Neal Adams quickly made himself the top kahuna of comic art with is work at DC and to a lesser extent Marvel and Warren. As good as his interiors could be, his covers were his real calling card and the thing that lingers in my mind all these decades later, long after the great man himself has shuffled off this mortal coil. One of his most famous images was this cover for DC Super-Spectacular #6 which starred a wide array of heroes thanks to its reprinting of Justice League of America issues #21 and 22 which was the first of the Earth-1 and Earth-2 crossovers of the League and the Justice Society of America. As well as a Spectre story from More Fun Comics #55, a Johnny Quick story from Adventure Comics #190, a Hawkman story from The Brave and the Bold #36, and a Vigilante story from Action Comics #146. There is also a delightful Wildcat story which had never before been published.
This is extra juicy because like more than few to come it was a wraparound cover. The only big difference between this classic a typical Adams effort is that every figure is static in a heroic posture as if posing for a class photo. Some object to it, because there is no movement, no action. But I remember being spellbound by this image the first time I ever saw it.
Someone noted in the comments that the cover had a Golden Age feel to it. I concur as I'd say it's a pretty sure bet it's a shout-out to the cover of All-Star Comics #16's dramatic cover credited by the GCD to someone named Frank Harry.
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I was also "spellbound " when I first saw this cover Rip, so many heroes on display some I had never heard of at the time, and illustrated by my all time favourjte artist. Its sad to realise that Neal left us nearly 2 years ago, he was such a presence in my young comic buying life .
ReplyDeleteI agree. He was a fixture in comics the entire time I was a regularly reader of new monthly material and later even. Every picture showed that handsome face and almost always a smile. He seemed fixed in my imagination, he seemed immortal. But of course that wasn't true. There is much more Adams to come this week.
DeleteOne anecdote, for which I've no source, is that Jack Kirby dissed the cover as being like a "class photo." There's some truth in that, and a little later another Super-Spec wraparound showed a bunch of heroes in a more active flight formation.
ReplyDeleteHOWEVER, the advantage of the static arrangement is that the reader can make out all the fine details of every costume, which isn't always possible in more action-oriented setups. And if the reader isn't familiar with a bunch of the characters, a static shot gives him the chance to say, "hey, interesting costume, what's his or her story--?"
I run across that same story about Kirby. And like you, I disagree with the King on this one. George Perez was the master of crowds, giving them both energy and clarity.
DeleteJust noticed an odd thing about the feed for my ARCHIVE blog here. The ARCHIVE part takes one to the general blog, but below the feed doesn't display the most recent post there, but rather claims to go to THE UNNAMEABLE review, though the actual address is "page does not exist."
ReplyDeleteI've checked on my end and it seems to be working. But thanks for alerting me.
DeleteIndeed, an iconic cover and don't exactly know what rattled Kirby as he did a few group poses himself, although not as elaborate. With his patented foreshortening technique, he probably couldn't get all the characters on two pages! Looks also like a bit of an homage to the Golden Age era.
ReplyDeleteI should have included this but I'm pretty sure it's a shout out to All-Star Comics #16 from 1943. I think I'll add that to the post.
DeleteI bought the replica edition of that issue (had the original when it first came out, might have a replacement, but can't quite remember) and I was disappointed to see that the cover had been redrawn - and not too accurately, sadly. I think it was Carmine Infantino who was praising the Adams' cover as how covers should be done to Jack Kirby, but Kirby wasn't impressed, saying that he'd have had the characters jumping, flying, and leaping off the page. I have to agree with him, it's a pretty boring cover with just about all the heroes standing in the exact same position. Not one of Adams' finest and I'd say you're all letting your nostalgic affection for it prevent a more objective evaluation.
ReplyDeleteI think Dick Giordano did the reconstruction. That anecdote about Infantino sounds right. Nostalgia plays a part in most of my opinions about comics of a certain era, but that's still one dandy cover.
DeleteOK, thanks for checking. I finally figured out that I had created a trash post whose feed was getting prioritized on your blog and at least one other one. Once I permanently deleted the trash post, both your blog and the other one corrected to the current real post.
ReplyDeleteGlad it's fixed.
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