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Great Artist, Wrong Comic

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DS9guy Since: Jan, 2001
#1: Nov 21st 2012 at 5:19:29 PM

Have you ever seen an otherwise great artist put onto a comic book that doesn't match his or her style? Ron Lim on Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog comes to mind. He just couldn't draw Funny Animal characters that well.

MainManJ Since: Jan, 2001
#2: Nov 21st 2012 at 7:04:28 PM

I should be able to come up with some perfect examples, but I'm not sure. Tan En Huat on Annihilators and Larry Stromen's short stint on the current volume of X-Factor come to mind, but it might have been more that the art was bad than unfitting (though they might have fit a horror comic or more surreal comic better).

SKJAM Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: Baby don't hurt me!
#3: Nov 21st 2012 at 8:30:35 PM

There was a fill-in artist on "Billy Batson and the Power of Shazam" that just wasn't right for a cartoony children's comic book...but a couple of panels showed he'd look great on an old-fashioned horror comic.

Robbery Since: Jul, 2012
#4: Nov 21st 2012 at 10:29:09 PM

In the early '80's, Gene Colon, a true luminary as a horror artist (he drew a good deal of Marvel's Tomb of Dracula)was drawing Wonder Woman. He hated doing it and, while he was always professional, it kind of showed.

BearyScary Since: Sep, 2010 Relationship Status: You spin me right round, baby
#5: Nov 22nd 2012 at 1:54:54 AM

I'm gonna say Ben Templesmith on Silent Hill, somehow. I normally like Templesmith's work, but his art on the SH comic just didn't suit the source material's eventual, high-precision, high-detail graphics. In fact, none of the art for the comics I've seen from SH have.

I also think that Frank Cho's art on The Mighty Avengers from 2007 just didn't gel, somehow.

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DrFurball Since: Jan, 2001
#6: Nov 22nd 2012 at 4:08:52 PM

I have this reaction every time I see Spider-Man drawn by Jack Kirby. Kirby was the king, but his Spidey always looked somewhat odd.

Robbery Since: Jul, 2012
#7: Nov 22nd 2012 at 9:22:25 PM

[up] Apparently, Kirby was the first artist Stan Lee approached with Spider-Man (according to Lee and Kirby, anyhow), and he thought Kirby made him look too muscular and powerful (when what he wanted was a skinny kid). Kirby did end up doing that iconic cover for Spidey's first appearance, though. Funny how he couldn't make Spidey skinny; he always drew Johnny Storm and Reed Richards as fairly lean.

PennyDreadful Since: May, 2010
#8: Nov 25th 2012 at 8:17:19 PM

Bill Sinkiewicz on New Mutants. That is all.

DrFurball Since: Jan, 2001
#9: Nov 27th 2012 at 8:30:49 AM

[up][up] I had heard that it was a marketing thing. Ditko was always Lee's choice for Spidey artist, since he was the artist for Amazing Fantasy at the time. But Stan thought that his cover wouldn't attract readers, so he had King Kirby draw a more heroic-looking Spidey for the cover.

As far as I can tell, it worked out pretty well.

Jhimmibhob Since: Dec, 2010
#10: Nov 27th 2012 at 11:19:35 AM

[up][up][up][up]It was even worse when Steve Ditko tried to draw one of Kirby's creations. The man managed to make Thor look nebbishy.

Jhimmibhob Since: Dec, 2010
#11: Nov 29th 2012 at 7:00:27 AM

One famous example is Sam Kieth's work on the early Sandman issues. It was fine work; it simply failed to mesh with the story Neil Gaiman was telling, and both men later acknowledged as much.

Robbery Since: Jul, 2012
#12: Nov 29th 2012 at 4:45:57 PM

[up] Apparently it taught Gaiman to try to get artists who matched the needs of his script...or to tailor his scripts to the artist he's working with. No point in putting in a big crowd scene if your artist hates crowd scenes and is likely to render the crowd as an amorphous mass.

