My Ditko Year!

"Sturdy" Steve Ditko was one of the true greats in comics during my lifetime. He had an instantly recognizable style which while sometimes not as sleek and handsome as some counted among its virtues nigh perfect clarity. Ditko was a storyteller through and through who seemed to have found his ideal calling drawing comics, which he did professionally all his adult life. In 2026 I want to take a long hard look at the work of one of the greats in the field. 

But that said, the Dojo is going to run at a more leisurely pace in the coming year. I've maintained pretty much a daily schedule for seventeen years or so, and frankly I'm getting a wee bit winded.  Last year saw a lot of reposts to fill in the schedule (my health played up more than a bit), and I think I did a pretty good job updating and enhancing them when necessary. But this year I want to make this blog more of a weekend event and less of a full daily grind.

I do plan to keep a daily schedule but Monday through Friday will harken back to the original days of this blog with the return of variations of "Favorite Cover of the Day". I'll feature comics, magazines and books that I like, but with only relatively brief captions or descriptions and pertinent links. Some of these will be covers by Ditko, while many others will not. More on that Saturday. 

I am planning on reading all the Steve Ditko work that I have in my possession, and that's a lot of material dutifully gathered up over the course of decades. Some of that work was for publishers who hardly lasted a year. He was an important artist in both Charlton's and Marvel's early development and later as a maverick artist dedicated to his specific philosophy of Objectivism. 

Ditko also spent some fruitful years working off and on for DC Comics as well as a host of others such as Tower, Dell and in later years Eclipse, Pacific, and many more. He was a guy always looking for a berth to place his work. In the end he opted to produce this material himself. 

He created many great heroes such as The Amazing Spider-Man and Dr. Strange alongside Stan Lee at Marvel. He created Captain Atom along with Joe Gill and later revamped The Blue Beetle for Charlton Comics. 

At DC he introduced The Creeper and Hawk and Dove when he worked briefly for Dick Giordano. But he soon left DC, returning years later with characters such as Shade the Changing Man and The Odd Man. 

At Marvel there was of course Spider-Man which he drew for several years, eventually becoming alongside Jack "King" Kirby one of the pillars of the Marvel revolution. He drew other features for the company such as the Incredible Hulk and in later years Speedball and even Squirrel Girl. He had a remarkable stint on ROM as well. 

At Charlton and Warren he became quite well known for his work on ghostly comics with weird tales featuring such characters as Mr. Dedd, Wendy the Witch and his most famous creation, Dr. Graves. 

Perhaps Ditko's most singular and personal work was done on Mr. A, a fascinating character who followed a strict code when dealing with crime. A softer version of the character was The Question who has become a regular part of the DC Universe. 

I'll almost certainly get into other items of interest as they occur to me. See you in the funny pages in 2026, especially those created by Steve Ditko. 

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