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No. 70July2007

Human Torch, Captain America, Sub-Mariner, & The Red Skull TM & ©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.

Roy Thomas ’ ’ s--Something

Comics Fanzine

Roy Thomas ’ ’ s--Something

Comics FanzineYOU ASKED FOR IT—

SO IT SERVES YOU RIGHT!

ON MARVEL IN THE 1970s!

YOU ASKED FOR IT—SO IT SERVES YOU RIGHT!

ON MARVEL IN THE 1970s!

ROYTHOMAS

ROYTHOMAS

7070

PLUS GOLDEN AGE GREAT

PLUS GOLDEN AGE GREAT

&&LILY RENÉE

“ROY THE BOY” TALKS ABOUT WORKING WITH:ADAMS * ANDRU * BORING * BOTH BUSCEMAS * BRUNNER * BUCKLER

CHAYKIN * COCKRUM * COLAN * CONWAY * ENGLEHART * EVERETTGERBER * GOODWIN * KANE * KIRBY * LEE * MOENCH * PÉREZ

PLOOG * ROBBINS * ROMITA * THE SEVERINS * SHOOTER * SMITHTHORNE * TRIMPE * TUSKA * WEIN * WOLFMAN * WRIGHTSON, & MORE!!

“ROY THE BOY” TALKS ABOUT WORKING WITH:ADAMS * ANDRU * BORING * BOTH BUSCEMAS * BRUNNER * BUCKLER

CHAYKIN * COCKRUM * COLAN * CONWAY * ENGLEHART * EVERETTGERBER * GOODWIN * KANE * KIRBY * LEE * MOENCH * PÉREZ

PLOOG * ROBBINS * ROMITA * THE SEVERINS * SHOOTER * SMITHTHORNE * TRIMPE * TUSKA * WEIN * WOLFMAN * WRIGHTSON, & MORE!!

LILY RENÉE

18265827763

5

07

Alter EgoTM is published monthly by TwoMorrows, 10407 Bedfordtown Drive, Raleigh, NC 27614, USA. Phone: (919) 449-0344. Roy Thomas, Editor. John Morrow, Publisher. Alter Ego Editorial Offices: 32 Bluebird Trail, St. Matthews, SC 29135, USA. Fax: (803) 826-6501; e-mail: [email protected]. Send subscription funds to TwoMorrows, NOT to the editorial offices. Single issues: $9 US ($11.00 Canada, $16 elsewhere). Twelve-issue subscriptions: $78 US, $132 Canada, $180 elsewhere. All charactersare © their respective companies. All material © their creators unless otherwise noted. All editorial matter © Roy Thomas. Alter Ego is a TM of Roy & Dann Thomas. FCA is a TM of P.C. Hamerlinck. Printed in Canada. ISSN: 1932-6890. FIRST PRINTING.

Vol. 3, No. 70 / July 2007EditorRoy Thomas

Associate EditorsBill SchellyJim Amash

Design & LayoutChristopher Day

Consulting EditorJohn Morrow

FCA EditorP.C. Hamerlinck

Comic Crypt EditorMichael T. Gilbert

Editorial Honor RollJerry G. Bails (founder)Ronn Foss, Biljo White

Editor EmeritusMike Friedrich

Production AssistantChris Irving

Circulation DirectorBob Brodsky, Cookiesoup Periodical Distribution, LLC

Cover ArtistGene Colan

Cover ColoristTom Ziuko

With Special Thanks to:Dan AdkinsHeidi AmashNick ArroyoBob BaileyMichael BaulderstoneAlan BargerAllen BellmanAl BigleyDominic BongoJerry K. BoydMike BurkeyR. Dewey CassellLarry ClayGene & Adrienne

ColanTeresa R. DavidsonJack DiMartinoChris FamaMichael FinnGregory FischerShane FoleyTodd FranklinJenna Land FreeJanet GilbertArnie GrievesGeorge HagenauerJennifer HamerlinckDavid G. HamiltonHeritage ComicsTom HorvitzJay KinneyScott Kolins

Karen KraftBob LaytonStan LeeBruce MacIntoshMichel MaillotJonathan MankutaMark MullerJim MurtaughJerry OrdwayTom PalmerNigel ParkinsonGeorge PérezJoe PetrilakJohn G. PierceTrina RobbinsPhil SchlaefferJohn SeverinMarie SeverinRick ShurginKeif SimonAnthony SnyderFlo SteinbergSteve StilesAaron SultanMarc SwayzeDann ThomasFrank ThorneAngelique TrouvereJim Vadeboncoeur, Jr.Alan WaiteHames WareNicholas Yutko

— Contents —

Writer/Editorial: The Devil Made Me Do It! . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2“Writing Comics Turned Out To Be What I Really Wanted To Do With My Life”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Roy Thomas talks to Jim Amash about the 1970s at Mighty Marvel.

Lily Renée At Fiction House—And Beyond . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63A far-too-brief look at a “Star Woman Cartoonist” by Trina Robbins.

Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt! Mike Mallet. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67Michael T. Gilbert presents “The World’s First Adult Comic,” by Bob Powell.

re: [comments, correspondence, & corrections to >ulp!< A/E #57!] . . 74FCA [Fawcett Collectors Of America] #129 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79P.C. Hamerlinck showcases Marc Swayze, John G. Pierce, and Roy the [Shazam!] Boy.

FREE! Rough Stuff #5 preview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89On Our Cover: “Gentleman Gene”—“Gene the Dean”—even “Adam Austin”—Stan Leecalled Gene Colan all of the above during the early days of Marvel Comics. Other peoplehave called him other things, among them “an artist’s artist” and “a painter with pencil.”Gene and Roy Thomas never worked together on The Invaders—but English collectorMichael Finn commissioned Gene to draw this powerful illo of Timely’s “Big Three” facingoff with The Red Skull—so, with Gene’s blessing, nothing was gonna stop us from repro-ducing it as our cover, straight from Mr. C.’s pulsating pencils, with Tom Ziuko adding thecolors. What’s more, you can rhapsodize over the penciled original art on p. 31! [CaptainAmerica, Human Torch, Sub-Mariner, & Red Skull TM & ©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Above: Gil Kane, who (twice!) came within an ace of becoming the first artist ever to illustrate Conan's adventures in comics form, drew the Cimmerian in this time-tossed settingfor the 1976 Mighty Marvel Bicentennial Calendar. Maybe the barbarian wound up atLexington and/or Concord because of Shamash-Shum-Ukin's fabled Well at the Center ofTime from Savage Sword of Conan #7 (Aug. 1975) and What If? #13 (Feb. 1979)! Repro'd froma scan of the original art, as retrieved from the Heritage Comics Archives by Dominic Bongo.[©2007 Paradox Entertainment.]

“Writing Comics Turned OutTo Be What I Really Wanted

To Do With My Life”

3

NTRODUCTION BY JIM AMASH:

“By The Middle Of 1970, I’d Been At MarvelFor Five Years”

JIM AMASH: All right, so it’s 1970 and you’re the second “headwriter” of Marvel Comics, with Stan [Lee] being #1. And you’reediting, so you’re the #2 editor, too.

THOMAS: That’s like saying you come in second in a horse race. Youdon’t get nearly as much money. [mutual laughter] Actually, it was anice situation to be in. By the middle of 1970, I’d been at Marvel forfive years, just picking up whatever little tidbits or reins Stan let fall,sometimes at his direction, sometimes at my own initiative. And I justbecame “#2 editor”—my real title was “associate editor”—by default.

Sol Brodsky was there—right before he left for Skywald and wassucceeded by John Verpoorten. As production manager, Sol ranked mein certain ways, and I had no problem with that—but he wasn’tinvolved in editorial decisions except from a scheduling angle, so thethree of us took care of things… well, in a sense maybe there were fourof us, because Stan relied on John Romita in certain areas concerningSpider-Man and even art direction and corrections.

JA: Now, as you rise in the company, is your compensation risingthat much?

THOMAS: I was doing okay. Is anybody ever really ever paid whatthey’d like? I was working, really, for [Marvel publisher] MartinGoodman, and he wasn’t somebody you could go to directly and say,“I’m worth more money.” Remember, Flo Steinberg quit in the late’60s because she couldn’t get a $5 raise, because Goodman felt secre-tarial positions paid a certain salary and not a penny over that. But,between Goodman and Stan, I got raises from time to time, when saleswere fairly good. There were sometimes Christmas bonuses, too. And,unlike back in the ’40s or ’50s, they never had to lower my salary,although back around ’68 they probably came close to doing thatacross the board when sales went soft, right after they turned the threeanthology titles into six solo hero titles.

JA: How did other people react to your rising in the company?

THOMAS: I probably had more friends than I’d had before. [mutuallaughter]

JA: That’s what I figured.

THOMAS: Well, I had more people suddenly finding excuses to hangaround with me. I’m not saying they were always doing thatconsciously. You naturally gravitate towards somebody in a situationlike that, as I’m sure I’ve done myself. I never had to work hard at that,because when I was dealing with pros earlier, it was most just writingfan letters to Julie Schwartz or Gardner Fox or Otto Binder. And, withthe exception of once or twice with Julie, I wasn’t really thinking interms of getting into the field professionally.

