The Worst Comic Book Artists

Jose Delbo - he was the main illustrator for Wonder Woman starting around 1975 and for the next 8 years. Awful. All of his characters were thick and slack jawed, including WW herself.

most of the 90s image b list

Frank Quitely. Is he on your list r2? Good night, he's awful. He ruined a good story line for The Authority by Mark Millar with terrible art.

Don Heck was the first name I thought of when I saw the thread title, before I even read OP's post. I remember as a kid I loved Teen Titans, but I hated when he drew it.

The horrible 90s art is what made me give up on comics for a while.

I know he's a "legend" but when I was a kid, I loved the concept of DIAL 'H' DOR HERO...but I thought his art was butt-ugly.

Sienkewicz ruined New Mutants.

Sekowsky

Jack Kirby. I have more appreciation for his art now, but when I read the "classics", his characters were so [italic]blocky[/italic]. And their fingers resembled sausages.

Yeah, he’s bad.

Cecilia Giménez

Jack Kamen

Sienkewicz - oh Lord, how I hated him. Such a hack, so overrated. And a piss-poor fit for the Mutants.

What Keith Giffen morphed into post-Crisis on Infinite Earths made me want to puke. EVERY character had that squished square face, weird mouths, just awful. I hadn't realized how much his Legion inkers had been carrying his water prior to that.

Rob Liefeld. There can’t be anyone worse.

Ric Estrada. All of his characters looked like stiff window display mannequins.

George Tuska. Infamous for giving Iron Man a nose. I think he also illustrated the syndicated Justice League newspaper comic strip in the 70s. I remember being all excited for it until I saw the actual artwork.

George Tuska didn't give Iron Man a nose. Marketing did.

A lot of you are blaming artists for editorial dictums (Estrada's Wonder Woman was supposed to evoke the Golden Age) or bad inkers (Vince Colletta).

Even guys like Jackson "Butch" Guice can produce good work now and then.

But Ethan van Sciver is a Nazi prick. He is the worst comic book artist morally.

[quote]Sienkewicz ruined New Mutants.

Loved his stuff. Hated Heck, though. And I didn't come to appreciate Kirby until the last few years. The hands-down worst for me was Frank Robbins, a cartoonist who took over Captain America at one point.

Agree with you about Frank Quietly, r3. I never acquired a taste for his particular style. And all of his characters looked like they had a disease.

I have a soft spot for Carmine Infantino, r6. I loved his stint on Spider Woman especially.

Ric Estrada was just plain bad.

I diasagree. Estrada could do very good work. He was not suited for superheroes, though.

Don Heck before he became of the Marvel machine was really very good.

Whoever it was that took over Harley Quinn's first run and drew her like a starfish.

Wayne Boring (DC - he could make flying look...well, boring)

Herb Trimpe (Marvel - Hulk no like the way you draw me! Am not that blocky. Hulk smash!)

Rob Liefeld - (Tits are not a super power)

Frank Quietly - (why does everyone look like they've just sucked on a lemon)

Joe Staton (aka Robbins/Estrada etc....)

r25 I've always thought that Wayne Boring was the most aptly named artist.

[quote]Rob Liefeld. There can’t be anyone worse.

My favorite Liefeld atrocity:

Though the jump between New Mutants 17 and 18 was startling, I welcomed it. Bill Sienkiewicz perfectly fit the dark storylines that Claremont had in store for Xavier's second string. This final image in NM#18 made me an instant fan. I had been reading NM from the beginning and I was totally on board for the change in tone Sienkiewicz had brought.

(my only complaint with this particular image was that the kids all ran from the mansion as a group but the image has them approaching Danielle from different directions)

Jack Abel. He was mostly an inker but he did some (poor) pencilling work in the late 70s.

Or maybe I just liked him because he managed to make Sam Guthrie hot.

[quote]What Keith Giffen morphed into post-Crisis on Infinite Earths made me want to puke.

Yeah, Giffen has gotten progressively worse over the years. Same with Frank Miller -- loved his Daredevil stuff but his work over the last decade or two has been just painfully bad.

Steve Ditko seemed perfect in the early 1960's still with the Bob Kane style of the 1940's but in the 1980's looked very dated, he's still alive and hates Stan Lee

It seems like most of the top artists go downhill as they get older. John Byrne was at the top of his game in the late 70s/early 80s, but even with the late 80s Superman, he started running on fumes.

Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster weren't so hot

Jack Abel had been pencilling for a long time before that, mostly on war titles.

R18 - you are correct...Robbins was the absolute worst. Even Don Heck doesn’t seem so bad by comparison!

Chris Marrinan had the unenviable task of following George Perez as series artist of Wonder Woman in the late 80s. He was a talented artist but probably ill suited to this particular character.

