Reclaiming History: Jack Cole's Plastic Man

Welcome to a new installment of Reclaiming History, an ongoing series where the Comics Cube! tries to balance out what the history books say and what actually happened! Click here for the archive!

Today, I talk about Jack Cole and Plastic Man!

So whenever I've written one of these Reclaiming History pieces, it's always been driven by a feeling of need. Whether it's Dave Gibbons' contribution to Watchmen or the careers of Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Roger Stern or the greatness that is Carl Barks, they all share one common link: they're all things that I think more people should know about.

Until recently, I never thought I'd feel the need to write this article. An article about Jack Cole, maybe, but of his most famous creation, Plastic Man? I didn't think there'd ever be a need. Plas is a true comics icon, someone who even my non-comics-reading coworkers know about. Or, at least, the ones older than me do. See, one of them recently made a crack about Plastic Man, which sent a younger coworker laughing, because she thought that the older coworker totally made that name up. Intrigued, I asked another coworker, also older than me, if she knew who Plastic Man was, and she talked a bit about how much she loved the old cartoon with Plastic Baby. The age gap between the oldest coworker and the youngest is just about 10 years. That's not a huge gap, all things considered, so it's pretty indicative of how quickly perceptions change.

Comic Book Glossary: Bleed

Welcome to a new installment of Comic Book Glossary! One of the aims of the Comics Cube! has always been to help out the newer readers who may be interested in, but aren't all that knowledgeable in comics, and one thing everyone needs to know if they're interested are the terms. Click here for the index!

Today's word is "bleed," and that's a general term in the print industry. In comics, it basically means when a drawing isn't contained by panel borders and "bleeds" out to the rest of the page. A bleed has several applications. Sometimes it's just used for a splash page.

Sometimes it's used when a sequence is taking place "behind" the panels on the page.

And sometimes it's used just for one panel.

But the effect is almost always the same: it's about involving the reader. Scott McCloud states in Making Comics that bleeds can open up a scene not just because it has more space, but because since we're so conditioned to treat panels as windows, if we can't see the frames, then it means we're through the window and into the world beyond it. In a way, it's kind of like zooming in without actually having to zoom in.

It's particularly effective when used in establishing shots.

All examples for this piece are from Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns!

A Sense of Wonder: The DC Multiverse

Welcome to the a new installment of A Sense of Wonder, a feature of indefinite length in which I detail the wonderful (and I mean that in the purest sense of the word) and imagination-inspiring aspects of the characters in the comic book medium, which would emphasize the superheroes, but would not be limited to them. Click here for the archive.

I can't say I'm a fan of big events in comics. It's not that I hate them; it's just that I mostly can't muster up the emotional investment to even really get excited about them as early as they're announced. I'm aware this isn't the common mentality among comics fans,  but that's the way it is with me. I still haven't read Secret Invasion, barely remember anything about Civil War, have no idea what in the world Fear Itself was about, hated Genesis, and so on and so forth.

But one set of big events I always end up tuning into is whenever the DC Multiverse is involved. I love the very concept of parallel worlds and the idea of doubles on other earths.

To this day, Crisis on Infinite Earths is my favorite comic book event. That's not nostalgia—I didn't read the entire thing or even most of it until I was 14. (My first real big event was Infinity Gauntlet, which I still love. That's nostalgia.) It starts off with a great character moment in the Crime Syndicate, the evil Justice League from Earth-3, sacrificing themselves to stop a wave of antimatter from destroying their planet.

That's Ultraman, finding his nobility in the last moment of his life.

Starman Retrospective, Day 5: The Shade

Welcome to Day 5 of The Comics Cube!'s retrospective series on James Robinson, Tony Harris, and Peter Snejberg's STARMAN. You can read about this series here.

THE SHADE

When we started this retrospective, I said that while Jack Knight is the main character of the STARMAN series, he wouldn't call himself the hero of the book. That would be Ted Knight. In the same vein, if we're talking about the protagonist of the book — in the sense of carrying out the actions that drive the story — we could very well be talking about The Shade.

The Shade made his debut in FLASH COMICS #33 in September 1942, and was a thorn in the side of the Flashes throughout the decades, using his control of shadow matter, via his cane, to give them trouble. He wasn't defined very well — if he was defined at all — and Robinson took the opportunity in 1994 to flesh him out as a character.