Twentington Since: Apr, 2009 Relationship Status: Desperate
#13: Nov 29th 2012 at 7:44:07 PM

[up][up]Sam Kieth. Hey, I know him for inking Fish Police.

Twentington Since: Apr, 2009 Relationship Status: Desperate
#14: Dec 6th 2012 at 3:19:56 PM

A name that came to mind. Ron Lim. I've looked at his other stuff and it's good, but he was just terrible at drawing any of the Sonic characters in Archie Comics Sonic The Hedgehog.

DS9guy Since: Jan, 2001
#15: Dec 6th 2012 at 4:29:06 PM

[up] Hate to break it to you but I started out this thread with that Ron Lim/Sonic example.

Here is another Archie example: Jim Lawson on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures. I know he was from Mirage Studios and created the Rat King but his artwork just didn't work with the cartoony nature of the comic.

edited 6th Dec '12 4:31:16 PM by DS9guy

Twentington Since: Apr, 2009 Relationship Status: Desperate
#16: Dec 6th 2012 at 5:03:07 PM

[up]Derp. This is why we scroll ALL the way up.

DrFurball Since: Jan, 2001
#17: Dec 8th 2012 at 10:47:00 AM

[up][up] Honestly, no disrespect intended to the guy, but I didn't care for his artwork on Mirage's TMNT series, either. He's not a bad artist, but I just didn't like how he drew the comic.

purplefishman Misanthrope Supreme from Ganzir Since: Feb, 2011 Relationship Status: Above such petty unnecessities
Misanthrope Supreme
#18: Dec 11th 2012 at 11:59:58 AM

Steve freaking Ditko on Chuck Norris Karate Commandos. That is all.

Robbery Since: Jul, 2012
#19: Dec 11th 2012 at 2:54:07 PM

[up] Also, Steve Ditko on Marvel's Indiana Jones comic.

C0mraid from Here and there Since: Aug, 2010
#20: Dec 12th 2012 at 12:24:44 AM

@Penny Dreadful I thought that was the best period of the New Mutants.  

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Jhimmibhob Since: Dec, 2010
#21: Dec 12th 2012 at 9:31:17 AM

I always thought that Dave Cockrum's second X-Men run was unfortunately timed, following as it did directly on John Byrne's heels. Cockrum was a great artist and composer of scenes, but "kinetic" isn't the first word you'd use to describe his style. Byrne's lines, however, were so sinuous and elongated that—like him or dislike him—everyone's motions always seemed ready to break out of the panels and snake into the white space. Coming immediately after Byrne's, Cockrum's characters looked positively rigid and juiceless by contrast ... even though the latter's stuff never gave that impression in isolation.

C0mraid from Here and there Since: Aug, 2010
#22: Dec 12th 2012 at 11:43:03 PM

[up] I agree but for different reasons.

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MainManJ Since: Jan, 2001
RedM Since: Oct, 2012 Relationship Status: You can be my wingman any time
#24: Dec 30th 2012 at 1:39:49 PM

John Romita Jr. does great work on Spider-Man and Eternals, but it took some getting used to when he started drawing Bendis' Avengers. He's got sort of a boxy, sketchy style, and it didn't really gel with Iron Man or Thor. And I can't stand how he draws Wolverine.

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C0mraid from Here and there Since: Aug, 2010
#25: Dec 30th 2012 at 1:55:33 PM

John Romita JR is a great artist who keeps drawing comics which lack a matching level of writing. The Eternals is okay but it's more generic than anything else I've ever read by Gaiman.

As for Cockrum, as I I tended to elaborate, I think there is more wrong with his second X-Men run than just following Byrne. It really doesn't compare well to the peak of his first run, the stiffness is more noticable and there's a general lack of enthusiasm. In addition Claremont's writing suffers during this run; Doom isn't handled well, and the space stuff is boring, repetitive I think a lot of people assume his writing never recovered from this point and never bother with the later stories.

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