Tag: Jack Kirby

Great Covers – TALES OF SUSPENSE #82

More than anything, it’s really the green color hold on the illusory figures that makes this Jack Kirby TALES OF SUSPENSE cover sing. It’s a very striking color choice.

Great Covers – THOR #157

I think that, more than anything, it’s the coloring that makes this THOR cover by Jack Kirby stand out. There’s a lot of interesting modeling being done, in a way that wasn’t typical for the time, and the overall red hue gets across a real feeling of Armageddon. Also impressive is the fact that Mangog … Continue reading Great Covers – THOR #157 →

Great Covers – FANTASTIC FOUR #87

This Jack Kirby FANTASTIC FOUR cover similarly uses knock-outs and a limited palate, but it’s way more successful. By any stretch of the imagination, this is an odd image for the cover of a super hero comic book–Stan pretty much makes it work by calling it out as the most off-beat ending of the year … Continue reading Great Covers – FANTASTIC FOUR #87 →

Great Covers – FANTASTIC FOUR #81

DC weren’t the only ones who could louse up a perfectly good Jack Kirby cover in color, Marvel did it occasionally as well, as on this FANTASTIC FOUR cover. Knocking all of the other elements back to browns and reds definitely helps Crystal to pop as the center of the composition, but it’s actively unattractive. … Continue reading Great Covers – FANTASTIC FOUR #81 →

Great Covers – FOREVER PEOPLE #3

Here’s another strangely-colored Jack Kirby DC cover, this one for an issue of FOREVER PEOPLE. On this one, the strange choice was made to knock out all of the lead characters in red, and to make the focus the random Justifier in the background. Kirby’s selection of the background photograph doesn’t really help either, so … Continue reading Great Covers – FOREVER PEOPLE #3 →

Great Covers – MISTER MIRACLE #3

When Jack Kirby went over to DC in the early 1970s, he wasn’t a great fit in terms of the office’s aesthetic, and they often had no idea what to do with him or his work. Take this MISTER MIRACLE cover, for example. For some reason, they decided not to color the central figure, but … Continue reading Great Covers – MISTER MIRACLE #3 →

Great Covers – BOY COMMANDOS #24

Credited to the Simon & Kirby Studio, this BOY COMMANDOS cover might be the work of Jack Kirby, or it might not. Either way, it makes its impact through the juxtaposition of the immaculate attributes of Superman and the down-to-Earth dead-end kid values of Brooklyn. As always, the yellow background functions like a spotlight.

Great Covers – X-MEN #16

Here’s another excellent Jack Kirby cover to X-MEN. It’s a bit strange for a super hero cover in that we’re seeing almost all of the heroes from the back, where common wisdom would want at least one of them turned towards the camera, so as to engage the reader–nothing commands the attention of a viewer … Continue reading Great Covers – X-MEN #16 →

Great Covers – KAMANDI #23

Another Jack Kirby cover, this one for his KAMANDI series from the early 1970s. This piece just screams for attention. The shark-as-monster who dominates the image to the inclusion of virtually everything else is powerful enough, but the fact that he speaks, and his line is at once so obtuse and yet also so provocative, … Continue reading Great Covers – KAMANDI #23 →