Unlikely Hero: JLA and T.H.U.N.D.E.R. AGENTS Artist MIKE SEKOWSKY

Be careful whose work you diss! It may come back to haunt you!

Many were the hours when my BACK ISSUE buddy JERRY BOYD and I would discuss the merits of the cult Tower Comics series T.H.U.N.D.E.R. AGENTS. And many more were the hours that we'd get a hearty laugh out of the Lightning feature, which was A BIG SKIP in our book! Gee whiz! Only the Manny Stallman art on Raven was worse!



I mean, look at this douche! Is he not the biggest swipe of The Flash and The Whizzer that you've ever seen? And the Sekowsky art was kind of corny.

Well, there's bad corny and there's good corny, and now I've put Mike Sekowksy in the good corny slot thanks to his work with writer Gardner Fox on the Justice League of America stories dubbed CRISIS ON MULTIPLE EARTHS.



This reprint collection (Alex Ross cover above) is brimming with Earth-1, Earth-2, Earth-3 and Earth-A switcheroo nonsense that has to be read to be believed. Fox's writing applies a T.H.U.N.D.E.R. AGENTS-type tone to the JLA proceedings (even though it preceded the beloved T-Agents by four or five years). I won't get too deep into it other than to say that it's highly recommended....AND I LOVE THE MIKE SEKOWSKY ART! It's at once simple and dum-dum old school but it's also sophisticated... kind of like Don Heck art. In my book, Mike has now crossed over to join the ranks of the great naif artists in comics, such as DICK AYERS (UNKNOWN SOLDIER, COMBAT KELLY & THE DEADLY DOZENS) and DON PERLIN (WEREWOLF BY NIGHT, GHOST RIDER). Unifying all of these artists: an uncluttered, not at all flashy art style which greatest strength is storytelling flow and compositions. I rather have great storytelling with simple art over great art with lousy movement any day, wouldn't you?



Characters such as Dr. Fate and Green Lantern and the Atom come off as kind of cool in the series, and it's neat to see all the counterparts, such as the supervillain version of the JLA. One of my famous quotes goes like this: "Life makes hypocrites of all of us!"

Little is known about the artist Mike Sekowsky, a Jewish-American who came from Pennsylvania to Los Angeles to embark on a career of drawing cartoonists. He worked in animation at Hanna-Barbara shortly before his death in 1989.



Here is the proof that I am not the only cartoonist who gets his pages done with hot models in the room while I await my espionage assignment to go up against the evil bald forces of S.C.A.L.P. JUST A JOKE (but evidently NOT A JOKE for Mike Sekowsky....see below...)



Mike Sekowsky....you're alright, kid!

(Hmmmm.....maybe I should look into some of that other Manny Stallman art....)

Funnybook Eye Candy: ABBOTT & COSTELLO comics

Every now and then, I come across a pleasing-to-the-eye funnybook cover that dazzles me with its effective simplicity, color choices and minimalism aesthetic. Here comes one now, from the late HENRY SCARPELLI, whose death was just announced yesterday. Henry, not only did you inadvertently capture the sentiment of the nation on this vintage comic from four decades ago, you sure knew how to rock the Abbott & Costello in a way not seen since those animated mice in the WB cartoon.

And "I'm a baaaa-aa-aa-aad boy" for posting this now. Thanks, Hank!

Frazetta Candy: The Original GHOST RIDER

Like some of you fellers, I grew up reading ye ol' flaming skull on the motorcycle Ghost Rider, but before that incarnation, there was the original, lovingly rendered by the great Frank Frazetta, who did a few of the Western GR's covers back in the day.

Well, pard'ners, TwoMorrows just announced BACK ISSUE magazine's "Wild West" issue, # 42, which will come out in three months, and the article I'll be contributing to that issue will be about the original Ghost Rider, which was re-named Night Rider by Marvel when the character was revived in the 1970s (so as not to compete with the motorcycle demon GR...convoluted, huh?)

http://twomorrows.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=900&zenid=hp2qe7231sk9ucdhka7ie16b50

The Jonah Hex cover on BACK ISSUE #42 is by my buddy TONY DeZUNIGA (Jonah Hex's original artist/co-creator), who is featured in the issue. Yippy-yo!

