I'm not quite sure when I first became aware of the significant talents of Alfredo Alcala, but most likely it was when he was inking John Buscema's magnificent Conan pages in The Savage Sword of Conan. Alcala was one of a myriad of talents who had been tagged to do work in the United States from the Philippines. For the most part this group was already accomplished when they broke into the U.S. markets and none more so than Alcala. Later I got to see Alcala's full artwork and the lush lines were marvelous to behold. Alcala's pages looked like they were etched into metal and the flow of his lines oozed across the page. He became a mainstay of the industry, and then we began to get a gimpse of what he'd done before when his creation Voltar began to run int he back pages of Warren's The Rook. I learned sometime later that Alcala's speed and determination at the drawing board broached the legendary Kirby for durability. Here is an artist who drew comics for a living...and drew and drew and drew.
Rip Off
I didn’t really take to Alcala until I started seeing his inks on Conan and later Arak and with Don Newton on Batman and Detective. Seems like he also illustrated the adaptation of the second Planet of the Apes movie, too.
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