Simon And Kirby

With Great Chutzpah …

In the midst of the imbroglio over Alan Moore and Before Watchmen, Rob Steibel’s Kirby Dynamics blog reminds us that Marvel’s record of caring for creators isn’t any better.

In a new documentary about Stan Lee, “The Man” takes sole credit for creating the Black Panther when history indicates that some guy by the name of Jack Kirby had just as much – if not more – involvement in conceiving the character.

Lee also claims credit for The Falcon, when the idea – as originally revealed in the forward to a Marvel Masterworks Captain America volume – apparently originated from the mind of Gene Colan.

Guess those constant cameos in every single Marvel film, cartoon and video game weren’t enough to stroke Stan’s ego…

Poor Man’s Batman

As conceived by writer France Heron and artist Jack Kirby, Mr. Scarlet was Fawcett’s answer to Batman, one that was every bit as cold and ruthless as Bill Finger and Bob Kane’s original depiction of The Dark Knight.

The tone of the series rapidly softened, however, as the Crimson Crusader (Hey, why not?) adopted a sunnier attitude and picked up a teenage sidekick, the unfortunately named Pinky. Competent, if unexciting, adventures ensured.

Somewhere along the way, though, somebody in the Fawcett bullpen came up with a brilliant idea: What happens when a masked crime fighter succeeds beyond his wildest dreams?

In the case of Mr. Scarlet, a district attorney in his civilian life, the hero finds himself standing in the unemployment line. The character was so good at his work that illegal activities in Gotham City – believe it or not, Scarlet’s hometown was identified as such in Wow Comics # 1 – ground to a screeching halt and the good citizens no longer required the services of criminal law attorneys.

The end result effectively lampooned the concept of millionaire crime-fighters as Mr. Scarlet literally became the “poor man’s Batman.” The remainder of his adventures, which lasted until 1948, found the super-hero struggling to support himself and his ward as he continued battling the threat of the month.

Until Peter Parker came along 14 years later, I’m not sure comics saw a more hard-luck super-hero than Fawcett’s Mr. Scarlet.

From Wow Comics # 21 (Fawcett, January 1944), here’s the excellently titled “Out To Lunch – With Danger.” The art is uncredited, but the story is provided by one of the medium’s greatest writers: Otto Binder.

No Ordinary Joe

The comic-book world lost one of its greatest innovators this week. Joe Simon, the co-creator of Captain America and – heck – entire genres of comics with Jack Kirby passed away Wednesday at the age of 98.

Although many tributes have already mentioned Simon & Kirby’s most prominent creation – a certain star-spangled Avenger – Joe Simon will always hold a unique spot in my geeked-out heart for his whacked out masterpieces of the late ‘6os and early ‘70s: Brother Power The Geek and Prez.

I have to admit that both series warped my young, impressionable mind and helped me realize how comics could communicate more outré concepts than costumed musclemen beating the crap out of one another.

Simon, of course, was responsible for much more than DC oddities. Along with his famous partner, he created such landmark titles as Boy Explorers and Young Romance. Simon also founded and edited one of the more interested Mad knock-offs, Sick Magazine.

While the creation Captain America alone would enough for most writer-artists to consider themselves successful, Joe Simon and Jack Kirby’s accomplishments are proof positive of just how great an impact two visionaries can have on an art form.

Simon and Kirby, after all, did far more than create characters. They created the back-bone of an entire industry.

From Black Cat #6 (Harvey Comics, June-July 1947) here’s a brilliant, off-beat tale by Joe Simon starring “His Highness, The Duke Of Broadway.” The story is entitled “Fear.”

War And Peace

In celebration of the 94th anniversary of Jack Kirby’s birth, here’s a story from the very beginning of the King’s legendary partnership with the equally great Joe Simon.

Kirby first met Simon while working at Fox Publications. The two decided to freelance together and began their long collaboration with a memorable story from the second issue of Novelty Press’ Blue Bolt Comics.

