Tumgik
#joe staton
splooosh · 2 months
Text
Tumblr media
“Diabolical”
Joe Staton - Frank Giacoia
57 notes · View notes
cantsayidont · 3 months
Text
Tumblr media Tumblr media
For a long time, the main impetus for DC reprinting any its voluminous back catalog was some promotional or licensing tie-in: a movie, a TV show, some merchandise they were trying to push, or just a popular ongoing book. Given how prominently Dr. Fate was featured in the recent BLACK ADAM movie, therefore, it's surprising and somewhat disheartening that DC didn't take the opportunity to do some kind of greatest hits compilation for the character, who was certainly the best thing about that mostly terrible film.
This is especially unfortunate because you could fit quite a bit of Dr. Fate's Silver Age and Bronze Age non-JSA appearances in a single volume, starting with the two 1965 SHOWCASE team-ups with Hourman shown above, by Gardner Fox and Murphy Anderson. There are also a number of later team-ups with Superman and Batman:
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
Fate then got a couple of solo features in the '70s:
Tumblr media Tumblr media
Kubert cover notwithstanding, the 1ST ISSUE SPECIAL story, which is written by Marty Pasko, has some really outstanding early Walt Simonson art, while the SECRET ORIGINS OF SUPER-HEROES story has an eight-page retelling of Fate's origin, narrated by Kent Nelson's wife Inza, by the ALL-STAR team of Paul Levitz and Joe Staton.
In 1982, Doctor Fate got his own eight-page backup feature in, weirdly enough, THE FLASH #306–313. Despite what a couple of the covers imply, there wasn't a team-up between the Flash and Fate (who in those days still existed on separate parallel Earths); the Fate strip was just an unrelated second feature.
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
This strip, written by Marty Pasko and Steve Gerber with spectacular art by Keith Giffen and Larry Mahlstedt, presents an array of interesting ideas (some of which obviously paved the way for Giffen's 1987 revamp). Pasko had already established (in the 1975 1ST ISSUE SPECIAL story) that Doctor Fate wasn't exactly Kent Nelson: He was really the ancient Lord of Order Nabu, the entity who trained Nelson in the magical arts, who possessed Nelson's body whenever he put on the Helm of Fate. In other words, the Dr. Fate of these stories isn't so much a man wearing a magical helmet as a magical helmet wearing a man. Nabu has made both Kent and Inza ageless — they both appear about 25, but by this time, they're really in their 60s — but allows them little real control of their lives. Kent has more or less resigned himself to it, but Inza is feeling the strain of being trapped in a magical menage à trois with her husband and an inhuman entity that has little regard for Kent's welfare and even less for hers. Nabu, for his part, seems to exist in a state of constant mystical urgency in which human frailties are an unaffordable distraction.
This could have been really compelling, and it's both graphically interesting and quite strange, but all that is a lot to squeeze into eight-page installments, and having them crammed in the back of one of DC's most conventional superhero books was obviously not optimal. It was also having to compete for Giffen and Mahlstedt's attention with LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES, which I assume was why the Fate strip was dropped after only eight installments.
To everyone's surprise, there was even a Doctor Fate action figure in 1984 as part of the Kenner Super Powers line. This came with a little minicomic, which to my knowledge has never been reprinted:
Tumblr media
All of this stuff would add up to something in the realm of 230 pages, which would easily fit into a single trade paperback collection with a digestible price point. Maddeningly, DC has already done the color remastering for roughly three-fifths of this material, so even that probably wouldn't be a huge chore (although the Giffen/Mahlstedt stuff, which has a lot of color holds and graphic effects, really calls for more care in remastering than DC has tended to give its older material of late.)
38 notes · View notes
browsethestacks · 2 months
Text
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
The Justice Society Of America
Art by...
1) E.E. Hibbard
2) John Byrne
3) Jacob Edgar
4) Sheldon Moldoff
5) Dan Hipp
6) Kerry Callen
7) George Pérez
8) Linda Pardee
9) Alex Ross
10) Joe Staton And Dick Giordano
21 notes · View notes
p-c-ba-dcforever · 9 months
Text
Doom Patrol month continues with Cliff Steele, Robotman! The connective tissue between every version of the Patrol, his refreshingly blue collar mannerisms really made him stand out amongst his DC contemporaries!
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
58 notes · View notes
Text
BHOC: SUPERBOY AND THE LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES #247
SUPERBOY AND THE LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES was one of those titles that consistently failed to hook me for the long term. It always felt like a series i should really enjoy, with an awesome variety of futuristic heroes. But I found most of the individual issues no better than okay. Every so often, something would compel me to dip my toe back into the water–in this case, I’m sure it was that bottom…
Tumblr media
View On WordPress
23 notes · View notes
popping-your-culture · 2 months
Text
Tumblr media
Gurrrl
14 notes · View notes
bringbackwendellvaughn · 11 months
Photo
Tumblr media
54 notes · View notes
tomoleary · 5 hours
Text
Tumblr media
Joe Staton - Starfire, Raven, and Wonder Girl (undated) Source
19 notes · View notes
fiapple · 1 year
Text
something i love about huntress (1989) is just how succintly its opening scene builds up helena as a character & the overall themes of her narrative.
the comic opens on western society’s prototypical idea of a victim, a young white woman (that fact having its own horrid political history should be acknowledged)- fashionable for her era- walking alone at night, and being followed by a man with a knife.
