Halloween bring on the back ups- Spawn of Frankenstein by Kaluta and Wolfman

The Phantom Stranger was one of the few DC comic books that I found difficult to track down back in the good old 1970s. That was until one day in 1974 when I came across Phantom Stranger #29 staring out at me from the spinner rack . That issue contained the second last back up tale featuring the Spawn of Frankenstein with art by golden age legend Bernard Bailey. Now Mr Bailey drew one of my favourite golden age strips the origin of the Spectre, but his art by 1974 was very dated for this character, so when I found out Mike Kaluta had illustrated the first 3 tales (#23-25) of the Spawn of Frankenstein I had to track them down. So far I have only found issue 23 ( which I picked up in 1979) featuring his origin tale but its a great little story worthy of reading on a cold dank halloween night.

Below a page fron Bernard Bailey's version of Spawn of Frankenstein. Image from internet

Below the cover from Phantom Stranger #23 featuring the above origin of the Spawn of Frankenstein. Cover art by Jim Aparo

Halloween countdown. Top 13's - The horror covers of Luis Dominguez

Well it's that time of the year again when ghosts and gouls take centre stage, so lets take a look at some of the best horror\mystery comic book covers of the 1970's. One of the best horror cover artists was the excellent Argentine artist Luis Dominguez (1923 - 2020). Luis worked for many publishers including Warren , Gold Key, and Marvel but he was most prolific at DC. During his time at DC Dominguez drew for almost every DC mystery title including Witching Hour, the Unexpected, Weird War, Houses of Mystery\Secrets and the Phantom Stranger. Like the legandary Nick Cardy I picked up many DC comics simply based on his cover art alone. Below are some of my favourite of his covers.

Favourite comics: Captain Sternn by Bernie Wrightson

One of the best comics of the 1980s that wasn't published by the big two (DC or Marvel) was Bernie Wrightson's Captain Sternn. The good Captain first appeared in the pages of the June 1980 edition of Heavy Metal magazine before staring in the 1981 animated Heavy Metal movie. However, it wouldn't be until 1993 when Kitchen Sink published the adventures of Captain Lincoln Sternn in a 5 issue mini series that I would savour Wrightson's lush cartoon style art. Below are some pages from the series featuring the amoral, wisecracking captain along with his wonderful partner in crime, the Hulk like Hanover Fiste (pictured above at the header).

Below are the excellent front and back covers to a recent collected edition (image from inertnet) whic

back cover

Conan the Movie by Neal Adams?

Here's an interesting piece of Conan art from the legendary Neal Adams that was published in Savage Sword of Conan #60. A few years before the release of the first Conan movie ( 1982) Adams was approached to provide some storyboard ideas for the proposed film. Sadly these never came to fruition due to the original producer losing the rights to Conan, other fustrations with Holywood followed which resulted in Adams losing interest in the project. As an exercise he provided a set of unofficial ( and unused) storyboard ideas on the opening sequence for what would become the Conan the Barbarian movie

Below the introduction to Neals storyboard idea by Mike W Barr.

Below the cover to SSOC #60 ( art by Earl Norem).

Top Tens - James Sherman

James Sherman burst onto the comic book scene in the mid 1970's but left comics a few years later to work in advertising. During his time in comics Sherman was probably best remembered for his run on the Legion of Superheroes where he took over the art chores from Mike Grell starting from #225 until #242 ( with a few breaks in between). My favourite of his LSH run was on the excellent "Earth War Saga" ( #240 - #242) with writer Paul Levitz who he fell out with and left the title with issue 242 before returning for a final issue (#262)in 1980 when Gerry Conway became the writer. Although Sherman worked for other publishers including Marvel, his work on the Legion will always be the highlight of his tenure in the medium.

Sherman was not always paired with inkers that complimented his art. For #229 he was teamed up with Jack Abel who really was not the best inker for his style .

Another of my favourite Jim Sherman Legion of Superheroes comics was #231 ( cover below by Mike Grell) which contained some of his best splash art.

As noted above Sherman also worked for other companies including Marvel where he drew several one off issues of various titles. Below is the splash page to Silver Surfer #39 ( vol 3).

Sherman was also picked up by Red Circle Comics (Archie) where he drew the first issue of the Fly under a stunning Steranko cover.

And finally, as I need to add another illo to make it a "Top 10" is the splash page from Super-Team Family #9. Sadly Sherman was teamed up with Jack Abel for his Challengers run.

Milestones: The last Jack Kirby Fantastic Four comic

Fantastic Four #102 (September 1970) was a comic book that I picked up around 1987 in the back issue section of the now long gone Glasgow comic store Futureshock. My hope was that the book contained John Romita Seniors art but as it turned out I missed that by one issue and this issue only featured his art on the cover. On the plus side this issue featured the final collaboration of the legendary team of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby on Marvels flagship title before Kirby left to join DC comics.

A lot has been written about Jack Kirby's decision to leave Marvel by commentators with more insight and knowledge than I have. However, having read many of the Lee/Kirby stories (in weekly instalments via Marvel UK titles ) it was clear to me that the series was struggling with the Lee/ Kirby team running out of steam and ideas. Certainly to my eyes Kirby seemed to be holding back on his art and ideas that were always his trademark. Despite this, issue 102 is a good comic it just didn't have the feeling that this was the end of comics greatest ever artistic team.

Below, Stans Soapbox focuses on Jack Kirby leaving Marvel but makes no mention of the fact that he is leaving to join the Distinctive Competition.

Below , the issue I meant to buy, Fantastic Four # 103 featuring John Romita Seniors first Fantastic Four art ( image from Marvel Fandom) . By issue 107 John Buscema would take over the art chores and the FF would go from strength to strength.