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Post by berkley on Feb 3, 2024 22:01:25 GMT -5
Yep. You raise some reasonable points. What gets lost in the shuffle is that Kirby made a lot of money in comics. He want poor and I’m sure that the way he was treated at the end became a sticking point. I heard that some editors would pass his finished pages around and make fun of them the second time around at Marvel. I don't think it was only or even primarily about the money, though given Kirby's background that was how he framed it when talking about the dispute. It was also about artistic integrity and credit where credit was due.
I'd be curious to hear who those editors were, specifically. I'm guessing it was some of the younger, relatively inexperienced guys. I've also heard that some of those young guys behaved badly to Marie Severin around the office, making fun of her for being a middle-aged, unmarried woman, trying to embarass her with sexual remarks and jokes, etc. To me both those rumoured behaviours come from a similar attitude on the part of the culprits. I wonder how they felt about it themselves in later years.
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Post by commond on Feb 3, 2024 22:25:10 GMT -5
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Post by berkley on Feb 3, 2024 22:47:18 GMT -5
It's no news that most people think Kirby's dialogue and captions were badly written. I'm in the minority that doesn't agree. Edelman uses the word verisimilitude and that's exactly where he goes wrong, IMO, because Kirby wasn't going for verisimilitude, not in his art and not in his dialogue. He wasn't trying to draw like Neal Adams or write like Stan Lee (usually - I think there are occasional exceptions, usually attempts at humour, when he did try to emulate Stan's style and failed badly).
That's one reason it would have been disastrous if Stan or someone else had scripted the Eternals or the New Gods for him; the other being that most likely they'd have missed the thematic underpinnings of those works, something Kirby was able to bring to the fore in his captions and dialogue.
Anyway, we have one name, Scott Edelman, do we know of any others?
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Post by kirby101 on Feb 3, 2024 23:06:50 GMT -5
Sure, ask Steve Ditko if Stan created everything. I'll wait.
And Flo didn't get there until 1963, after all the creation was done.
Larry Hama did not work with Woody until 1971.
Stan's demeanor with people has never been an issue. His stealing writing credit is. Woody's story holds up to scrutiny. Ralph Reese has confirmed it.
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Post by Icctrombone on Feb 3, 2024 23:16:39 GMT -5
I was looking through the Jim Shooter blog and found this Kris Brownlow said… (in reference to Reminiscing About Jack Kirby)
Is there any truth to these rumors that people in the Marvel offices were calling him “Jack the Hack” and trying to fill his letter columns with knock letters?
Marvel paid creators, usually the writer of the series, to go through the fan mail, choose letters to print and write replies. Because Jack was in California and didn’t want to do the lettercols, David Anthony Kraft was assigned (before I became EIC) to write the lettercols for Jack’s books. DAK chose largely negative letters. Jack called me and complained. We fired Kraft and got someone else. Kraft’s excuse was that he was writing an “honest” lettercol, reflecting the general tenor of the mail. Horseshit. A lettercol shouldn’t bash the book it’s in.
Jack was generally revered by those of us in Marvel’s offices, especially by Len, Marv and the older guys. A few Philistines, noting the lousy sales figures, had unkind words for Jack.
jimshooter.com/2011/04/questions-and-answers.html/ |
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Post by spoon on Feb 3, 2024 23:29:01 GMT -5
I find it odd that this article states, "Kirby avoided creating new characters" in the same sentence that mentions Devil Dinosaur and right after a sentence that mentions Machine Man and The Eternals. Beyond that, in his 1970s Marvel work on established characters Captain America and Black Panther, those runs were remarkable for the extent to which Kirby came up with new villains and supporting cast rather than using established characters. One of the few established he used in that Cap run was Magneto (in an annual), but he teamed him with a totally new Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. |
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Post by commond on Feb 4, 2024 4:57:37 GMT -5
Sure, ask Steve Ditko if Stan created everything. I'll wait. And Flo didn't get there until 1963, after all the creation was done. Larry Hama did not work with Woody until 1971. Stan's demeanor with people has never been an issue. His stealing writing credit is. Woody's story holds up to scrutiny. Ralph Reese has confirmed it. Flo is on record as having said she wasn't present for the story conferences. She would hear what was going on, but wasn't privy to who actually created what. |
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Post by commond on Feb 4, 2024 5:04:09 GMT -5
It's no news that most people think Kirby's dialogue and captions were badly written. I'm in the minority that doesn't agree. Edelman uses the word verisimilitude and that's exactly where he goes wrong, IMO, because Kirby wasn't going for verisimilitude, not in his art and not in his dialogue. He wasn't trying to draw like Neal Adams or write like Stan Lee (usually - I think there are occasional exceptions, usually attempts at humour, when he did try to emulate Stan's style and failed badly). That's one reason it would have been disastrous if Stan or someone else had scripted the Eternals or the New Gods for him; the other being that most likely they'd have missed the thematic underpinnings of those works, something Kirby was able to bring to the fore in his captions and dialogue. Anyway, we have one name, Scott Edelman, do we know of any others? Roy Thomas gets mentioned here -- Knock Letters: Some Context |
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Post by commond on Feb 4, 2024 5:48:49 GMT -5
Yep. You raise some reasonable points. What gets lost in the shuffle is that Kirby made a lot of money in comics. He want poor and I’m sure that the way he was treated at the end became a sticking point. I heard that some editors would pass his finished pages around and make fun of them the second time around at Marvel. I don't think it was only or even primarily about the money, though given Kirby's background that was how he framed it when talking about the dispute. It was also about artistic integrity and credit where credit was due.
