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Post by bobc on May 14, 2009 13:08:03 GMT -5
I couldn't agree more about Bendis' "writing."
Re: JB--whether he liked doing comics or not, his work was always top notch. I happen to think JB was just a naturally gifted artist. He was incapable of drawing an awkward pose--which is something I can't say about any other artist off the top of my head, myself included.
I wonder if JB's comments about inkers meant that he and Tom Palmer didn't get along? I absolutely loved TP's style and thought it was a huge asset to JB's work. I'd be sad to learn they didn't like each other because tehy were/are two of my heroes.
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Post by bobc on May 14, 2009 8:40:30 GMT -5
That's very nice of you to say, HB--thanks. I feel very fortunate to do what I do for a living. Those tree guys were actually variations of the Ents (I think that's what they were called) for a pitch my company did for a Lord of the Rings video game. I ended up working on the "Return of the King" for EA in 2003. I never developed my coloring skills--I should work on that more.
Now to answer your question--yeah I think you can do great work on something that you aren't particularly inspired by. I think my best video game environments were for the upcoming Ghostbusters game--I did the graveyard and the Times Square environments and there are shots of it on my site. I loved Ghostbusters (the movie) but I wouldn't say it was a movie that would particularly inspire an environment artist--most of the game takes place in a library, a cellar, a cafeteria, a ballroom. Not terribly inspirational!! But my whole attitude is if you are stuck doing a cafeteria, make it the coolest looking cafeteria possible--even if it comes down to just how you light it.
That being said, I tend to pick projects, when possible, that I know something about so I can do a good job with the material. To me it's not so much about me producing "a masterpiece" as it is just wanting to be competent. I'm a writer too, and I would never want to write, say, The Legion of super-heroes because I just don't know enough about them. And if I did take such a job, the first thing I'd do is lock myself in a room and read every single issue of what came before in LSH. This is why Bendis bugs the hell out of me--he is so lazy and careless and incompetent. He can't even follow his own continuity from issue to issue. That is pure laziness. Millar, on the other hand, could NEVER have created The Ultimates without having a stellar knowledge and understanding of Avengers history. Never in a million years. Busiek is another writer who obviously had done his homework before writing the Avengers, and it showed. Busiek and Millar couldn't be any more different in style, but the underlying competence is there in both of them.
How's that for wordy?
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Post by bobc on May 14, 2009 8:13:23 GMT -5
Don't you guys think what's happening in comics is similar to what's going on in the world in general these days? Seems like everywhere you look, things are falling apart.There's no core anymore. It seems like this mad dash towards making money off this "global economy" has left everyone wondering who we really are. It's the scariest time I've seen in my 44 years. It's almost like the Chaos Theory coming to full bloom...
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Post by bobc on May 14, 2009 8:07:14 GMT -5
Redstate--LOL!!! It was a watershed moment alright--bringing to mind the water swirling around inside a toilet...
Ultron--The Ultimates is very adult and very "today," it's not like the stuff Busiek or Roy Thomas wrote (those writers were fun but Millar is darker and edgier). I just want to make sure you know that before you buy it. Millar writes The Ultimates as though the Avengers were created today. If you buy the paperback and don't like it I'll buy it from you since I loaned my own copy out to a friend and he never returned it.
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Post by bobc on May 13, 2009 15:04:05 GMT -5
Yeah I do videogames. My website is bobcooksey.net
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Post by bobc on May 13, 2009 14:16:36 GMT -5
Spiderwasp--you forgot to mention that there is a group maquerading as the Avengers.
About the only unifying thing at Marvel these days is Wolverine--he's in every Marvel comic. Oh wait--he's the Hooded Man, Weapon X, Logan, blah blah blah. Oh who cares.
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Post by bobc on May 13, 2009 10:55:00 GMT -5
Tana--guys who do comic books want to do video games these days, and video games artists want to do comics.
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Post by bobc on May 13, 2009 10:50:46 GMT -5
Glad you brought up Namor and Hercules! Remember when the two of them fought over who got the bigger room at the mansion? Hee hee! That was awesome! Those two totally made that whole era! I loved when Hercules kept calling Namor "Prince No-More."
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Post by bobc on May 12, 2009 15:08:40 GMT -5
Ultron you took the words right out of my mouth. One, and that is pushing it.