Fante Day

Today, ASK THE DUST author JOHN FANTE would have turned 101 years old, and to commemorate his contributions to Los Angeles literature, they are going to name the corner of 5th and Grand in downtown LA (the setting for DUST, DREAMS FROM BUNKER HILL and other novels and short stories) John Fante Square at 11 a.m. If you're in the area, try and make it. It's a special day for a brilliant author who did not receive enough acclaim in his lifetime. His daughter, Victoria Cohen Fante, and sons Dan Fante and Jim Fante will be there.

WONDER CON 2010 HIGHLIGHTS - PART I

Sweet Jesus, where do I begin?

(This may be one of those part ones where you'll never see a part two).

So the Road to Wonder Con spanned from Wednesday, March 31 across Monday, April 5, and I went up to push my latest comic book, FLOOP! FEATURING HARRY LUMMEL. Above, I'm trying to look all badass holding a comic about a little bald man.



WEDNESDAY, MARCH 31

The Wonder Boys on this trip were myself and EL MUERTO AZTEC ZOMBIE creator JAVIER HERNANDEZ. The nonsense began as soon as we set out to leave Los Angeles. Wednesday was coupon crazy! I came armed with two sheets of coupons for Jack N Da Box and Yoshinoya that I had literally just received in the mail before Jav arrived. But we never got to use the coupons because before we could find either fast food palace, Jav caved and we entered a Carl's Jr. somewhere around Bakersfield.

And the moment we stepped inside, a woman accosted us and gave us two sheets of Carl's coupons that she said she could not use, so it all shook out OK. Why the coupon craze that day? Beats me! But try dealing with Carl's on a week when you're observing Passover!



Jav and I were excited to be heading up to San Francisco to see old friends and (inevitably) meet new ones. This particular trip was punctuated by the fact that on Saturday, Javier had an art opening in the city and I had a birthday.



But more on that later...


On our way up California, Jav and I took a moment to stop and smell the methane.



Coincidentally, we were getting gas at the time. And this guy was probably none too pleased...



....word probably got around in the bovine community that Jav had ordered a Western Deluxe Cheeseburger at Carl's!

When we got up to San Francisco, we arrived at the Twin Peaks area home of our pals the Padillas - Ricardo and Rosa Linda. They were hosting Jav during his stay while I was staying at my Cornell buddy Geoff's pad in Marin County.

Rico and Rosa surprised Jav by putting him up for most of his trip at the Hayes Inn in the Hayes district of San Francisco. Surprise, Javy!



Jav was a little wary of a bed and breakfast in which the bed was down the hall from the bathroom....but he finally gave the thumbs up....especially after learning that the breakfast room was in between!



Seriously, this place was cute as a button.

That night I arrived in beautiful Mill Valley, CA....



THURSDAY, APRIL 1

Gentleman Geoff is always the perfect gent when I visit the area, and the perfect arbiter of quality television, and this time was no different. The tradition is to watch some late night viewing splendidness that he TiVo'd. It's a time when we bond over some sips and snacks and catch up on a lot of nonsense.

On past trips, Geoff turned me onto such gems as BSG, BEING HUMAN and one of the most brilliantly written and acted shows, THE WIRE (5th season). This time, it was all about DEXTER (we watched the last four eps of the season in one night) and SPARTACUS: BLOOD AND SAND. I have to admit I'm now a big fan of both. We also previewed THE WIRE creators' TREME and caught some NCAA games. Good times!

But those were the evenings...during the day, we caught some exercise in style trolling the rolling hills overlooking Mount Tam, Saucelito and the Golden Gate Bridge. But after much walking, we took a rest on the big rock to ponder and pontificate.



That night, I had the first of two panel speaking engagements at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in downtown SF. It went pretty well, considering about 18 people attended. But I'll get to that in a separate post. Posting is tedious, folks, and there's only so much I can handle at once!

