|
|
Post by tartanphantom on May 20, 2024 12:41:05 GMT -5
I concur. And let's not forget the fact that although his health was beginning to fail, the Kirby "crackle" still delivered.
My biggest beef with Kirby was the sometimes lack of cohesiveness in his plotting (on jobs when he was actually scripting the story in addition to doing the art), but I was never, ever disappointed with his artwork.
...and Captain Victory seldom gets the praise it deserves.
I don't think it was his plotting, which was pretty amazing considering the large arcs he envisioned in The Fourth World and The Eternals. But it was he was his own editor. Kirby rarely looked back, and even though he knew where he was going, there were times he could have used an editor to point out where things didn't connect. There were also times where publisher interference made him change directions or do things that he hadn't planned.
I think you are more correct than me on this. I didn't think about the self-editing aspect of it.
|
|
|
|
Post by kirby101 on May 20, 2024 13:34:43 GMT -5
It's interesting to think about. Kirby was a creative force of nature, one of the greatest writers in the history of comics (I'm not talking about scripting dialog) but he wrote visually, working out a story as he drew. I suppose if he worked out one of his giant stories on a big board with each chapter set, there wouldn't have been the lack of cohesion we see. On the other hand it would have constrained him from bringing in all those amazing concepts that came to him.
He came up in the 40s, when there wasn't a worry about what happened the months before, just give the readers a great story. And he definitely had no time for the fanboy writers and editors who were overly obsessed in continuity.
But Kirby was a singular artist and it's best to approach his work as he offered it.
|
|
|
|
Post by tonebone on May 20, 2024 14:26:25 GMT -5
I concur. And let's not forget the fact that although his health was beginning to fail, the Kirby "crackle" still delivered.
My biggest beef with Kirby was the sometimes lack of cohesiveness in his plotting (on jobs when he was actually scripting the story in addition to doing the art), but I was never, ever disappointed with his artwork.
...and Captain Victory seldom gets the praise it deserves.
I don't think it was his plotting, which was pretty amazing considering the large arcs he envisioned in The Fourth World and The Eternals. But it was he was his own editor. Kirby rarely looked back, and even though he knew where he was going, there were times he could have used an editor to point out where things didn't connect. There were also times where publisher interference made him change directions or do things that he hadn't planned. YES! If he had an impartial person editing his work, I think it would have been much more cohesive and accessible. Does anyone know if Captain Victory has ever been collected? All I've ever seen is the "graphite" edition from TwoMorrows of Issue 1. |
|
|
|
Post by berkley on May 20, 2024 15:01:19 GMT -5
I concur. And let's not forget the fact that although his health was beginning to fail, the Kirby "crackle" still delivered.
My biggest beef with Kirby was the sometimes lack of cohesiveness in his plotting (on jobs when he was actually scripting the story in addition to doing the art), but I was never, ever disappointed with his artwork.
...and Captain Victory seldom gets the praise it deserves.
I don't think it was his plotting, which was pretty amazing considering the large arcs he envisioned in The Fourth World and The Eternals. But it was he was his own editor. Kirby rarely looked back, and even though he knew where he was going, there were times he could have used an editor to point out where things didn't connect. There were also times where publisher interference made him change directions or do things that he hadn't planned.
That was the biggest problem, for me. Both the Eternals and the Fourth World were huge epics that were cut short at a criminally early stage; and before they were cancelled Kirby was pressured to change things in a way that went against the spirit of the concept - so it really makes no sense to criticise them for being all over the place or directionless as if he had no idea what he was doing, yet this is the kind of comment you see all the time (I'm not referring to Tartanphantom's comment BTW but rather more generally to some the common criticisms I've seen online).
|
|
|
|
Post by MDG on May 20, 2024 15:18:46 GMT -5
That was the biggest problem, for me. Both the Eternals and the Fourth World were huge epics that were cut short at a criminally early stage; and before they were cancelled Kirby was pressured to change things in a way that went against the spirit of the concept - so it really makes no sense to criticise them for being all over the place or directionless as if he had no idea what he was doing, yet this is the kind of comment you see all the time (I'm not referring to Tartanphantom's comment BTW but rather more generally to some the common criticisms I've seen online).
Simply put, he was trying to do things the industry just wasn't set up to do. |
|
|
|
Post by kirby101 on May 20, 2024 15:38:50 GMT -5
Today Mark Evanier posted a clip of Jon Stewart about the best advice he ever got. It was from Letterman. But Evanier said Kirby told him the same thing.
