The Crime-Master Takes Aim at Spidey, in color

Here's the Spider-Man commission for Rick, finally colored. I've written a bit about the Crime-Master already, he's a character that's almost completely untouched since the 60s, and to which I envision a lot of potential. It's a real danger bringing this up, because you see, what's going to happen, is that someone is going to happen across this blog and suddenly The Crime-Master is going to become the "it" character before I get my chance. Well, I call dibs, you here that Steve Wacker, I have dibs on the Crime-Master. No one except me is talking about him anywhere. So if suddenly, after I start drawing him and telling my vision, he suddenly becomes the big Spider-Man villain, I better get a nod.

This piece is a little dark, but I felt it had to be. I really wanted to make the point that The Crime-Master is more of a blue color villain. I see him as an Irish Mobster, a low man, muscle, whom isn't happy with his place, hence the mask and the schemes. He's cunning, and no principles or loyalty and he'll betray your in a heartbeat. Like I mention somewhere on my forums, in his one storyline (unless you count retcons in Untold Tales of Spider-Man), which I do only for those stories) it's often forgotten that he's the one whom double crosses The Green Goblin, not the other way around. In fact, The Goblin seems very idealistic about his partnerships, and seems diapointed when they go wrong, which is the lost appeal in the early Goblin, that he was the "geek" of the villains who didn't get respect. The Crime-Master is the badass who hangs out at the wall that all the other kids stay away from because he's always kicking someone's ass. So the Goblin and him come together out of mutual convenience. But, the Crime-Master proves to be to uncontrollable for the Goblin, he double crosses him, and becomes a real wildcard.

The Amazing Spiderman #39 pg. 1

I've posted this image before but the design wasn't complete until now. The first thing that Spider-Man enthusiasts might notice here is that it reads "The Amazing Spiderman", without a hyphen separating the words "spider" and "man". This was very much intentional, for two reasons.

The most obvious reason is that the use of the hyphen really limits the way you can present the typography. If you take the character Batman, he started out as "The Bat Man", then became "Bat Man", and then finally "Batman". And now, with the latest animation cartoon show, he's "The Batman". Well, for some reason there is more flexibility in a character like Batman. We've seen him dark, we've seen him as a respectable role model, and we've seen him campy. In some versions a man named Joe Chill killed his parents. In other versions his parents killers remain faceless and uncaptured. In some versions his adversary, The Joker has an origin and he even has a name in a few. In others the Joker in an enigma, whom you never know how he became what he was. That flexibility has allowed Batman to remain popular throughout many generations. As popular as Spider-Man is, his precise identity and continuity is held very sacred, which I think makes Spider-Man more difficult to take in different directions.

Which brings us to the underlying reason for the change. As much as I'd love to just ignore the hyphen for aesthetic reasons, I would not dare make the change for that reason. Amazing Spider-Man #39 is one of my favorite comics. In fact, a reprint of the issue that's featured in Marvel Tales is the very comic that hooked me into becoming a collector. In that issue The Green Goblin had unmasked Spider-Man which was unheard of at the time and he revealed himself to be Norman Osborn. It was an amazing two part story that featured the debut of John Romita doing the art. John Romita's art was beautiful. He popularized the look of Spider-Man that my generation grew up with and he drew some gorgeous girls. It was an amazing issue.

But there was something else about about that issue, it's only deficit; it was the first the first issue of Amazing Spider-Man that wasn't produced by both of Spider-Man's original creators. And it is an urban myth that artist Steve Ditko had left Spider-Man because he disagreed with writer Stan Lee on who the Green Goblin should be revealed as (I'm sure that there's more to it than that but Steve Ditko is a very private man who refuses to discuss Spider-Man). Well, it occurs to me that Steve Ditko was more than just the artist. In the 1960s Spider-Man comics were done in "Marvel-Style", where Stan gave his writers a brief description of what was to occur in the comics (and he's admitted that sometimes it was no more than a sentence or two), then the artist would draw the book with only that to go on, with Stan filling in the balloons and captions after that. There's no doubt about Steve Ditko had a huge role in the storytelling process and in the direction and style of the book. And after he had left, there was a definite continuity shift, with Romita's clean, more mainstream style becoming the lasting template. The book has never since had the pulp flavor that Steve Ditko brought to it.