Some people probably accepted what you call my “rise” in thecompany, and some people didn’t. I wasn’t handing out assignmentsdirectly at that stage, but I had some growing influence, and Stan oftenlistened to my suggestions. Sometimes he’d ask who should do this orthat. It was a case of a gradual evolution. If I’d looked from one year tothe next, I was probably handling a little more and I was having to dealwith a few other writers and a bit more with the art—less with the artthan with the writers. But I wouldn’t have noticed from day-to-day orweek-to-week.

II

ROY THOMAS Talks About Writing—And Editing—For Marvel During The 1970s

Interview Conducted by Jim Amash Transcribed by Brian K. Morris

of Tuzun Thune, and he’d wonder about who was real, him or theSerpent Men—that sort of thing.

JA: Now a couple of things: the first “Kull” story is in Creatures onthe Loose #10—because I own that original art, you know.[chuckles]

THOMAS: Do you? The whole story? The story that Bernie thoughtfor a long time that I had? It got stolen from the office between when itwas first printed in Creatures on the Loose and right after I reprintedit in Savage Tales so we could see the artwork better in black-&-white,and I could even print Bernie’s cover. How did you get hold of thatstory?

JA: It was eventually found and returned to Wrightson, who latersold it to an art dealer, and the art dealer sold it to me. Was that atest for “Kull”? So if it had done badly, you might not have done aKull comic?

THOMAS: It was an attempt to get Kull out there, and see if we couldget a second Howard comic—and because Bernie had really wanted todo Conan and that hadn’t worked out. Of course, we ended up with aHerb Trimpe cover. Stan didn’t like Bernie’s cover, which underscoresthe fact that, had I pushed hard earlier for Bernie to do the Conanbook, it might not have worked to either my or Bernie’s advantage. The“Kull” story was months later, by which time Bernie had gotten moreexperience, and his “Skull of Silence” adaptation is gorgeous work. Hesaid equally nice stuff about my adaptation at the time, because I added

a few touches here and there. I suspect he didn’t do the Kull bookbecause, by then, he was more involved with DC.

JA: Swamp Thing starts not too long after that.

THOMAS: Otherwise, I’d have been very happy to work with him onKull. But I wound up going to Ross Andru, whose work I also loved.But I felt his pencils needed a bit more decoration to compete withwhat Barry was doing, just as I later thought Buscema did, which led tomy getting Alcala and Chan. For Andru’s Kull—well, you can’t get anybetter inker than Wally Wood. They’d have been the regular team. Butthere were several months between those first two Kull issues. And bythat time, Andru and Wood were both gone, so by Kull theConqueror #2—the third “Kull” outing—we wound up up with yetanother team. We had three different overall “teams,” if you countBernie, in just three issues. Three artistic looks—and all of themexcellent! [laughs] A plethora of riches.

JA: Later you changed the book’s title to Kull the Destroyer.

THOMAS: Stan changed it, just as Ploog came in to draw it and Iwrote that one issue. Stan felt maybe the word “Conqueror” washurting the book—it sounded too much like a king—so he changed theword to “Destroyer.” I remember the two of us were walking downthe hall and I argued, “I don’t think the word ‘Conqueror’ is theproblem, or that changing it will make a difference.” He got a bit teedoff at me for not thinking it was a great idea. I usually did like Stan’sideas; and in this case, it wasn’t like it was a bad idea. I just didn’tfigure it would help. I think what helped sell that book then for a littlewhile was Mike Ploog’s cover and art, plus we were doing a Robert E.Howard story, which got me all fired up. But I was just too busy tocontinue doing it. I think Steve Engelhart did a good job on Kull afterthat, but still it kind-of petered away. Maybe if Mike had kept oninking it—but we also lost Mike’s inking after that one issue, andMike’s work never looked as good when someone else was inking.

JA: Why did Ploog replace the Severins?

THOMAS: I don’t remember why Marie left. Remember, the last issueshe penciled wasn’t inked by John, and I think she lost interest after herbrother left, plus the fact that it wasn’t selling that well, anyway. Mariewould have to tell you more, if she remembers. I don’t think she wastaken off Kull.

JA: Okay, Red Sonja is an immediate hit when you introduce herinto the Conan series.

THOMAS: Well, in terms of reader reaction, anyway. She wasn’t evenon the first cover.

JA: Right, but since she was popular with the readers almostimmediately, why didn’t you use her more often in the Conan comicbook?

THOMAS: Conan was a loner. So, once he met her, she had to wanderoff at the end of the second story [Conan the Barbarian #24]. I alwaysknew she’d be back. But I wanted several months to go by first. I feltConan shouldn’t be part of a regular team.

JA: So you were thinking more in terms of realism than for sales, ina sense.

THOMAS: I didn’t really think a lot about sales in terms of Conan.And that’s probably why Stan saved our bacon [mutual chuckling] byinsisting that Barry and I use more humanoid villains, starting with #8.That probably made the upturn that saved the book. I wanted to sellthe book, of course, but mostly my feeling was that, if we did the bestjob we could, the book would either sell or it wasn’t going to sell. Andit was picking up in sales at that time, so I didn’t have to worry too

Conqueror, Hell! I’m A Destroyer!Mike Ploog’s cover for Kull the Destroyer #11 (Nov. 1973), as reprinted in black-&-white, with gray tones added, in FOOM #2 (Summer 1973).

See photo of Mike on p. 51. [©2007 Paradox Entertainment.]

10 Roy Thomas Talks About Writing—And Editing—For Marvel During The 1970s

much. It’s not like I needed RedSonja and other characters to sellConan.

So I didn’t have her reappear tillaround #40 or 41. Actually, there’sanother story we prepared thatshould’ve been in Conan theBarbarian a month before thatsecond two-parter—it’s the one thatbecame the lead story in SavageSword of Conan #1. But, as usual,when we launched Savage Sword—“We have a new book on the scheduleand it’s late!” [laughs] She could’vecome back earlier, but I was adapting a lot of Howard’s stories,and I didn’t feel like shoehorning Sonja into those, so I just kepton working. Then the chance came to bring her back, and we did.Are we through with the Howard stuff now?

JA: [chuckles] No, you don’t get off that lucky, Roy! [mutuallaughter] Because Conan was a more writer-intensive series foryou, did you feel like working on this helped you grow as awriter?

THOMAS: I’m sure it did. I always thought in terms of bringingpulp-like writing into comics—even Doc Savage, which I wasnever wild about as writing—and there were a lot of clumsythings about Burroughs, even Howard. It was all pulp-typewriting, but I felt that bringing in those characters and thoseconcepts would elevate comics a little. It wasn’t that I didn’t likewhat Stan Lee, Gardner Fox, and other people had done, myselfincluded… or that everything Howard did was better than mostof what, say, Stan Lee did. It’s just that I felt that having a non-comics approach would broaden the appeal of comics and enrichit in some vague way. This is the same motivation that later mademe want to bring in science-fiction and to do horror adaptationsand not just new stories.

JA: You did that Worlds Unknown color comic—

THOMAS: Yeah, that was a favorite. But it didn’t sell.

JA: —and I forget the name of the other one, that had thatgreat Steranko cover with The Invisible Man.

THOMAS: That was Supernatural Thrillers. Stan had the ideafor that one, then turned it over to me, and I decided we shouldadapt some fantasy/horror classics, like Theodore Sturgeon’s “It”and “Killdozer.” H.G. Wells’ The Invisible Man was Stan’s idea.I remember some of those worked out quite well, like Howard’s“Valley of the Worm.”

JA: Yeah, that was a good one. Okay, now this is hindsight, [laughs]but it seems to me—and maybe I noticed this because, when Istarted reading comics, you were already writing—but it seems tome that this is one of your real growth periods, the turn of or theearly to mid-’70s.

THOMAS: I think working with this other, non-comics materialcaused me to think more about the writing. I was trying to matchHoward’s style, or at least write a bit differently from what I waswriting in The Avengers. Challenges like that do make you grow as awriter. You don’t necessarily have to be constantly thinking, “I’mgrowing as a writer! I’m growing as a writer!” I get physically ill whenI see actors and actresses on TV talking about how they’re “growing”all the time. I was just trying to do a good job, and as you do that,maybe you improve in certain ways.

“I Really Did Like Deepening The Marvel Universe”

JA: That’s right, because in that same period you did the Kree/SkrullWar in The Avengers, which was a bit different from what you’ddone before in Avengers. You had like a “Women’s Lib” issue, andthings like that in Avengers. In fact, I think you took the whole ideaof that further than Lee and Kirby had done in Fantastic Four whenthey first introduced the Kree.

THOMAS: There were two factors in that. One is what you’re talkingabout, how working with Conan and other adaptation materials mademe start thinking a little differently, so that ideas would occur to methat maybe wouldn’t have otherwise. Actually, there are another threethings—I sound like Monty Python here, I know.

Another was the fact that I really did like deepening the Marvel

Red Sales In The SunsetYou can’t say Red Sonja artist Frank Thorne didn’t throw himself into his work! At

top center he confronts Big Red in the flesh (and lots of it!) at the unique Red SonjaConvention held in New Jersey in 1976! Photo courtesy of “Sonja” Angelique

Trouvere. The Hyrkanian’s comic sold quite well for a year or two there! Frankhimself provided a scan of the original art to the cover of Red Sonja #7 (Jan. 1978).

[Art ©2007 Red Sonja Properties, Inc.]

“Writing Comics Turned Out To Be What I Really Wanted To Do With My Life” 11

supporting characters that appear every so often, instead.

