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Tuesday, March 23, 2021

Page turners: The Buscema Power Punch!

Sal Buscema has always been one of my favorite comic book artists. His art was always energetic and filled with figures taking up heroic power poses their faces caught in wide eyed and open mouth shock with their fists gripped tightly in frustration. However, of all his many wonderfully illustrated panels my favourite was always the legendary trademarked Buscema “power punch” where the hero would send the villain flying upside down his mouth open in a pained scream hurtling straight off the page towards the reader.
Of course Sal wasn't restricted to simply drawing testosterone filled brawling males and was more than capable of illustrating stunning looking (albeit fantasy) females such as the Valkyrie as featured on the splash page of Defenders issue 5 (1973). Despite the inclusion of what I would assume is an uncomfortable to wear and move in metal pointy bra the Valkyrie was always able to hold her own in the Buscema power punch stakes.
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4 comments:

  1. KidMarch 24, 2021 at 3:38 PM

    I think Sal, much like his brother John (who openly admitted it), followed Jack Kirby's example when it came to punch-ups. As for Val in that 2nd pic - va-va-voom! Have her washed and sent to my room. In fact, don't bother with the wash. (I can be as dirty as the next man.)

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  2. McSCOTTYMarch 25, 2021 at 12:51 PM

    As a kid I have to admit I was quite smitten with Valkyrie, although my heart always belonged to Gwen Stacey :)

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  3. Colin JonesApril 9, 2021 at 2:58 PM

    The first Conan story I ever read was "The Lair Of The Beast-Men" in Marvel UK's Savage Sword Of Conan weekly No.2 in March 1975 which was drawn by Barry Smith but Sal Buscema's inks really complemented Smith's pencils in my opinion.

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    Replies
    1. McSCOTTYApril 9, 2021 at 3:51 PM

      Hi Colin nice to hear from you. I agree Sal was a great inker and his early work inking some of Barry Smith's pencils were excellent. I think I read that Sal wanted to be an inker rather than a penciller when he started out so I'm pretty glad he didn't specialise in inking. He inked the pencil art of Ron Frenz on Spider-Girl from a few years ago (and Thunderstorm, a Thor type character) and both strips looked like prime Sal art from the early 1970s

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