R.I.P. Carmine Infantino (May 24, 1925 to April 4, 2013)

Who's to say whether the Silver Age of comic book super heroes would have taken off as it did if not for the contributions of Carmine Infantino? He designed the second (and best) Flash's unforgettably streamlined Jet Age costume and drew his adventures from 1956 to 1967, then returned to draw the Flash's final tales from 1981 to 1985. He was the artist on The Flash when I began reading super hero comics as a kid. The Flash was my favorite super hero even when his comic book became bogged down in an interminable and legally erroneous (as it was self-defense under the law) storyline about our hero's manslaughter trial, and even after The Flash was canceled to clear the decks for D.C.'s ill-conceived Crisis on Infinite Earths. The Flash is still my favorite D.C. super hero, and when I picture the Flash, I picture a drawing by Mr. Infantino. He was the perfect artist for the fastest man alive.

 

No one conveyed speed quite like Mr. Infantino! Let us not forget that he also helped create the "New Look" Batman with the yellow oval on his chest. Quite a change from Bob Kane's various ghost artists. Mr. Infantino brought Batman into the modern era.

Not to mention he co-created Batgirl, everyone's favorite "dominoed dare-doll."

But for that, we never would have had Yvonne Craig looking like this. Hubba hubba!

According to the infallible Wikipedia, Mr. Infantino was cited in a Comics Buyer's Guide poll as the greatest penciller of all time. I'm sure some would argue about that, in fact I know some would. By strange coincidence, I was visiting another blog today and defending Mr. Infantino's late-period artwork in the pages of The Flash, Spider-Woman, and the "Dial H for Hero" feature in Adventure Comics. While his art had become highly stylized in his later work, I would argue it was at least as great as his work in the '50s and '60s. I certainly enjoyed it and wish I could draw like that.

Perhaps his stylistic changes are an acquired taste that requires more work on the part of the reader to be appreciated than the more conventional art done by the photorealistic/commercial artists that seem to have come into vogue in the comic book world. Mr. Infantino was a master of laying out panels so as to guide the reader's eye through the page. He also designed many of the greatest comic book covers of all time. Just Google for yourself!

 

Goodbye, Mr. Infantino.

Super Heroes and Comic Book Cover Art

Some super heroes standing around as though they were posing for a photograph. 

Super-types seem to do a lot of that, especially on the covers of their comic books nowadays. Used to be they would be in action on the cover, presumably the publisher's way of catching your eye and drawing you in. Now that they've given up on attracting the casual reader, the covers are basically just tiny posters. Usually poorly drawn, too. Compare for yourself.

 

This cover makes me want to know who the Queen Bee is, how she managed to make these powerful super heroes her slaves, why she's doing it, and how the Justice League will prevail.

 

These girls just seem to be confused as to why they're there. They certainly aren't interacting with each other or anything else. I won't even bother noting the bad perspective and incorrect anatomy. Whoever drew this needs to actually look at some women before making another attempt at drawing them.

More Stunt Bug

A picture of our pal Stunt Bug just standing around, doing nothing in particular. Maybe he's waiting for a crime he can stop. Drawn in crayon, extra scribbles courtesy of my three-year-old son who was helping me.

Radioman #5

Radioman squares off against Gas Man in this exciting installment. Our hero demonstrates that he's more than the sum of his super powers, as he doesn't even use them to take out this villainous madman. No, Radioman simply uses his wits and mastery of fisticuffs this time!

Radioman #4

Here's Radioman #4, in which we demonstrate Radioman's ability to shrink via short waves, which he and Radioboy cleverly use to make a surprise attack on the infernal Thermo-Killer. Again, this is a one-page story inspired by those old Hostess ads that used to be in comic books back in the good old days. I keep thinking I should draw one as an actual ad, albeit for a nonexistent product. Come to think of it, Hostess snacks are nonexistent products now.

Super Hero Team-Ups and Super Teams

It seems inevitable that any comic book universe containing multiple super heroes would have them team up or form a super team like the Avengers. I haven't yet drawn any stories where, for instance, Radioman and Gummy Man team up, nor do I have any completed super team stories thus far. All I have is an aborted story about a super team called the Ultra League (for lack of a better name). The team comprised five or six super heroes struggling against giant robots controlled by an evil mastermind. I think it took place in a fictional version of Charlotte, North Carolina called Tarheel City. That was back when I was considering using a fictional setting in the mode of Gotham City or Metropolis. Nowadays I'm dead-set against fictional cities and prefer to use real locations for my stories.

The story was done in bits and pieces during hard-to-find free time. If I can locate the completed portion of the story I'll post it here.

Back to the topic of this posting: I prefer to keep super heroes in mostly separate worlds even if they operate in the same city. It makes it special when they occasionally meet and team up. I remember how exciting it was when, for instance, Spider-Man would turn up in the pages of Daredevil and they'd work together against the Owl or the Kingpin. It was an event!