THOMAS: Like The Vision. I never really had any thought of tryingto put him in his own book. He was a great character in Avengers, andthat was fine. That’s what he stayed for the whole almost 50 issues thatI wrote after Avengers #57.

“I Was Just Supposed To Be The ‘Story Editor’”

JA: Okay, you became editor-in-chief in 1972. Now Stan moves upin the company. How do you think Stan felt about giving up beingeditor-in-chief? And how much did you want that job?

THOMAS: He didn’t give me the title “editor-in-chief” title rightaway. I was just supposed to be the “story editor.” I don’t know ifthat would’ve been the term in the books, but I suspect Stan aspublisher saw himself continuing to act as editor-in-chief, because heknew that his strength really was the stories, the direction of thebooks. He didn’t want to give that up. There’s no reason to think Icould do it as well, and he wanted to do as much of it as he couldhimself, and besides, he and I worked rather well as a team. I wasn’tso ambitious that I was looking to wrest it away from him.

I was quite content to be second banana. When you’re a secondbanana to somebody as good as Stan, you don’t mind that much.Well, maybe somebody else would, but this wasn’t All About Eve.[mutual chuckling] This was more like Batman and Robin. While Iwanted to do things on my own, I was just happy to help Stan realizewhat he wanted to do, because he’s the guy who’d had the vision forthe company. It wasn’t me, it wasn’t Martin Goodman, it wasn’t evenJack Kirby—it was Stan. I’ll get some arguments on that, but I’mabsolutely convinced. He’s the only person that did it, and maybehe’s the only person who could have done it. There’s certainly noevidence that anybody else could have. So I wasn’t looking tooverthrow that. I just wanted to make my own little niche and havefun with it and do the best job that I could. Still, I didn’t like beingjust “story editor,” because I really wanted to be—under Stan, atleast—over the art and everything else. I felt that was the only way to

be efficient.

So Stan appointed me “storyeditor,” and John Verpoorten wasthe production manager, andFrank Giacoia got named—well, Idon’t know if it was ever anofficial title, but I always thoughtof him as “assistant art director,”with Stan as the art director—although John Romita had a bigrole to play there, too. So who wasthe art director as of mid-1972?There wasn’t one. Stan had alwayshad that title, “Editorial and ArtDirector.” So Frank and I were just“promoted” to being “story editor”and “assistant art director”—and it

didn’t work out. It was an unstable little triumvirate that Stancreated there, and it didn’t last more than a few weeks—because Frank Giacoia, as good as he was, just wasn’t up tothe job of being an art director like Romita was a little later. IfRomita wasn’t offered the title, it was only because he wasjust too valuable, doing so many other things, includingSpider-Man. Frank really wanted the job, because it was achance to mostly to deal with covers; it gave him a chance tomake money without having to do as much drawing andinking. The only thing is, we suddenly had these impasses.

Well, I’ve told that story before.

JA: Which one?

THOMAS: I just didn’t really feel the story editor thing was workingout. It was just too frustrating, because I’m having to deal with Frank,but he wasn’t under me—and he wasn’t producing cover sketches asfast or as good as we needed. So unless I went to went to Stan and hetalked to Frank, there was nobody to tell Frank, “Do something.” Ihad no such problems with Verpoorten as production manager. But,after just a few weeks, I was at my wit’s end and just thinking, “MaybeI should just get out.” I always had feelers from Carmine at DC, andsometimes they were tempting. I liked DC’s characters. Maybe it wastime for a change—and that was another time when Gil Kane was so

Frankie And Johnny Were… Well…Frank Giacoia (far right) & John Romita (right)

each had a piece of the “art director” titleand responsibility in the early 1970s—but by1973 Jazzy Johnny was definitely the man!

Giacoia, of course, remained one of Marvel’stop inkers, despite his deadline problems.

Photos from FOOM #3 (Fall 1973).

Earlier, John and Frank had worked in tandemon layouts by Jack Kirby for the “Captain

America” story in Tales of Suspense #77 (May1966). Thanks to Matt Moring and Chris Fama.

[©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.]


important in my life. I remembermoaning the blues to Gil about it, thesame way he did to me about otherthings.

And Gil says, “My boy, [mutuallaughter] don’t let it worry you. It’ll allcome to you.” I said, “What are youtalking about?” And he says, “Well,look. You’ve got these three people.”And he just analyzed it perfectly. Hesays, “John Verpoorten doesn’t count.He just wants to get the books out. Hedoesn’t care how it happens, as long ashe can get the books out, so he’s nothreat. He’s not ambitious, trying tobuild an empire or anything. AndFrank’s a good inker, but he’s totallyincompetent as an art director becausehe’s never really worked at being atartist. He’s always been an inker. Youknow he can’t make it over the longhaul. So,” Gil said, “all you have to dois hang in there a little while longer, andeverything will come falling to you, justlike you want.” I wasn’t too sure.

And then, a few days later, maybe aweek later, something came up and Stancalled me in because he wasn’t happywith the stuff Frank was doing. Hewanted to know why I wasn’t ridingFrank, [laughs] to make him shape up. Isaid, “There’s a very simple reason, Stan.It’s because Frank is not under me. Youmade us equals, so therefore the onlyperson who can give him orders is you.I can’t tell him what to do, because I’mnot his boss.”

So Stan said, “I think maybe we’dbetter change that.” [chuckles] So that’swhen I officially became editor-in-chief,and Frank was still assistant art director or whatever, and before longhe was sort-of shunted back into being an artist and Romita finallybecame the official art director, as he should’ve been all along. I’vealways found it funny that Gil analyzed the situation exactly. All I hadto do was sit tight and not do anything for a couple of weeks. [Jimchuckles] Once John Romita was art director, I guess I was technicallyhis “superior”—but it was never a question. For one thing, werespected each other and John just wanted to do whatever wasnecessary. Of course, if John and I had gotten into a serious dispute,John would’ve had direct access to Stan in a way Frank hadn’t… but,like I said, it never came up.

Frank got to hate me, feeling I had sabotaged him… when in realityhe had sabotaged himself. I suspect he felt similarly about John Romita.Frank talked to me from the heart once, soon afterward, about how hehad “busted my hump” at that job, and I didn’t know what to sayexcept make sympathetic sounds, because it sure hadn’t looked to uslike he was busting any humps. But we all liked Frank, sometimes inspite of himself, and we liked his inking.

JA: Don’t you think it worked so well between you and Romitabecause of John’s temperament, his willingness to be a team player,rather than to live by a title like Frank, in a certain sense, wasdoing? Also, John probably had a better grasp on what Marvel was

supposed to be and what you and Stanwanted.

THOMAS: Yeah. He and I were bothgood at anticipating Stan… and atturning his ideas into finished products.Stan knew we’d take the ball and runwith it. He could count on us in thatway, just as, earlier, in a productionsituation, he’d been able to count on SolBrodsky. I don’t think John Verpoortenand Stan had the same rapport as Stanand Sol had, although they got alongwell. I think Romita, Brodsky, and I

were probablythree of thepeople whowere the mostin tune withStan during theperiod of the’60s and ’70s,the same wayJoe Maneely ora couple ofpeople wereback in the’50s.

“Skywald And Atlas”JA: Well, there’s also the fact that,frankly, Sol Brodsky wasn’t that greata comics artist.

THOMAS: He was a competent artist,but it wasn’t his major talent. He was agood inker, but he was just more of anorganizer and overseer. Sol’s idea wasalways whatever will get the book out intime. Well, that’s good up to a point,because you need somebody like that.Otherwise, even somebody like me who

is pretty practical can worry something to death and not get it out. Andguys like Sol, and Verpoorten later on, they’d be the ones riding Stan orother editors, saying, “We’ve got to get this book out.” Somebodysometimes had to stand up to Stan and say, “You can’t play around anymore, or we’re going to eat a big expense on this book.”

JA: Right, because of late fees. I think your point about Sol is partic-ularly well-illustrated by what happened when he left and startedSkywald. I know that later, when Goodman started Atlas Comics,you had some discussion with some creative people, that, “Hey, ifyou leave here for Atlas and it doesn’t work out, don’t count onautomatically being able to come back.” Why do you think Sol wasable to escape that?

THOMAS: Because Stan needed him—also because Sol had left undervery friendly circumstances. Besides, I don’t think Stan ever saw SolBrodsky or Skywald as a real threat, even though Goodman got reallyannoyed at Skywald for various reasons. Stan knew Sol’s skills, whichwere as an artist in general and a production person/overseer, anexpeditor. He never said this to me, but I think he probably didn’t feelthat Sol Brodsky and Israel Waldman were going to come up with acompany that would be much of a threat to Marvel at that stage.Besides, he liked Sol, and I think he felt, “If Sol can make a go of it,okay.” Sol was smart to talk to Stan before leaving, the same way Stan’s

Like, “Jolly Solly Brodsky” Didn’t Occur To Stan In 1964?

“Sparkling SOLLY BRODSKY”? Well, that’s how Stan tagged himin the photo section of 1964’s Marvel Tales Annual. While Sol

isn’t primarily remembered as an artist, he was drawing (andoccasionally writing?) back in the Golden Age, and once told

Roy T. he had created the Holyoke hero “The Red Cross” in 1942.Along with inking Fantastic Four #3-4, he embellished John Buscema’s pencils on the cover of Sub-Mariner #1

(May 1968) while serving as Marvel’s production manager.Thanks to Bob Bailey. [©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.]