Starman Retrospective, Day 4: History, not Continuity

Welcome to Day 4 of The Comics Cube!'s retrospective series on James Robinson, Tony Harris, and Peter Snejberg's STARMAN. You can read about this series here.

HISTORY
not Continuity 

We superhero fans love continuity. We love our OFFICIAL HANDBOOKS OF THE MARVEL UNIVERSE, our official DC ENCYCLOPEDIAS... heck, some of my first comics were some issues of WHO'S WHO: THE DEFINITIVE GUIDE TO THE DC UNIVERSE that came out after the Crisis on Infinite Earths. We like it when things fall into their nice little boxes, and we like figuring out timelines. Continuity, however, can be a hindrance. Sometimes the hammer starts swinging the carpenter, and before you know it, we get stories that seem to really do nothing more than fix continuity errors and inconsistencies, and that's unfair to both the characters who could be used in more meaningful stories and the very concept of continuity.

One of STARMAN's most oft-cited strengths is its usage of continuity, but I would argue that since "continuity" now has that connotation of making things fit into appropriate boxes and whatnot, STARMAN doesn't really do that. What it uses isn't continuity, but history.

Starman Retrospective, Day 3: Opal City

Welcome to Day 3 of The Comics Cube!'s retrospective series on James Robinson, Tony Harris, and Peter Snejberg's STARMAN. You can read about this series here.

OPAL CITY

The first page in the entire STARMAN saga is a shot of Opal City. The captions describe its atmosphere and its history.

As the series progresses, we learn more about Opal City and are treated to panoramic shots and desciptions of the various boroughs. James Robinson in fact states in the back matter of STARMAN #0:

In the course of this book, I intend to create this city — give it streets you recognize by the landmarks; give it a design sense all its own. Fortunately, I'm collaborating with Tony Harris, an artist who not only shares that vision, but has the visual talent and skill to bring off the architectural diversity we have in mind. We want the Opal City skyline to be so distinctive that you'll recognize it without a caption or any verbal indication of where you are. Starman's home.

Starman Retrospective, Day 2: Legacy

Welcome to Day 2 of The Comics Cube!'s retrospective series on James Robinson, Tony Harris, and Peter Snejberg's STARMAN. You can read about this series here.

LEGACY

Jack Knight was the seventh Starman. Or maybe he was the sixth. Or the eighth.

It's complicated.

Either way, he wasn't the first, nor was he the last to prefix his name with "Star."

Top row: Jack Knight, Will Payton, Mikaal Tomas
Bottom row: Prince Gavyn, Starman of 1951, Ted Knight
Behind everyone: Thom Kallor
Art by Tony Harris and Alex Ross

Starman Retrospective, Day 1: The Knights, Jack and Ted and David

Welcome to Day 1 of The Comics Cube!'s retrospective series on James Robinson, Tony Harris, and Peter Snejberg's STARMAN. You can read about this series here.

THE KNIGHTS

Jack and Ted and David

The main character of STARMAN is Jack Knight, a junk dealer from Opal City who, because of his lineage, inherits a cosmic rod that lets him harness energy from the stars for flight, energy projection, and other offensive and defensive capabilities. Jack is one of the most well-defined characters in mainstream comic books, and it's because we get really specific looks into his head. Unlike, for example, Peter Parker, who is relatable by virtue of having traits that are universal, Jack's tastes are so specific. He's a bit of an elitist and likes the fact that his girlfriend Sadie knows who the Valentine Brothers are. He enjoys EC Comics and Robert Mitchum movies. He knows some martial arts, but only because he went through a period when he just got really into it and decided to learn until he was bored.

Jack also doesn't want to be a hero. He thinks costumes are silly, and would rather be discussing a found Alfred Hitchcock screenplay than fight the bad guys. He's also probably relatable to comic book fans in that he legitimately enjoys collecting stuff that he deems are valuable — the hunt is a source of thrills for him as well as income.

In today's comic book field where it seems that a lot of writers go so far as to make their protagonists as relatable and general as possible in terms of their minute details such as tastes and passing fancies, Jack is proof that you can add very minute details to a character and still achieve relatibility.

The main character of the STARMAN series is Jack Knight, but he wouldn't call himself the hero of the story. "Hero," he says, is a label given to you by other people when you deserve it, not one you readily apply to yourself.

No, if we were to ask Jack Knight who the hero of STARMAN was, he would be quick to point to his father Ted, the original Starman.

