank Ketcham all had animation studio experience.
It started with me sending Denro this picture of an album I saw on display at Newbury Comics. The late and very great Joe Sinnott, Bing’s #1 fan, would have been pleased to see a new Crosby record in 2025.
The topic quickly switched to something else from long ago, when Denro replied that he had just purchased a new record he spotted at a Barnes & Noble.
It’s a soundtrack of It’s a Wonderful Life that I heretofore didn’t know existed. Denro said the album was originally released as a CD that is no longer available.
The CD information at that link includes this warning…
Do not be fooled by any other CDs that purport to be the original soundtrack for this film – they are all bootlegs and contain dialogue, sound effects and music right off the film itself. This is the first release of the real deal.
… a warning that is easily confirmed.
The album Denro bought is also available as a new CD release.
The soundtrack is on Amazon as an MP3 for $9, so I bought that. I would have sprung for a CD copy, but the liner notes are available on the Kritzerland page.
This music cue is called “Love Sequence”. It reminds me of the music that Tiomkin composed for Capra’s Lost Horizon, produced ten years before It’s a Wonderful Life.
My favorite aspect of It’s a Wonderful Life is the contrast that’s drawn between Mary and Violet, who I see as the most interesting character in the movie. It’s easy to infer what Violet originally had in mind for her evening’s fun, before her attempt at seducing George, and it’s certainly intended for mature audiences. “We’ll wait for you, baby.”
Most “hour” network TV shows are now about 40 minutes long. So is this survey of Fantastic Four comic book covers from the legendary Lee-Kirby run on the title. More than half of the issues were inked by my dearly departed pal, Joe Sinnott, who returned to the series in issue #44, after inking Jack’s art for the introduction of Doctor Doom in issue #5.
I went there not knowing that a couple of years ago the museum hosted a comic book event. The computer voice in this brief video mispronounces Haverhill. The “have” should sound like “cave,” and the second “h” is mostly silent.
The museum’s library has a nice selection of comic book related items, including the gigantic volume “The Stan Lee Story” that was published by Tashen shortly after Stan’s death in 2018.
This is the original art for that cover, owned by some fortunate and presumably well-heeled person.
Cover to Fantastic Four #59, 1966, by Kirby/Sinnott
A member of the Comic Book Historians group on Facebook posted this excellent article about the production of the 1966 Marvel Super-Heroes cartoons. It was published in the short-lived “The World of Comic Art.”
