A Sense of Doubt blog post #3050 - Jack Kirby Statement to Stan Lee Documentary - More John Romita - Newsletters Various - Comic Book Sunday for June 25, 2023
Three comic book things here:
First, Jack Kirby.
Though I wrote about loving Romita over Kirby as well as Gil Kane, Gene Colan, Neal Adams, and a few others, I do ADORE Jack Kirby.
Despite Steve Ditko being the original artist on The Amazing Spider-Man, few know that Jack Kirby conceived the look of the character and drew the cover of Amazing Fantasy #15, the first appearance of the famous wall-crawler.
Kirby was at least equally as instrumental as Stan Lee if not more so. Though Kirby did not continue with Spider-Man, which became a Lee-Ditko production and then a Lee-Romita production, Kirby had great influence if not outright complete creation of The Hulk, The Fantastic Four, Thor, The Avengers, the X-Men, Iron Man, Daredevil, and of course, Captain America.
And so, it's upsetting that a new Stan Lee documentary continues to advance a narrative that Stan Lee was the main or ONLY mastermind behind the Marvel universe.
https://www.vulture.com/2023/06/disney-s-stan-lee-documentary-perpetuates-a-myth.html
https://screenrant.com/stan-lee-2023-documentary-controversy-mcu-creator-issue/
Jack Kirby Estate official response to the recently released Stan Lee Documentary
Jack Kirby artwork now showcased on YouTube The newest Stan Lee documentary is another example of regurgitating falsehoods and repeating long debunked ideas into the creation of these beloved Marvel characters. Jack and Stan were an amazing team, whose combined talents ushered in an entire universe of superheroes that have inspired generations. The Jack Kirby Estate has and will continue to ensure that comic book and pop culture fans understand the importance of Jack in the creation of the Marvel Universe. This continuation to push a challenged narrative, hurts the legacy of Stan Lee as well, and continues the disregard towards Jack in the creation of these iconic characters. It truly pains the family to once again have to fight to ensure Jack’s legacy and his global contribution to the comics industry. Jack Kirby was more than an artist, he was a visionary and creative force, whose contribution to the creation of many Marvel characters goes way beyond putting pencil to paper. Stan Lee will rightfully be remembered as a champion of comic books, creative powerhouse and figurehead of one the world’s most cherished brands. It is now time for the world to discover the other creative force behind their favorite superheroes. The Jack Kirby Estate invites you to learn more about Jack’s version of how these superheroes were created and his inspiration for doing so. Jack loved his fans and creating for them was not just a job, it was his passion. There are many resources that now add historical facts that are finally changing the one-sided narrative that has been pushed throughout the years. We look forward to one day having a documentary that tells both sides of this amazing story. Until that time, we’ll continue to ensure Jack’s legacy is protected and find solace in knowing that these co-creations continue to inspire and entertain people around the world. The Kirby Estate |
https://secretoranges.substack.com/p/growing-up-with-spider-man?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=775446&post_id=129020370&isFreemail=true&utm_medium=email
Growing up with Spider-Man
RIP John Romita. 1930-2023. I can't imagine growing up without John Romita's Spider-Man. It meant so much to me. An absolute legend has left us.
Thinking back to when I first discovered American comics, there were three of us at Junior school who decided to adopt our own secret identities. We each made a costume to wear beneath our school uniforms. Unfortunately, lycra or spandex were not an option, and mine was made of rather itchy wool. It’s a wonder we didn’t all pass out in the blazing heat of summer, but I got my special moment as I was leaving school one afternoon. A girl in my class (who knew my secret) said to her mother who was waiting beside the school gates, ‘Look, Mum... look at this boy’s secret identity!’ and forced me to pull back my school shirt and tie to reveal a rather pathetic home-made attempt at a Spider-Man costume.
I never could find anything suitable for a mask. The closest I got, was one of those string net bags that you buy oranges in, but to be frank, it looked ridiculous, so I gave up on that.
This very same ‘costume’ had one more outing the night my father discovered a burglary was in progress on the other side of the street, and was on the phone to the police. It took me 3 minutes to get changed and run down the stairs to the front door, and 3 seconds for my father to yank me back in by the scruff of my neck to prevent any heroics!
I have another tale that relates to my Spidey costume fascination. You see, there was a great cut-away by Larry Lieber and Mike Esposito, in my favourite issue of Spider-Man showing the costume hanging in Peter Parker’s closet, and I always wished I had one to hang in mine.