Ted Knight was created by Jack Burnley and a host of writers and editors (including Mort Weisnger and Jack Schiff). He first appeared in ADVENTURE COMICS #61, dated April 1941. And as far as Golden Age heroes go, you could say he was pretty generic. He was a billionaire playboy who created a device — the cosmic rod, which lets him harness power from the stars to project light beams and enable him to fly — that would help him in his quest to fight crime. So he dons a red and green costume with a fin on the head and does just that. Ted had an arch-enemy, the Mist, a man made out of nothing but vapor, so in that sense, he was a little different. He joined the Justice Society of America but never had his own series. And but for a short-lived feature in the 60s teaming him up with the Black Canary, he barely had the spotlight on him. He was taken off DC's main stage after the Crisis on Infinite Earths, and was brought back a few years later, right before Zero Hour, in which he and the rest of the JSA, kept young by supernatural forces all this time, were rapidly restored to their true ages. Too old to still be active, he passes the cosmic rod to his oldest son David, with Jack in the background, making it clear that he doesn't want the job.

That would lead right into the STARMAN series, where Ted Knight would get more character development than he ever did in 50 years of existence.

A Starman Retrospective

In the mid to late 90s, one mainstream DC superhero comic book expressly had a cult following strong enough to warrant a month dedicated to it at the time of publication and six omnibuses from DC. That series was STARMAN, written by James Robinson and drawn by Tony Harris and, later on, Peter Snejberg. It focused on Jack Knight, the son of Ted Knight, the Golden Age Starman. Jack was a junk dealer who didn't really want to be a superhero, but was kind of thrust into it. He's one of the most relatable, most human superheroes ever, and the series was really top-notch stuff.
 
And for over ten years, I ignored it. See, when I was a kid, one of my favorite superheroes was Will Payton, who was back then carrying the name of Starman. Will had an awesome costume (the black one, not the yellow and purple one), and equally awesome powers (he shot cosmic blasts out of his hands!). So when this STARMAN series starring Jack made waves, I deliberately avoided it, because Will was my Starman.

Then one day, at a Barnes and Noble in Easton PA, I browsed through a copy of STARMAN: STARS MY DESTINATION, because Will Payton was in it. And you know what I realized? This Jack Knight guy was pretty cool. What's more, this series was pretty cool.

Before I left the United States for good in June 2007, I decided to make one last big comics-related purchase, and I bought the entire James Robinson–written STARMAN run off of eBay, specials and all (I'm only missing the first issue of BATMAN/HELLBOY/STARMAN, but since that's mostly Batman, I don't care).

I felt the need to write about it, but there was a lot to write about, so I did it in five parts. Click the links to get taken to those particular sections:

• Part 1: Fathers and Sons. A look at the relationships between Jack, David, and Ted Knight, and how they anchor the series.
• Part 2: Legacy. A look at the legacy of Starman, the arch-enemy The Mist, and the Justice Society of America.
• Part 3: Opal City. How the setting of the book affected its characters, how the characters from Opal were different from the ones outside it, and
• Part 4: History, not Continuity. The difference between the two, and how STARMAN uses one to great effect while treating the other as a tool and not a hindrance, and how continuity should help, but not hamper your story.
• Part 5: The Shade, and the Future. A look at the one character that DC is still using after the end of the series, his spinoffs, and where it may lead.

I hope you join me for a week-long look at one of the best comics of the 90s, and certainly one of the most memorable comics of all time!

Comic Book Glossary: Splash Page and Spread

Welcome to a new installment of Comic Book Glossary! One of the aims of the Comics Cube! has always been to help out the newer readers who may be interested in, but aren't all that knowledgeable in comics, and one thing everyone needs to know if they're interested are the terms. Click here for the index!

Today we take a look at two terms that tie into each other. A splash page is a term most of you are familiar with, and it really just means a page that consists of one big image. It's most often used in the beginning of a comic. Common practice will put it at the very first page, to get the reader's attention right away, as in this Steve Ditko–drawn page from AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #12:

DCnU Sales: An Econometric Regression

For a long while, Matt and I had been thinking of running studies to gauge the various factors that go into comic book sales: creators, characters, price, etc. Since both of us have economics backgrounds, we decided that the way to do it would be by means of an econometric regression.An econometric regression is a method by which you can enter a dependent variable and name the independent variables. The regression would then assign coefficients to each of the independent variables. The coefficients would indicate the approximate impact of those variables. In essence, it looks something like this:

Y is the dependent variable — in this case, sales — and the Xs are the independent variables, meaning various creators and characters. The Bs are the coefficients, except for that first one, which is the constant (essentially, if none of the independent variables are met, that's the one that sticks). That last term is the error term, because obviously, it's not gonna be exact.