One of the elements that forever changed, was the Green Goblin. While Amazing Spider-Man #39 and #40 together are one of my favorite Spider-Man/Green Goblin stories, the rest of those favorites are Ditko's Green Goblin stories and what made those stories different than any that came later, was that the Green Goblin was a character whom nobody knew who he was. That was the main appeal in the character. The Green Goblin had his own personality, independent of the man under the mask. His face was always shown in shadows. The anticipation and mystery is what made him so cool. But no new story could ever capture that quality before. The Green Goblin became Norman Osborn, and Norman can be portrayed as an interesting character. But he's never been the same impish, devilish, elf-like, mysterious gangster he was before the unmasking. Even retrospective stories told to take place in that time period featured the Green Goblin as Norman Osborn. The Green Goblin of that time period is lost, along with a lot of the qualities of Ditko's stories, underneath layers of continuity and decades of stories that have come since. And many of those stories are brilliant in their own right. But it's a shame that new stories cannot be told in the same vein as the classics. There are generations whom are growing up whose only sense of these stories is the retroactive continuity that has been added since.

So what do you do, if this is the kind of story you want to tell? How do you bring things back to remind people, where things were at when Stan and Steve did the definitive Spider-Man. Well, I know better than to tweak with Marvel Continuity. The Marvel Zombies would never tolerate such a thing, let alone Spider-Man fans in particular. And I don't want to make up my own universe, or "imaginary stories" featuring Spider-Man, because in my opinion, if it doesn't start with Stan and Steve, it isn't Spider-Man. But what if, and granted, this is just a dream project, but every dream has the possibility to become real, I was allowed to tell a story that took place right after Ditko's last issue. What if that story only followed the continuity of those original Ditko stories that came before it. It still wouldn't be Stan and Steve, but it would bring things back to where Stan Steve were at and go a direction not dictated by everything that's been established since. It would be a different take, a different continuity, but if it can be done with Batman, why not with Spider-Man?

So what do you call it. The first title that popped into my head was also the boldest. Calling it Amazing Spider-Man #39, even with another label attached to it, probably isn't going to fly considering that the real Amazing Spider-Man #39 is one of the greatest Spider-Man stories ever told. So names like "Spider-Man Pulp" or "Spider-Man Noir popped into my head, but, because I'm seeing a total retro design to the book and I wanted it to be clear that it's a continuation of Ditko's stories, I kept seeing the first issue as having a pulp style cover with "#39" on it. And at the same time I found myself drawing playing with the typographic logo, sketching out different type styles that I felt would make it look vintage, classic, retaining the same look, but in a totally new way. But that damn hyphen, what a pain in the ass it is to have to work around that. So it occurred to me that to fanboys the hyphen is significant, perhaps significant enough to distinguish a different continuity. Why mess around with titles like "Ultimate" Spider-Man.

So in my perfect hypothetical reality the first issue of my dream project is The Amazing Spiderman #39, with the #39 being marketed. In a slightly less perfect version, the title and numbering could be tweaked, but perhaps the shift in continuity could still justify the loss of the hyphen. It opens things up, without totally breaking the rules.

So that's the long story behind my Spider-Man portfolio I've been working on. Each page of the portfolio features a different character from this story. This serves to purposes for me, it introduces the story and the characters and, because each character in the story is very distinctively different from the rest, it shows my range and my ability to stretch genres. This splash page is designed to capture the feel of 1960s Marvel Comics and Ditko's Spider-Man in particular. I did almost everything in this page by hand. That is in part because of my appreciation for people like Robert Crumb, whom even renders the logos of each new cover of his comics as part of the original art. It's also used because there are some qualities that digital art on it's own had a difficult time achieving on it's own. I certainly took advantage of the digital process in finishing the page, including the fine fonts by Comicraft in the byline, but as little as I felt necessary.

The Crime-Master takes aim at Spider-Man!

This is one of the two paid commissions I'm doing for Rick Foster, or as he's known on the internet "Grandpa". Rick has been very supportive and enthusiastic about my art. We have similar tastes in comics (we both love this obscure 1960s Spidey villain, The Crime-Master, and the next piece I'm doing for him is The Shadow!!!).

I really appreciate the opportunity to do make a little money while getting my feel for these characters. Like I said, The Crime-Master is a favorite of mine, but I came to understand the character more through this drawing. I've always seen him as a gangster, but what really came through to me as I drew him, is that he's a blue collar gangster. He's not The Rose, whom is a Spider-Man villain from the 1980s whom also is an underworld character who wears a suit and a mask, but whom is rich, stylish, and powerful. The Crime-Master wears drab colors. For some reason I'm seeing him as old school Irish-American. He's a small time gangster, muscle, with bigger ambitions; hence the mask. I also think he's smart. He's been in the trenches, he's a survivor and there's blood on his hand. He has perspective. If he had been allowed, he could lead the mobs and he's brutal enough to do what it takes to hold power. Unfortunately for him, because of this social class and ethnic background, that's not a role open to him through the mobs. Hence the mask, which allows him to grab for power without becoming a target.