FRIDAY, APRIL 2

Geoff and I hit a local fave, Pearl's Phatburgers, for some delicious beef (don't tell the cow!). Despite Friday being super-drizzly, it was a nice relaxing day in which I skipped going to day 1 of Wonder Con and stayed at Geoff's and caught up with my Crisis on Multiple Earth reprints of JLA (drawn by failed THUNDER AGENTS artist Mike Sekowsky, a mad genius of misery! I also read an Gerry Talaoc-inked UNKNOWN SOLDIER and SUICIDE SQUAD # 1.



A highlight of the day was when I was surprised by my girlfriend with a birthday package surprise that Geoff did not even attempt to play along with (it's just not his style). So I got my surprise a day early. No matter, it was still great. I love my Laura, she's the sweetest! Thanks, baby!

The sun set on Friday, April 2 and, with it, another year for me......



SATURDAY, APRIL 3

Did I mention yet it was my birthday?

Geoff and I hit the city for a day of Wonder Con and a night of art and action at Javier's show.

At Wonder Con on Saturday, I was a guest at the WILDCARD INK table, where once again, MEL SMITH effortlessly sold Gumby comics to the kids while peddling DEAD AHEAD zombie comics to the tweens, teens and grown-ups. In between that, he had a new comic based on Vincent Price that Mel had drawn the cover for himself. The man never rests!

At Mel's table, I met a new character in the WildCard stable of stars: Mr. Seth Povich himself, a cool dude with much fortitude...



While at the Gumby Comics table pushin' and pimpin' the Gumby stuff and CARTOON FLOPHOUSE comics, an assortment of characters showed up....I negotiated with Black Jack to do some emergency brain transplant work on writer Mark Evanier....but his price was too high. Sorry, Mark, you'll have to continue writing bad Garfield cartoons.



Along came Big Boy with what was left of that cow Jav and I saw on the side of the road near Santa Nella....



Mel really savored Bob's burger while I tried to slice half of it for myself with Big Boy's light saber (bet you didn't know Bob's Big Boy had product placement in STAR WARS, huh? Well, we didn't know either!)



The Wonder Con All-Stars on Parade continued....in walked IRON MAN 2!!!



....and Kung-Fu Panda!



The Mike Sekowsky Flash slowed down long enough for me to snap this shot:



And this cartoon character, a webcam moppet named Flo Jalin, took a break from her busy, BUSY booth of signing pinups to endorse CARTOON FLOPHOUSE comics wholeheartedly (and wholebreastedly).



Ahem! Moving right along, folks.....

I'll have to save my "Baby Rocketeer" story for the next posting but for now, here is a family of apes who time-traveled from before Tim Burton re-imagined PLANET OF THE APES into the ground!



One of my new friends is MARK ARNOLD, author of the great UNDERDOG history. He was terrific to talk to and he came to my table courtesy of my ol' friend LEE HESTER from Lee's Comics.



I loved this girl's shirt, which repurposed Steve Ditko-drawn Spidey in a 21st century context! Hey, even ol' man Ditko is on the InterWeb these days so calm down!



Well, I'll be back to finish this posting up but I gotta go right now...More notes to come and the inevitable Part II of my post. But for now, enjoy these wild party shots at Javier Hernandez's terrific art show, with delicious sangria courtesy of the show's curator, Ricardo Padilla.....

THE COMICS JOURNAL reviews FLOOP! FEATURING HARRY LUMMEL & CF#2

While I was wiling away at Wonder Con, the astute comic book critic ROB CLOUGH took the time to review my two most recent Cartoon Flophouse books, FLOOP! FEATURING HARRY LUMMEL and CARTOON FLOPHOUSE FEATURING GREENBLATT THE GREAT! #2, at the Comics Journal website Journalista. His write-up is well-written and filled with interesting insights and observations about the books.

Take a gander here, you Silly Goose!

Wonder Weekend 2010 was won....terrrific!

A fun weekend birthday up in the Bay Area. I'll blog all about Wonder Con and hopefully get some photos up here once I catch my breath in a day or two. But in a nutshell, a very fun time. More to come soon.....