But Matt and I had some problems with these studies. For one thing, icv2 gives the top 300 comics each month. That's great, because these things are helped out proportionally by the size of the sample, but that's 300 titles immediately just to analyze sales for that one month. In the time since, as well, DC relaunched, and the New 52 happened, and the thing is that the New 52 had so many variables that didn't apply to other titles that couldn't be accounted for, such as the amount of publicity it got. Analyzing comic book sales with the New 52 didn't seem to make much sense to us. After all, if being a DCnU book helps, it doesn't give much predictive power or help anyone because it's not like Archaia, for example, will ever produce DCnU material.

So we thought, how about just DCnU sales? When we started, it was the start of September, and there were 11 months of sales data available, with 52 titles each (we decided to just stick to the ongoings, figuring that miniseries were different beasts). That's 571 data points (BATMAN INC came later than the other second wave launches). So we decided to do it.

How did things turn out? Let's see.

The Comics Cube Interview with Budjette Tan

Last month, Budjette Tan, co-creator and writer of the acclaimed Filipino comic book TRESE with artist Kajo Baldisimo and editor of various products from Alamat Comics, gave a talk at De La Salle-College of St. Benilde about the creative process, likening writing to a magic trick. Here's the video.



I thought he brought up some interesting points, so I contacted him for an interview. I'd intended to ask him about the creative process only, but of course, as interviews and conversations often go, we ended up talking about other stuff. Read on for an in-depth conversation with Budjette Tan! (By the way, Budjette is a hoot. If you ever have the chance to talk to him, be ready to laugh a lot.)

TRESE brings old Filipino myths into the modern urban landscape.

There's Tagalog sentences in the interview, which are immediately followed by translations in parentheses.

Reclaiming History: Carl Barks May Be the Greatest of All Time

Welcome to a new installment of Reclaiming History, an ongoing series where the Comics Cube! tries to balance out what the history books say and what actually happened! Click here for the archive!

Regular readers of The Comics Cube know that I've reviewed Fantagraphics' first two installments in The Complete Carl Barks Library, DONALD DUCK: LOST IN THE ANDES and UNCLE SCROOGE: ONLY A POOR OLD MAN. You also probably know I love them, and think very highly of Barks.

Here's a couple of things you probably don't know though:

1. Despite my extensive plugging, those posts get virtually no hits. Moreso, not a single person has bought them through my Amazon links at the bottom of those posts.
   
2. Those stats are backed up by my anecdotes — no matter how much I talk about it, I have had very limited success in getting  people to read those books.

I can't speak for everyone, of course, but I think it's pretty understandable that I would attribute the reasons for this to people being of the "Well, it's Disney; just how good can it really be?" mindset. Be honest. If I say "Uncle Scrooge is one of the greatest comic characters ever created," how would you react? Most likely with an "I understand, but I'm not interested," right?

And that's the thing. It's frustrating. I've said what needs to be said! It's all there — these are great characters. Barks is a master of pacing. Barks is the first to prove that you can tell really long stories without dragging. Unlike TINTIN (for example, since Tintin stories seem to lose something after growing older), UNCLE SCROOGE still holds up the older you get. Unlike other comics, you don't need to take the time period Barks' comics were made into account — they still hold up today. They're good for kids. They're good for adults. They're entertaining, while at the same time, they say something about the human condition. So why can't I get people to read this, but I can get thousands of people either arguing with me or agreeing with me about Grant Morrison's comments being right or wrong?

Maybe I'm not authoritative enough for my opinion to be conclusive. So fine. Let's pull out some facts!

Fact 1: Disney employees worked in anonymity, and yet somehow fans still found out who Barks was.

Jim Korkis' article over here sums up this story perfectly. Barks worked on multiple titles, including WALT DISNEY'S COMICS AND STORIES and UNCLE SCROOGE, along with many other ghost artists. But the fans could tell via visual cues that, much like in Archie, different stories were drawn by different people. Barks was known among the fans simply as "The Good Artist," and when two fans, Malcolm Willits and John Spicer, got together, they found him, went to his house, and published an interview with him, "outing" him to the world.

