DC "Cartoon Flips"

I recently obtained a collection of over-sized DC comics from the 1970's. The group included Limited Collections' Edition #3, which contained a Golden Age feature titled "Cartoon Flips starring Superman."

The page had instructions for cutting out, stacking, and flipping the images, but with our magical computers of 2010, I decided to make animated GIFs instead.

Wow, it's like I'm standing in the same room with him! Too bad DC hasn't continued with such fun activities for the kids in the Modern Age.

Oh! I've got it! How about a Cartoon Flip starring Wonder Woman, repeatedly breaking Maxwell Lord's neck...

Monkey Ghost Rider bids you to obey.

I've been meaning to do this...

I have a couple of friends who create web comics and I wanted to mention 'em...

First up, Chickenhare! By Chris Grine. A lot of you might already know about Chickenhare. High adventure. Wonderful art. What more could you want?


Next, The Blabbing Baboon! By Rich Marcej. I'm jealous that Rich manages to do a daily cartoon about his life. You never know what will appear. Plus, he sees lots of movies and shares his thoughts.


Please visit them. I'm certain you wouldn't want the Simian Of Vengeance coming after you.

What if DC published 1970's Marvel characters in the 1960's?

As a follow-up to my recent post where I imagined DC published Marvel characters in the 60's, I thought I'd twist it up a bit and create fake covers using 1970's Marvel characters. Just for fun. Click on 'em to enlarge.

I'm sure this will confuse non-comic fans even more than my last post.

What if DC published Marvel characters in the 1960's?

Have you ever noticed that early Marvel covers typically showcased a superhero fighting a villain, while during the same period, DC covers presented mostly outrageous, character scenarios? I started wondering what DC would have done with the Marvel characters back in the 60's.

Then, I felt compelled to create a couple. Click to enlarge.

Happy $#!@% Halloween!

The good folks at Robot 6 are posting three articles this weekend entitled, "What comic scared the $#!@% out of you?" They were kind enough to ask me to contribute. I thought it would be fun to also post my answer here, along with pictures..!

When I was a kid, my older brother brought home an old, beat up copy of Ripley’s Believe It or Not #25.


I don’t know where he got it. The cover was a painting of “Spring-Heel Jack”. As far as I remember, I had never seen a comic with a painted cover. It hit me as something I might see in a grade school history book, which seemed to validate Jack’s possible existence.

The issue contained several stories, including one with a scary harpy/bat/witch...


...but Spring-Heel Jack had the most effect on me. The story contained only mystifying incidents with no real wrap-up. Plus, he apparently didn’t wear pants.


I found it all terrifying, and I couldn’t help but imagine him jumping over tombstones whenever I was in a cemetery. Brrrrr.

Cross Panel Comics #6

Martin started this one of with, "Greetings." "Oh, hey, Killbot." Click to enlarge.

The see all Cross Panel Comics, click here. For an explanation of the process, read the oldest post.

Comic Panel Mischief

I've enjoyed contributing to Covered Blog. It now has a sister site in Repaneled, where artists reinterpret comic panels, as opposed to comic covers. I've started contributing as of today.

The panel I used is from Captain America's Bicentennial Battles, published in 1976. (Which I've actually written about before.) Here's the original panel, cropped in on a bit...

And here's my tacky reinterpretation...

Look at it here, or check it out on the Repaneled site!

Wonder Wonder used to have cool boots.

...but this post isn't actually about her boots. I recently ran across the cover to Wonder Woman #33. I couldn't help but notice that none of the participates appeared to be putting much energy into it.


I wanted to capture the lack of drama by creating my own version. See it on Covered Blog, or merely look at it below.


See all my Covered covers here.

Drops of Jupiter in My Head

I recently added the song Drops of Jupiter, by Train, to my ipod. I like the song, but I swear every time I hear it, this is the scenario that runs through my head...

Little Seen Marvel Comics Art

Not a real exciting post this week. I've decided to sell a few things on ebay and wanted to share some of the vintage art I like.

First up, Hulk art by Michael Golden, from the month of March, in Marvel's 20th Anniversary Calendar, 1981. From my perspective, Golden brought a whole new feel to comics. It was a "cartoony realism", which would influenced a slew of artists to come.


Next is Dave Cockrum art from three Marvel Novels. This was 1979, so on the cover to the anthology book, Hulk, TV star, is seen in the foreground, while a fairly new character, Wolverine, is stuck in the background. It would have been different today. As a kid, I was always fascinated to see painted superhero art. There was very little of it.