Seems like modern comics have their heroes constantly tripping over each other or making reference to events in each other's comic book. But then again, I think there are far too many super heroes in the Marvel and D.C. universes. Back in 1964, Marvel had fewer than 20 super heroes operating in New York. I haven't read any of their comics in nearly 20 years, but even 20 years ago it seemed like there were hundreds of super heroes crowding Manhattan. It makes them seem ordinary and makes it that much harder to believe their adventures take place in a real world, particularly when so many of them use technology far beyond what currently exists or are from other planets and dimensions. The effect on the world's culture would be staggering if the general public were familiar with the mere fact that such things and persons were real. Back when Stan Lee was scripting these things, you'd have bystanders remark that they didn't believe Thor was for real, or they thought Spider-Man was a hoax by the Daily Bugle, and so on. Super heroes weren't commonplace.

And that's how I think it ought to be, so my super heroes will probably not be meeting one another very often, and if they form a super team it will likely be a "non-team" akin to the early Defenders: a loose confederation of allies with a common interest that brings them together for the duration, after which they go their separate ways until the next crisis rears its inevitable head.

Hand-Drawn Map of Balboa Park and the Evildoers Who Dared Disrupt the Peace Therein

Here's a hand-drawn map of Balboa Park (in San Diego) that we used for a session of TSR's Marvel Super Heroes roleplaying game. Some villains took advantage of distractions caused by a cultural event in the park and tried to steal antiquities from the Museum of Man. The map didn't get nearly the use I had hoped. I spent almost as much time making it as we did using it. Still, a fun time was had by all.

In case you were curious, the player characters Sonic Blaster, Dark Shield, and Swamp Master saved the day. I have no pictures of the heroes, but here's the assortment of villains they defeated.

There was a Southwestern theme to the bad guys.

The Jackalope

The Jackalope is another character I will not be using again. Not that I ever did much with him aside from draw him bounding towards you.

Here's his origin. The jackrabbit is obviously radioactive.

Turbo Racer #1

In his debut issue, Turbo Racer fights the deranged Krazy Klown and his gang. For some reason Krazy Klown's goons only tie Turbo Racer at the ankles after capturing him. I suppose that was to allow Turbo Racer to use a super-speed trick and defeat them. Villains seem to do a lot of that in every media.

Turbo Racer's costume has changed since this story was completed. He now looks more like this from the neck up.

In addition to having the speed of a dozen cheetahs, Turbo Racer possesses catlike senses and agility. His origin has something to do with his being a veterinarian and saving a wild cheetah. The details remain vague at this time.

Ratman

Ratman is a character I would never use again, but I thought it would be neat to post it here since I drew an entire eight-page story a little more than six years ago. It never occurred to me that his name would make everyone think "Batman." His inspiration was actually a character I played in a game of TSR's Marvel Super Heroes roleplaying game around 2004 or 2005. One of the panels in this story is almost a complete swipe from a Daredevil comic book. In fact, Daredevil was a greater inspiration to me than Batman. I've always liked Daredevil, at least the Daredevil I knew when I used to read his comic book in the early to mid-'80s. A particular point in his favor was that he and I are both named Matt. 

Anyway, here's all eight pages of Ratman. This is the only story I properly penciled (within my limited ability) and then inked just like in the real comic books. It was even drawn in the larger size real comic book artists use.

The Electrophile

Here's a character I have yet to use in any capacity. I was trying to think of some sort of electrically-powered super hero but couldn't think of any good names that weren't already taken. Then I came up with "the Electrophile." Very little has been determined about this character, which is why she hasn't been used for anything to date. I'd need to think of something that makes her distinctive, at least to my mind, before I could draw an adventure of the Electrophile.

Dogman #2

As promised, here's Dogman #2. It all started with the idea of "an army of Frankensteins." I thought that was just fabulous. This is also the first time we see Dogman use his "dog discus." Don't ask me where he keeps it, as I don't see anywhere on his costume that it could have been stored prior to its sudden appearance in panel four. I guess it could have been somehow attached to his back.

Gummy Man #1

Here's Gummy Man's debut issue. He works someplace called "Research Island," a detail I had almost completely forgotten until posting this today. I think that might be a fictional island in New York's East River. As you can see, Gummy Man is a pretty tough customer.

Gummy Man

Another mainstay of my little comic book universe is Gummy Man. Gummy Man is a research scientist with a mind almost on the level of Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic) but a surly attitude more like that of Ben Grimm (the Thing). Unlike Ben Grimm, however, Gummy Man needs nothing to rile him up. He's just a prickly guy who would prefer to work on scientific experiments but keeps getting drawn into super hero adventures against his better judgment. His condition is the result of an accident involving an experimental adhesive and "Z-radiation."

Gummy Man's body has the texture and color of an old stick of chewing gum after it's all dried out. He can stretch pretty far and he's also pretty dang strong. He can lift a city bus at the very least.