Tumblr media
Immediately, the scene visually cuts between the young woman & helena, tying them together in the eyes of the audience. it then plays out as so:
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
Huntress (1989) #1 by Joey Cavalier & Joe Staton
Both through the very explicit paralleling of the two women, and the lamp-shading thereof on the writer's part within the scene itself, helena is framed within the eyes of the audience as someone who herself has once been a victim. the creative team presents you with the one most archetypal examples of a victim they possibly could, though, again, the problems within the history of that fact can't be ignored either- one that for all its commonplace is still powerless and meek as ever, and said "our hero has once been her."
"I knew somebody with a name like that... a long time ago..."
By allowing the audience access information so early on, the creative team is quickly able to position helena as existent within a dichotomy of the struggle between the ongoing disempowerment of trauma, and the fight to regain one's sense of power thereafter, as seen through the lens of non-linear trauma recovery. It is planting the seeds of what will grow to be a major theme in helena's arc.
Additionally, it very quickly posits helena as a character who is, in part, motivated by the phantom of her own vicitimization. She is very quickly suggested to the audience to be a character that is doing this- doing all she can to fight, stave off, prevent acts of violence- as a form of penance both to herself and to the world for the moments in her own life in which she was unable to do so. It is put into the mind of the reader that she is followed by the wraith of her own suffering, and of knowing that the weight of trauma is one that others can also be forced to bear.
This is further reinforced by the immediate narrative focus the collaborators chose to place on helena as a figure of compassion. from her first scene in main canon, her focal point is the victim, so much so that when choosing to return to the scene to comfort the young woman, she is able to notice something as innocuous as a wallet and return it. Moreover, due to its atypical nature in the context of comics, the 'alley-way victim' being named with such a sense of gravity in this scene takes on an added layer of importance besides the aforementioned. The victim is humanized, emphasizing their centering in helena's concious motives. To further compound this, the first time we ever see helena speak on-panel is when she chooses to comfort this young woman. her words, her actions, her passion are all motivated by her own needs & wounds, yes- but the victim, the person being hurt, that is what is at the centre of them. if further evidence were required, one may even point to the fact that the first face we see at all is that of the victim's.
And, emphasizing the overall themes present within the introduction to an even more extreme extent, is the nature of the visual story-telling taking place on pages 4 & 5.
Page 4 begins with helena fighting the perp, her back turned away from the audience, but ends with her walking toward us, body language confident. This draws our attention both to helena's capacity to be imposing, to inhabit the position of the unknown in order to illicate fear, and to helena's individual power as a character.
Conversely, the first time we see helena on page 5, when her face is finally revealed to the audience, she is talking to the victim. It ends with her back to the audience, standing as if fixed in her position, taking up fairly equal panel space with her fellow as she watches helena k. walk off, and falls into a memory. this places the audience's focus on the fact that helena b. is just as, if not more so, consumed by her victimhood as her counterpart.
(this also sets up the following scene, in which we are given helena's backstory, exceedingly well btw)
Moreover, the visual choice to hide her face temporarily gives helena a sense of being quite guarded as a person, which will be expanded upon later, and shows that the dedication to character building started very early-on for Stanton & Cavalieri, which i really appreciate.
From the first breath of life given to her story, helena is deliciously presented as a byronic heroine- an unusual type of female character to see at all, let alone in comics- and it is done through focus on her agency as a character & her dominating sense of compassion for others.
Truly, I adore beyond my heart’s capacity just how much Staton & Cavalieri chose to dedicate their opening to showing just how much Helena is a character who finds the power to find personal redemption, empowerment, & rebirth- as violent and bloody as that rebirth may grow to be- in the ability she has to do good unto others, to try to allow them to retain the innocence that was taken from her by force & the closure she was denied. They put such energy into making it clear that she is a character so very deeply driven by a sense of compassion, one so consuming it may as well be keeping her heart in chains, and they portray it as equally served by her violence as tender-heartedness. it’s enrapturing, it’s enchanting. like, really, heart’s honour, i live for it.
141 notes · View notes
cccovers · 1 year
Text
Tumblr media
Bizarre Thrills #1 (1977) cover by Joe Staton and Bill Black.
56 notes · View notes
balu8 · 7 months
Text
Tumblr media
Avengers #130
by Steve Englehart; Sal Buscema/Joe Staton; Bil Mantlo and Joe Rosen
Marvel
21 notes · View notes
splooosh · 4 days
Text
Tumblr media
Earth -2
Joe Staton
27 notes · View notes
cantsayidont · 1 month
Text
Tumblr media
April 1983. How the Earth-2 Batman and Catwoman finally worked it out, in Alan Brennert's exceptionally poignant "The Autobiography of Bruce Wayne" in THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD #197.
26 notes · View notes
cryptocollectibles · 4 months
Text
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
Batman Death of the Innocents #1 (December 1996) by DC Comics
Written by Dennis O'Neil, drawn by Joe Staton and Bill Sienkiewicz.
14 notes · View notes
p-c-ba-dcforever · 7 months
Text
Countdown to Batman Day marches on with Batman and his main Bronze Age squeeze, Catwoman!
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
42 notes · View notes
Text
BHOC: SUPERBOY AND THE LEGION OF SUPER HEROES #248
So last month I had backed into buying SUPERBOY AND THE LEGION OF SUPER HEROES, purchasing the most recent two issues, albeit in reverse order. In my head, I never made a specific decision that I was going to continue to follow the series, but when this next issue turned up at the 7-11, I bought it without qualm. This would only go on for a couple of months before I once again dropped…
Tumblr media
View On WordPress
16 notes · View notes