JA: I always thought the Silver Age kind-of ends when Kirby goesto DC, only because that affects both companies, whereas Stan Leestepping down as editor only affects Marvel, you see? But it’sarbitrary. For Alter Ego’s purposes, I know you count through theend of 1974—and when I’m interviewing, I often count throughwhen Carmine Infantino stepped down at DC—at the end of 1975or early in 1976.

THOMAS: It must’ve been around then that Jenette Kahn becameDC’s publisher, because I left New York in early July of ‘76 for theWest Coast, and Jenette was in at DC for several months before that.She and I even dated a couple of times. She took me to a Patti Smithconcert and a cocktail party for some prospective DemocraticPresidential candidate… Morris Udall… even though I’d stopped beinga Democrat the year before, when the Democratic Congress stoppedPresident Ford from coming to the rescue ofSouth Vietnam when the North broke thepeace treaty and invaded. When thathelicopter took off from the US embassybuilding in Saigon, it took with it my oldparty affiliation. In 1976, Gerald Fordbecame the first Republican I ever voted for.

“Talented People Who GotStirred Up By What Had

Happened In The PrecedingDecade”

JA: Okay, a couple of editor-in-chiefquestions that I didn’t ask you last time.During your reign—

THOMAS: Whatever.

JA: Yeah, and you can spell it “R-A-I-N”.[laughs]

THOMAS: It was more like a drizzle.

JA: Okay, during the hailstorm, [laughs] a lot of new people camein. Frank Brunner really starts about then, and Jim Starlin and AlMilgrom, Engelhart comes in around in ’72, I think. Did you havean accounting for why all this new—and good new—talent comesinto the field at that time? Do you think you had anything to dowith it? Were you looking to bring more people in?

THOMAS: Well, peripherally. But it would’ve happened anyway.These were all talented people who got stirred up by what hadhappened in the preceding decade, especially in the latter half of the’60s, when Stan and Jack, Ditko, and Romita all hit their stride on theMarvel books. And of course, they were also inspired by some things atDC—the coming of Neal Adams with “Deadman,” and other bookshere and there. DC was experimenting, after Carmine came in. DC hadhad an earlier experimentation stage, which had kind-of petered out bythe mid-’60s. I remember how startled I was when I learned from Stanthat Hawkman didn’t sell well, because I loved that character. But Ishouldn’t have been surprised. It never had sold as well as even TheAtom, and there are reasons for that, I think. However much we maylove him, Hawkman is just a guy with a beak who can fly. And he haswhat I always called a “church window” costume—too many colorsfighting each other. [mutual chuckling] Not that that stopped himfrom being my favorite Golden Age hero of all time… and one of my

Duo For A New DecadeSteve Englehart (above, as writer) and Frank Brunner (as artist) became thecosmic caretakers of the “Dr. Strange” feature beginning in Marvel Premiere#9 (July 1973). Soon co-plotting the book, as well, they became one of the

most successful “Dr. Strange” teams ever. Thanks to Bob Bailey for the scan.[©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Silver Age Among The GoldWhenever the Silver Age started or ended, these three DC guys were an

integral part of it. (Left to right:) artist Carmine Infantino… editor JuliusSchwartz… artist Joe Kubert. Because all three of them (and writers Robert

Kanigher and John Broome) had produced the Silver Age-jumpstartingShowcase #4 in 1956, after also taking part in the Golden Age, they starred

on a special “Flash” panel at the All Time Classic New York Comic BookConvention in 2000. Photo courtesy of Joe Petrilak.


favorites of theearly Silver Age, aswell.

And so, between whathad happened at Marvel andDC, but also at othercompanies, there were more andmore people getting inspired bycomics—and fandom was allowingthose people to be in touch witheach other—people who mightnever have met in an earlier daybecause they weren’t all in NewYork. In the old days, guys like GilKane and Carmine and Giacoia andToth and Hasen all knew each other,because they all lived in New York,even if they may have come fromdifferent parts of the country. Thenew guys were in touch with eachother even before they came to NewYork.

JA: How actively were you recruiting?At all?

THOMAS: Well, off and on, yeah. By the early ’70s, we began toexpand again. In mid-’72 or so, when Stan became the president andpublisher, suddenly, we had not just our own president and publisher,separate from Magazine Management and the other magazines, themen’s sweat and romance and confessions and crosswords and all that.That meant that, suddenly, Marvel had to support all that, see? Marvelsuddenly had to pay a few extra salaries, and I don’t mean mine.[mutual laughter] I remember one of the first things Stan had to dowas to hire a comptroller—whether they spell that with an “M” or an“N”—and there was this guy named Conway—I think it was RichardConway, no relation to Gerry—brought in to handle the money. Agreat big Verpoorten-sized guy [Jim laughs] whom I don’t remembertoo well. He was around for a year or so. He seemed like a nice guy. Ihad a few dealings with him. That was one of the new salaries, and wehad to expand a bit to support all this.

And, of course, only two or three years earlier, we’d gone to adifferent distributor [Curtis], since Marvel was now owned byCadence, which had started out as Perfect Film (or been absorbed bythem, I forget which—it didn’t matter much to those of us in thetrenches). So, Marvel being a separate company, we had to add morebooks. And that was, coincidentally, also the period in which the Codewas rewritten, liberalized. All of a sudden, the monster field opened upto us, so even without just flooding the stands with more super-heroes,pure and simple, we had another genre or two we could play aroundwith. The Kung Fu angle, for example—we got a book or two out ofthat. The monster angle, we got 80 titles. [mutual chuckling]

JA: Right, including a lot of reprints.

THOMAS: Yeah, but we needed more people on staff even just tohandle the reprints! And to handle the mail for the extra books. All of asudden, we had maybe another assistant editor where before just onemight’ve sufficed. By the mid-’70s, Roger Stern and Roger Slifer andDave Kraft and others were hired to answer letters, as much asanything else.

Well, like I said, we suddenly needed more people, and that was partof my job—but the thing is, all I had to do was walk out the door andstumble over some of these guys. [Jim laughs] Steve Englehart was sent

up there. He was a summer replacementor some such thing for Gary Friedrich.

When Gary wanted to go away for awhile, he got Steve, who was sort-of a young aspiring artist when hecame up to Neal’s studio, and heended up at Marvel as a proof-reader. Then he wanted to write,and I believe he wrote a few pages

of a sample script. Anyway, I gave him “The Beast” to try out on, andthat worked out pretty well.

JA: I think he colored before he wrote.

THOMAS: Maybe so. He’s always said he got back into readingcomics by seeing that last issue Ditko did of Spider-Man, where Stanwrote this caption about the villain being “a full-time nut.”

Alan Weiss—I always liked Alan, but I don’t remember how hecame up there. Frank Brunner had worked there on staff, a couple ofyears earlier—a talented young artist in the Frazetta vein, but “FrankBrunner” and “Marvel staff job” are not two phrases you’d thinkbelong in the same sentence, then or now, and I think he’d agree.Whether it’s right or wrong, some staffers had the impression he sort-of wandered around all day saying how great Frazetta was. [Jimlaughs] His art at that stage was like Bernie Wrightson’s. It was kind-ofrough, but you knew it was going to come together one of these days.

And, my God, Barry Smith hadn’t done any work that good, really,when he wound up drawing for Marvel! Frank did this story called“What Rough Beast?”—a quote from Yeats—in one of the Warrenmagazines. I got in touch with him because this was his breakthroughstory as far as I was concerned. In short order, he was drawing “Dr.Strange” in Marvel Premiere.

JA: Which I thought he did a great job on.

THOMAS: Right. Starlin came in by other means; I didn’t haveanything to do with that. He was this guy that had a lot of the feel ofGil Kane and Kirby and others. So he started off on things like IronMan, and then he inherited Captain Marvel. He was a dynamic artistright away, long before anybody knew he would also soon be writingand telling his own stories. So some of these artists maybe I particularly

Starring StarlinJim Starlin and his lady at the Wizard World convention in

Philadelphia, June 2005—and a 1980s drawing of Mar-Vell thathe did in marker for collector Phil Schlaeffer, used by courtesyof Phil and Jerry K. Boyd. Jim’s 1970s work on Captain Marveland Strange Tales/Warlock is mostly in print, or soon will beagain! Photo by Keif Simon & Jim Murtaugh. [Captain Marvel

TM & ©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.]


it with the Star Wars screenplay or Burroughs, it didn’t work as well.Burroughs just described the action going on, and you don’t need to do that ina comic book. The pictures are there for the straight-on action.

So I feel my writing of Tarzan was partly successful, partly unsuccessful. Idid love the first couple of issues, because John Buscema both penciled andinked them. We told the story of Tarzan of the Apes to get it out of the way,then went on with the first real novel after the ones Joe had adapted—notcounting Tarzan and the Lion Man, a later story. We did Tarzan and theJewels of Opar, which had been adapted by Manning and Gaylord DuBois, Iguess, at Gold Key, but as only three comics or so. I wanted to do it at muchgreater length. I had fun with it, and I threw in ape language pages, but theMarvel Tarzan was never a great success, either—not under me, or whenDave Kraft took over after I left it and went to all-new stories. The Burroughsbooks just never really caught on that well, even though they looked goodmuch of the time. Warlord of Mars looked great under Gil, inked by Nebresand others.

