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Friday, January 27, 2012

The Dream of the '90s Is Alive in Comics

Posted by on Fri, Jan 27, 2012 at 8:09 AM

From Glory #23, art by Ross Campbell
  • From Glory #23, art by Ross Campbell
I've always hated Rob Liefeld. When I was growing up, his comics were everywhere; he was celebrated in a way that comics artists aren't celebrated any more, with mindless raves and sales in the hundreds of thousands. And he was the very definition of what a comics artist shouldn't be: His anatomy was terrible, his continuity was nonexistent, he couldn't draw backgrounds or feet. As soon as he left Marvel to go out on his own, he immediately set to work creating thinly veiled analogs for popular properties, basically recreating the worlds of Marvel and DC so that he could profit from them. It was unimaginative crap, and it eventually failed. A couple of his books had some good stretches once he hired other people to take over—Alan Moore and Rick Veitch's run on Supreme was a fun, self-referential take on Superman—but Liefeld's a marginal figure now, doing work-for-hire dreck for DC and coasting on what's left of his fame.

Except, not: A couple of weeks ago, two Rob Liefeld properties, Glory and Prophet were dusted off and re-presented in an interesting new light. Glory, written by Joe Keatinge and drawn by Ross Campbell, doesn't stray very far from Liefeld's idea for the character—her origin, in short: what if Rob Liefeld got all the royalties for Wonder Woman?—but the execution is what matters here. This is a comic written and drawn by two people who know how to make comics. Keatinge's script is solid, but slightly derivative of these kinds of comics; a young reporter tries to find the truth behind the superheroic legend of Glory. As far as introductions go, it's a decent one, but it leaves you hoping he's got loftier goals than intellectual property maintenance in upcoming issues. The art by Campbell is the star here: Hyper-detailed, kinetic, and imaginative. He gets bonus points for making Glory more muscular than Liefeld's Barbie doll character. It's a solid first issue that promises some thrills and—hopefully—some surprises.

From Prophet #21, art by Simon Roy.
  • From Prophet #21, art by Simon Roy.

But Prophet is good enough to make you grateful for the existence of Rob Liefeld. Writer Brandon Graham and artist Simon Roy leave Liefeld's concept—a big muscle-y guy who screams a lot and uses huge guns, like every other Liefeld concept—far behind and embark on a truly strange sci-fi adventure. John Prophet wanders through an alien world, where monkeys are kept in farms by strange quadrupedal monsters and vomitous biological changes occur on every other page. Not everything is clear (this is a first chapter, after all) but it's utterly unlike every other comic on the stands right now, an imaginative, adventurous story with weird moral choices and its own unique visual language. If you like the sci-fi comics of Moebius, or just sci-fi in general, you owe it to yourself to pick up Prophet. It leaves the past entirely behind.

 

Comments (8) RSS

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starsandgarters 1
LIIIIIEEFELLLLD!!!!!!!!!!!

Sorry, I had to.
Posted by starsandgarters on January 27, 2012 at 8:48 AM
BostonFontSnob 2
"Prophet" I remember, but I had forgotten all about "Glory". Sheesh. What's next, a revival of Bloodwulf?
Posted by BostonFontSnob on January 27, 2012 at 9:06 AM
Philly 3
Why is that creature made of labia?
Posted by Philly on January 27, 2012 at 9:13 AM
JensR 4
I gotta admit that the blog linked is one of those... awww ffs kinda blogs written by someone who has never ever worked as an illustrator or comic artist. Like the part where the writers angry about a gun having two barrels, or the one with the guy who dies in a room after drinking something... All I want to do is grab the blogger and shake him.

I get the poses and I get the things about wierdly shaped women. Fine. But bitching about the tiny details (or parts that just isn't the illustrators work at all) is like... I dunno whining about the cucumber on my burger from McDonalds being wierdly shaped...

Whats even worse the guy who wrote it doesn't seem to know anything about the craft he's whining about. I mean what the hell does he think an industry comic artist does? Or any artist?

Rob Liefield isnt my favorite artist, but if I would criticize him it wouldn't be done by this kind of limp comic-book-guy blog-text. I can just hear him snorting over the keyboard going "are we supposed to believe that water [snort] is opaque?"...

Gah...
Posted by JensR http://ohyran.se on January 27, 2012 at 10:31 AM
5
I have a Ross Campbell print hanging in my apartment. It is fabulous.
Posted by suddenlyorcas on January 27, 2012 at 11:03 AM
6
Uh, I realize this sort of makes JensR's point, in a way, because this comic blog post talks about how Rob Leifeld apparently thinks water is opaque... But still, have you *seen* his art?! It is just. AWFUL.
http://www.progressiveboink.com/archive/…
Posted by jsr1138 on January 27, 2012 at 1:49 PM
JensR 7
JSR1138: its the same blogg Paul Constant links to. But yeah its not great, lets not mince around that part and some times it makes you a bit frustrated but its art made out really really fast. Since its morning here for me I cant for the life of me figure out who the hell it was but the later marvel comics use an effect similar to live trace in Illustrator to create quick large illustrations.

It looks great, it really does, but it is in my opinion worse than the work of Rob Leifeld because its not using the artists imagery. I mean tracing a photo is all fine (allot, and I mean ALLOT of illustrators do that) but the difference is that they add something to the image, recreating it into something of their own. When you, like they have, just plonk it into illustrator its changing nothing. Its like adding sunflairs to photos in PS Elements and calling it "art".

But the feets look great, no extra gun barrels and all the realism freaks can sleep safe at night knowing that the water in the image probably isnt opaque.

... but thats ok. I mean these illustrators work under an extreme pressure to force something out very very quick. Its like an assembly line and if you have to, like Leifeld, cover the feet or in more modern cases use live trace... its what you need to do to keep the pace.
(luckily the hunt for mind numbing "realism" is slowing down and we start to see comics more in the style of Hellboy and Sin City becoming more common)
Posted by JensR http://ohyran.se on January 28, 2012 at 2:48 AM
8
I love Ross Campbell's style. His continuing series Wet Moon has no plot and no actual sympathetic characters, but I will read it over and over just for the way he draws women. Beautiful.
Posted by Nitidiuscula on January 28, 2012 at 10:00 PM

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