When I decided to leave my staff job at Marvel UK in 1988 and go freelance, Robert Sutherland, the MD offered me free studio space in the basement as a sort of incentive to continue doing freelance for them, which was very much appreciated. A few months later, Marvel decided to relocate to another part of town, leaving me behind until I found another space of my own. Anyhow, they’d left a lot of old rubbish down there in their haste to vacate the premises, and one night I was packing up to go home after working late on a particularly urgent deadline. I was fumbling around looking for loose change for the underground journey home, and a coin fell out of my hand and rolled across the floor to rest behind a big old cardboard box in the corner of an abandoned office space. As I shifted all the rubbish to get to it, my heart began to race when I saw, in the dim light, a red webbed hand hanging over the edge of the box. I peered in and there was a complete (if a little ragged) Spider-Man costume. I couldn’t believe my eyes!
I knew that the publicist had invested in a new one for public appearances a few months back, because we used to share an office, but it hadn’t occurred to me that she’d just binned the old one. A bit of a wash and some needlework renovation and my childhood wish had finally come true!
When I mentioned this to John Tomlinson, who I’d worked with at both Marvel UK and 2000 AD, he said:
‘I never knew you rescued that old Spider-Man cozzy from the bin... Somewhere on VHS I still have its appearance on Data Run, a Saturday morning kids show (with Timmy Mallet) in which 'Spider-Man' visited the Marvel UK offices in Jadwin House. I was in it too as a student on work experience, as was (UK Spider-Man editor) Jez Meteyard and (artist) John Higgins, who pretended to draw Spidey. The costume was so knackered, they had to do it up with masking tape – Spidey backed out of the room at the end to avoid showing it!’
I’m pretty sure that reading about Peter Parker’s exploits as a photojournalist spurred me on to be a photographer with a press card myself, coupled with my first viewing of the Antonioni film, Blow-Up which was also a major influence, and one of my all-time favorite films.
As much as I was into Steve Ditko’s Spider-Man initially, I grew to really love the way John Romita drew the strip. As I went from junior to senior high school, the stories about Peter Parker’s college and personal life became far more interesting to me than the battle scenes. Stan Lee’s witty, snappy dialog worked so well with Romita’s hip, and groovy looking characters, and that panel of the first appearance of Mary Jane Watson has most definitely become THE most iconic comic book panel of all time IMHO. In fact, I created my own photographic homage to that panel which I will share at some point.
There's no mistaking a Stan Lee script! The Amazing Spider-Man #55 - Doc Ock Wins! (1967) Script: Stan Lee. Pencils: John Romita Sr. Inks: Mike Esposito Letters: Sam Rosen.
Another of my 'rescued from the rubbish pile' items from Marvel UK. It's a shame it's so stained, but maybe that's why it was discarded. I had this bromide print on my office wall for a long time, slightly out of view in this photo below, by Marvel’s managing editor, Jenny O'Connor. I think I must have worn the shades as a joke, it was never that bright in the office, plus the fact that I always wore a Walkman probably explains why I now have extremely annoying tinnitus!
Another vintage production stat from my collection: Amazing Spider-Man #54 - November, 1967 'The Tentacles and the Trap' Script: Stan Lee. Art: John Romita Sr. Inks: Mike Esposito. Letters: Sam Rosen.
I’m thinking back to when I was kid, sitting on the pavement outside my Uncle Bill’s house on a sunny day in Edmonton, London. I was reading the Terrible Tinkerer story in Amazing Spider-Man annual #2 that he’d just bought me from a local newsagent called Sands. I’d never have thought that one day I’d have my own name on a Spider-Man comic, so when I did, I made sure to send him a copy and thank him for the inspiration he gave me all those years ago.
In my opinion, apart from John Romita Jr., nobody else has surpassed Steve Ditko or John Romita Sr. when it comes to Spider-Man, but maybe that's because I grew up enjoying their interpretations of the character.
All artwork © Marvel Comics
Hullo.
I read a book, like a grown ups
If you can’t love yourself
Driven
Links
Byyyyeeee!!!
Immortal X-men is back, with issue 12, which is our Colossus point of view. It’s somewhat packed. It’s only when seeing the initial response I’m reminded that “Oh yeah – we do that too.” Colossus is an unusual PoV, because due to his plot over in X-Force, he’s being manipulated by a reality-warper, who tweaks existence by writing. I mentioned this way back in issue 1 of Immortal X-men, so it was always on the table, but bringing it to the fore has been interesting.
