Justice
for Starhawk!
Well obviously but Wolfman was the guy in the pic so he was the one naturally mentioned. Colan's art made the series, for sure.
The Countdown to SDCC 2025!
- Thread starter SDcomics
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Chooch555
Thoughtful
He's never done Marvel work has he? I agree he's ready for bigger exposure. Folks make a lot of hay about his speed, but damn he's also nice and clean.
tasmaniantwister
Ponderous
- Joined
- Apr 8, 2025
- Messages
- 239
Totally agree. I love Gene Colan and Tom Palmer on TOD. Colan did a great job on Daredevil too. I know the Miller stuff on Daredevil is now considered Daredevil at it's best. However, I also think another highpoint is the Stan Lee/Gene Colan run. You've got most of Daredevil's other rogues showing up, plus great usage of other heroes' villains: Cobra and Mr. Hyde, The Beetle with his suction cup look, Trapster and Dr. Doom. Also, the weird Matt Murdock's swinging brother ruse, Mike Murdock, introduction of the Jester, etc... Overall, effective, quality stuff.
Hmmm. Wolfman, Colan and Palmer. What can I say here?
Stan Lee once described Gene Colan's art as "cinematic". He said it was almost like you were watching a movie instead of reading a comic. And Stan the Man was so right. Gene's moody, atmospheric and gothic art was perfect for a book called Tom of Dracula. Tom Palmer was an extraordinary inker. No matter whose work the guy was inking, (Colan, Buscema, Adams, Byrne) I could always tell it was him. He never overshadowed the pencillers he worked with and always managed to bring out the best in their work. And Marv Wolfman's contributions to comics are too lengthy to list. Marv understood the language of words and pictures. I mean he really, really understood comics.
Leave us not forget that these three created Blade the Vampire Slayer during this historic run.
To me, what makes a run of comics great is how often you want to go back and re-read it. I still have my complete run of Tom of Dracula and 50 some years later I still pull them out and re-read them once or twice a year. Tomb of Dracula is a classic, right up there with Alan Moore's Swamp Thing and Watchmen, Frank Miller's Dark Knight Returns, Grant Morrison's JLA, Claremont and Byrne's X-Men, Brubaker and Epting's Captain America and Art Spiegelman's Maus. Just brilliant, beautiful stuff that will live on as long as people love comics.
Actually, all the bronze age Marvel horror books are pretty damned good.
Stan Lee once described Gene Colan's art as "cinematic". He said it was almost like you were watching a movie instead of reading a comic. And Stan the Man was so right. Gene's moody, atmospheric and gothic art was perfect for a book called Tom of Dracula. Tom Palmer was an extraordinary inker. No matter whose work the guy was inking, (Colan, Buscema, Adams, Byrne) I could always tell it was him. He never overshadowed the pencillers he worked with and always managed to bring out the best in their work. And Marv Wolfman's contributions to comics are too lengthy to list. Marv understood the language of words and pictures. I mean he really, really understood comics.
Leave us not forget that these three created Blade the Vampire Slayer during this historic run.
To me, what makes a run of comics great is how often you want to go back and re-read it. I still have my complete run of Tom of Dracula and 50 some years later I still pull them out and re-read them once or twice a year. Tomb of Dracula is a classic, right up there with Alan Moore's Swamp Thing and Watchmen, Frank Miller's Dark Knight Returns, Grant Morrison's JLA, Claremont and Byrne's X-Men, Brubaker and Epting's Captain America and Art Spiegelman's Maus. Just brilliant, beautiful stuff that will live on as long as people love comics.
Actually, all the bronze age Marvel horror books are pretty damned good.
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Thor-El
Pensive
I’m not going into SDCC season with any expectations. Keeps my level of disappointment down.
PantherCult
Make Mine M'Baku
- Joined
- Apr 5, 2025
- Messages
- 923
Thats very wise... although last year they did drop the ROM bomb, so hopefully we get at least one reveal as cool as that.
From the year 2005, the DC Direct (remember them?) booth and panel.
From left to right, you have designer Shawn Knapp, a sculptor who's name I do not remember (It's been 20 years. Give me a break), legendary sculptor and great guy Tim Bruckner and Jim Fletcher (also a nice man).
A little back story: I have loved the character of the Composite Superman since I was a little teeny tiny lad and I've always wanted him as a toy. For some reason he just really grabbed my young Silver Age mind. DC Direct first appeared I think in 1998 or thereabouts. Right from the get go, I started begging and pleading with them to make a Composite Superman. Every year at SDCC it would be the first thing I would mention. I whined. I cried. I sniveled. I shouted at them from across the cavernous convention hall. One year I brought a bull horn. They would just look at me, smile, and walk away (I actually got that reaction from a lot of different toy companies. Jesse Falcon did that a lot, too).
And then in 2005, it happened.
Left to right: Georg Brewer, Tim Bruckner and Shawn Knapp. That's my copy of World's Finest that Tim is holding. I've had that since I was a little boy.
And here it is with Syndee Barwick.
I will keep that comic book and that figure until the day I die.
Georg, Shawn, Jim, Syndee and Tim: I miss you and I wish you all well wherever you are. Thank you for everything.