And here are my original pencils, which I thought I'd show so people can see how my art evolves. Sometimes it's not apparent to me what's working and what's not until the piece materializes in ink. I'm disappointed to lose sight of Spidey's right arm, but the perspective just wasn't working on that and I think the piece is stronger without it. These are actually really tough poses to draw. There are still a few decisions I'm not sure I made the right choice on, but there is a time when an artist needs to step away so he can meet his deadlines.

Please show Rick your support by shopping at his comic shop, if you're in his area. I spent some time with him on the phone this week and he's a really nice guy. Rick's store is:

Grandpas Comics
34161 RT.45
THIRD LAKE, ILLINOIS

Spider-Man Underworld

This isn't brand new, I did it last year, but I don't have it displayed here and even though it's in my gallery on my website, I figured it wouldn't hurt to have it here as well. I put this together for a local comic shop that I've been going to since I was a kid. The design is based off of my favorite poster I had as a kid which was done by Ron Frenz. The art for that rare poster is for display on my Non-Art Blog.

Again, I'm going for a Ditko-esque Spider-Man. This character design is slightly different than the one I'm working on with my Crime-Master Portfolio. I chose to use characters that were more crime based. I think I make it pretty clear that my favorite Spider-Man stories are more pulpish and I prefer the Mobsters and Gansters to fantastic supervillains (for Spider-Man at least). And the two time periods that interest me most for the character of Spider-Man are the 60s and the 80s.

Spider-Man - The Crime-Master's Mask Pt. 2: Peter Parker Page

This is the first of the character pages for my Spider-Man portfolio. It's will also probably be the most challenging page for me. When there's lots of action it's easy to make a scene look interesting but when the story slows down it's a challenge to keep the story flowing. There are a lot of nuances here that will probably be unnoticed (more noticeable without them though). This sort of page is never going to be the sort that people remember. It's not the one that will jump off the page at people. But it's very important as a part of the whole and it is very intentionally part of this portfolio to show my ability to stage such a scene.

Obviously the image has not been colored yet. I may get to that eventually but I think it's more important to get the other pages done first. I haven't added the word balloons yet either, and while they're important in the story, hopefully the images give you enough so that you get the gist of it.

The Return of the Man in The Crime-Master's Mask Pt. 1

The Return of the Man in The Crime-Master's Mask is a portfolio series of 6 or 7 comic pages with the purpose of promoting my work. The work is based on my favorite Spider-Man story by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko, The Man in The Crime-Master's Mask, which appeared in Amazing Spider-Man issues #26 and 27. This under appreciated story stands out in the run and it's gitchy-noir element is one that has been seldom tapped into in a Spider-Man comic since and works perfectly with the character.

My goal is to capture the essence of Ditko's Spider-Man but in my own style, more a homage to Ditko than a swipe. I've had something in mind like this for sometime and then at one point I was re-reading one of my favorite superhero comics of all time, Batman The Long Halloween, and it clicked with me that while that story was pure Batman, there was something in there that could be applied to Spider-Man. The Romita Spider-Man is what has endured, bold, bright, very superhero-ish. But the original Spider-Man, Ditko's Spider-Man, was a bit darker. It was filled with gangsters, in fact that's what the Green Goblin was, a gangster. Spider-Man is a character with a lot of tragedy, a lot of sadness. Things don't go right for him. He's a bit like Charlie Brown. He keeps trying but his victory is that he manages to survive. He hasn't won yet.

The storyline is a sequel to the Crime-Master saga of the 60s. The story adheres only to the continuity established by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko together outside of the current Marvel Continuity or the retroactive continuity added by writers and artists since. The concept itself would be a dream project for me, not something I expect to work on anytime soon but something I would aspire to after making a reputation for myself.

This first page, the splash page, was designed almost two years ago and sat unfinished until I recently decided this concept was unique enough to put together as a portfolio. Each of the following pages will focus on a different key-character in the story, including Peter Parker, The Green Goblin, The Crime-Master, Betty Brandt (finally getting her due), J. Jonah Jameson, Frederick Foswell a.k.a. the man called Patch, and finally Spider-man himself. The different character focus will give me a chance to show my range in storytelling.

This page was designed in an over-sized Sketchbook filling the page from corner to corner before being removed to be scanned. It was actually drawn two years ago and I just recently applied color to it when I decided to put this portfolio together. The following pages will be drawn and inked on hot pressed premium quality bristol board. When I present those pages I'll go into the story concept a little bit more.

The original art for this page is for sale in my ebay store.