Great Art: Savage Dragon and Spider-Man by Erik Larsen!

Erik Larsen is one of those guys that is just a consummate comic professional. He just loves making comics and has made a living doing so for over three decades now. Twenty-five years of that have been focused on Savage Dragon, his childhood character that he turned into a multimedia star for a few years before comfortably settling in to regular adventures of the entire Dragon family. Hundreds of issues later, he stands as a unique single writer/artist on a book with only Dave Sim and Fred Perry challenging him for commitment to his creation.

He also happens to be one of my favorite comic artists, dating back to his Marvel days. I actually saw his work first in the pages of Marvel Comics Presents though, not Spider-Man. He did a strange little Excalibur arc in that book where the team basically fought the Looney Tunes characters that I adore and am a little surprised has never been reprinted. It wasn't until a few months later I found his Spider-Man and loved that just as much. But I was an X-Men guy up until the rise of Image. Yet after I read the first couple issues of Dragon's adventures, I knew I had read something different. I could almost feel Larsen's commitment to the character and making him work. It impressed me then, and he became the character I most latched onto as a young man. (Though I'm still mad that none of my contributions won his villain creation contest in issue 10.)

To make a long story short, I'm always excited to see unique pin-ups from Larsen. So when I found this Spider-Man / Savage Dragon crossover piece, I thought it was the perfect image to feature on a Great Art installment. Enjoy and be sure to go buy a copy or two of Savage Dragon, still going strong after all these years.

As always, you can check out a lot more Great Art in the Super Powered Fiction Facebook group!. And after you're done admiring some great art here, don’t forget to check out some of the other great stuff from me this week!

Happy New Year! (Though I might be a few years off...)

Tomorrow, I kick off the best of 2017 lists. But for now, whether you're celebrating New Years 1975 or New Years 2018, have a happy one!

Great Art: Spider-Man and Mary Jane by Steve Lightle

It is almost Christmas, so why not celebrate with a classic by the ever-underrated Steve Lightle featuring the formerly happy couple of Spider-Man and Mary Jane Watson-Parker!

As always, you can check out a lot more Great Art over on the Tumblr. And while you are admiring some great art here, don’t forget to check out some of the other great stuff on the site this week!

What's Up for October 27, 2017

What's Up is a simple post where I give you links to the books, comics, movies, games and/or music I have been enjoying as of late. Feel free to check them out if you would like to enjoy them as well or give your opinions of these works in the comments below (though do try to keep it spoiler free.)





Succubus Blues | Sheriff of Babylon | Spider-Man: Origin of the Hobgoblin |
Meet the Robinsons | Lana Del Rey: Lust for Life

Great Art: Spider-Man vs. The Circus of Crime by Fred Hembeck

I can think of few conceits of comics I love quite as much as the Circus of Crime. It is such a weird comic idea, one used to perfection by Marvel for years. The unit has evolved over the years (check out the late 90s Joe Casey-written Deathlok for an example), but they will always remain a unique favorite of mine, much like the art of Fred Hembeck.

Best Character Ever 11: Spider-Man

On this Labor Day, I figured there was no better time to talk about Spider-Man.

Romita's swinging Spidey is still one of the character's most iconic images.

Let's be honest, here's no greater working class hero than Spider-Man. Of course, Marvel dropped that element of him years ago to replace him with another super-amazing Marvel scientist, but his media appearances still understand the importance of his working class Queens background.

I grew up nowhere near New York, deep in the Midwest. I was raised in a tiny Iowa town, the kind of place books and movies would call sleepy. Smallville was a city compared to the 3000 person community I spent the first ten years of my life in. But despite that background, I had a love for superheroes from my earliest memories and a show called Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends. Iceman was my true favorite of the show because I thought ice slides were cool (pun intended). I am pretty sure I had my first crush on Firestar. But Spider-Man was the one with his name on the title card.

I really loved the Lobo brothers.
Art by Sal Buscema. Click for larger view.

By the time I was nine, my brother was regularly buying all three Marvel Spider-Man books at that time: Amazing Spider-Man, Web of Spider-Man and Spectacular Spider-Man. All three books shared a narrative, but the second two were incredibly closely tied by sharing a writer in Gerry Conway. Along with his artists Sal Buscema and Alex Saviuk as well as the Amazing creative team of Dave Michelinie and Todd McFarlane, Spider-Man entered what I would call his last great renaissance in comics. Newly married to Mary Jane Watson, his wife and him found themselves at the mercy of a crazed businessman turned stalker that crippled their finances, evicted them from their home and got Mary Jane blackballed from her modeling career. Spidey was at his lowest point, only having a home because of the generosity of Harry and Liz Osborn.

I could understand it all perfectly at nine years old. I got being poor as my family never had much money. I could see how someone could be obsessed by Mary Jane and saw stories about corrupt businessmen seemingly daily on a dozen different TV shows. (Yes, it was a cliche even then.) I groked Peter's struggle because it was something I could relate to, even if I wasn't regularly fighting super-powered were-gangsters or helping my friend stay alive against an Albino hitman. I never wore an alien costume or had to fight to keep New York free from a citywide demonic possession. But I could always get Peter Parker.

I think that more than great power and great responsibility, more than his catching thieves just like flies, more than every variation of his origin, is what makes Spider-Man a truly special character. He was someone that no matter how hard life treated him, he always strove to do the right thing.

Alex Saviuk was always my Spider-artist,
making me the weird(er) kid.
Click for larger view

Spider-Man's influence on the superhero landscape cannot be under-estimated. Outside Superman, no one character did more to change the narrative of superheroes in the 21st century. Half the Marvel Universe is built around the storytelling cues first put together by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. Even DC got in on the inspiration with books like Firestorm, Blue Devil and New Teen Titans. Comics became as much about the tribulations of everyday life as about the crazy super villain this month.

Even my own characters owe tons to Spider-Man. I always wanted to write characters with more depth than the comics I grew up upon. Even after that late 80s golden age of Spider-Man, I learned a lot about prose superheroics from Diane Duane's excellent Spider-Man: The Venom Factor. (They also served to show how easy it was to make Mary Jane useful, something modern Marvel might have took note of before any Mephisto based retcons.)

Of course, Spidey continues to be a frequently seen character in all Marvel media with his own TV series, two different movie franchises and a third on the way as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

All for a kid from Queens with a sense of responsibility. Not too shabby.