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Post by bobc on May 12, 2009 15:03:37 GMT -5
I gave him a 2. He didn't bother me as an Avenger--and the reason he was chosen at the time was kinda interesting, but he seemed to be better working with Captain America.
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Post by bobc on May 12, 2009 14:28:42 GMT -5
That's David Lynch--the director. He is another of my idols! We were just talking about him here at work last night!
I love the t-shirt too and I share your love for the B-listers! Most of them are on my A-list!
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Post by bobc on May 12, 2009 14:17:51 GMT -5
Nobody won! The game was canceled. It was Clive Barker's "Demonik" and David finch did concepts for us. He did amazing work and he's a very nice guy.
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Post by bobc on May 12, 2009 13:58:39 GMT -5
well I'm an artist for a living myself, and I love collaborating with other artists--as long as they aren't the diva type. If you actually do art for a living, you will eventually learn that you must not expect to get your artistic fulfillment at work. Really young artists tend to be volatile and moody because they think, when hired by a company, that the company is there to satisfy their creative urges and it's not.
Also--art is extremely subjective and your career will suffer if you don't learn to compromise. I have seen video games take seven or eight years to make, when they should take roughly two years, just because the prima donna artists could not agree on a "look." I once saw two video game artists almost come to blows over whether some stupid house in a huge scene should be yellow or blue. I mean that's how petty it can get.
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Post by bobc on May 12, 2009 10:47:16 GMT -5
BLASPHEMY!! I loved what Tom Palmer did with JB's work!!
Man JB certainly was a character! What a diva!
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Post by bobc on May 12, 2009 10:22:27 GMT -5
ULTRON!!!!! You must read Mark Millar's Ultimates! There is the Ultimate universe, and there is the comic The Ultimates, which is kinda like an alternate universe Avengers. It is absolutely brilliant. Millar puts a brilliant spin on all the characters but the core is still there.
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Post by bobc on May 12, 2009 10:05:11 GMT -5
Sharkar--if any single comic artist is responsible for my 35 year love affair with comics and the Avengers in particular, it is John Buscema! In the 3rd grade I had a friend named Francis Rhineheart and he had an older brother who was into comics. He had tons of old 60's issues of the Avengers, so naturally Francis and I always sneaked into his room to read them! I distinctly recall that one late 60's Avengers issue where the Vision just calmly walks down through a sidewalk, intangible, and I thought that was so incredibly cool! I couldn't wait to find out more about him! Then--I think in the same issue--you had Yellowjacket clinging to a brick wall at insect size, and I wanted to know more about him too! Then when the Black Panther smashed through a car windshield, capturing two thugs--it was all over.
John Buscema was so good at capturing the Vision's spooky, detached air back in the 60's and 70's. And the Panther always looked catlike and cool. And nobody drew women as beautifully as JB!
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Post by bobc on May 12, 2009 9:38:15 GMT -5
Tana--The Black Panther isn't a "dick" anymore. The last couple of BP issues have been very good, must say. Hudlin seems to have pulled it together and is getting back to the spiritual aspects of the character, the core, instead of making him a black Batman. The heart-shaped herb--all but forgotten in the past couple of decades, even plays a part in the last issue. I have high hopes for the future.
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Post by bobc on May 11, 2009 15:35:38 GMT -5
You're right--I think David Finch is one of the best artists in the world. I was extremely excited after reading the first two Avengers Disassembled and even wrote a fan letter. It seemed as though the whole thing was going to be exciting and a blockbuster--but then nothing happened. Issue after issue of boring, disjointed, incompetent writing. Thought balloons. Dead end plot developments. Incoherent character development. If not for Finch's beautiful art I wouldn't have stayed with it as long as I did. Great art can only mask garbage for so long,
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Post by bobc on May 11, 2009 14:39:00 GMT -5
I was wondering the same thing. I often ask myself if Hollywood were to make an Avengers movie, and they certainly hinted at it at the end of Iron Man, what story would they go with? I think they'll have to do the Ultimates because most of the Avengers' members have long, convoluted histories that might be too confusing to the mainstream public. The Ultimates scraps most of the history so that would probably adapt better and the stories were very memorable.
Bendis' stuff? I'm going to be nice.