When you hear of other artists getting this kind of dedication and love from his fans, give me a call.

Fact 2: Carl Barks had free reign at Disney, when no one else did.

In COMIC BOOK COMICS by Fred Van Lente and Ryan Dunlavey, it's stated that Walt Disney managed everything to the point of actually going over some of the comics. He was very protective of the final product and was difficult to work with, to the point where employees avoided other employees that had fallen out of favor with Walt.

But not when it came to the works of Carl Barks. Barks had free reign at Disney. He didn't need to be managed.

He was that good.

Fact 3: Carl Barks may have been responsible for the bestselling single issues of all time.

Okay, work with me here. COMIC BOOK COMICS states that WALT DISNEY'S COMICS AND STORIES achieved the highest circulation of any comic book in history. But how much of that had to do with Barks? Here are three facts.

• Comic Book Superheroes Unmasked says that the highest-selling period in comics history was after World War II and before the Senate Hearings in 1954.
• Various books on comics have credited funny animals as the top-selling genre of this era.
• UNCLE SCROOGE debuted in 1952 and was the top-selling comic in 1960, selling 1,040,543 copies . It was followed by WALT DISNEY'S COMICS AND STORIES. Both were significantly ahead of the next title, and outsold the next funny animal title, MICKEY MOUSE, by almost half their sales. What did UNCLE SCROOGE and WDCS have that MICKEY MOUSE didn't? Barks.

Conclusion: The highest-selling period in comics history was most likely headlined by UNCLE SCROOGE and WALT DISNEY'S COMICS AND STORIES, both of which Barks contributed to.

Fact 4: Carl Barks influenced George Lucas and Steven Spielberg.

George Lucas wrote the introduction to ONLY A POOR OLD MAN. Bark's influence on him and Barks is well documented. The opening sequence of INDIANA JONES: RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK is taken from "The Seven Cities of Cibola," from UNCLE SCROOGE #7.

Fact 5: Carl Barks kickstarted manga.

As the myth goes, manga evolved in Japan completely separately from comics in the Western countries. And for the most part, that's true. But where it's not true is when it comes to manga's genesis. You see, in World War II, GIs in Japan read UNCLE SCROOGE comics. Christopher Couch, the editor-in-chief of CPM MANGA, had this to say:

Manga developed after World War II at the hands of one designer, Osamu Tezuka. He was influenced a great deal by the work of Carl Barks – the creator of Scrooge McDuck. Basically, Tezuka made an American art form Japanese by mixing Disney with sophisticated stories.

While I disagree with his implication that Barks' stories were not sophisticated (they seriously are as sophisticated as you, the reader, would like them to be), it is impressive that Barks' influence would spread out so strongly in the one country where the comics are often said to have developed completely independently of Western influence. In the gigantic roster of Western comics, Barks stands apart in this matter.

Just for fun, here's a greeting card Barks got from Osamu Tezuka one year.

Fact 6: Academics and scholars love Carl Barks.

Fantagraphics' collections come with essays from scholars, professors, and historians that talk about the Duck stories. Like I said, it really is as sophisticated as you would like them to be. Much like Bill Watterson's CALVIN AND HOBBES, Barks' stuff can be enjoyed by people all ages, different backgrounds, and different levels of intellectual involvement (you can read them as pure entertainment or look deeper).

The difference is that I bet if I were to recommend CALVIN AND HOBBES, a thousand of you would read that article, despite the fact that it has a talking tiger in it.

Fact 7: There is an asteroid named after Carl Barks.

Well, there is. And it was named after him in 1983, 30 years after UNCLE SCROOGE was outselling everything on the market.


So where does that leave us? Well, it's highly possible that Barks' legacy is hurt by the fact that he worked on Disney characters. He's often overlooked in "The Greatest of All Time" discussions, and I'll admit it, I think I even ranked him too low on this list.

Would Barks' legacy have been better off if he did his own stuff? Would he have been more renowned by fans if he had done superheroes instead? Would he have been better off doing anything other than Disney characters?