I always hated the work of Curt Swan though he was long considered THE iconic Superman artist, maybe still is. There was something very square and overly wholesome about his work, which I suppose fits this square, overly wholesome super hero.

chris wozniak... horrible

Curt Swan was an extremely skilled illustrator but pretty bland and boring, r38.

I enjoyed Keith Giffen on Legion but yeah his artwork morphed over time into something that came off as smug...if that’s possible.

Kenneth Rocafort‘s art for OUTLAWS, the Starfire/Red Hood book that no one needed or asked for, was utterly painful. Critical opinion was not as kind as I’m being.

Thankfully the writing was no less abysmal, so at least the book had continuity of sorts.

Heck was a hack. Liefield is a nightmare. Couldn't stand John Byne. Of recent artists Brett Brune and Rocafort are both awful.

Brett Booth is awful. Doesn't know basic storytelling.

Curt Swan wasn’t always boring

Curt’s Superman

At a certain point John Byrne lost the ability to draw the human neck.

I loved Byrne on Fantastic Four and Superman. Things went downhill from there and he seems kind of crazy now.

When I was a kid I hated Sienkiewicz on NEW MUTANTS, but now when I look at that run, it was pretty amazing.

r48 - if you told me in 1980 that John Byrne would one day be illustrating Wonder Woman, my young gay self probably would have exploded in joy.

Suffering Sappho - what a letdown!

[quote]Steve Ditko seemed perfect in the early 1960's still with the Bob Kane style of the 1940's but in the 1980's looked very dated, he's still alive and hates Stan Lee

With good reason.

This is such a great thread. Nice to see some support for Bill Sienkiewicz, one of my favorite artists.

Curt’s Superman at r46 looks pretty damn hot to me.

Clark, be my butch Daddy!

Vinnie Coletta always gets a bad rap, but I worked at DC when he was there, and he was one of our best inkers, especially because he simplified pencils that were too busy and would be hard to read. That's why he gets accused of doing a less than thorough job.

But in the romance division, Artie Saaf inked by Vinnie Coletta gave us the best looking girls and boys (though they tended to look a bit too old for our readership).

And I don't understand why Carmine Infantino gets all that praise. He was a good artist, yes, but when I was at DC he had the corner office as head of the whole division, and the job calls for vision, which I don't think Carmine had.

I have to admit, I never thought there'd be a thread on this topic here on DL. Anyone remember Bob Kanigher? A writer, not an artist, but a real character.

Cut Curt Swan some slack. He drew Superman in the 1950s, so he’s not exactly going to be Frank Miller. Criticizing his work for being “square and wholesome” is a bit absurd. It’s like saying Batman is too dark or Wonder Woman too feminist.

[QUOTE] Don Heck. In the 80s, you always knew your favorite comic book was on the verge of cancellation if Don Heck was added as series artist.

In this respect, Don Heck was the Ted McGinley of comic books.

i hate stan lee as well. and with good reason.

Heck was fine in the 60s but had no business in the 80s or 90s

If we talk about artists we love - Alan Davis drew the hottest guys. Captain Britain - yum.

I also couldn't stand Mark Bagley...

Brian Bolland. Too much detail, for me.

I agree with the above posters on Carmine Infantino.

I blamed him for the comic book declines of both Flash & Supergirl which resulted in their Crisis deaths.

If both of the above mentioned heroes had better artists on their books then they wouldn't have been on any hit list.

Infantino's Flash in the 60s was great though.

Gil Kane was another comic book killer. Can you imagine his Batman being any type of commercial success?

I always wondered why some of these guys kept getting hired after so many of their titles were cancelled. (Did their bosses blame the writers or the characters instead?)

There are reports of an old boys network in the comic book industry which makes it harder for women to break into.

Have any women been named yet? I don't recall any.

I think Neal Adams did the best Batman.

[quote]Gil Kane was another comic book killer.

I absolutely loved Gil Kane's stuff. And it seems to me he had pretty good runs on Green Lantern and Spider-Man.

Infantino’s work on Spider Woman was inspiring.

We also have Infantino to thank for Batgirl.

Tell us more, R56 & R59...

R53, i'd really love to hear any behind the scenes stories of DC you have. I work very hard at comics.org to document DC history. Art Saaf is one of those forgotten guys of comics history.

I quite liked Jim Aparo in the 70s but by the mid 80s it was time for him to pack it in.

(And all of his women looked like drag queens.)

I LOVED Infantino's work on Mystery in Space (Adam Strange) and The Flash. When DC put him in an editorial position, well, he sucked.

This thread is taking me back. God, I loved Murphy Anderson too.

