Covered Beyond 365 – #614 to #616

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

I have no idea what this “Point One” concept was about, but I will go as far as to say I think Acuna’s Captain America #615.1 is so amazing as to be worthy to stand with Schomburgs:

Cap looks a bit Thor-like in this, but we all know that this resemblance was not coincidental.

Similarly I have no idea where all these Sandmen came from, but I love ASM #616 anyway:

I’ve felt kind of bad lately about not showing any painted Four Color covers, but frankly there haven’t been any good ones. Four Color #616 is at best on the cusp:

If I’m going to argue for why it belongs here, it’s going to be that dual-wielding dude on the left – clearly one cold hombre.

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Covered Beyond 365 – #611 to #613

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

Captain America #611 is a crazy one, but with crazy good art:

I have no idea why Cap is a vampire, but this is one super beautiful piece. Compare the quality of this cover with Cap’s other brush with a supernatural transformation as Cap-Wolf:

I guess a case can be made for primitivism – everybody loves those Matt Fox Chilling Tales covers after all – but there’s no excuse for it from Marvel in 1992.

Jim Lee is back again on Batman #612 with a nice strangling around cover:

Again the hand of Frank Miller can be felt here, and again Lee takes his direction and makes it his own.

Lee’s Batman run was key in the history of comics, and #613 another truly great cover:

Like yesterday my only complaint is the washed-out colors. The composition and art are off the charts.

Covered Beyond 365 – #609 to #610

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

As I’ve commented here and elsewhere, in the current Age, which I would say dates back to the early 2000s, it seems like a disproportionate number of covers are standing around or poster covers. I think there are a variety of reasons for this, but probably the main reason is that continuity has been thrown to the winds and there are few loyal title readers. The publishers have added to this trend by rebooting series so many times that in most cases being a loyal title reader and knowing character histories means little or nothing. Therefore story takes a big back seat to eye-catching covers.

If we look way back in the Golden Age, before there was any continuity to speak of, a similar state prevailed. So maybe not the worst thing, but certainly disconcerting to readers of the 1960s-1980s.

With that said, I give you Thor #609 by Ribic, which is a standing around poster, but a really cool one:

I don’t have a clue what is going on here, but I dig it.

We get another poster from Garner for WW #609:

Zow!

Batman #610 bucks the trend with Jim Lee giving us story and battle cover:

I think the colors are a bit too washed out – this is a comic book after all – but otherwise awesome. I love how Lee was able to take Miller’s Batman style and polish it – unfortunately it seems to me that Miller’s subsequent efforts were more like a caricature of himself.

 

Covered Beyond 365 – #606 to #608

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

Incredible Hulk #606 is a bit visually confusing, but this battle can’t be passed up:

I love the in your face composition and the audacity of Doom taking on the Hulk. I also love the Hulk’s face, which takes me back to the magazine-format Rampaging Hulk.

I told you there was one more Campbell ASM coming, and here it is, #607:

Who could blame Pete? Avert your eyes, Aunt May.

And don’t tell me Bruce didn’t have a similar weakness, we all know about that. Here on Batman #608 he goes out to stand around and be rendered by Jim Lee and take in some chilly night air to clear his head:

I was Jim Lee crazy from almost the beginning, and this one was a big deal.

Covered Beyond 365 – #602 to #606

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

While some of my vast many readers might not think Thor #604 by Coipel is great, none can deny that it’s great (in expanse):

You can barely see it as resized above, so take a look at it at GCD. Coipel has difficulty with faces, Thor’s unfortunately being one of these, but otherwise this is a truly amazing extravaganza with beautiful colors. Hela is up there with Annihilus for me – maybe it’s the green – and she’s fantastic on this cover. (I’m sadly without a really nice copy of Thor #150.) Look at those patterns on her outfit – is she a Celestial?