But, all along, Gil would keep bugging me, “My boy, you’ve got to takeover the writing of this book,” because he and Marv didn’t get along thatterribly well. I thought it was a shame, because Marv is a very talentedwriter, Gil was a talented artist, but somehow they were always on differentwavelengths. At least Gil felt they were. I would’ve started at a differentpoint in John Carter’s life than Marv did—I’d have begun with A Princess ofMars and ignored the DC version of same, if I’d had my druthers—but Ican’t say that would’ve made it more commercially successful. I told Gil,“Look, I’ll come in if Marv ever leaves the book, but I’m not going to try topush him off.” But I missed my chance entirely, because the book died erelong, just as Tarzan did. I suspect ERB, Inc.’s, cut of the profits didn’t helpthose books turn a profit, either.

JA: [chuckles] But didn’t you quit Tarzan over a dispute?

THOMAS: Oh, yeah. The basic thing is, I gave John Buscema a few fill-in storiesto draw when he needed a Tarzan plot and I was busy doing something elseinstead of working on the chapters of Jewels of Opar. I thought it’d bewonderful to adapt the stand-alone stories of Burroughs’ Jungle Tales of Tarzan,and I was told by Marvel that was all right. Jungle Tales is a collection of shortstories about Tarzan in the days before he met any white people, when he mostlyjust interacted with animals, and I loved those stories, just as I loved Kipling’sMowgli stories in The Jungle Books. A couple of those Jungle Tales adaptationswent into an annual we did, and a couple of others were sandwiched into themain Tarzan comic. I’d give a story to John and tell him, “Just draw it inpictures.” That’s all you had to do with John. He preferred that to a synopsis.Then I’d add the dialogue later. Actually, I think the Jungle Tales adaptationsworked out better than that of Jewels of Opar.

But then, one Friday afternoon in late 1977—December, I guess—I got aphone call from MarionBurroughs. She was inTarzana, just a few milesaway, and I’m in myapartment just up the hillfrom the Warner Studios.She was very upset becausewe’d done these JungleTales of Tarzan. I said, “Idon’t understand.” She says,“You have no legal right todo this.” I said, “Well, you’llhave to take that up withMarvel. They told me it wasokay, or I wouldn’t havedone them.” Several hadcome out by this time, andthis was the first word ofcomplaint I’d heard. I don’t


Warlord Of MarvelMarv Wolfman, flanked by

(above) Gil Kane’s thumbnailsketches for a page from John

Carter, Warlord of Mars #1(June 1977)—and a more

detailed pencil breakdownby Gil of a page (was #10

really already in the workslike the caption says?). The

photo and art spots appearedin FOOM #20. [Art ©2007

Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc.]

know if she got a complaint from Burne Hogarth, or she was justworried that she might get a complaint from Burne Hogarth—but he[Tarzan comics strip artist in the late 1930s and 1940s] had come outwith his second Tarzan “graphic novel,” doing new adaptations, andhe’d done a couple of the Jungle

Tales, including at leastone of the same ones I’dadapted. I even had hisbooks, though I’d neverpaid any attention tothem. So I told MarionBurroughs, “Yourproblem is with Marvel,not with me. If we can’tdo any more JungleTales, I won’t do anymore. It’s that simple.”

But she kept ridingme, like I was supposedto offer some hugeapology. I couldn’treally figure out what

she wanted. Then she said, “A lot of the writing is even the same. A lotof the wording is the same in your version and Hogarth’s.” [Jimlaughs] I said, “Well, of course it is. He and I were both adapting thesame Edgar Rice Burroughs story. It’d be strange if the wording

Jungle Tales Of ThomasSince it was a dispute concerning

Marvel’s adaptation of shortstories from Edgar Rice

Burroughs’ Jungle Tales of Tarzanthat led to Roy’s leaving the bookin December 1977, it’s ironic thatthe only typed synopsis of RT’sfrom that series known to stillexist is the one he sent John

Buscema for the two introductorypages of a framing sequence forTarzan Annual #1 (1977)—the rest

of which adapted two of thosevery Tales! Thanks to MichelMaillot, over in France, whosomehow latched onto the

original typed manuscript. Inkson the printed pages by SteveGan. Also shown (above) are

Buscema’s pencils of two panelsfrom that sequence, as per FOOM

#17 (March 1977). Roy’s alwaysfelt that this Annual, along withTarzan #1-2 penciled and inkedby Big John himself, were the

best of those he worked on in theMarvel series. The series was laterably continued by David Anthony

Kraft, one of Roy’s later Marvelrecruits. [©2007 Edgar Rice

Burroughs, Inc.]


as I’d hoped to ease the way for him to come back the previous year,when he and his family talked to me about it in San Diego—and it’s ashame he stopped himself from being as integral to the company thesecond time around as he’d been before, which would’ve been to hisadvantage as well as theirs. Even so, I felt it was good to have him back,because then Marvel had him and DC didn’t. But he soon left againanyway, when he wouldn’t sign the work-for-hire agreement, and Ican’t fault him for that, even though I signed it.

“[Gil Kane And I] Both Liked To Talk A Lot”JA: I started to ask you about why you and Gil Kane worked sowell together.

THOMAS: I think that we just had similar viewpoints, which Gilrealized when he first saw my Captain Marvel #17 plot, the revamp ofthe Fawcett Captain Marvel, which was already plotted before he cameaboard as artist.

JA: You worked well together, but it seemed like you guys weren’texactly similar personalities.

THOMAS: Well, no. We both liked to talk a lot. With Gil, I did tendto do more listening than talking, [Jim laughs] but I did my share. Not50%, I’m sure, if you had a tape recorder out, but I did enough. I wasintimidated by him to some extent. Gil had been around longer—he’dbeen the artist of Green Lantern and The Atom, for chrissake—andhe’d thought more about comics. Like most people in the field, I wasn’tgiven to a lot of analysis. I did it more on instinct, and Gil was a self-taught guy who sometimes maybe talked himself out of things a littletoo much. He theorized so much that, sometimes, he’d put more workinto the theory than he did into the pages, and he couldn’t quite live upto what he wanted to do. But there was never a Gil Kane job thatdidn’t have some interesting aspects, with an individualistic look to it.

After that first Captain Marvel story, I rarely just came to him andsaid, “This is what we’re going to do, and you’ll draw it.” I’d have anidea—sometimes a sketchy idea, sometimes a little firmer idea—andthen Gil would become a creative part of it, and not everybody wouldlet him do that. Even Archie Goodwin, another favorite collaborator ofhis, would often just write something and then Gil would draw it.They might talk it over, but it wasn’t quite the same kind of collabo-ration. Gil liked working with Archie, but he liked to be a creative partof things, and I allowed him to do that. In later years, he wanted to beso much a part of it that I found that, unless whatever we did wasinitially his idea, I could no longer interest him in things. So I adjustedmyself to that, and it worked out okay. The only exception, I suppose,was the Ring of the Nibelung adaptation we did at DC, which wassomething Mike Gold approached me about, because he knew I’d liketo do it.

Gil and I often had dinners and lunches together. We talked aboutwork and about personalities and business and theory, a little bit ofeverything. Again after he moved to L.A. in the early ’80s, or wheneverit was, we spent a lot of time together. We’d go out every couple ofmonths or so with our wives and have dinner together, and a lot of thetalk was not about comics, and a lot of it was. It was a wonderful, avery nice relationship. I think maybe at times I was kind-of the juniorpartner in it, [Jim chuckles] but it was a good relationship and I felt areal loss when—oh, God, I know how hard it was when he had cancer,and he didn’t tell me because he was just so terrified that somebodywould let it slip to DC that he was ill, and they might take him off theRing series we were working on. Nobody would’ve learned that fromme, but he was understandably a bit paranoid about it. It did kind-ofhurt me to be kept in the dark, but he didn’t tell many people, so Ididn’t feel singled out. But going through something like that is soincredibly difficult, perhaps I’m lucky I didn’t know about it at thetime.

JA: How did you feel about winning the Inkpot Award [at the SanDiego Comic-Con] in 1974?

THOMAS: Well, it was an honor. The convention at that time wasonly four or five years old. I know I first attended in 1972, when Jeanieand I were driving south on a vacation in California. The real thrill tome in 1974 was being up on the dais between three artists I particularlyesteemed. On one side of me was Milt Caniff, and on the other side,Russ Manning, and right next to him, Charlie Schulz. So I felt greatabout that, even though Russ and I quickly found we didn’t agree onmuch about how to do comics. [mutual laughter] He started askingme why the words that were bold in my Marvel scripts weren’t theones that people speaking would actually emphasize. And I said, whilethere might be an occasional exception—for instance, Stan didn’t likethe word “himself” lettered bold—I felt, in general, that the bold wordsin my scripts were exactly the words to be emphasized in speech. Russwas just reading the lines differently than I was writing them. He also


Kirby’s KrusadersRoy snagged Jack to draw as many Invaders covers as he could—since Kirby,along with Joe Simon, Bill Everett, and Carl Burgos, had been one of the four

artistic pillars on which the early Timely/Marvel had been built in 1939-41. TheKing’s pencils for the cover of #14 (April 1977) showcase The Crusaders, the

hero-villains Roy and Frank Robbins devised as an homage to Quality Comics’WWII-era stars Uncle Sam, Black Condor, The Ray, Human Bomb, et al. Thanks

to John Morrow and the Kirby Estate. [©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.]