As far as artists who suck go: Anybody remember Mike Grell? Dick Dillon? Ross Andru (although he brought a fun goofiness to Spider-Man)?

I thought Mike Grell was one of DC’s best illustrators in the 70s, r71.

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Al Milgrom. I'm glad, though, because I think his art has a certain charm.

John Romita Jr.

R53 - tell us about Bob Kanigher. I hated his Wonder Woman stories.

BEST artist has gotta be Dick Giordano!

Believe it or not, this is a young Bob Kanigher.

He sure didn't look like that when he was doing Wonder Woman.

Incidentally, does anyone here recall the old term for when an inker ignores too much of the pencilling? There was a specific term for that, and I don't remember it after all this time.

I don’t know, r77 - but you made me immediately think of inker, Tom Palmer. His style always overpowered the artwork and not in a good way, IMO.

such a fun thread. I was really into DC Comics from about '84 to '90.

Infantino, Gil Kane, those guys all had such distinct, individual styles, you either loved them or hated them.

Seems now all the art is extra-muscly and just trying to emulate movies or something...

[quote]I enjoyed Keith Giffen on Legion but yeah his artwork morphed over time into something that came off as smug...if that’s possible.

Yes, it's possible. I loved his work with Larry Mahlstedt on Legion. But when he took over Legion post-Crisis with the 'Five Years Later' shit, it was like a different artist. His work regressed over time. Ugh.

I just thought of another Character at DC: Nelson Birdwell (or Bridwell; I never got that straight). He was something of a nerdy oddball, and used to make hideous throat-clearing noises that drove Carmine crazy. But Nelson was a human Superman encyclopedia. He knew all the details--what issues supposedly ran a story of Superman's death, when Lois got a weird hairdo, what Lana Lang wore to her Senior Prom.

He was amazing in that way, invaluable in keeping an authentic continuity going in the Superman saga.

Not so fast R73 Al Milgrom was Marvel's hack go-to guy in the 70s. I really had to hold my nose and pray the story was good 'cause the art sucked. Others have already been mentioned like Ross Andru, George Tuska, Herb Trimpe Robbins and Gil Kane. I will say Kane somehow made Green Lantern not awful but Spidey? Oy.

I'm right there with you, r59. I've never been a fan of Mark Bagley. His art is so unappealing and he is one of the few artists whose work produces a visceral dislike.

I am really surprised by some folks disliking Bill Sienkiewicz. I thought his run on New Mutants was brilliant - and a perfect counterpoint to the psychologically dark story arcs Claremont was doing on that title. I thought Sienkiewicz' debut arc on - "The Demon Bear Saga" was gorgeously weird.

Apologies for the following sidebar, but I just had to say that the stories Claremont was telling in NM was so much more intense than his work on Uncanny X-Men. Especially noteworthy considering NM was the junior title. Aside from the aforementioned Demon Bear story (which addressed the murder of someone's parents), there was a storyline regarding kidnapped teens used for pharmaceutical experimentation, a really memorable (and IMO, non-very special episode) suicide story and an exercise that forced the team to battle a super-powered assassin squad.

And then there's the arc where they battled a near omnipotent being who simultaneously murders AND erases them from existence. They're then resurrected but left with a nihilistic memory of it all - so the following issues address their severe PTSD.

That some intense shit for a team featuring 13 to 17 year olds.

/tangent (I'm so sorry! I need-out with comics)

Anyway, I also add my vote to those who named Rob Liefeld. His characters always look as if they were dehydrated via a laxative/lemon cocktail. And r50, I'm right there with you regarding John Byrne's run on Wonder Woman. I thought we were going to get the Byrne of Phoenix/Dark Phoenix at best or Fantastic Four era at worst...and the reality was a big ol' yikes.

I know he’s a gay and we should love him, but I find Phil Jimenez’s work to be overly detailed and awful. He’s like a George Perez wannabe without the talent.

I've never understood why Michael Turner is so popular. He is horrible with anatomy.

I don't mind Jiminez, R84. True, he's a Perez clone - but even Perez himself hasn't been able to come close to his own work throughout the 80s. I always thought it amazing how when Perez would do those close-up panels of the eyes of multiple characters and you INSTANTLY knew who the character was. That's some serious artistic chops.

That said, I liked Jiminez' early aughts run in Wonder Woman. That's a fun sequence of stories.

R85: Regarding Turner, you know he passed away from cancer, right? In a just a few more months it will be a full decade since he died.

I want more Silver Age DC dirt! I remember, say, 20 years ago, Julius Schwartz (recently widowed and sometimes drunk) was supposedly groping every young woman in sight. If he had lived, it definitely would have been a #metoo moment. Fucking nerds!