Daredevil #604 is far more understated, but more deftly executed:

I had to look up the artist at MyComicShop.com because he wasn’t listed in the GCD entry – it’s Chris Sprouse. I hope he was also the colorist because that’s who deserves at least half the credit.

I know Gerald won’t like it, but ASM #606 is another modern classic that I won’t pass over:

I like the one from yesterday better because of the colors, but this one clearly has a story and action, and a good fourth wall break. Gird your loins (in private) because there’s one last Campbell ASM coming tomorrow.

 

Covered Beyond 365 – #601

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

Strangely we’re heading into a patch that is pretty thick with great covers, even though we’re down to a small number of titles.

Archie Giant #601 is not great for its art or joke:

HOWEVER I just had to show it, because I have shown a couple of other comic con Archie covers, but this one from October 1989 actually pre-dates them, and may be the first of them. I’m pretty sure that’s Don and Maggie Thompson at the CBG booth. Ah that’s some nostalgia…

ASM #601 is something of a modern classic:

I keep saying I’m not a Campbell fan, but when it works, it works. The mystery colorist is really the star of the show for this one, just phenomenal.

Thor #601 by Djurdjevic is both great and a JOWA:

The art’s fantastic and I especially love the goat staring at us at the bottom of the page, but I feel like this is a “make your own caption” cover. Hogun: “Volstag, if you must, please be gentle.”

 

 

Covered Beyond 365 – #600 continued

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

It’s Daredevil #600 day! No point asking questions on how the title got to #600, let’s just go with it.

Granov gives us this Elektra standing around cover – yowza!

Oh, Daredevil’s there too? I hadn’t noticed.

Mora’s “gang’s all here” cover is standard anniversary fare, but I dig it all – art, composition, colors, characters:

Yu’s cover has exactly nothing to do with Daredevil, but it is still very cool, really love both of the poses and the colors:

 

 

Covered Beyond 365 – #597 to #600

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

Marvel went crazy with #600 and restarted the core titles, so we have a lot of anniversary covers to choose from, especially since each title was printed with multiple covers. Unfortunately I didn’t dig a lot of them. Nevertheless I have enough for a couple of days.

The Ross Captain America #600 is typical Ross, and Cap is a bit too shiny for me, but I love the background images and the colors:

Thor #600 by Coipel is another poster, but I like its composition and the old friends and enemies:

The only #600 that I’m going to show that’s not a Marvel is the Hughes homage/variant of Wonder Woman:

I have to tell you a story about this one. There is a 1:100 (or something like that) b/w variant that sold for a lot of money a few years ago when things other than toilet paper were worth money. I was looking for one and weirdly I found a raw copy on Amazon for very cheap from somebody who clearly didn’t know anything about its value. I bought it, it arrived – with a giant inventory sticker right on the front cover! Luckily they took returns…

 

 

 

Covered Beyond 365 – #591 to #596

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

I’ll try to keep this going until the lights go out. Thanks to my loyal readers.

I have always loved Byrne, but over the past year or so I’ve realized that most of his covers aren’t great – he shines more in the interior pages. I do think Action #593 is great:

This I think is a double homage – Byrne certainly knows his history:

ASM #593 gets my vote:

No action, no real story, but crazy good art and composition.

Another ASM follows, #596 (Jimenez variant), a cool battle cover:

Covered Beyond 365 – #587 to #590

Three great comic book covers a day until we run out of covers or I run out of gas. Please chime in if I miss a great one, and if I concur (!), I’ll recap.

We sure could use some levity, so let’s have some today. Great is in the eye of the beholder.

Archie Giant #587 has to be featured as a top-notch giant hand cover:

The Challengers of the Unknown definitely faced some giant hands in their time:

But the Archie Giant reminds me more of this one:

Archie Giant #589 definitely involves a hand, if only a normal sized one:

Lots of good stuff here – a really high grade copy of this one would be striking.

And while our painted Four Color covers are petering out, we have this nice painted JOWA in ASM #590 by Paolo Rivera: