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Friday, March 26, 2010

And In This Corner... 1972

Doug: If you're like us, part of the charm of Marvel Comics in the Bronze Age was the wonderful corner box that adorned all of their titles.

When I first started getting/buying my own comics (which would be closer to the end of 1973/beginning of 1974) I used to make my own comic books. As part of those books, I'd often glue in the corner boxes I'd snipped from my comics. It didn't take long until some friends of mine, who had older brothers, recommended that I desist in that habit. I had been educated!
A fun pasttime with any sort of stock art is to try to determine who the artist was. If you know, or have some solid guesses, why not post them in a comment below?
In our first row, you'll see cover art from Tomb of Dracula, Mighty Thor, Uncanny X-Men (during the reprint era), and Werewolf By Night. I've always liked the regality of this Thor image.



This row contains corner boxes from Claws of the Cat, Namor the Sub-Mariner, Amazing Spider-Man, Shanna the She-Devil, and Power of Warlock. You'll see the same Warlock picture below.





Who can forget (or more likely, can anyone remember??) Night Nurse? Also, you'll find Marvel Team-Up, Marvel Triple Action, and Marvel Spotlight featuring Ghost Rider! That Ghost Rider image is pretty cool, as he bursts right out of the magazine and into your lap!




Up next are two images from Marvel's Greatest Comics, Marvel Premiere featuring Adam Warlock, Marvel Premiere featuring Dr. Strange, and Luke Cage, Hero for Hire. The Torch and the Thing are obviously rendered by Jack Kirby.



Of course here we find some heavy hitters: The Incredible Hulk, the Invincible Iron Man, the Fantastic Four, Doc Savage, Man of Bronze, and the Defenders. I never liked that Iron Man pose (there's a similar Doc Doom pose -- it was on the cover of Marvel Team-Up #43). The Thing and the Hulk look like are about to square off!


In this row you see art from Daredevil (with the Black Widow, looking quite curvaceous!), Conan during the Barry Smith era, and Captain Marvel.

Here are Captain America and the Falcon (pre-wings!), the Avengers, Astonishing Tales featuring Ka-Zar and Zabu, and Amazing Adventures starring Black Bolt and the Inhumans. Four of these dudes are pretty stoic, and isn't it interesting that the Vision and Black Bolt strike virtually the same pose?

And last but certainly not least, we have the Beast (in his very early gray fur), also from Amazing Adventures!

I didn't get any artwork from the corner boxes of Marvel's westerns. If we do this again, perhaps fast-forwarding a few years, we'll check out some of those.

8 comments:

  1. OK, you asked for it.

    ROW 1.
    Dracula: John Romita

    Thor: John Buscema

    Angel: Jack Kirby

    Werewolf: Mike Ploog


    ROW 2.
    The Cat: I'm not totally sure. The face could be Romita but the hands don't look like his. Wally Wood keeps leaping into my mind but I'm not sure why.

    Sub-Mariner: It's sort of fuzzy but I'll guess at John Romita

    Spider-Man: John Romita

    Shanna: John Romita

    Warlock: It looks sort of weird but I'll guess at John Romita on an off-day


    ROW 3.
    Night Nurse: John Romita

    Spider-Man: Gil Kane

    Doom/Thing/Surfer: Jack Kirby

    Ghost Rider: Mike Ploog


    ROW 4.
    Dr Strange: John Romita

    Luke Cage: John Romita


    ROW 5.
    Hulk: Herb Trimpe

    Iron Man: Jack Kirby

    The Thing: John Buscema

    Doc Savage: John Romita and A N Other?

    Defenders: Kirby/Ditko/Wally Wood/Romita


    ROW 6.
    Daredevil: John Romita

    Black Widow: John Romita

    Conan: Barry Smith

    Captain Marvel: Gil Kane


    ROW 7.
    Captain America: John Romita

    Falcon: John Romita

    Vision: A very early Barry Smith?

    Ka-Zar: Jack Kirby

    Black Bolt: John Buscema


    ROW 8.
    Beast: I don't have the slightest clue. Plucking a name randomly from thin air, for no good reason, Bill Everett?

    Do I get a No-Prize?

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  2. I think those are pretty solid guesses for the most part.

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  3. I used to love those corner boxes! Still miss 'em - sob!

    BTW, Steve, I think that Beast artwork is by Tom Sutton who was drawing the strip at the time.

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  4. A couple of suggestions, based solely on the creators who brought us the first issues of --

    The Cat: Marie Severin inked by Wally Wood.

    Night Nurse: Win Mortimer

    What do you think?

    Doug

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  5. >>Steve Does Comics said...

    Angel: Jack Kirby >>

    --

    It looks to me like Werner Roth/Joe Sinnott.

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  6. A couple of other guesses:

    Black Widow -- art by John Buscema from her run in Amazing Adventures?

    Vision and Black Bolt -- John Buscema, or perhaps even Sal Buscema?

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  7. Loved seeing all those corner boxes together - strangely enough, I've just started up a blog attempting to review all Bronze Age Marvel's from 1972 onwards in sequence. Only two reviews up so far, but hopefully more to come this weekend.
    http://mightyworldofbronzeagemarvel.blogspot.com/

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  8. Don't really have any guesses about the artists involved that are better than those already suggested. I just had to note that it's interesting that you did something I also did when I first started reading comics (my own start was sometime in mid- to late 1975): cutting out pictures from the covers and interiors (and yes, the corner boxes were particular favorites). It took me about a year or two to stop doing so, after it dawned on me that it was really hard to go back and re-read them or trade with friends.

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