I don't know. What I do know is this: at one point in comics history, Carl Barks dominated the market with not one, but two books. He was so huge that even though he worked in anonymity, people distinguished him, and even found out who he was. Two of the most acclaimed and influential filmmakers of all time are strongly influenced by him. Walt Disney himself let him do whatever he wanted, and he, alone among his peers, stood out as having a significant effect on the comics of a country often purported to not be influenced by Western comics. His works have been enjoyed by children and university professors alike, and to top it all off, he has an asteroid named after him.

If he's not on top of the mountain, he's damn well close to it. And there's no good reason, as far as I can see, that he's not talked about more often. Recommending him shouldn't be this hard, simply because he was that good. Carl Barks may have been the greatest comic book creator who ever lived, which makes it more of a damn shame that he gets as overlooked as he is among comic book fandom.

Techniques and Tricks: What Not to Do

Welcome to another edition of Comics Techniques and Tricks, in which we showcase techniques that only comics can do! Click here for the archive!

Here's our first example of what not to do when it comes to page layout. Lately I've been reading the old JUSTICE LEAGUE AMERICA series, written by Keith Giffen and JM DeMatteis. As it turns out, the issues I have aren't from their legendary run with Kevin Maguire, but from after that, when the art chores were mostly handled by Adam Hughes. This is from issue #42, with art from a young Mike McKone and Jose Marzan Jr.

See the problem here? J'onn's speech bubble "I won't stand in your way--" goes straight to the panel on the right, and is even connected to the speech bubble next to it, which says, "--but I want you to know that I'm always here for you. Always."

Where does that leave the panel on the bottom left? A reader will either want to turn the page because that right panel where Gypsy is walking away, or realize that the bottom panel went unread and reread the sequence.

The layout isn't the problem; the dialogue and the placement of the balloons are. If only that last balloon in panel 1 didn't overlap with the right panel, and if only "--but I want you to know" continued from "Soon" rather than "I won't stand in your way." Actually, "Soon" is probably unnecessary, isn't it? J'onn's last speech balloon in panel 1 could easily have taken its place!

That's just one example of the many things comics creators have to go through to facilitate readability. Not only does the layout of the pictures have to make sense; the lettering has to do it too. (This is also why letterers are some of the unsung heroes in comics — you rarely ever notice when they do it right, but it's so easy to realize when they're doing it wrong.)

Easter Eggs: Mogo Predicted!

Welcome to another installment of Easter Eggs in Comics! Click here for the archive!

Most Alan Moore fans, as well as Green Lantern fans, know of the short story "Mogo Doesn't Socialize," by Moore and his WATCHMEN co-creator Dave Gibbons. In it, a bounty hunter called Bolphunga the Unrelenting goes to a planet to find and kill the Green Lantern known as Mogo. Eventually he realizes he's in trouble, because Mogo happens to be the entire planet.

"Mogo Doesn't Socialize" was published in GREEN LANTERN #188 in 1985.

Now, in THE COMPLETE ALAN MOORE FUTURE SHOCKS, 2000 AD's collection of Moore's short stories and early work, there's a story by Moore and John Higgins (the colorist of WATCHMEN) entitled "The Bounty Hunters." In it, the hunters are looking for someone named Rogel Dax. As with Bolphunga and Mogo, they don't know what he looks like.

Anyway, one of the hunters says this:

"The Bounty Hunters" was published in 2000 AD prog 253, in 1982, three years before Mogo!


Both these stories can be found here:

An Interview with Joe Kubert, by Michael Leal

Michael Leal, founder and head writer of Metaverse Entertainment,conducted an interview last year with the recently departed Joe Kubert. Since the magazine that was supposed to run it folded and was unable to publish it, Michael asked me yesterday if I would be willing to run this for the Cube. Of course, I said yes. Everything after this paragraph is Michael's, with only minor edits by me.

Original interview conducted on March 3, 2011

Joe Kubert is the legendary comic artist that has worked on everything from Hawkman, to Sgt. Rock, to Enemy Ace and countless other titles, including a few original graphic novels currently being re-released by DC comics. He's had numerous roles in the comic book industry over the years. He's been an artist, editor, and teacher. He is the mentor to thousands of art students that have graduated from The Kubert School over the past 34 years. Including his two sons, Adam and Andy Kubert, who now teach at the school and are legends in their own right. His artistic influence has permeated the comics industry and far beyond. Joe Kubert was kind enough to chat with me about the industry, his life and the work that he is so well known for.