I saw Phil Jimenez do a talk on gays in comics at a local university and later someone showed me a website with all the same info in the same form. He had completely plagiarized his entire presentation.

I always liked Gil Kane but he was really into showing nostrils.

Mike Sekowsky was a terrible artist, though some of his work with the "new" Wonder Woman, inked by Dick Giordano, was often passable.

When I was a kid I hated Sekowsky but I have come to love him.

This artist.

[quote]I know he’s a gay and [bold]we should love him[/bold]

Automatically, [bold]because[/bold] he is gay? Nope.

[quote]Anybody remember Mike Grell? Dick Dillon? Ross Andru

Grell's work was distinctive, if nothing else -- and I'll always appreciate his tendency to outfit male LSH members in the skimpiest costumes possible.

In 2001, Jimenez made it his mission to kill off Hippolyta because he was worried that her appearances in the popular JSA comic were "ruining Diana's uniqueness."

Jeph Loeb told me that Jimenez offered to kill off Hippolyta in 'Our Worlds At War' to up the death count. Jimenez lied that he was told to do it by an editor.

It's interesting how so many queens hated Hippolyta becoming the Golden Age Wonder Woman back in 1998. "But Diana's uniqueness is being threatened!"

And NOW for the last several years, Diana has been running around with a shield and sword, in a costume similar to Byrne's Hippolyta.

I like Phil Jimenez work and he's really nice and supportive of other artists. So what if he took talking points from the net- He probably searched for something to discuss and found it interesting enough to share. He's an artist not a writer.

Love Alan Davis too R58.

As far as popular bad comic books artists go.....Quietly is the worst.

Has the WW troll brigade arrived yet?

Because let’s make this whole thread now about her now.

that old fucking stan lee..........ahhhhh

this is freaking Fascinating....all the minutia..................................., just wow. super interesting dynamics going on here......

carry on.

Tom Grummett was certainly a talented artist, but his faces...all of his characters looked like William H. Macy to me. Even the women.

[quote] another Character at DC: Nelson Birdwell (or Bridwell; I never got that straight). He was something of a nerdy oddball, and used to make hideous throat-clearing noises that drove Carmine crazy.

I deeply sympathise with Carmine.

I temporarily work/live my mother atm (protip: don’t ever do this, I’m desperate to find somewhere else to go). My Mom takes thyroid medications that mess with her glands and also has bad allergies, which cause her to punctuate her every sentence & gesture with this enraging back-of-the-throat gagging. It’s disgusting, and raises my hackles & my cortisol levels every time she does it. And she’s done it for years.

I’ve given her teas & tonics & lozenges aplenty, offered to take her to an allergenist or private doctor to reassess her meds or get her throat looked at, kindly asked her several times to try to curb it....and she won’t. Just says “sorry” and smiles sweetly, then carries on. She thinks it’s “unreasonable” to ask her to try and fix it. Yes, I live in her house, but I also pay rent and give her free petcare and make her dinner and troubleshoot her tech etc. Any free time I have is spent blocking her out, or on Starbucks where I go to escape it.

I’m now resolved that for however many months of sleepless nights and stress and shattered focus I’ve endured, she’s getting that much future Elder-care from me docked. So far we’re at around 20 months..

I was never a fan of Pat Broderick.

Jimenez thinks he’s a writer. Did you ever see his run on Wonder Woman? The excruciatingly wordy word balloons barely left any room for his crappy art.

Have any comic book pencilers stayed consistently skilled until the end? Inkers, yes. Pencilers, I’m not sure. Even Kirby, whose work I adored, produced awful artwork at DC at the end of his career.

Sometimes the transition from one artist to another can be jarring. I remember hating Chuck Beckam’s work on Miracle Man. Not that he was a bad artist by any means, but the switch from Alan Davis to him took me out of the story and certainly lessened the impact of the storytelling, IMO.

Was Mike Grell into the homosex, r94?

I’m secure with what I do, OP.

R102 "How can you be SO RUDE?!?!"

(Get it?)

A lot of these artists were genuinely great in their day, and then they just went downhill. They became too mannered and lazy as they got older--but once upon a time they were considered the best artists in the business. A case in point is Carmine Infantino, whose work for both the Flash and Mystery in Space in the Sixties was considered mindblowingly good for its time.

Similarly, no one had done a cover for a newsstand cover with such an inventive use of the title before (although this was something Infantino learned from Will Eisner's "The Spirit" section from 40s newspapers)

Similarly, despite the fact that his work later got hack-like, John Byrne's 70s and 80s work for x-Men was just unbeatable (especially since it was inked by Terry Austin). Look at the amazing moodiness of the final panel and how it works with the whole layout.

Stuart Immonen had such distinctive art when he was at DC 1992-2000.

