Friday, December 11, 2009

Early Career Murder

Friday Comic Book Day.

Joe Kubert has done so much comics in his long career that someone could do a blog devoted soly to his work and not be done in a very long time. But there's isn't so here I wll show an early horror strip Kubert did, when his Eisner influences still showed. I scanned it in a long time ago, so I have forgotten what title it came from, but I think it was some early Prize title, possibly an early issue of Joe Palooka. Prizes did a lot of books reprinting newspaper strips and many of those have filler stories by artists such as Kubert, Bob Powell and others.



4 comments:

Smurfswacker said...

Okay, I'm being dense again. How does "FLEAS" answer the riddle?

I'd forgotten how thick an outline Kubert used in his early drawings. His draughtsmanship certainly improved over the years. Thanks for posting this interesting piece.

Paul C.Tumey said...

Beautiful. Thanks, Ger. As awkward as it is at times, I think Kubert's early work has a power and appeal that I like very much. He has always had a great sense of page layout and design. I read once that he started at top left and worked to bottom right, as though he already had the whole page composition worked out in his head!

Ger Apeldoorn said...

In my opinion his thicker line is much more interesting, although my fvorite period is a little later. Let's say the mid to late fifties. The thinner line he developed later on may be more impressive, but it is a bit boring as well. If you read a lober piece, like Tex Willer or a whole series of any of his DC work, it very soon al starts to look the same. His earlier work didn't have that problem. His later work is better written, though. I like Jew Gangster or Sarajewo as much for the text as for the art.

Smurfswacker said...

I'm with you, Ger. I think my favorite Kubert period was when he was working for Avon. Stronger drawing, but lots of the personality of these earlier strips.

The more realistic style he developed during the 60s--Viking Prince, Hawkman--was still interesting. A friend of mine owned an original war comic page from that time which was stunning for its bravura brush and pen work.

I lost my enthusiasm for Kubert's drawing when he developed his scratchier style in the 1970s. That Tex story didn't do anything for me. I agree that his stories are worth reading, though.