The issue’s called “The Idiot” after the Dostoevsky novel and about poor old Piotr tends to be looked at. After writing it, I had significant guilt because it’s a Dostoevsky that I haven’t read. So after handing in the script, I did – the first big literary thing I’ve handled since Iris joined us – and then did some extra specific tweaks at lettering. It was pretty small stuff, because I’ve handled enough of the big D to write the issue, but the tweaks were fun, and it was a joy to read the book. It’s a book of complete hot messes. I also wasn’t expecting a joke about throwing a dog from a moving train.
Anyway – here’s the preview, which includes the first of the big WTFs.
You can’t keep a good woman down, and you can’t keep a bad one down either.
Last time I forgot to mention that the second Immortal X-men trade has been released…
…which collects issue 7-10, which wraps up Judgment Day before cascading into the build up for Sins of Sinister. There’s some of my fave stuff in here – issue 10 is one of my favorite issues I’ve done since I’ve been back at Marvel, for example.
Comics!
Meanwhile, the Sinister 4 special has its unlettered preview released. You can look at all four pages here, but here’s an example one…
Yes, if it they weren’t bad enough, now the Sinisters are dating.
This picks up of Sins of Sinister’s status quo, and builds from what Gerry does in X-men today. While we’ve seen them both as active players in a load of comics, this is where we dig into their background, their motivations and who they actually are. I want to delineate them as much as possible, and hopefully afterwards folks will really get how (say) Stasis differs fundamentally from Sinister.
For the record, I consider it as an issue of Immortal X-men, and believe it’ll be collected in the third trade .
I found myself thinking about something I wrote for Empire magazine back in 2016 recently, and realised I didn’t think I had put it out anywhere. It was for their feature where they got people who hadn’t seen a movie in Empire’s readers Top 50 to watch it and then write about it.
I hadn’t seen Drive, so chose that. Reading this, I smile a little at the tone I choose. As a compare and contrast to what I do in the newsletter is telling. I’m awful.
DRIVE
I’m not sure if I’d try being an inconspicuous getaway driver if I had Ryan Gosling’s face attached to the front of my own potato shaped head. “Do you remember the driver at all?” “Yes, I do. He had a face like the very sun itself. He made me want to do a film that lingers lovingly on his features for – oooh – about one hour forty.”
I have no idea why I hadn’t seen Drive. I’m pretentious enough to like Refn’s previous Valhalla Rising. Presumably 2011 was one of the years I dedicated to solemn solitary crying and masturbation. I’m a writer. We do that occasionally. In retrospect, I can’t help but link the films – Drive needed Gosling in the same way Valhalla Rising needed Mikkelsen. Both wouldn’t have worked without a face for the lens to fetishise for its length. It’s striking that both films that are so deeply embedded in an examination of masculinity objectify their paragon so much. It’s interesting to compare and contrast that to its treatment of a crime trope as hoary as backstage with the strippers – where the lens showing no interest in all the boobs. This isn’t male gaze. This is a movie that’s predominantly gazing at males.
It’s a deeply old fashioned, traditional form of masculinity. This isn’t even Han Solo. Driver would always let Greedo shoot first, because that’s what real men do. With the greatest of love for you lot, with Empire’s demographics, it doesn’t surprise me in the slightest that it’s in your Top 50. Running through here is how to square being a good man in this world which often isn’t – the fantasy of hypercompetence with the longing for peace and home. In the film’s most memorable visual tour de force in the kiss/fight elevator scene, the doors shut on the possibility of squaring those two worlds… but with the doomed, mythologising romance.
However, as we head the credits, with College/Electric Youth’s A Real Hero playing out you do pause. This is so glossy, so hyper-stylised, so about the idea of all this, you can’t help but read some irony into it. “A real human being – and a real hero.” I’m unconvinced that there’s a real human being anywhere in here. That the movie manages to fetishise so much about being male here while leaving a question mark may be the most interesting thing of the many interesting things about it.
I’m glad I watched it. I’ll watch it again. I’d recommend to others. I would have probably have ended up writing about it after seeing it even if Empire hadn’t asked me to. That said, there’s an alternate universe where slow-motion hasn’t been invented where Drive is about a half hour long.
DIE continues to reach folks over the world, which is lovely to see. We’ve updated the character sheet resources online, which you can get here. If you haven’t nosed at the game yet, skimming through some of the resources is likely the best way to get a feel for some of it. My suggested way to learn the game is to read the introduction from the book, then skim the Rituals character sheets (which include the core rules), then read the chapter Rituals and then likely the Rules chapter and a proper read of the sheets. After that, you really could play.