But ever since he became Marvelized, his art has lost all passion and character. He looks like every other Olivier Coipel clone out there - and Immonen came first!

Blah now. Beautiful with DC.

I hated Don heck when I was young in the Eighties, but he was never really cut out for superhero comics (his designs for superheroes and supervillains were infamously bad--he gave them the dullest costumes that were invariably mostly brown). But he had trained to do moody spy comics (like Terry and the Pirates, drawn by his hero Milton Caniff), and did a great job in his early career with them and with romance comics. Check out the nice page below.

Apparently he knew he was no good with superhero comics, and was embarrassed how much fans hated it when he took over a book. But they kept him on at both Marvel and DC because everyone liked him so much.

If you were a gay boy in the Seventies and Early Eighties, there was a 100% chance that Don Heck would get around to your favorite characters.

Despite all the odds, Don Heck would somehow alway end up wherever my favorites were:

Wonder Woman, Supergirl, Mantis, Zatanna, Scarlet Witch, JLA, Batgirl, Donna Troy, Black Widow... and more Wonder Woman! Over and over!

I was so floored and disappointed that Heck got the rushy-rush job of 'Giant-Size Avengers' #4 which featured the weddings of Mantis & "Swordsman" and the Vision & the Scarlet Witch! I guess it was symmetry since he also drew Mantis' very first appearance in 1973.

Heck got to close out Wonder Woman's first series in 1985. I actually loved his art on Justice League of America in 1981-1983 when he was inked by Brett Breeding.

Yes, Brett Breeding was a terrific inker.

Mantis is another character Heck designed quite hideously. He just was not cut out to design superheroes.

Another genuinely awful Don Heck design: the first appearance of The Living Laser.

Don heck's design for Power Man

The huge difference in r111 between the high quality of the artwork and draftsmanship as a whole and those hideous, inept faces is really quite shocking.

I am finally figuring out my hatred for Shelagh from ‘Call The Midwife’...she makes me think of Ross Andru’s Wonder Woman from the 50’s/60’s!

But seriously - despite the hatred he’s getting on this thread, he’s probably the only penciller whose work I liked more as he got older. I would have been in gay heaven if he had been illustrating WW in the 1980s instead of Don Heck!

Ross Andru in the 1980s .

Oops, sorry, not r111, I meant r99

The worst: Kurt Schaffenberger.

Comic book art for the Frau.

Kurt schaffenberger did incredibly detailed work with wonderful facial expressions. Loved his early Marvel Family work and he really made Lois Lane one of the best selling comics of the 60s.

[quote]I was so floored and disappointed that Heck got the rushy-rush job of 'Giant-Size Avengers' #4 which featured the weddings of Mantis & "Swordsman" and the Vision & the Scarlet Witch! I

Yes! The Celestial Madonna saga was my favorite comics storyline and Heck mucked it up, especially compared to some great Dave Cockrum art in previous story installments.

Keith Giffen, “homage artist”.

Bob Brown and Dave Cockrum had the most amazing art in the Mantis Saga.

Even John Buscema and Sal Buscema/Joe Staton did fine with their parts.

But Don Heck on the ENDING?????????????

At least it wasn't Tuska.....

Bob Hall.

I always thought this Supermen cover by Stuart Immonen was one of the ugliest covers ever. Superman looks awful.

Superman’s mullet period was pretty unfortunate.

This is a fantastic thread. I was never heavily into comic books but I’m in awe of your erudition and passion, and I can’t stop reading. Carry on!

Ugliest cover ever? Put down the colored chalk, George!

I have always hated Jill Thompson in EVERYTHING, especially Wonder Woman.

Brian Postman.

Bill Sienkiewicz' "New Mutants" was the most exciting the book ever became.

I used to hate Paul Smith's run on the X-Men but now I love it even if Maddy Pryor looked NOTHING like Jean Grey and I couldn't figure out why Cyclops was so stunned when he first met her.

What did you all think of the transition from Steve Ditko to John Romita in Amazing Spiderman? That was a classic case of extremes. I loved that the characters were less "ugly" but the quirkiness of the art was sorely missed. Then again, Mary Jane could have never lived up to the hype under Ditko.

Under Romita, Aunt May looked less like she was going to disintegrate into powder at any moment. But Peter was hot so it was hard to relate to a muscular stud as still a loser, despite his money woes. Gwen and Mary Jane looked exactly alike except for hair color and a headband.

This is one of the funniest things I've ever seen: what if Captain America from the movies had the body of Rob Liefeld's Captain America?

It's always astonishing to think how popular Rob Liefeld was in the 1990s. unlike some of the other people on this list, he was NEVER a good artist. He was a cheesy Art Adams imitator who had absolutely no idea of human anatomy or of perspective.