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Post by bobc on May 11, 2009 14:14:41 GMT -5
No--not that I recall. You have to understand that I was so shocked that I was talking to him that everything went out of my head like air! I know he did work for ad agencies before he did comics, so maybe drawing comics was a more stable source of income. I do want to be clear here though--hearing JB say those things about comics didn't coming across like he was complaining. It was more like he just wasn't that interested in comics even though he drew them. I know the feeling--I do video games for a living and never play them. In fact, I've never even looked at a game I made after it came out. Zero interest. Anyway JB remembered Ultron eventually--but I had to explain who Ultron was.
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Post by bobc on May 11, 2009 10:56:50 GMT -5
Yeah--I thank God for the marvel Essential Editions.
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Post by bobc on May 11, 2009 10:25:40 GMT -5
As Humanbelly points out--if you go back and re-read that Masters of Evil story arch, it is almost mind-boggling how much characterization was going on. You had the Wasp really coming into her own as a leader, you had her obliviousness to Dane's crush on her, and you had her using her powers in creative ways to take out the Absorbing Man and Titania was really cool for us trendy Wasp fans! Even the way Captain America came to warn Jan that something was wrong at the mansion was very creative and unusual. Man! The good old days! Makes me sad...
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Post by bobc on May 11, 2009 8:57:40 GMT -5
Humanbelly--most of us on this forum have already blocked Disassembled from our memories. When even the most fleeting and dim memory of Bendis rears its ugly head, I hit myself with a hammer. Sure it sounds extreme, but a hammer strike is far less painful, trust me.
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Post by bobc on May 11, 2009 8:54:28 GMT -5
Ultron--that isn't a stupid question. I'm the dummy for not specifying. I'm talking about the 80's Masters of Evil storyline where they take over Avengers Mansion. I think Roger Stern wrote it but I'm not sure--John Buscema certainly drew it!
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Post by bobc on May 8, 2009 14:18:17 GMT -5
It was shockingly hypocritical! That's what made it interesting. When you are a routine victim of prejudice or bigotry, you can either rise above it or you can become bitter and angry. Pietro became the latter--and so did Wanda for a while. She hated humans when the those human bomb people blew up the Vision. Eventually she got over it but her brother never really did. Depends on who was writing him.
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Post by bobc on May 8, 2009 9:12:03 GMT -5
Exactly. The way people carry on you'd think The Avengers was hovering in the bottom 10, pre-Bendis.
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Post by bobc on May 8, 2009 8:32:43 GMT -5
Well I think Quicksilver is a character that people like more for what he brings out in other characters--and he was the first jerk in the Avengers! Remember when he likened the Vision to a wrist watch, when he found out Wanda liked the Vision? The Avengers were always goody goody up until then---Quicksilver really brought out some interesting characterization within the group back in the day.
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Post by bobc on May 8, 2009 8:07:19 GMT -5
1. Black Panther
2. Vision
3. Captain America
4. Beast
5. Quicksilver (I agree that every team needs an a-hole)
6. Thor
7. Iron Man pre Bendis
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Post by bobc on May 8, 2009 8:04:39 GMT -5
I loved the Beast in the Avengers--he was the first super-hero who mutated into a monster (for lack of a better word) who didn't mope around in self-pity, in fact--he totally embraced it! He flaunted it! Unlike Reed and Sue, the Beast left a popular team and immediately fit in with the Avengers --and I really liked the angle that even though he was usually happy and funny, underneath there was this feeling that he wasn't up to the Avengers' standards.
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Post by bobc on May 7, 2009 13:10:24 GMT -5
Ultron--back in 2001 I think--I was working at Acclaim and one day this artist named Manny came walking into my office, out of the clear blue sky, and handed me his cell phone. He said "Bob John Buscema wants to talk to you." I was completely dumb-founded! There I was talking to one of my lifelong idols--I'm lucky I could even form words! I was so completely caught off guard that after I finished talking to John, I asked Manny how in the hell he even knew I was a Buscema fan--and apparently during my interview at Acclaim, the team asked me who my artistic influences were and I said John Buscema! I totally forgot about that!
John told me he hated drawing comics, didn't remember creating Ultron and said if he could have figured out a better way to make money, he'd never have drawn comics in the first place. I was shocked! He swore a lot, too! JB was like the kind of blustery old guy you'd meet at a hole-in-the-wall bar and really enjoy talking to! He was really down-to-earth, zero ego, and swore like a sailor!
Unfortunately John was losing his battle with cancer at the time and I think I was talking to him while he was in the hospital. He died shortly thereafter. Nobody, but nobody, drew a more striking Black Panther, Vision or Black Knight. Am I right?
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