I'd be curious to hear who those editors were, specifically. I'm guessing it was some of the younger, relatively inexperienced guys. I've also heard that some of those young guys behaved badly to Marie Severin around the office, making fun of her for being a middle-aged, unmarried woman, trying to embarass her with sexual remarks and jokes, etc. To me both those rumoured behaviours come from a similar attitude on the part of the culprits. I wonder how they felt about it themselves in later years.
Initially, it was about Stan being paid a page rate for stories that the artists plotted. That was why Wood and Orlando left. They felt they weren't being paid enough for what they were expected to do. When Ditko fought for his plotting credit, Stan allegedly stopped speaking to him because the pay came out of his writer's page rate instead of being a separate payment. Kirby was reportedly offered the same plotting credit but turned it down in favor of the "produced by" credit that didn't pay him any extra money. Whether that was Kirby playing the good soldier, or he was simply happy with some sort of credit, we'll never know. Personally, I believe that Kirby enjoyed working in the Marvel method and that not only did he produce the best work of his career under the Marvel method, it also helped him reach the peak of his powers as a cartoonist. That said, he was a working professional and we know that as hurt and frustrated as he may have been over the New York Herald Tribune article and Stan increasingly taking credit for the creative work, that his relationship with Marvel's new owners fell apart over contract terms. Later in life, his family became angry that he wasn't properly compensated for his role in the creation of the Marvel Universe, but the impression I get is that despite Jack being feisty at times about the way he was treated, he didn't want to be at loggerheads with Stan Lee or anyone else. |
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Post by kirby101 on Feb 4, 2024 9:03:37 GMT -5
Sure, ask Steve Ditko if Stan created everything. I'll wait. And Flo didn't get there until 1963, after all the creation was done. Larry Hama did not work with Woody until 1971. Stan's demeanor with people has never been an issue. His stealing writing credit is. Woody's story holds up to scrutiny. Ralph Reese has confirmed it. Flo is on record as having said she wasn't present for the story conferences. She would hear what was going on, but wasn't privy to who actually created what. I wish people would stop conflating the creation of the original comics with Stan being involved with the stories. The latter has not been in contention, except for people who still think Stan thought up all the plots (not here, but they are still out there).
This is why I pointed out Flo was not there at the initial creation.
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Post by impulse on Feb 4, 2024 10:44:08 GMT -5
Looking even beyond this topic, boy, isn't this the cause of so many problems today?
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Post by kirby101 on Feb 15, 2024 16:32:11 GMT -5
Inking Kirby came up in the Thor thread (I think by me). Of course there was a tongue in cheek mention of Colletta. So it got me thinking.
Now a defense of Colletta is when he erased pencils or simplified backgrounds he wasn't doing anything the editors weren't aware of. He can't get blamed for doing a job they approved. Okay. But here's the thing, there weren't nameless editors.
There was someone who saw all the original pencil papers before they went to Vinnie. Not just saw them, but went over each one, panel by panel to write the dialog. He had to study each page and write in word balloons. So it was this man, not some random someone in an office. It was the man who claimed Kirby was the best in the business who was didn't care about the changes to the beautiful art he had.
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Post by tarkintino on Feb 15, 2024 17:08:38 GMT -5
Kirby needed great inkers. There's no getting around that. Clearly, Colletta was not at the top of the list, but it is undeniable that the best of Kirby's Marvel work was bolstered / helped to immeasurable degrees by supremely talented inkers who hold a permanent spot in any comic book history hall of fame.
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Post by berkley on Feb 15, 2024 17:24:05 GMT -5
Kirby needed great inkers. There's no getting around that. Clearly, Colletta was not at the top of the list, but it is undeniable that the best of Kirby's Marvel work was bolstered / helped to immeasurable degrees by supremely talented inkers who hold a permanent spot in any comic book history hall of fame.
I think it's more nuanced that that. Yes, Kirby was helped by some great inkers - and I would include Colletta on that list in some respects: his erasures were unforgivable but the stuff he did ink gave the art in Thor a unique effect that I think was very well-suited the the mythic background of that book.
Where I would disagree - if it's permitted to do so without being considered part of the "Kirby Hype machine"! - is that Kirby "needed great inkers" in the sense that I think Tarkintino intends, which is that he was incapable of producing great comic book artwork without inkers to cover up his flaws. I think this is incorrect.
Did some great inkers work with Kirby and give the artwork a unique flavour on different books? Absolutely. But this could be said of any penciller: John Buscema inked by Tom Palmer has a very different feel to John Buscema inked by George Klein, etc. Colan and Janson on Howard the Duck had a completely different feeling to Colan and Leialoha on the same book. And so on.
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Post by kirby101 on Feb 15, 2024 17:25:17 GMT -5
Vehemently disagree that Kirby needed great inkers. He needed good inkers, as did every single comic artist ever. He looked fine with Colletta when Vinnie inked all the pencils. He looked good with Ayers, with Stone, with Veerpoten, with Giaccioa, with Simon, with ... outside of Roussos and Rienmen, his worked came through.
The idea that his pencils needed a great inker to look good is undeniably false.
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