Another of the most awful Rob Liefeld renderings ever: the Enchantress.

R134: I remember reading an interview with Paul Smith where he said his being accepted by UXM readers was an arduous process. Particularly since he replaced Dave Cockrum - who was immensely popular with readers. But by the end of his run the readers loved him but hated his replacement (John Romita Jr.).

The slow beautification of Rogue from hag-like villain to heroic bombshell definitely had its roots during Smith's run. He noticeably de-aged and de-uglied her during his run.

And Madelyn's non-resemblance to Jean was not helped by the hairstyle Smith gave her. The 'resemblance' never really worked until they changed her hairstyle once Marc Silvestri was the regular artist. Interestingly, the original hairstyle was deliberately based on Louise "Weezie" Simonson's hairstyle during that period. She was the editor on the X-Books then (and wife of Walter Simonson - responsible for one of the most acclaimed runs on "Thor").

R137: OMG, that Liefeld bit is HILARIOUS. And you're totally right about his trying (and failing spectacularly) to ape Art Adams. Adams work on "The Asgardian Wars" is so beautiful.

R58: Alan Davis is another artist who, like 80s era George Perez, is able to make distinct looking faces. With Davis, you could ID a character even if their body and hair was not drawn. Which is incredibly difficult if you think about it. Both his runs on Excalibur is the best of his career.

"I like Phil Jimenez work and he's really nice and supportive of other artists. So what if he took talking points from the net- He probably searched for something to discuss and found it interesting enough to share."

You misunderstood. He was paid by a university to give a presentation on Gays in Comics. He cribbed the entire thing from someone else's work and presented it as his own. He plagiarized it.

How can one say that Madeline didn’t resemble Jean? They’re both comic book characters!

It's called being involved in the story, r141. It's no different than when showrunners bring in a new actor for an already existing character on a televison show or movie.

Stop being such a wet blanket.

Hack evangelistic tract monger Jack Chick, because without his shitty work we will all SPEND ETERNITY IN A VERY GAY CIRCUIT PARTY.

William Johnson.

Jon bogdanove drew an ugly Supes who looked like Jay Leno

I hated how inker Joe Sinnott overpowered the work of the penciller so much that you could hardly tell who pencilled the issue if they weren’t already identified.

This is George Perez inked by Sinnott.

Mike Grell--now his panels could get really, really sexy. That Green Arrow comic in the late 80s practically showed Oliver Queen and Black Canary fucking. And he'd draw Queen with a really hairy chest, which I loved. I fucking loved that.

I miss the days of Superman’s hairy chest from the Byrne era...

Well, this thread brings back memories. Tuska and Heck were the first two to come to mind. Gods they were awful! But the Trilogy of Terror isn't complete with Al milgrom

Though I'm happy to hear that Heck was an nice guy, and that's why they kept him around.

Mike Grell's "Warlord" was a sexy silver daddy wearing as little as possible.

R146, I agree about Joe Sinnot. He did the same thing to John Byrne. Heavy inkers are a real problem for good artists. Dick Girodano (or, as rumor has it, the Dick Giordano conglomerate) could ruin some good art,notably George Perez' in certain issues of "Crisis on Infinite Earths." This also can be the penciller's problem is they do breakdowns or full pencils but Sinnot... yeah, he blows.

I feel like I am one of the only people who really liked Romita Jr. and Dan Green on the X-Men. I liked the art and the stories going on at that point. Right before Dan Green became the regular inker, Romita inker his own son and Colossus looked exactly like Peter Parker only with blue-black hair.

How many gay boys liked Colossus even though he was only pen and ink?

Can editors give artists "overall" notes on their style?

I want someone to give Adam Kubert a paid two-week leave of absence to learn how to draw different faces. Everyone always has pinched facial features.

There's a nice piece on Mike Grell here...

And here I thought "comicsgate" was confined to a few shitty talentless hacks on Twitter who can't write or draw properly, till R17 comes along and literally calls Ethan Van Sciver a Nazi! (Insert a good Jimmy Carr chuckle here.)

R17, you should die of embarrassment right now, loser.

R155 must be EVS.

EVS is a trump-loving, Nazi and alt-right symbol using asshole.

[quote]Or maybe I just liked him because he managed to make Sam Guthrie hot.

One of my few clear memories of New Mutants is when Sam went skinnydipping. Definitely brought up some confusing feelings in my young self.

Something else that made an impression on me, this is more of an odd decision than bad art, but when Todd McFarlane worked on Infinity, Inc he blatantly drew the characters without underwear. I don't know if that's typical of his style.

You would think men going into danger would want some crotch protection, or that huge-titted Wildcat would wear a bra, but nope. You could practically see the women's areolae. I think I actually got a boner from the panel in which you can see Nuklon's dick.

