Tales of Syzpense #17
Tales of Syzpense #2 (the comic, not the newsletter) in stores this week, R.I.P. Dan Green, and a Harlan Ellison tale
When I was in Roanoke at the Big Lick Comic Con a couple weeks back, I happened upon an old comic at Marc Nathan’s Cards, Comics & Collectibles booth. Marc, for those who don’t know, also runs the excellent Baltimore Comic-Con (September 8-10). And when he appears at other shows, he doesn’t skimp on his presence. He’s always got a massive array of comics old and new, and it’s always the old ones that catch my eye the most.
In particular, I happened upon a copy of this DC reprint from 1969:
Rather hilariously, it’s a reprint of the 1940s World’s Fair Comics issue that advertised on its cover, “96 Thrilling Pages in Full Color!” This reprint kept the original cover intact, as you can see… only all 96 pages were actually just reprinted in black and white.
But that was fine—I didn't care about the contents, which I’m sure I have in other formats, and in color.
The reason I wanted this one was more personal.
Over about the last decade of his life, I had somehow befriended and grown very close to science-fiction author Harlan Ellison. And as anyone who knows or even has read about Harlan is aware, there are always a great number of interesting stories to share about the guy. This story involves the comic above. The original (in color) release, that is.
In 2007, writer Scott Tipton (himself a dear friend, too) and I were shopping a Comic Books for Dummies book. The book ended up landing not with the Dummies folks but instead with IMPACT Books, who published it under the title Comic Books 101. By either approach, it was our general primer to the industry as it stood then: the creators, publishers, characters, history, and various approaches to comic-creation, all presented in a conversational, accessible way for people who maybe didn’t have a full understand of who Steve Ditko was or why Batman and the X-Men couldn’t pair up regularly.
Along with the more general information, Scott and I wanted to load up the book with contributions from friends and creators we respected. And we got a wide array of pieces from Stan Lee, who wrote our intro, to comic creators, authors, musicians, and the like.
And Harlan Ellison. He said he was happy to contribute, but he didn’t want to blurb it or answer a short Q&A or anything along those lines. He wanted the final word in the book. What he delivered was this wonderful piece detailing the first comic he ever owned — the aforementioned 1940 World’s Fair Comic. Harlan’s piece in its entirety is here:
Cut to a couple years later. Harlan’s birthday was coming up and, nearing 80 and being a packrat of the first order, Harlan had pretty much everything he could ever want.
So I decided I wanted to find that first comic and get it for him as a gift. Until I also checked out the prices for said comic, which were, let’s say, never going to be covered by the advance from Comic Books 101.
But I did find out that a reprint existed, the cover the same one as the original, and it too was printed at that nice Golden Age size. The reprint was within range, so I picked it up for him. The gift wasn’t really about the valuable comic itself (which I’m sure he still owned and had stored somewhere in one of his many vaults). It was more what the comic represented: his first love of comics, and in turn, my appreciation for him doing that piece for our book. The gift went over just fine.
Harlan passed away a few years later, in the summer of 2018. The loss hit me hard. It hit a whole lot of us hard. I miss the guy quite a bit.
Harlan’s house, which he nicknamed “Ellison Wonderland,” certainly deserved that name. His estate wants to keep the house as intact as possible, and turn it into something the public can experience. Which requires plenty of funds, to get it back in working shape, manage the upkeep, and everything else about home ownership that requires plenty of money. To help cover those expenses, his estate has been auctioning off some of his collection, including some comics. Including the 1940 World’s Fair Comic.
Now, I completely understand the need to do so. And it’s not that I need an artifact to help me remember anyone, but I found myself watching the auctions and really wanting to somehow get back the reprint comic. It doesn’t really have much value, not in the way the original does, so it likely won’t hit the auction block. But I also really wanted that comic just for what it represents — the friendship, Harlan’s piece in our book, all of it. Yet I also felt that asking the estate if that might be possible would’ve somehow been in poor taste, and also not something I wanted to bother anyone with.
But damn, I wanted that comic. Thanks to Marc Nathan’s booth at the Roanoke con, I now have a close-enough approximation. Which I’m sure sounds silly enough but now I see that comic sitting in my spinner rack and it just makes me happy. Better, it makes me think of Harlan every time I see it.
You couldn’t wish Harlan a happy birthday or a merry Christmas or other such sentiments without getting some very pointed words in reply (which just made me do it all the more). And Harlan absolutely didn’t believe in any great beyond. And yet, I feel sure that somewhere, somehow, he’s reading this and thinking…“geez, pull yer head outta yer ass, kid, and get on with your life.” And that too makes me happy.
Speaking of the great beyond, the comic industry lost another genuine talent and nice guy this week. Inker Dan Green passed away on August 21 at the age of 70.
Dan inks many of the Bronze Age greats, and it didn’t really matter whose pencils he finished, he did a great job with their lines. Most people remember Dan’s work on X-Men, over artists like John Romita Jr., Marc Silvestri, and Jim Lee. Green even inked Jim’s first X-Men work, Uncanny X-Men #248. But his work was also welcome whenever I saw his name listed alongside pencilers John Byrne, George Perez, Walt Simonson, and many more.
Most of us knew Dan as an inker over those artists, but he got his start as a penciler, and would return to drawing comics now and again, too. He had a short but solid run as penciler on Doctor Strange alongside writer Roger Stern and inker Terry Austin.
And he blew lots of minds with his fully painted work on a Marvel Graphic Novel, Doctor Strange: Into Shamballa, with writer J.M. DeMatteis.
Chatting with Byrne about Green’s passing yesterday, he said “His were the first inks that made my pencils look how they looked in my head.” Which is about the highest praise from any penciler.
Below are a series of images showcasing Dan’s work as inker, as penciler, and finally as painter. R.I.P., Dan. Thanks for the great comics.
Spinner Racking
I don’t normally put together homage themes for the spinner but every now and then, a cover and the images it inspires deserves that. A couple weeks ago, Walter Simonson’s debut as writer/artist on The Mighty Thor, #337, celebrated the 40th anniversary of its release.
Walt’s wonderful cover for that issue loomed large than and now, inspiring numerous homages. (It’s also a prime example of the always-fun “broken logo” theme) So to celebrate the anniversary of that comic’s release, here’s a full Thor 337 theme you can build, if so inclined:
In stores this week! No, really this time.
Tales of Syzpense #2! By T.P. Louise and Ashley Wood, and also by Nelson Daniel and me. In our story Dreamweaver, a successor is chosen, and while that often goes well for aging heroes in other comics, that’s very much not the case in this one…