Michael Leal: You seemed to have achieved what every comic book creator dreams of, a long and fruitful career and just a touch of immortality. What do you attribute your long lasting success in comics to?

Joe Kubert: Well, I've been very lucky ...very lucky. There were a lot of guys that I worked with, amazingly talented guys. Why some guys are able to maintain the longevity that I have and others haven't is pure unadulterated luck. It's just my ability to work. I was wise enough to choose parents with the right genes so I'm still able to do this stuff. I'm able to do it to the extent that people still want to see it, and people are still willing to buy it.

The Craft: An Interview with Alan Moore by Daniel Whiston

I got this interview a few years ago on the Engine Comics website. It's entitled "The Craft," and was conducted in two part by Daniel Whiston in 2002. The interview is with Alan Moore, and he talks about many of the technical aspects of comics, how he approaches his craft, his working method, and a variety of other subjects. I thought it was a fascinating read back then, and since it's available in its entirety only on another website now, one that isn't a comics website or even mostly in English, I figured I'd post it here.

Nothing from this point on is mine, other than the placement of the pictures within the text. I also removed some pictures from the original interview, because, I, uh, forgot what they were supposed to be. Also, a bunch of the links at the end are dead, there. I figured I'd keep them in for the sake of full replication. But generally, the misspellings, wrong punctuation, all that stuff — not mine. (I think Alan meant "World Tree" and not "World Three," by the way.)

ABOVE: Photo by José Villarrubia

Reviews: League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Century Volume 3: 2009

So LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN: CENTURY VOLUME 3: 2009 came out a few weeks ago, and I've had time to properly digest it. Time for a review!

This story concludes the three-part "Century" storyline, which spanned a hundred years but we only saw three years of (1910, 1969, and now 2009). At the start of the book, Mina Murray is in a mental institution, Alan Quatermain is missing, and the gender-switching Orlando is just getting discharged from the army. That's when he turns into a woman and is confronted by Prospero (from Shakespeare's The Tempest) to get the band back together and stop the coming of the Anti-Christ. All that gets accomplished in a tantalizing and captivating story.

I'll be the first to say that I thought LOEG CENTURY: 1910 was a bit of a mess. I thought it tried too hard to be clever, to the detriment of the story (which I couldn't really say about any of the previous LOEG books aside from BLACK DOSSIER, and even then that was kind of the point.) However, I thought LOEG CENTURY: 1969 was a marked improvement, done in such a way that even if you didn't get the references, you'd still get the whole story. And if you did get the references, then more power to you. (Side note: Andy Capp is in 1969. It's great.)

I thought LOEG CENTURY: 2009 was even better. I've already read it three times, the third time with Jess Nevins' annotations handy. And instead of doing a regular review, I thought I'd look back at my old LOEG retrospective piece and look at the factors I listed there for why LOEG worked in the first place, and see how this one stacks up. So, in reverse order:

4. Moore and O'Neill are just damn good at what they do. This part's still true. O'Neill is a master storyteller, able to convey a lot of motion and emotion through his pictures. His art style was, back in 1999, an acquired taste for me, but now I can't imagine anyone else drawing these books. It's idiosyncratic and it works. I'm still surprised that he can make some characters look distinctly like an actor (Daniel Craig and Roger Moore are both in this book) with his style. It's amazing.

Similarly, the writing is as strong as ever. Perhaps even stronger. I haven't had this kind of adrenaline-rushing pumped-up reaction to LOEG since the first one, and that's a great thing. Moore and O'Neil are also still the masters of the unexpectedly dramatic, as you'll notice when Emma Peel/Knight is given an offer by Orlando. In any other comic, it would be dismissed with a quick gesture, but here, Emma's reaction is given the proper depth and gravitas that such a moment would demand in reality. The result is not realism (this book's too far gone for that), but believability. There's a distinction.

Moreso, it works on many levels. If you want to read it as a rollicking adventure story, you can. If you want to read it as Moore's critique of modern fiction in contrast with classic fiction, you can. And if you want to figure out who everyone is and how they all play into the themes of the story, you can. This brings us to our next point.

3. It makes you work. This is still true. Look, I'll be the first one to say that if the first thing you can say about a book is "It makes you work," it's probably an annoying book, and that's partly why I think 1910 was the worst LOEG book so far. But by and large, that's not the way LOEG works. Like I said, it works on multiple levels. I still have unanswered questions about the story. I want to know, first and foremost, what the point of the Nemo family being spotlighted in every issue is, what the significance of the references to Bertolt Brecht's The Threepenny Opera has, what underlying intentions Prospero obviously has, and more. But I don't want them spoonfed to me; I want to actually reread them and do the research until I get it.