The tale – which features one of the great femme fatales of the Golden Age, The Green Sorceress – may strike modern readers as odd given the heroes’ willingness to wage a brutal war against their enemies. They even resort to brainwashing as a means of securing victory.

While such tactics are usually attributed to anti-heroes – or form the basis of an over-hyped mini-series - in contemporary comics, Simon and Kirby’s early comics reflected their acute concerns regarding Hitler’s expansion in Europe.

(An issue they would tackle more overtly with their most famous creation, Captain America.)

At that point in comics history, super-hero comics were much more freewheeling. Even the Big Blue Boy Scout himself, Superman, felt free to toss criminals and sabouteurs to their deaths if it meant innocent lives would be saved.

To Simon and Kirby, who were following in the traditions of pulp characters like The Shadow and classic adventure fiction such as Dumas’ Three Musketeers, heroic figures utilizing any and all means possible to secure peace seemed perfectly natural.

Here are “The Green Sorceress and the Cyclotron” from Blue Bolt Comics Vol. 1 #2 (Novelty Press, July 1940) and “The Green Sorceress Reforms” from Blue Bolt Comics Vol. 1 #3 (August, 1940).

The story and art for both stories are by Simon and Kirby.

Freedom’s Just Another Word

With Captain America set to conquer the silver screen and further whet Marvel zombies’ appetites for Joss Whedon’s Avengers movie, I thought it appropriate to highlight Joe Simon and Jack Kirby’s work on another star-spangled hero.

Captain Freedom debuted in Speed Comics #13 (Harvey Comics, May 1941) as yet another publisher’s response to the commercial success of such patriotic characters as The Shield, Uncle Sam and – of course – Simon and Kirby’s Captain America.

Credited to “Franklin Flagg” (the writer’s real name is unknown, sadly, but the art to most of Captain Freedom’s adventures is by Arthur Cazeneuve), Harvey’s defender of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness was a crusading newspaper publisher who decided he could better aid the American War effort by dressing up like a walking flag.

The good Captain was frequently aided on his adventures by a group of courageous newsboys known as “The Young Defenders.”

Captain Freedom proved popular enough to become Speed Comics’ cover feature and lasted until the magazine was finally canceled in 1947. His adventures were pretty much standard punch-em-ups, but at one point the Captain unexpectedly found himself elevated to the A-List after Joe Simon and Jack Kirby were hired to draw a number of covers featuring Harvey’s star-spangled avenger.

Simon himself depicted the Captain in Speed Comics #17-#21 and #23 while Kirby and Simon teamed up for a striking cover to Speed Comics #22. It probably goes without saying that the covers outshone the Captain’s adventures inside the comic, but that’s a comic-book tradition that persists to this very day.

Here are the Simon & Kirby covers to Speed Comics. Be aware that some of the following images contain racial stereotypes that were considered acceptable in their day but are decidedly offensive now.

Give A Hoot

Before Joe Simon and Jack Kirby introduced Captain America to the world, the pair honed their super-hero chops by writing and drawing a somewhat obscure Batman-wannabe for Prize Comics: The Black Owl.

The character – created by Robert Turner and Pete Riss of the Jack Binder Studio – first appeared in 1940 as “K The Unknown,” your typical good-for-nothing millionaire playboy who decided fighting crime was a worthwhile hobby to alleviate boredom. The “K” gimmick apparently worked about as well as the concept of a pro-wrestling dentist, however, as the name was changed to The Black Owl without explanation in the character’s second appearance.

The Black Owl continued, in one form or another, for about seven years. Although the character never really hit the big leagues in any incarnation, Simon and Kirby’s short stint on the would-be Caped Crusader remain a definite high point and set the stage nicely for the duo’s more heralded work on Captain America.

From Prize Comics #9 (Prize, 1941), here’s “The Menace Of Madame Mystery” by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby.

If you’d like to read a more pristine version of this comic – along with tons of other boss Simon/Kirby creations – I heartily recommend purchasing The Simon & Kirby Superheroes, published by Titan Books.

‘Nuff said!