Lastly is art by John Byrne, from December, in The Amazing Spider-Man Calendar, 1978 . It's sometimes interesting to see what characters were popular during any given year. And look how clever Mr. Byrne was by grouping the old/new X-Men with Cyclops in the bottom right corner.


If I wasn't sleepy, I'd try to do a witty wrap up.

Cross Panel Comics #5

For an explanation of Cross Panel Comics, click here. I started this one with, "Wanna hear something funny?." Click to enlarge...

We're all making stew from the same garden.

I tend to say, "We're all making stew from the same garden," whenever I see a similar creative idea coming from more than one person. Case in point, I noticed this post today on Fail Blog...

Several years ago, I wrote a few newspaper strips, for the Kansas City Star, called Scattered Thoughts. They were drawn by my friend, Rich Lapierre. The one below appeared on February 24, 2005...

I have to admit, it's a lot cooler to see it done in real life!

Greetings from DC Comics, 1978.

Let's play a game!

Below are old DC Superhero birthday cards (printed by a company named Mark 1). I've included the cover, inside, and two fake insides on each one. Can you guess which ones are real? Remember, this was 1978. Click on each to enlarge.



Anyone who can identify the correct answer on each card will receive a warm feeling inside!

Correct answers in comments next Monday.

The Flash has weird thoughts.

I love the cover to Flash #133 (1962). Flash thinks, "I got the strangest feeling I'm being turned into a puppet."


What exactly does that feel like? I had to emphasize how silly it is by creating my own version. He still thinks it, but he's wrong. What a goofball!


Check it out on Coveredblog.blogspot.com. Look at more covers while you're there. It's a great site.

Cross Panel Comics #4

For an explanation of Cross Panel Comics, click here.

Typically, Martin and I sit down and do one of these in an single evening. We almost finished this one, and then he went off to camp. I rounded it out by adding a couple after he left. I started this one with, "I'm going to spend all my money." Click to enlarge...

Marvel and DC's Wizard of Oz!

I recently ran across this Wizard of Oz comic from 1975...

Since it was published by both Marvel and DC, I couldn't stop myself from redrawing it with a few substitute characters. Click on it to enlarge...

You won't see this on on Covered Blog like some of my other recreations. It's too much of a parody/mash-up for the purpose of that site, if you're curious why.

When I first thought about what characters to use, I was surprised to realize that there are no Lion-based superheroes! And, very few villains.

Using Tin (who's awkwardly out of step, if you didn't notice) from Metal Men was an obvious choice. Using the Batman villain, Scarecrow, was also an obvious choice. I very, very briefly considered using the Marvel hero named Scarecrow. He was created in the 70's and maybe used only three times.

I debated about who to use for the Cowardly Lion. The most obvious choice would be Leo...

...from the Zodiac, a group of old Avengers villains...

...but he was too obscure, and boring to look at. I thought about the Griffin...

...but he was a griffin, not a lion. Marvel has a whole race of Cat People. I thought about using one of them, like this dude below...

...but, again, too obscure. Even though she's a girl and a tiger, I came close to using Tigra herself. However, my son told me I've already drawn her too much.

As I considered using Kraven, my other son reminded me that "craven" means "cowardly". A winner had emerged.

It's my fondest wish that my thoughtful examination of how to translate Wizard of Oz characters into Marvel or DC characters will be of great use to future generations.

This is slightly interesting!

I've been relaxing lately by drawing Covered Blog covers. I've turned in a couple recently which should appear on the Covered site in the future. I considered drawing Strange Tales Annual #2. I really dig the multicolored title and all gray background. Plus, there's always something slightly weird about Jack Kirby's version of Spider-Man.

I started my version with only minor changes planned. On the original, there is no spider on Spider-Man's costume, so I added it crawling across the logo. I changed the wording a bit.

Sharp-eyed readers will notice that there is no Human Torch on my version. I never drew one I truly liked, and, overall, the cover was feeling too close to the original. I saw no reason to continue working on it. If I'm not liking what I'm doing, I shouldn't expect anyone else to like it either.

Okay, on a tangent, here comes the slightly interesting part...

I was flipping through Marvel Treasury Edition #1 from 1974.

On the inside back cover, it has reproductions of "famous" Spider-Man covers. It includes Strange Tales Annual #2.

However, it has extra dialog included!

It's a pretty crowded cover, so the decision must have been made to remove the word balloons. The file copy used on the Treasury page obviously doesn't reflect that. It could have looked like this--!

And that, my friends, is slightly interesting.