Just A Perfect Blendship(Center:) Though they never really collaborated until CaptainMarvel #17 in 1969, Roy Thomas and Gil Kane first met at DaveKaler’s New York Comicon in summer of 1965. The photo at top

right shows them talking to fans [is that Rick Weingroff?], after apanel they were on together. Roy was wearing his spanking-newFantastic Four T-shirt, just then being offered for sale; Gil was a

bit more nattily attired. See A/E #20 for in-depth coverage ofthat “first full-service comics convention,” including a

transcription of that panel. From the Jerry Bails collection,courtesy of Jean Bails.

Both Gil and Roy admired the concepts of Edgar Rice Burroughsand Robert E. Howard, as per these two covers and a story page

they devised together. (Clockwise from right center:) AstonishingTales #11 (April 1972) starring Ka-Zar… Creatures on the Loose

#20 (Nov. 1972) featuring “Gullivar of Mars”… and “The Valley ofthe Worm” from Supernatural Thrillers #3 (April 1973).

Ka-Zar was a Tarzan wannabe, right down to being the son of anEnglish lord who was reared by jungle beasts (#11 featured his

origin, by Thomas & Kane)… “Gullivar,” which Roy & Gillaunched together, was inspired by a novel that had actuallypreceded the first John Carter adventure by several years and

may even have influenced ERB, so Roy and Gil gave it adecidedly ERB twist… and “Worm” adapted an REH story which

postulated that tales of ancient heroes slaying dragons weredistorted human-racial memories of an even more gruesome

account lost in the mists of pre-history. Inking in this artmontage is by Romita (“Ka-Zar”), Gil himself (“Gullivar”), andErnie Chan (“Worms”); Gerry Conway dialogued the last half of

“Worms” when Roy’s time got eaten up by legal/maritalproblems. “Gullivar” and “Worms” art repro’d from Australian

reprints supplied by Shane Foley; thanks to Bob Bailey for the ATcover. [“Worm” art ©2007 Paradox Entertainment; covers ©2007

Marvel Characters, Inc.]


“The Swordsmen, The Damned StupidSwordsmen, Will Win After All”

Vicente Alcazar illustrated the adaptation of sf author Larry Niven’s “Not Long before theEnd” for Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction#2 (May 1975). For a photo of Vicente, see

p. 45. As the b&w mag’s editor, Roy admiredthis short story despite (or perhaps becauseof) its anti-Conan philosophy. Larry, whom

Roy got to know later in Los Angeles, felt thatin sword-and-sorcery tales it was the wizard,

not the brutish warrior, with whom anintelligent modern reader should empathize.

Lacking the time to script the adaptation, Royhad that ably handled by Doug Moench, seenat right in a photo taken at the 1975 MightyMarvel Convention, as printed in FOOM #10.Doug had been brought to New York by Royand b&w editor Marv Wolfman a year or so

earlier to fill a crying need for stories for theirhorror mags—and Doug was well up to thetask! [Art ©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.;

original story ©2007 Larry Niven.]

Superman Vs. Captain Marvel—A Boring ConfrontationWayne Boring (photo at bottom right), surrounded by two super-heroes he drew from

time to time:

(Below:) He’d been either the second or third person ever to draw “Superman” (runningneck-and-neck in that department with Paul Cassidy), and penciled the Man of Steel’s

newspaper comic strip for years. When he later sold dailies that didn’t depict Superman,he sometimes drew the hero right on the original art, as per this 1982 addition to a 1960

strip. [©2007 DC Comics.]

(Right:) Boring penciled Marvel’s Captain Marvel #22-24, with inking by Ernie Chan, asper this page from #24 (Jan. 1973). Script by Marv Wolfman, who added villains like “Dr.

Savannah” and “Dr. Mynde” as tips of the hat to foes of the original 1940-53 FawcettCaptain Marvel. Both pieces of art in this group repro’d from photocopies of the original

art; thanks to Anthony Snyder. [©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.]


like the city in Georgia. We were always doing crazy thingslike that, and why not? After all, earlier, I had revamped ourCaptain Marvel to make him a sort of science-fictional revivalof the Fawcett hero, at a time when we didn’t think theoriginal would ever be coming back. And now he was back atDC, but Marvel had the trademark on the name “CaptainMarvel,” so I figured, let’s continue doing whatever we canlegally and ethically.

Wayne Boring was good, but he was a little too stiff andstylized to work out for Marvel, I guess. Yet there werecertain panels I’d see, and I’d say, “Ah, that reminds me of theold Superman!” In fact, most of his panels reminded me of panels inSuperman in the 40’s and 50’s. I liked that very much. We justcouldn’t find a really good place for him. He was the uncle of RalphMacchio, who became, in the late ’70s, an editor at Marvel and who’sstill there.

“[Stan] Wanted To Do Some Books ThatWould Have Special Appeal To Girls”

JA: There was a time when Marvel decided to do a few comicsgeared towards women. You had Night Nurse and The Claws ofThe Cat and tried to find women to write and draw them.

THOMAS: And don’t forget the third of that trilogy—Shanna the

She-Devil. I think they were all thought up the same day, basically.

JA: Oh, yeah? By whom?

THOMAS: Stan had the idea, and I think the names, for all three.He wanted to do some books that would have special appeal togirls. We were always looking for ways to expand our franchise.We had a lot of super-hero books. You can’t just go on putting outmore and more books that are in exactly the same genre, but if youcould find ways to nibble around the edges, to add on at the edges,you can maybe cover a little more territory. Conan was like that, ahero with a little different feel. The kung-fu heroes were in thatvein, and the monster heroes like Dracula and Werewolf by Night,so maybe a couple of women characters might bring back a few ofthe female readers who’d been lost to comics over the years withthe decline of humor and romance comics.

There’d been a time when women used to buy even super-herocomics. When I was back in grade school, one of the main people Itraded comics with around the block from me, a few minutes walkaway, was a girl named Joyce Glueck, my age or a year younger.

Stars In Our EyesGeorge Pérez , as per FOOM #15 (Sept. 1976)—first with a Star Wars

comicon sketch, courtesy of George and Anthony Snyder. George said inFOOM #22 (Autumn 1978): “The first color comic I did was ‘Man-Wolf’with David Kraft. After I did ‘War Toy’ for Unknown Worlds of Science

Fiction, Roy Thomas offered me what worked out to be two issues of theFantastic Four, which were followed by two more issues as a guestartist. I had a long run as a guest artist—until I finally wound up

becoming the regular penciler.”

At left is George’s splash page for “War Toy” from UWSF #2 (March1975); inks by Rico Rival. Tony Isabella wrote the story, based on a

concept of Roy’s that had been painted as a cover by Michael Kaluta.Roy and George’s two 1976 FF issues that brought The Impossible Man

back into the Marvel Universe after a 12-year absence have beenreprinted recently. [Darth Vader TM & ©2007 Lucasfilm, Ltd.;

“War Toy” art ©2007 Marvel Characters, Inc.]


because Gil was such a stylized artist. If one artist was going to draw a big percentage of Marvel covers, it would’ve worked out best if it had beenJack Kirby or John Romita—or maybe John Buscema, except that he didn’t always have the kind of “poster” approach that worked best for covers.I think Kirby or Romita figures would’ve worked a bit better for a mass of covers,but Gil drew heroes who looked like gymnasts, whereas Kirby and Romita drewthese big, powerful characters. But Gil was such a good artist—and besides,Romita was too busy to do many covers and Kirby wasn’t working for Marvelwhen I was editor-in-chief, and John Buscema didn’t especially like doing coversanyway. In the end, I’m basically very pleased to look back on all the nice coversGil and I did together. Of course, he did a bit more work on them than I did![laughs]

“I’m Not Going To Sign Any Contract With MarvelThat Isn’t A Writer/Editor Contract”

JA: So finally, do you want to talk about why you left Marvel in 1980?

THOMAS: I can only say what I said once before. One day late in 1977 itsuddenly occurred to me that Archie [Goodwin] had been editor-in-chief for a

KataclysmicKane KoversA pair of coverspenciled by GilKane, selected

almost atrandom from

among themany he did foreditor-in-chief

Roy:Supernatural

Thrillers #6 (Oct1973), inked by

Ernie Chan…and The Tombof Dracula #28

(Nov. ’74),inked by Tom

Palmer. Repro’dfrom b&wimages in

various issuesof FOOM.

[©2007 MarvelCharacters,

Inc.]

Land Of Oz Ho!One of many covers on which Roy “collaborated” with John Romita (of course, JazzyJohnny did a bit more of the work): JR’s pencils for that of the tabloid-size Marvel

Treasury of Oz #1 (1975), which adapted L. Frank Baum’s second Oz book, The Land ofOz, as a follow-up to the Marvel/DC Wonderful Wizard of Oz tabloid earlier thatyear. Even when Marvel went ahead with its own Oz series, it still used, under

license, the likenesses of the MGM movie versions of some characters. Alfredo Alcaladrew the interior art; Roy was the scripter.

Marvel Treasury of Oz #2, adapting Baum’s book Ozma of Oz, was prepped by thesame Thomas/Alcala team (again with Romita covers, front and back) but was never

published due to legal problems. RT still has photocopies of that issue, which hehopes will see print one day—along with reissues of the first two! [©2007 MarvelCharacters, Inc.; based on characters © 1939 Loew’s, Inc., renewed © 1966 Metro-

Goldwyn-Mayer, ©2007 MGM’s successors in interest.]