Oh – a couple of pieces on DIE. Here’s Eurogamer on what they’ve been playing at the moment. Here’s a rave over on Medium, though very mean to poor old D&D. There’s a number of actual plays coming too, which I’ll gather up and link in here as well.
Aditya reposted their lettering checklist, of what to consider when doing lettering. This is useful stuff to internalise for everyone.
This Scorsese quote is a lot. When I was coming out of games journalism, a question which was working into my standards when talking to older games devs was: You’re in your early 50s. Game dev cycles are about 5 years. You probably have 2 big games left, right? What do you want to do with them?” I also thought a lot that I probably should be doing big, serious career interviews with developers while they’re still here. You never know when someone is going to be Bowie or Prince. Then I gave up, and went to write comics. What am I like, eh?
The big thing was the UK Gaming Expo. As said, it was the first time I’ve spend a night away from Iris, so was a lot personally – but it was also a lot as a con. I’d never done the Expo, because there’s only so many cons one can do in a year, and ones not directly related to the job are going to suffer. But now it is the job! I had a very casual schedule – RRD had me sign for an hour and a half every day, which is basically the equivalent to a light jog for a comics wirter. Apart from a lovely live game of The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen in front of an audience, I generally filled my time seeing friends, meeting new folks, having a very reasonable amount of drinks, sleeping, doing a quick playtest of a new small game I’ve been fiddling with, buying a bunch of stuff, and so on.
Here’s what I brought home with me.
Which is a pretty good portrait of my head. You can see that the part of me which has thought “you know – maybe you’ll like to play a historical miniature wargame. That’ll be nice. Maybe you collect Carthage? Or Sumer? That’d be a nice time” has finally taken control of my wallet.
The Masterclass went well last night. Or at least I think it did. I’ll find out when the feedback form arrives. It also focused my brain on what I don’t include the Masterclass, and what I probably should if I ever expand into a two parter.
The other work has mainly focused around my X stuff, and the tight plotting going forward. Basically, if you take someone like Jon Hickman, and then hand stuff to someone like me, you end up with something that’s so impossibly complicated I’m going to have to work hard to make it as accessible and clean as possible. It may involve my ultimate Data page, which will look like a nervous breakdown on paper, but in a good way. But there’s really good stuff, I think. It’s big and (ironically) human, which is what the Krakoan age has always been about.
As such, the Creator Owned stuff has been a little slower – still in conversation with an artist for the furthest out book, and I need to do some digging into the one that’s nearest soon, but the other artist has just started work on our book, and sent over a screengrab of the first page, which is lovely.
Oh – I said I had something I wanted to float last week. Basically, you may remember why I left Substack – I didn’t think they had been sufficiently transparent about who they were giving grants to. There’s never been any proof that they were giving grants to dodgy folks (any news story which claimed that retracted it), but when the upside was “a free mailing list” I decided it wasn’t really worth parasitising of a Venture Capitalist’s money when I could pay for my own. It’s no skin off my nose.
Buttondown has been great, and the list has grown happily in its usual way, but I found myself looking at my substack account a couple of weeks back and was surprised to find it has a couple of hundred more subscribers than my actual mailing list. In other words, the passive influx of new subscribers from being part of an interconnected platform gained more subs than me actually running a newsletter.
Hmm.
You can see how this changes the math. This list is my main marketing outreach to readers, and so that I’m limiting my reach is actual skin off my nose – especially as I head into doing more Creator Owned work where reach is everything.
So, I’m thinking of merging the mailing lists, and moving back to Substack.
Anyone has strong feelings on this, feel free to reply to this. I’m still chewing it over.
However, as people who follow my Mastodon will know, the main drama has been my keyboard. Last week, it started going wrong. Everything is working… except Caps and a single key. Caps Lock works fine with it, but any Caps and this key doesn’t do anything. We thought perhaps it may be a macro, but the error remains on my PC and my Mac. Eventually, I realise that I’m not going to be able to fix this, and should just get a new keyboard. So I order one.
After it’s shipped, the key starts working again. Arghh.
Then today, it stops working again. Arrgh.
I then decided to slap the keyboard hard, to see what happened.
It’s working again.
I hope our forthcoming AI masters will overlook this act of brutality.
Speak soon.
Kieron Gillen
London.
7.6.2023
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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2306.25 - 10:10
- Days ago = 2914 days ago
- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.
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