Category: Comic Books

Denro’s promise to Sin Not!

Do my cataract replacement lenses deceive me, or is that D.F. Rogers hanging out at the home of none other than Marvel Comics legend Joe Sinnott?

Joe Sinnott and Dennis Rogers

Dennis spent some time with Joe this past weekend, and of his brief stint at the drawing board he says,

“Joe let me airbrush some drawings. The only thing on the brush was air!”

Even I, who once could handle a #2 Kolinsky Sable dipped in Higgins Black Magic with some confidence, wouldn’t dare dab so much as a dot on a piece of paper that the great Joe Sinnott had touched. To do that would be a sin as well as a crime!

Here are a couple more snaps of Den with Joe. Maybe Dennis can add a comment to fill in some details about his visit. The thing about Dennis is, he is very knowledgeable on two of Joe’s favorite subjects: Baseball and Bing — Bing Crosby that is, not the Microsoft search engine. I’m not qualified to keep up my end of the conversation on either of these topics.

Joe Sinnott and Dennis Rogers

Joe Sinnott and Dennis Rogers

This picture of Joe and his son Mark (the tall guy), was taken last February in New York. Standing between Joe and Mark is Mike Uslan, one of the producers of the Batman movies, including The Dark Knight, and on the right is Chip Cronkite, the son of another legend, Walter Cronkite. I’ve featured Chip before, at this link.

Joe Sinnott, Mike Uslan, Mark Sinnott, Chip Cronkite

1965 comic book predicted the iPhone

Denro visited today, which is always fun, bringing with him the new mono Beatles CD set. We listened to “Sgt. Pepper’s” and realized that mono is indeed the best way to hear the Lonely Heart’s Club Band. The experience really was as if we were hearing it almost for the first time.

I always expect Dennis to bring a stack of old comic books, and he didn’t disappoint. One story in particular caught my eye. Take a look at this drawing.

Gil Kane drew this picture of a smartphone in 1965! He really nailed it in every way. Very impressive.

STANd and deLEEver

A long time ago, my world would have been rocked by the news that Disney is buying Marvel. Today the news interests me greatly, but I can’t think of any way that the purchase will have an effect on me personally.

The picture above of Stan Lee is noteworthy, because he’s standing next to Steve Ditko’s unpublished cover for “Amazing Fantasy” #15, the 1962 comic book that introduced Spider-Man. A similar drawing by Jack Kirby was used instead. In my opinion, Jack’s style didn’t suit the character, and I assume Stan felt the same way, because after that first cover he rarely had Jack draw Spidey. Jack included Spider-Man in his 1969 Marvelmania self-portrait, and even at the time that seemed wrong to me.

One of the most reliable hit-getters for this site is the BBC documentary, “In Search of Steve Ditko.” At this link you will find Stan talking about Ditko’s insistence that he is the co-creator of Spider-Man.

Stan is always lavish in his praise of the artists who worked for him in the Marvel Bullpen, and that’s great. Stan absolutely deserves everything he has received in money and recognition, and he has received a lot of both:

Lee sued Marvel, claiming he was owed profits from the Marvel films that had started to take Hollywood by storm. The suit was eventually settled with Lee reportedly getting a settlement of more than $10 million.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32645353/ns/business-media_biz/

But if Stan deserves the money and credit he has received, Steve Ditko deserves some of the same. With the BILLIONS of dollars now on the table, Ditko should get a million bucks and co-creator status for Spider-Man. Without the latter, it seems he won’t accept the former.

Denro comes through for Joltin’ Joe

Joe Sinnott is the best ink man the comic book business has ever had. Most of Joe’s work, even the earliest of it, is instantly recognizable to fans, but there are exceptions, including hundreds of pages of Archie comics that Joe inked anonymously in the 70’s. Good, ol’ Denro has been painstakingly finding these issues and forwarding them to Joe’s son Mark.

http://www.joesinnott.com/home/othercomics.html