NTRODUCTORY NOTE: On July 26-29, 2007,Golden Age comic book artist Lily Renée will be aspecial guest at the San Diego Comic-Con

International. This will be her first appearance ever atany comics convention. In honor of that landmarkevent, Trina Robbins has granted us permission toreprint the paragraphs below, slightly edited, from herprior coverage of Ms. Renée’s career and the world inwhich she worked from 1943 to 1948. This materialoriginally appeared, in a somewhat different form, inTrina’s invaluable 2001 book The Great WomenCartoonists, from Watson-Guptill Publications, and is©2001, 2007 Trina Robbins. We’re pleased to announce,as well, that Lily Renée has consented to be interviewedat length by Jim Amash for a near-future issue of AlterEgo!)

Of all the comic book companies in the 1940s, onepublisher hired more women cartoonists than any of theothers. That was Fiction House, a company whose comicsline was launched in 1936 by Jerry Iger and Will Eisner,artist/creator of The Spirit comic strip.

The six longest-running Fiction House comic booktitles—Jumbo Comics, Jungle Comics, Fight Comics,Wings Comics, Rangers Comics, and Planet Comics—specialized in luridly sensationalistic stories with strongand beautiful female protagonists. And they were likelyto be drawn by women.

Unquestionably, the star woman cartoonist on theFiction House staff, and the only woman who ever drewa cover for them, was Lily Renée. From 1943 through1948, her elegant art graced the pages of their books.Although she contributed some light and cartoony fillerpages, such as “Tex Taxi,” her best work could be seenin “The Lost World,” “Señorita Rio,” and “WerewolfHunter.”

“The Lost World,” the lead feature in Planet Comics,took place in a post-apocalyptic future. Amid ruins of

Lily Renée AtFiction House—And Beyond

63

I

A Far-Too-Brief Look At A “Star Woman Cartoonist”

by Trina Robbins

I

Señorita Renée(Top right:) Lily Renée circa 1947-49, the years when she drew for St. John Publishing—and(above) a splash page from one of her signature series, “Señorita Rio”—in this case from

Fiction House’s Fight Comics #41 (Dec. 1945). Thanks to Jim Vadeboncoeur, Jr., for the scan.The photo is courtesy of Trina Robbins. [©2007 the respective copyright holders.]

All Mike Mallet material in the following six pages ©2007 Estate of Bob Powell.]

ike Mallet made his debut in Panic #11 (cover-dated Feb.1966), in a feature billed as “The World’s First AdultComic!” Of course, there had been other, earlier “adult”comics, from Eric Stanton’s bondage comics in the ’40s, to

the so-called “Tijuana Bible” sex comics decades earlier, as well asstories with adult themes by Charles Biro, Harvey Kurtzman, and WillEisner, among others. But Bob Powell’s Mike Mallet certainly standsas a bold early attempt to push the medium’s boundaries.

It should be noted that Panic Publications’ Panic had no connectionto the earlier EC color comic of the same name. This Panic was ablack-&-white humor magazine, one of many short-lived Mad imita-tions. It lasted six issues from July 1957 to July 1958. The creative line-up included Bob Powell (who also held an editorial position), JackDavis, Jerry Siegel, George Tuska, Angelo Torres, and two of Powell’sold assistants, Martin Epp and Howard Nostrand.

Panic returned a few years later for a three-issue run (Vol. 2 #10- 12)from Dec. 1965 to April 1966, consisting mostly of reprints. Thepublisher was listed as Robert W. Farrell, and the editor was CarlBurgos, creator of The Human Torch.

I first came across a used copy of Panic #11 in the early ’70s, anddiscovered a feature inside that really didn’t belong there. While therest of the magazine featured the usual ham-handed humor common tothe genre, Mike Mallet was done straight. What humor it did have wassubtle and very dark. In fact, someone at Panic felt that additional gagshad to be pasted onto the strips in order to make them “funny” enoughto see print.

That’s probably because Mike Mallet wasn’t originally intended forPanic at all. The origins of the strip have been lost to history, but theformat suggests that Mike Mallet was unsuccessfully pitched as anewspaper strip, most likely in the early ’60s.

Powell patterned his detective on the popular Mike Hammer seriesof novels, starring Mickey Spillane’s brutal, misogynist private eye.Like Hammer, Mallet reveled in cheap sex and brutal violence. In fact,the strip is so similar in tone, one wonders if Mike Mallet might havebeen Powell’s attempt to sell an actual Mike Hammer-style comicstrip. If so, it was doomed to failure.

Mickey Spillane, a former comic book scripter who passed away ayear or so ago, wrote his first Mike Hammer novel in 1947, and itproved immensely successful. He and cartoonist Ed Moore produced aMike Hammer newspaper comic strip in 1953, but censorship battleskilled the strip after only a year. It’s hard to imagine any paper in theearly ’60s taking on such a risky strip again.

So how did Mike Mallet wind up in Panic?

Powell had been one of the lead illustrators for the title during itsfirst run in the ’50s. When the magazine was revived in 1965, Powellundoubtedly saw it as an opportunity to recycle some unsold art.

Of course, the strips had to be reworked first, and the changes werepretty extensive. The art was crudely rearranged to fit the magazine’s8G x 11" format, leaving empty space between the strips. Panelsdeemed too racy were censored—with talking fingerprints! More onthat later….

And, since Panic was a newsstand publication primarily aimed atteenagers, even mildly offensive words like “call girls” were removedfor the printing therein. You can see examples of this on the previouspage, and in the last frame of the second strip on the opposite page.Powell also used squiggle marks in the word balloons to suggestcursing, though it’s unknown whether these were lettered that wayoriginally.

For this printing we’ve attempted to restore Powell’s strips asclosely as possible to the way he originally drew them. Strips have beenrearranged, missing title lettering has been added, and thumbprintsmudges removed.

And now, without further ado, here’s Mike Mallet — the self-proclaimed World’s First Adult Comic!

68 Mr. Monster’s Comic Crypt

The cover of Panic #11 (Feb. 1966).[©2007 Panic Publications or successors in interest.]

Mike Mallet: The World’s First Adult Comic!By Michael T. Gilbert

MM

Mike Mallet: The World’s First Adult Comic! 69

Oh, the indignity! Mike Mallet—censored by a fingerprint! (The “fingerprints” have been removed, leaving white, finger-shaped forms at one point in each of the strips. We preferred not to add Powell-style art, but to leave those areas blank.)

Mary Marvel, by Marc Swayze[Mary Marvel TM & ©2007 DC Comics.]

[FCA EDITORS NOTE: From 1941-53, Marcus D. Swayze was atop artist for Fawcett Publications. The very first Mary Marvelcharacter sketches came from Marc’s drawing table, and he illus-trated her earliest adventures, including the classic origin story,“Captain Marvel Introduces Mary Marvel (Captain MarvelAdventures #18, Dec. ’42); but he wasprimarily hired by Fawcett Publicationsto illustrate Captain Marvel stories andcovers for Whiz Comics and CaptainMarvel Adventures. He also wrote manyCaptain Marvel scripts, and continued todo so while in the military. After leavingthe service in 1944, he made anarrangement with Fawcett to produce artand stories for them on a freelance basisout of his Louisiana home. There hecreated both art and story for ThePhantom Eagle in Wow Comics, inaddition to drawing the Flyin’ Jennynewspaper strip for Bell Syndicate(created by his friend and mentor RussellKeaton). After the cancellation of Wow,Swayze produced artwork for Fawcett’stop-selling line of romance comics,including Sweethearts and Life Story.After the company ceased publishingcomics, Marc moved over to CharltonPublications, where he ended his comicscareer in the mid-’50s. Marc’s ongoingprofessional memoirs have been FCA’smost popular feature since his firstcolumn appeared in FCA #54, 1996. Lastissue Marc discussed the “panel.” In thisinstallment, he reflects upon the aging ofcomic characters and the evolution ofMary Marvel. —P.C. Hamerlinck.]

ave you ever noticed how yourfavorite comic strip characterseems to be aging? Or how some

grow older and some don’t? Or … they don’t age at all … and you do?

And there’s an unfair inconsistency about it. I couldn’t helpwatching the splotches of gray at my own temples grow whiter andwhiter … while, in the newspapers, the head of Li’l Abner Yokumstayed black as ever.

Not a matter of great concern, but you had to conclude a definitedecision was involved … likely made by the creator … or possibly theeditor … or publisher … whether to age the character or not. And, if

yes, to what extent, and at what rate?

And by what criteria? Could the gender havesomething to do with it? I would never have hesitatedto lay a year or so on the Phantom Eagle. But on hisgirlfriend, Jerry? Never! Nor on Flyin’ Jenny.

Or Mary Marvel! Youth, to my way of thinking,was a prime characteristic of that little super-damsel.To imagine her growing older? Nah!

Yet she underwent changes… that began even beforeshe left my drawing board. No conferences had takenplace following approval of the original portraitsketches, and the alterations … good or bad … thatoccurred before completion of her first story, were

mine … the boots … the art style … even Mary’s face.