Radioman #3

Radioman #3 may be my best issue to date. In this story, it's revealed that Radioman won't strike a lady, but he is more than willing to blast the fair sex with "compressed residual radio waves." Radioman and Weather Woman have a sort of (Adam West) Batman and (Julie Newmar) Catwoman relationship. Much like Batman in the '66 series, Radioman's true love is "law and order." A lot of details of the story of Radioman and Weather Woman are worked out in my mind, but so far they haven't made it to the page beyond what you see here.

Radioman #2

In Radioman #2, our titanic twosome tackles the troubling terror of punk rock. A timely tale. Clearly Radioman is rather conservative with regard to his taste in music.

And here's another color drawing of Radioman.

Solar Woman's Costume Inspiration

Just located another color drawing of Solar Woman. I like her costume and color scheme.

Her costume was somewhat inspired by a photograph I saw on the cover of Rolling Stone a long, long time ago.

Stunt Bug

I know what you're thinking: "Spider-Man ripoff!" As I have yet to complete a Stunt Bug story, it's easy to see why you would think that based on his name and appearance, but in fact Stunt Bug has no super powers at all, but rather he is a stuntman who mainly relies on his athletic ability and detective skills to fight crime. His costume has specially designed "stickum gloves" and "stickum boots" that allow him to stick to walls, but that's really the only thing he has in common with Spider-Man.

I really need to draw a story so I can show that Stunt Bug is not a poor man's Spidey! Why, he even has his own logo.

P.S. All the scribbles over the drawing and logo are courtesy of my three-year-old son.

Solar Woman #1

Unfortunately Solar Woman's powers aren't fully on display in this story, and I have yet to draw Solar Woman #2. Just for the record, in sunlight she has super-strength and stamina, she can mesmerize you via "photohypnosis," she can blast you with photons, and somehow "glides" on sunbeams. She loses her powers in the absence of sunlight. If I remember right, she obtained her powers from some sort of idol or statue found in a cave in Mexico. Something to do with an Aztec sun god or goddess. I think I drew all or part of her origin at one time, so if I can locate it I'll certainly post it for your perusal.

And here's a color drawing of Solar Woman.

Dogman #1

You can't have your own nonexistent comic book empire with just one super hero, can you? 

So it is that the ever-popular Radioman came to be joined by Dogman. Dogman has all the powers of a dog, including super-sensitive hearing and sense of smell as well as "doglike strength and agility," as he proudly proclaims in Dogman #2 (soon to be posted). In his exciting debut issue, we see Dogman foil the wicked scheming of Mind Master, a truly nasty super villain whose eyes I tried, to the best of my admittedly unimpressive ability, to make look maniacal.

Radioman #1

Here we have the very first adventure of Radioman, hastily drawn on a regular sheet of lined paper. The idea was to tell a more-or-less complete story in just one page, kind of like those old Hostess ads from comic books of the late '70s and early '80s. Had I imagined I would be sharing this at some future date, I would have made greater effort in the drawing and used actual drawing paper. But here it is, in all its glory.

I drew this in about 10 minutes, in case you can't tell.

Eagle-eyed readers will notice that the symbol on Radioman's chest is simply the letter "R" at this point. That's because this story predates the color drawing used in my first post. The "R", over time, evolved into a stylized "R" with a lightning bolt extending from its base, then turned into the radio tower emblem that we all know and love today.

Radioman & Radioboy

I have never blogged before. I actually don't even like the term "blog," prefer to say "web blog" but were I to continue to do so folks might look at me funny, so "blog" it is. Anyway, this is my blog and welcome to it. Unsure how often I will post, or whether my interest will wane and the blog will soon go silent, but as I have some time on my hands and some material to share, thanks for reading.

The main focus of this blog will be my super heroes. That is, super heroes of my own devising. So I'll post drawings and sketches, whatever amateurish "comic book pages" I generate, and some general information about the characters and their world. A secondary focus, as the blog name indicates, is "other stuff": real comic books, roleplaying games, movies, novels, TV shows, what have you. Maybe I'll write a brief review or express on opinion on something that interests you. Maybe my opinion will be so utterly obtuse you will feel compelled to comment and correct me.

There, my introduction is out of the way, so let's take a look at the premier super heroes of my little fictional world: Radioman and Radioboy. They were inspired by my son Ben, who was about one year old at the time. Ben has a toy car carrier that came with a pretend radio. Ben ran all around the house clicking the button on the pretend radio. I took to calling him "Radioboy" whenever he did that. "Radioboy" struck me as a great name for a super hero's sidekick, so naturally his mentor would have to be "Radioman."

What can Radioman and Radioboy do, you ask? Well, they have the ability to ride on radiowaves from one transmitter or receiver to another. They can blast you about once a day with "residual radiowaves" they've stored up in their bodies. They can also shrink very tiny via short waves. Finally, they can transmit, receive, and jam radio communications. All very Silver Age and unscientific to say the least, but it's fun for me and I hope you like them as well.