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Seeya Later, Alligator

Jack Kirby was not only one of the premier action-adventure writer-artists of his – or just about any – generation. He could also draw a mean funny animal strip.

Lockjaw the Alligator – whose demeanor and speech pattern will undoubtedly strike a familiar chord with fans of a certain Blue-Eyed Ever-Lovin’ Thing –  was one of Kirby’s rare forays into the genre. Although the story is only  five pages long, it aptly demonstrates an interesting direction The King’s career could have taken. Plus, there’s an unexpected – but expertly choreographed  - dance scene to boot!

And yeah, it’s entirely possible that Lockjaw’s memory lives on in the form of The Inhumans’ lovable, teleporting pooch.

“Lockjaw Goes To College” originally appeared in Punch And Judy Comics, vol. 3 #1 (Hillman Periodicals, 1947)

King Is Coming

Speaking of Jack Kirby …

Ninety-three years ago today, the King Of Comics was born and the world became a much richer place.

It would take far too many words to sum up Kirby’s contributions to popular culture via the uniquely American artform of comics, so let’s turn our focus to the days before the King earned his crown.

In 1938, the Fiction House publishing group – which owned and operated such wild and wooly pulp magazine imprints as Glen-Kel and Real Adventures Publishing Co. – decided to expand into the nascent, but rapidly growing, comic-book field.

Publisher Thurman Scott subsequently turned to an aggressive, young company known for creating and packaging comic books, Eisner & Iger (i.e. Will Eisner and Jerry Iger, two guys who already knew a thing or two about comics at that early date).

The result: Jumbo Comics #1, cover dated September, 1938. A compilation of adventure strips, the book is notable today for two reasons – the American debut of Eisner and Iger’s Sheena, Queen Of The Jungle and the first comic-book work of one Jacob Kurtzburg,  better known to us today as Jack Kirby.

Working under a variety of aliases, Kirby contributed a science-fiction strip (“The Diary Of Dr. Hayward” as Curt Davis), a western (“Wilton Of The West” as Fred Sande) and a serialization of Alexandre Dumas’ “The Count Of Monte Cristo” (as Jack Curtiss, probably the best pseudonym of the three.)

The features are said to be four pages apiece, but I was unable to find the complete stories. Still, considering that the comic is more than 70 years old and the product of a defunct publisher to boot, we’re fortunate that any material survives at all.

From Jumbo Comics #1, here are fragments of Jack Kirby’s first comic-book works. The strips are crude and only contain hints of what’s to come, but are more than worthwhile for those interested in comics’ rich history.

Happy Kirby day!

The Artificial Twin

After the fabled team of Joe Simon and Jack Kirby parted ways in the mid-50s, the once and future king of comics lent his talents to DC and produced an astounding 600 pages of material for the company in 30 months.

His contributions to the company included co-creating DC mainstays The Challengers Of The Unknown, blasting Green Arrow off into a unique series of science-fiction based adventures and assorted short stories in the publisher’s many anthology titles.

Despite his prodigious output, however, Kirby soon found himself at odds with a few notable – and powerful – figures within the company. Superman editor Mort Weisinger, the co-creator of Green Arrow, disliked Kirby’s take on the Emerald Archer and often spoke disparagingly of the King’s artistic style.

Complicating matters, Kirby found himself embroiled in a contractual dispute with DC editor Jack Schiff over disputed royalties owed from the artist’s work on the syndicated Sky Masters comic strip with Wally Wood.

The sum result of these, and other, disputes within DC led Kirby to rejoin Stan Lee at Atlas Comics … and of course, the rest is history.

“The Artificial Twin” was one of many stories Kirby illustrated for DC’s House Of Mystery horror anthology. Although DC’s horror and sci-fi offerings were rather tame even before the Comics Code Authority was established, the King’s art provides its customary kick and there are a few nice, paranoid moments as the protagonist struggles to make sense of his fiance’s sudden change in behavior.

From the House Of Mystery #76, here’s “The Artificial Twin.”