On a less shallow note, this thread is a great read.

After reading this thread, I was watching two great videos on youtube last night of Richard Bennett penciling and inking comics.

Here's the penciling one...

And the inking one...

You have to realize that when you call non Nazis Nazis you are basically screaming "I'm an insufferable idiot who should not be taken seriously! I know nothing about history or culture, I'm just offensively loud and miserable and I want you to be miserable and miserably stupid too!" Just FYI, in case you want to ever attract thoughtful, interesting people into your life. They don't like hysterics.

I had always remembered Ethan as a fill in artist for Grant's New X-Men (loved it, loved Quitely too but those faces) and how he drew SEX hidden in the art. Until I noticed a few people saying America was the cringiest comic book ever and he sided with the fans who believe good stories trump PC bad comics. I'll side with a literal Nazi (provided you can find me one) over some SJW snowflake any day of the week!

EVS couldn't get FLASH: REBIRTH finished because he was always on Twitter ranting about Evil Obama and the Democrats. The 6 issues took almost a year because of his political ranting taking precedence over his job.

Loved Romita Jr on X-Men too, except for whiny Rachel in her aerobics class gear. Just bought the Ghosts trade. Paid almost 80 bucks for it but now I have all of Claremont's original run in mostly OHC except for 215-219.

I got into X-Men around the time Romita Jr retuned to the book circa 300. Loved that issue. Hated the Manga style that took over.

Also ditto on Sam Guthrie being hot under Bill S. That boy could look fug. I thought Douglas was adzorable.

Frank Miller reckons Joe Kubert is the best comic artist of all-time. He says he could do it all: tell a story, his draftsmanship was impeccable, and you could read him and learn so much.

"I'll side with a literal Nazi (provided you can find me one) over some SJW snowflake any day of the week!"

That says pretty much everything we'd need to know about you or why you support EVS.

Jack Kirby was fantastic but even he at times drew Sue Storm with a huge forehead and small eyes that would make her look like Frankenstein's monster. But that wasn't consistent enough to make him one of the worst at all. His style was standard.

If anybody reads Archie or has read their "Best of" where they finally have collections dedicated to their artists- obviously Montana and Dan DeCarlo are two fo the best. DeCarlo set the house style that they are frustratingly trying to unravel in this post-"Riverdale" world. DeCarlo's Josie works pre-Pussycats is some of the best work he ever did. Harry Lucey and Sammy Schwartz were amazing. Stan Goldberg or Stan G. was a pale imitation of DeCarlo and the more and he did, the more cross-eyed his characters became.

Dan Parent's Archie work is good and he is so progressive but, covers aside, his work can look rushed and sloppy. BUT he does turn work in on time and his "Die, Kitty Dier!" series is brilliant. Problem is, his writing skills for Kevin Keller are far too "gee whiz" and didactic where it's too much about Kevin being gay and spouting statistics. I wish his family was more complex. They're too Stepford compared to the rest of the Riverdale pack. And Parent again is a good artist who rushes. But again, he's quite the ally.

Al Feldstein?

A bit of a stretch, but Alex Ross. A lot of his art is really cool, even if he relies too much on models to get general shapes down. But he also doesn't seem to know how to create original faces. His Gwen Stacy in Marvels is beautiful, but two issues before it, we have a Reed Richards and a Sue Storm who are clearly Thurston and Lovey Howell. There's another panel with a woman in a crowd who's also 100% Bea Arthur.

There's also Greg Land, who is a notorious tracer. He gets a lot of his women from porn stills, and often reuses images. He did a Werewolf by Night one-shot where all the werewolves looked like Abercrombie models, and an issue of X-Men where all the women had the exact same face.

Greg Land draws beautiful men.

R163, I just did the exact same thing! On a whim last month, I started buying up X-Men trades (I already had the Masterworks) all the way through to the end of the Alan Davis run in 2000.

I got 'Ghosts' for $70 and free shipping. #215 is in the 'Old Soldiers' trade which I got on eBay for $4.

[quote]Greg Land draws beautiful men.

He traces them, anyway.

Sometimes while perusing Adam4Adam I delete my trace...

Thank you, r170. Here's a fascinating page documenting many of Greg Land's swipes. Some of them are extraordinary. He's literally is just tracing other people's work...

You could always identify a woman who was inked by Vince Colletta by the 5 lbs of mascara.

Which is a shame, r174. Because before he started constantly tracing he was a pretty good artist. He did art for an earlier arc of the original "Birds of Prey" that I really enjoyed. It was an own style, but had shades of Alan Davis with crisp, clean lines.

[quote] shades of Alan Davis

Hmmmm.

