50 cent bin
by Frank Santoro
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
All right. More scans of 50 cent comics from the comics show the other day. First up, a Charlton Ghost Manor with a crazy, loose Ditko story that is already, safely, in my swipe file
Next up, one of the weirdest, most obscure, resonant comics of my youth and the “black and white explosion” of ’86-’87: Stark Future, drawn by Jim Somerville. It was like a poor man’s Moebius before Moebius really hit in the States. Like, I remember seeing this comic at the beginning of high school and then it fading from memory as European comics became more available.
Stark Future was inspirational because it felt within reach, like some comic you could draw yourself in study hall. It made me want to draw, and draw something different than superheroes. Reading this comic was like watching a Ridley Scott movie. It was dumb, futuristic nonsense but it made me want to try my hand at it too. It primed me for Moebius and everything “serious” about comics. Seriously.
Labels: comics conventions, Jim Somerville, Steve Ditko
More, please, Frank! I know you’re just shuffling around back in the Pitt. Give us more.
Does anybody know where I can find C.F on the web?
That interview Dan made him?
Liked the Ditko page.
Saludos.
Ghost Manor! Those cheesy 70s Charlton/DC ‘mystery’ comics burned a hole in my easily scared 7-year old brain (and better than EC for my money, which buried all tension under a barrage of exposition). By the time I got to Ditko’s Spiderman I found his style already kinda creepy, so Parker’s dilemmas seemed all the more disturbing… as for Dr. Strange – I was too creeped out to read ANY version of it (I still find ’em pretty incomprehensible).
Does anyone recall that full-length story in ‘Monster Hunters’ (by Kaluta, I think) which ends with the beast burning in the electric chair? Months of nightmares…
ps. Kinky, brutal, pseudo-adult ‘dumb, futuristic’ black and whites were a 70s/80s institution here in the UK – 2000ad! Our weekly altar of trash, satire and outre concept! You could feel ‘sophisticated’ in that 11-year old way with yands covered in cheap black newsprint every Saturday morning… especially as US mainstream comix got a bit too ‘A-team’ for comfort.
That Ditko page looks like an alternate universe Cold Heat Special…
like I said: already in the swipe file!
Stark Fu-ture!
Stark Fu-ture!
I love the blog, but the Moebius comments seem incorrect.
I don’t remember coming across “Stark Future” when it was first published, but seeing the sample images now, I wonder why it’s compared to Moebius. To my eye, it doesn’t resemble his work at all, even a “poor man’s” version. The main Moebius style is mostly linework, without much shadow. (For a typical example, see the image you linked to.) And the other common style Moebius used in Blueberry has more blacks, but is also nothing like “Stark Future” in technique.
Also, to say that the period of 1986 – 1987 was “before Moebius really hit in the States” seems wrong, considering his work was readily available in the pages of Heavy Metal from 1977 onward. And the Heavy Metal movie, which adapted Moebius’ work (among others) came out in 1981.
And on a different subject, when you wrote “Reading this comic was like watching a Ridley Scott movie. It was dumb, futuristic nonsense but it made me want to try my hand at it too.” Are you calling Scott’s films “dumb, futuristic nonsense,” or just the comic? Because Scott’s “futuristic” films up to that point in time (Alien, Blade Runner) were hugely inspirational/influential, and made many people “want to try [their] hand at it too, but I don’t think there are many people who would consider them “dumb” or “nonsense.”
When I was 15, Stark Future and Moebius looked a lot alike, to me, anyways. And I didn’t know Moebius was available in Heavy Metal. I saw Stark Future first, then the Epic reprints of Moebius works came out. I’m just riffing here and recalling my experience and connecting it with going to a comics show. Same with the Ridley Scott remark. I’m not being clear, but I’m speaking from a teenage perspective, how I interpreted “signs” in pop culture.