"Cancellation is not failure".
|
|
|
|
Post by commond on May 20, 2024 15:39:15 GMT -5
Personally, I don't see any evidence that if Kirby had been left alone to make his own comic books that he'd have seen any of them through to their conclusion. His goal at DC appeared to be to start a bunch of titles then farm them off to other creators, creating a DC West Coast, but Infantino had other ideas, the bigwigs weren't interested in a DC West Coast, and Kirby's contract stipulated that he produce 15 pages per week. Having said that, seeing a comic through to its conclusion and having a finite number of issues was a foreign concept at the time. As Dave Sims has mentioned, its a shame that Kirby missed out on the direct market and the chance to produce his ideas as creator-owned graphic novels. I'm not sure if Kirby would have gone that route as there were risks involved, but creatively it would have provided the best avenue to produce his magnus opus.
|
|
|
|
Post by kirby101 on May 20, 2024 17:31:48 GMT -5
Cranking out monthly books is what Kirby knew. One wonders if he could have changed his way of working to do Graphic Novels like Eisner did. I don't think I ever saw him talking about that.
|
|
|
|
Post by codystarbuck on May 20, 2024 22:33:21 GMT -5
I think there is a bit of a misconception about Kirby's process as being a linear progression within his stories. Personally, I think they are closer to improvisation, much like a jazz piece, going wherever the mood takes him, which affected the direction of some of the work he was doing, as you couldn't necessarily draw a straight line from one to the next. It varied a bit, from series to series. With the 4th World, I think The Forever People is the biggest example of it, as ideas get abandoned by the next issue and it meanders all over the place. New Gods is a more straight forward, Mister Miracle is a bit more in between. Jimmy Olsen is more conceptual than anything else, as Kirby mainly just uses it to throw ideas out there and go on wild adventures, exploring the possibilities.
I think that speaks to the self-editing issue, as it makes sense to Kirby, as that is where his creative mind took him; but, an outside editor might have been lost and look at ways to give more clear signposts, for the journey.
Getting back to Batflunkie's comment; I was not a fan of Kirby's 70s style, at the time, when I was young, though some images really stuck with me (Arnim Zola, for one). I preferred his 60s and earlier work. However, Eternals always struck me as interesting, because of the memorable characters, like Sersi, Ajak, Karkas and Ransak the Reject. As I grew older and more sophisticated in my reading and more philosophical in outlook (particularly after my time in the military) I started to see more in Kirby's work of that era and understand more of where he seemed to be coming from and more of the concepts he was exploring, but not necessarily articulating, in a direct manner. Mark Evanier remarked of that phenomena, where Jack would say something to him that he didn't understand, at the time, but which crystalized, at some later date. I just reached a point in my own world where Jack's meaning came through to me.
|
|
|
|
Post by berkley on May 21, 2024 0:08:02 GMT -5
Personally, I don't see any evidence that if Kirby had been left alone to make his own comic books that he'd have seen any of them through to their conclusion. His goal at DC appeared to be to start a bunch of titles then farm them off to other creators, creating a DC West Coast, but Infantino had other ideas, the bigwigs weren't interested in a DC West Coast, and Kirby's contract stipulated that he produce 15 pages per week. Having said that, seeing a comic through to its conclusion and having a finite number of issues was a foreign concept at the time. As Dave Sims has mentioned, its a shame that Kirby missed out on the direct market and the chance to produce his ideas as creator-owned graphic novels. I'm not sure if Kirby would have gone that route as there were risks involved, but creatively it would have provided the best avenue to produce his magnus opus. Even though Kirby did indeed start out with the idea of creating new concepts and characters, producing a few issues to set them up, and then handing them off to other artists and writers, to me as a reader there is overwhelming internal evidence that once he got going with the Eternals and the Fourth World they quickly evolved into works that meant something special to him and that he would have wanted to keep doing. To a lesser degree that was probably true to at least some of his other creations as well but those two in particular read to me as very personal projects. Obviously every reader is entitled to their own opinion - and equally obviously there are many who disagree with me on this - but that's how those two series have always struck me. |
|
|
|
Post by commond on May 21, 2024 15:19:21 GMT -5
Personally, I don't see any evidence that if Kirby had been left alone to make his own comic books that he'd have seen any of them through to their conclusion. His goal at DC appeared to be to start a bunch of titles then farm them off to other creators, creating a DC West Coast, but Infantino had other ideas, the bigwigs weren't interested in a DC West Coast, and Kirby's contract stipulated that he produce 15 pages per week. Having said that, seeing a comic through to its conclusion and having a finite number of issues was a foreign concept at the time. As Dave Sims has mentioned, its a shame that Kirby missed out on the direct market and the chance to produce his ideas as creator-owned graphic novels. I'm not sure if Kirby would have gone that route as there were risks involved, but creatively it would have provided the best avenue to produce his magnus opus. Even though Kirby did indeed start out with the idea of creating new concepts and characters, producing a few issues to set them up, and then handing them off to other artists and writers, to me as a reader there is overwhelming internal evidence that once he got going with the Eternals and the Fourth World they quickly evolved into works that meant something special to him and that he would have wanted to keep doing. To a lesser degree that was probably true to at least some of his other creations as well but those two in particular read to me as very personal projects. Obviously every reader is entitled to their own opinion - and equally obviously there are many who disagree with me on this - but that's how those two series have always struck me. The question is whether he would have been able to bring either series to a satisfying conclusion or whether he would have simply tired of them and moved on to another book. My understanding is that he grew increasingly tired of doing comics as the 70s wore on. I'm not sure if he had the stamina to do a long run on either series. He was also conditioned to doing one or two issue stories throughout his career. The other problem is that Marvel and DC treated most books as ongoing periodicals, I doubt they would have allowed Kirby to wrap up New Gods or The Eternals in x-number of issues just because it was The King. They would have handed the books off to another creative team like DC did with Kamandi. If it had been a decade later, perhaps he could have done both books as maxi-series. |
|
|
|
Post by commond on May 21, 2024 15:22:39 GMT -5
I am enjoying Frank Robbins' work on The Shadow just as much as Kaluta, if not more. There. I said it.