28 Days Until SDCC 2025!
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From left to right, you have designer Shawn Knapp, a sculptor who's name I do not remember (It's been 20 years. Give me a break), legendary sculptor and great guy Tim Bruckner and Jim Fletcher (also a nice man).
A little back story: I have loved the character of the Composite Superman since I was a little teeny tiny lad and I've always wanted him as a toy. For some reason he just really grabbed my young Silver Age mind. DC Direct first appeared I think in 1998 or thereabouts. Right from the get go, I started begging and pleading with them to make a Composite Superman. Every year at SDCC it would be the first thing I would mention. I whined. I cried. I sniveled. I shouted at them from across the cavernous convention hall. One year I brought a bull horn. They would just look at me, smile, and walk away (I actually got that reaction from a lot of different toy companies. Jesse Falcon did that a lot, too).
And then in 2005, it happened.
Left to right: Georg Brewer, Tim Bruckner and Shawn Knapp. That's my copy of World's Finest that Tim is holding. I've had that since I was a little boy.
And here it is with Syndee Barwick.
I will keep that comic book and that figure until the day I die.
Georg, Shawn, Jim, Syndee and Tim: I miss you and I wish you all well wherever you are. Thank you for everything.
28 Days Until SDCC 2025!
akajomiha
Loves DDs
Love these flashbacks, SD! Thanks for sharing photos and memories here.
Justice
for Starhawk!
Yes! As someone who has never had the opportunity to go it is fun to live vicariously through you to see what I've missed over the years.
Quoting this because I'll take any opportunity to rave about Moore's Swamp Thing. It'd been on my to-read list for more than a decade. I finally crossed it off last year. Wow. It lives up to every bit of the hype. Truly one of the three or four best comic runs I've read.
Indelible Lad
Ruminative
From the year 2005, the DC Direct (remember them?) booth and panel.
From left to right, you have designer Shawn Knapp, a sculptor who's name I do not remember (It's been 20 years. Give me a break), legendary sculptor and great guy Tim Bruckner and Jim Fletcher (also a nice man).
A little back story: I have loved the character of the Composite Superman since I was a little teeny tiny lad and I've always wanted him as a toy. For some reason he just really grabbed my young Silver Age mind. DC Direct first appeared I think in 1998 or thereabouts. Right from the get go, I started begging and pleading with them to make a Composite Superman. Every year at SDCC it would be the first thing I would mention. I whined. I cried. I sniveled. I shouted at them from across the cavernous convention hall. One year I brought a bull horn. They would just look at me, smile, and walk away (I actually got that reaction from a lot of different toy companies. Jesse Falcon did that a lot, too).
And then in 2005, it happened.
Left to right: Georg Brewer, Tim Bruckner and Shawn Knapp. That's my copy of World's Finest that Tim is holding. I've had that since I was a little boy.
And here it is with Syndee Barwick.
I will keep that comic book and that figure until the day I die.
Georg, Shawn, Jim, Syndee and Tim: I miss you and I wish you all well wherever you are. Thank you for everything.
28 Days Until SDCC 2025!
Hey, SD!From the year 2005, the DC Direct (remember them?) booth and panel.
From left to right, you have designer Shawn Knapp, a sculptor who's name I do not remember (It's been 20 years. Give me a break), legendary sculptor and great guy Tim Bruckner and Jim Fletcher (also a nice man).
A little back story: I have loved the character of the Composite Superman since I was a little teeny tiny lad and I've always wanted him as a toy. For some reason he just really grabbed my young Silver Age mind. DC Direct first appeared I think in 1998 or thereabouts. Right from the get go, I started begging and pleading with them to make a Composite Superman. Every year at SDCC it would be the first thing I would mention. I whined. I cried. I sniveled. I shouted at them from across the cavernous convention hall. One year I brought a bull horn. They would just look at me, smile, and walk away (I actually got that reaction from a lot of different toy companies. Jesse Falcon did that a lot, too).
And then in 2005, it happened.
Left to right: Georg Brewer, Tim Bruckner and Shawn Knapp. That's my copy of World's Finest that Tim is holding. I've had that since I was a little boy.
And here it is with Syndee Barwick.
I will keep that comic book and that figure until the day I die.
Georg, Shawn, Jim, Syndee and Tim: I miss you and I wish you all well wherever you are. Thank you for everything.
28 Days Until SDCC 2025!
Composite Superman was one of my favorites when I was a kid. Also the Legion of Super-Heroes. You can imagine the thrill I got when the very first cover I inked was World’s Finest #294 featuring both CS & the Legion. I also have the Curt Swan-based action figure. So cool. Enjoy SDCC!
Does it get cooler than that? No, it does not. I think I know what I'm going to re-read tonight.
Thanks for checking in, Mr. Mahlstedt! Anytime you want to share stories about the old days, I'd love to hear them!
cmoney
Considerate
- Joined
- Apr 3, 2025
- Messages
- 871
I love it so much. I was weirdly into the VERY short-lived cartoon and Kenner toy line as a kid, and it was pretty cool to find out how great the "source material" was years later (quotes because I don't imagine Moore's run specifically was the inspiration
). Veitch's run after is still really good too. But who am I kidding, I'll read every Swamp Thing series they do until they stop publishing them.
Justice
for Starhawk!
Maybe this should be my next series I read. I've been looking for a good one and I've never read any Swamp Thing.