Bump for DC (and what fresh Hell is this new Marvel reboot? *yawn*)

I will always have a soft spot for Dick Dillon who illustrated JLA for like 100+ issues in the 70s and 80s. But his ways of showing a character was upset or angry were always laughable. In this panel, Wonder Woman overhears the men talking smack about her and she’s so pissed her hair literally stands up!

So pissed her head sparks yellow flames!

[quote] This is more of an odd decision than bad art, but when Todd McFarlane worked on Infinity, Inc he blatantly drew the characters without underwear. I don't know if that's typical of his style.

R158 it certainly wasn’t typical of SPAWN, although those are admittedly the only McFarlane I’ve ever read. Spawn’s cape was a discretionary garment, for the most part.

R158 Pictures please.

I want to see some Infinity Inc. cock!

Todd McFarlane's run on Infinity, Inc., was a big part of my coming out. God, I lusted over the guys in that book. We never saw Obsidian out of costume but I seem to recall when we did, he was super hot.

I was a kid in the 90s and remember hating how Adam Kubert made all the X-Men look Asian. What made things worse was that this was when the team was split into blue and gold teams, and he was penciling the waaaay more interesting blue team.

This was the first image to come up when I entered Comic Book Super Hero Bulge.

I absolutely detested Bret Blevins when he took over illustrating The New Mutants.

Second the love for Kurt Schaffenberger. His work on Lois Lane was so detailed and clever - he really did well with facial expressions. Lois Lane went down after Infantimo pulled KS off of it and put Irv Novick on the stories. Novick did good work with the Flash and Batman, but he was awful on Lois Lane.

Pete Costanza was the WORST at DC. He ruined Jimmy Olsen when he took over as the lead in that comic, and did equally awful work on the Legion and occasionally on Superman.

I was not a fan of Sal Buscema’s work. He would always use the same image of a character getting thrown backwards.

He was also fond of the nasalabial fold.

[quote] There's another panel with a woman in a crowd who's also 100% Bea Arthur.

That's an in-joke.

It's bizarre you would complain about that...on Datalounge, of all places.

I loved the art of Jim Aparo. He drew hot men. In the 90s, every superhero became roided out thanks to artists like Liefeld. Artists like Aparo and John Byrne would try and fit the body type to the character. Therefore, in Byrne's "Fantastic four," the outfits on them were not skin tight and Johnny storm was slim and Reed was in shape but not a bodybuilder. John Byurne's only flaw for me was that he had a problem drawing little kids- they all looked like boxy adults.

[quote]I was not a fan of Sal Buscema’s work.

I didn't hate his stuff, but his brother John's work was far superior.

Gene Colan is an artist I liked very much but I know his unique style had a lot of detractors.

Rob Liefield was a cutie back in the day.

[quote]It's bizarre you would complain about that...on Datalounge, of all places.

If it had been the real Bea, she wouldn't have been so prejudiced against mutants.

Gene Colon was perfect for series like Dracula and Doctor Strange. When he joined DC in the 80s they made the terrible decision to put him on Wonder Woman. It was not a good fit.

r192, I also loved Jim Aparo in the 70s, especially on The Brave and The Bold. In the 80s his work declined a bit.

He was also not skilled at costume design.

Jimmy Janes and Dave Hunt became resident penciller/inker of Legion Of Super Heroes in the mid 80s and I thought their work was incredibly bland.

Dave Hunt also inked Wonder Woman in the early 80s. He was one of those inkers who overpowered the pencils so you always knew instantly when he was part of the art team. But I wasn’t a fan of longtime WW artist Jose Delbo either.

Gene Colan was originally paired up with inker Romeo Tanghal on WW and the artwork was good. But unfortunately Romeo left after a few issues and the inker who replaced him (I think it was Frank McLaughlin) was ill suited.

Eduardo Barreto - he wasn’t terrible but he had the unfortunate job of following George Perez on Titans.

Because I'm a true humanitarian...and I'm snowed in and bored...I tracked down some Infinity Inc scans for you thirsty nerds.

My memory misled me a bit. The art I was thinking of was not by McFarlane. It was the duo that followed him, penciller Michael Bair and inker Bob Downs.

The bulges seem to have, ah, grown in memory. It's not nearly as naughty as I seemed to remember. Mind you, they show greater anatomical fidelity and detail than I was used to seeing in comics at the time, which I still think gives it an erotic charge not seen in the work of, say, JohnByrne. But it's not nearly as nipplicious and crotchtacular as I thought.

On the plus side, those guys loved drawing ass. I wouldn't be surprised to learn they used porn for reference photos.

By the way, McFarlane did some nifty layouts for Infinity Inc.

Link to bonus gallery.