She was a new character. Not just one to play the lead role in astory, but a major feature … meant for story after story … maybe bookafter book. She was included in a partnership fighting evil with the

great Captain Marvel. I saw consid-erable merit in having the newcomervisibly related to Fawcett’s #1 super-hero. Her costume was evidence ofthat. If changes in it were needed, nowwas the time to make them.

The boots were a puzzle. I hadnever quite understood the boots wornby Captain Marvel. Why those folded-over tops didn’t droop down aroundthe ankles in the high action scenes …and what the heck did those miserablelittle stitches down the front mean …things like that. They didn’t botherCaptain Marvel, however … so theydidn’t continue to bother me.

On Mary I cared. In the beginning Ihad drawn her boots with notches atthe top. I don’t know why I did that. Itwas quickly seen as a time-consumingwhim and discarded.

In her first several adventures Maryshared the pages with Captain Marvel.That meant the art style was not to behers—as seen in the original portraitsand on the cover of Wow Comics#10—but his. Out went the finer lineand delicate shading originally deemedmore in keeping with a young super-lady.

The next item to come underscrutiny was Mary’s eyes. The eyes, Ihad thought, offered another oppor-tunity to relate Mary to Captain

Marvel by converting his squint to the laughing eyes of a pretty younggirl. In drawing Captain Marvel I had never experienced them as aproblem, those slits and dots by C.C. Beck … obviously an influenceof the old cartoon strips … and perfect for the Fawcett super-hero. Butthe lifestyle I saw ahead for Mary called for a wider array of facialexpressions. There would be no slits and dots.

The intention had been that Mary’s hair be black, like CaptainMarvel’s … signified in painting by an overlay of blue. Somehow,

[Art & logo ©2007 Marc Swayze; Captain Marvel © & TM 2007 DC Comics]

HH“The Mini-Skirt Had To Go!”

Fear of forthcoming restrictions and a predicted rigid “Code”may have had their effect on Mary’s costume… particularly thehem of the skirt. Marc Swayze drew the cover of Wow Comics

#10 (Feb. 10, 1943). [©2007 DC Comics.]

80

ack in 1980, when I heard that Roy Thomas was about tojump ship from Marvel to DC, and that one of the featureshe wanted to write was “Shazam!,” I became excited. On

other occasions I have written of how Roy was important in my owndevelopment as a Capfan, especially his outstanding article about TheMarvel Family in “One Man’s Family” way back in Alter Ego (Vol. 1)#7, 1964. So, the logical thing when I heard the news was to write tohim about it.

His reply to me, dated Oct. 10, 1980, both dismayed and excited me.Since this article deals with the exciting part rather than the dismaying,let me dispense rather quickly with the latter. I was somewhatdismayed with Roy’s then-tentative plans (which later came to fruition,though only briefly) for a new Captain Marvel, created on Earth-Oneby the wizard Shazam (“I did it before and I can do it again!”). “Gone,I’m afraid, would be much of the Parker/Binder feel, except in broadoutlines, if I handled the character...” I felt then, and still do, that thiswould be wrong for the character.

But happily, that’s not what I’m here to write about on thisoccasion. Instead, I’ll cover the other exciting news that lettercontained, as introduced to me by Roy with these words: “Still, just tobe inconsistent, I took the opportunity in DC [Comics] Presents #34to toss Superman and Captain Marvel (whom I’m trying to forge intofast friends, since they have far more in common than Superman andBatman, say) into a funny-animal dimension, while using Hoppy theMarvel Bunny for the first time in 30 years.” (Actually, it was rathermore than 30 years.)

The exciting part of this news was not so much the team-upbetween Superman and Captain Marvel, as that had already been donetwice, first in Justice League of America #135-137 (1976), in the three-part story which brought together the JLA, JSA, and the formerFawcett heroes (then still located on Earth-S), and secondly in 1978’sAll-New Collector’s Edition #C-58 (“Superman vs. Shazam!”), aGerry Conway-authored tale in which the two heroes met, with ableassistance provided by Supergirl and Mary Marvel. However, thecenterpiece of both of those tales had been battles between the twocharacters, with the actual team-ups coming only briefly near theconclusions. It could be argued that there was actually an earliercrossover, in Superman #276, the Elliott Maggin-authored, Curt Swan-drawn 1974 tale entitled “Make Way for Captain Thunder!” in whichSuperman met up with an alternate-Earth’s Willie Fawcett, who couldmagically change into Captain Thunder (which in 1939 had beenCaptain Marvel’s original, pre-publication name). This sort of “twosteps removed” tale was done because, for legal reasons, DC could notco-utilize Cap and Superman at that time. There are many who believethat this was the best of all the crossovers, and that Captain Marvel andSuperman, ideally, simply don’t belong in the same story. (It should benoted, also, that this story was a battle more than a team-up; the storyI’m about to review marked the first actual team-up of the twocharacters.)

In any event, Roy’s brief description whetted my appetite for hisforthcoming tale, not so much for the team-up aspect, but for thereturn of Hoppy the Marvel Bunny. Hoppy had debuted in Fawcett’sFunny Animals #1 (Dec. 1942), where he starred for a number of years,as well as appearing in 15 issues of his own title. In “real” life, he wasHoppy Rabbit, who, upon reading a Captain Marvel comic, wistfullyremarked that he wished that he, too, could become strong just by

The First True Team-Up Of Superman And Captain Marvelby John G. Pierce Edited by P.C. Hamerlinck

Of Men And Marvels (AndSome Bunny-Rabbits, Too!)

Of Cheeses Red And BlueThe Rich Buckler/Dick Giordano cover of DC Comics Presents #33 (May 1981)was the first comic to be scripted by Roy Thomas under his new three-yearcontract with DC, upon leaving Marvel after 15 years. Where did he dream

up this notion of Superman and Captain Marvel switching costumes? Read on! [©2007 DC Comics.]

BB

83

saying “Shazam!” And of course, you know what happened next, asHoppy was changed into Captain Marvel Bunny, or just plain MarvelBunny.

(Note: This means that the title of the feature was actually a combi-nation of his secret identity name and his nom de guerre, not unlike,say, the Quality Comics 1940s feature “Stormy Foster, the GreatDefender,” or DC’s later “John Jones, Manhunter from Mars.” Thoughhe is most often alluded to as Hoppy the Marvel Bunny, that was nothis full name in either identity. Incidentally, unlike the other Marvels,whose secret identities were often anything but secret, it was alwaysstated that Marvel Bunny’s secret, if revealed, would result in the lossof his powers. Just why was never specified.)

But Hoppy’s reappearance (unheralded until it actually occurred)was not to happen until the second part of a two-part tale, the firstchapter of which was seen in DC Comics Presents #33 (May 1981),under the title of “Man and Supermarvel!” officially co-authored (aswould be both parts) by Gerry Conway and Roy.

In an amusing opening sequence, Clark Kent chides Jimmy Olsenfor reading a comic book on company time. The comic turns out to bean old issue of Captain Marvel Adventures (though the Adventurespart isn’t seen on the cover of the comic book shown), about thecharacter Jimmy gleefully proclaims as “my favorite super-hero—Captain Marvel, otherwise affectionately known as the ‘Big RedCheese.’”

(Say those words again for us, Jimmy: “affectionately known as the‘Big Red Cheese.’” Certain current writers seem to think this term wasdemeaning to Captain Marvel. But, of course, it wasn’t.)

Clark then spots a potential disaster with a couple of elevated trains,and is off to the customary storeroom to change clothes. It is here thathe gets his first big surprise of the story, when he doffs his mufti to findthat he is instead wearing a red outfit with “this puny little cape”!(Although Rich Buckler and Dick Giordano, the artists, are certainlycompetent draftsmen, Rich had a tendency to draw Cap’s cape as quitelong, almost floor-length, and often with a stand-up collar which madeit look more like that of the original Green Lantern. Thus, the intendedhumor of the line falls a little flat.)

In any event, with “no time to worry about it now,” Superman is offto save the trains. It is here that he encounters his next surprise, in thathis X-ray vision, which had worked fine a few minutes earlier, nowdoes not function. Still, he has his other, non-sensory powers and isable to avert a disaster. Passengers are very grateful for the rescue butmystified by his different outfit.

Realizing that the mix-up which has happened to him might alsohave occurred to Captain Marvel, Superman makes his departure forEarth-S, after which the source of the problem, Mr. Mxyzptlk, materi-alizes in the spot Superman had vacated.

Superman utilizes the Rock of Eternity (“two fast loops around the

And The Hits Just Keep On Comin’!A Marvel-ous montage of the Superman/Captain Marvel encounters that had preceded the 1981 DC Comics Presents #33—backdropped by a panel penciled byDoug Braithwaite and painted by Alex Ross for Justice #9 (2007). Like John G. Pierce says in the article: not a hearty handshake in the bunch! (Left to right:)Superman #276 (June 1974), with “Captain Thunder,” art by Nick Cardy... Justice League of America #137 (Dec. 1976), art by Ernie Chan... Superduperman

meets Captain Marbles in the Harvey Kurtzman/Wally Wood parody from Mad #4 (April-May 1953)... Shazam! #30 (Aug. 1977), art by Kurt Schaffenberger...and All-New Collectors’ Edition #C-58 (1978), art by Rich Buckler & Dick Giordano. [Mad panel ©2007 EC Publications; other art ©2007 DC Comics.]

84 FCA [Fawcett Collectors Of America ]