|
|
|
|
Post by berkley on May 21, 2024 15:48:35 GMT -5
Even though Kirby did indeed start out with the idea of creating new concepts and characters, producing a few issues to set them up, and then handing them off to other artists and writers, to me as a reader there is overwhelming internal evidence that once he got going with the Eternals and the Fourth World they quickly evolved into works that meant something special to him and that he would have wanted to keep doing. To a lesser degree that was probably true to at least some of his other creations as well but those two in particular read to me as very personal projects. Obviously every reader is entitled to their own opinion - and equally obviously there are many who disagree with me on this - but that's how those two series have always struck me. The question is whether he would have been able to bring either series to a satisfying conclusion or whether he would have simply tired of them and moved on to another book. My understanding is that he grew increasingly tired of doing comics as the 70s wore on. I'm not sure if he had the stamina to do a long run on either series. He was also conditioned to doing one or two issue stories throughout his career. The other problem is that Marvel and DC treated most books as ongoing periodicals, I doubt they would have allowed Kirby to wrap up New Gods or The Eternals in x-number of issues just because it was The King. They would have handed the books off to another creative team like DC did with Kamandi. If it had been a decade later, perhaps he could have done both books as maxi-series.
We'll have to agree to disagree on this one as I don't see any evidence that either his interest or his energy was flagging on either the Eternals or the Fourth World before they were cancelled, apart from the changes forced on him by external demands - on the contrary, they were gathering more and more momentum.
I also disagree that he preferred one or two issue stories: there are several three, four, or five issue stories in Thor and the FF, but more importantly the distinction is irrelevant to the kind of long story-arcs he was doing with the Fourth World and the Eternals, within which one could do stories of varying length, anything to single issues to much longer. There's a three-issue Eternals story for example that is one of the most important to an understanding of the concept as a whole.
But you're absolutely correct that in any case Marvel/DC almost certainly wouldn't have allowed him to finish either book on his own terms. As MDG said, the industry at the time wasn't structured in a way that would let that happen.
|
|
|
|
Post by kirby101 on May 21, 2024 16:19:05 GMT -5
I am enjoying Frank Robbins' work on The Shadow just as much as Kaluta, if not more. There. I said it.  |
|
|
|
Post by kirby101 on May 21, 2024 16:25:57 GMT -5
Even though Kirby did indeed start out with the idea of creating new concepts and characters, producing a few issues to set them up, and then handing them off to other artists and writers, to me as a reader there is overwhelming internal evidence that once he got going with the Eternals and the Fourth World they quickly evolved into works that meant something special to him and that he would have wanted to keep doing. To a lesser degree that was probably true to at least some of his other creations as well but those two in particular read to me as very personal projects. Obviously every reader is entitled to their own opinion - and equally obviously there are many who disagree with me on this - but that's how those two series have always struck me. The question is whether he would have been able to bring either series to a satisfying conclusion or whether he would have simply tired of them and moved on to another book. My understanding is that he grew increasingly tired of doing comics as the 70s wore on. I'm not sure if he had the stamina to do a long run on either series. He was also conditioned to doing one or two issue stories throughout his career. The other problem is that Marvel and DC treated most books as ongoing periodicals, I doubt they would have allowed Kirby to wrap up New Gods or The Eternals in x-number of issues just because it was The King. They would have handed the books off to another creative team like DC did with Kamandi. If it had been a decade later, perhaps he could have done both books as maxi-series. I think you might be seeing him tiring of the crap he had to take in the Comics business, conflated with his love of doing comics. I don't think he was any more tired than a man of his years would be.
I also don't think we are realistically thinking Marvel or DC would have let him do it either, I agree with your assessment. We are postulating what he would have done if circumstances let him. As the market does now. Similar to what Kirkman or Vaughn have been able to do.
|
|