And I think that's the best testimony I can give for LOEG in terms of its multilayered nature: more than anything else, it makes me want to do the work. More than anything else. Yes, that includes FROM HELL.

2. Production. The production quality is still top-notch. I've got the first three volumes in hardback, and the CENTURY stuff is all in the original issues, but I'm guessing Top Shelf is going to collect CENTURY in a hardcover edition. It's all there: the ads (this time done in 2009 mold, so it's all Web-based), the glossy paper (with that wonderful glossy paper smell), the high-quality coloring, and the unparalleled lettering (how does Todd Klein keep going?). Impeccable. Let's move on to the next point.

1. Moore and O'Neill are obviously having fun. Yes, absolutely. I feel like these guys are having more fun than the guys writing for DC right now. But if I could describe LOEG CENTURY 2009 (or any of the LOEG books, actually) in any way, it's this: basically, it feels like Alan and Kevin took a bunch of action figures, played around with them, and made it into a comic. It's fun. It's vibrant. It's energetic.

And SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER if you ever told me just a month ago that I could say (highlight the text to see it) "Mary Poppins saving the day is one of the coolest things ever in the history of comics" and mean it, I would've told you to get outta here. But it is. It's one of the greatest moments in the history of comics, and it blew my mind. How many times has that happened to me in the last five years in comics? Probably exactly two more times (ASTERIOS POLYP and HABIBI).

So go pick it up. Go read it. You'll enjoy yourself. You'll want to read it again. And maybe, just maybe, you'll want to learn some stuff afterwards.

Watchmen French Reprint Edition Portfolio and Promo Posters: Hi-Res Scans

I've been looking for high-resolution scans of the French Reprint Edition pin-ups of WATCHMEN for a while. These are all drawn by Dave Gibbons. I saw them over a decade ago when I first got Internet access, but I only now found these really high-quality scans of them from here. Since notasdecine is not a comics site, I figured I'd give it a home here on The Cube.

So here they are, followed by the black-and-white promotional posters, complete with quotes for each. (Words by Alan Moore, of course.)

Since they're in high resolution, click through to see the pics. Click the pics to enlarge them.

Comics Techniques and Tricks: Revealing Word Balloons

Welcome to another edition of Comics Techniques and Tricks, in which we showcase techniques that only comics can do! Click here for the archive!

In JUGHEAD WITH ARCHIE DIGEST MAGAZINE #106 (dated September 1991), George Gladir, Tim Kennedy, and Rudy Lapick give us a story where word balloons are shaped to reveal a character's actual thoughts.

I'm actually now wondering if there's any mileage into using a technique like this casually throughout a story, instead of using thought balloons or narrative captions along the lines of "I say it, but I don't really mean it."

What do you guys think?

Comics Techniques and Tricks: Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Panel Transitions

Welcome to another edition of Comics Techniques and Tricks, in which we showcase techniques that only comics can do! Click here for the archive!

Pól Rua pointed me to this Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez–drawn page from BATMAN: KING TUT'S TOMB.

Look at the seamlessness of the panel flow. Garcia-Lopez manages to transition from one panel to the next with ease and that's because of the composition he uses. Note how the tree at the top left (and therefore where we would naturally start reading an American comic) leads our eyes into panel 2. The woman's leg and Batman's cape then lead our eyes into panel 3, where we see the cop chewing on a pencil that points to the right, which leads to the other woman. The other woman is looking back at Batman, the Riddler, and the first woman, so now our eyes are in the center of the page. We then take these visual cues from the conversation, and that leads us back to a straightforward storytelling tier of the final three panels.

In this manner, Garcia-Lopez manages to establish the location, the interior of the house, and all the people in the house while still making it look like a dynamic scene. Remember, it's just a conversation.

It's very subtle as well, and very understated. It does not overpower the story, because it serves the story. As Pól said to me, "It's like he knows what he's doing!"

Reclaiming History: Dave Gibbons and WATCHMEN

Welcome to a new installment of Reclaiming History, an ongoing series where the Comics Cube! tries to balance out what the history books say and what actually happened! Click here for the archive!

Regular readers of the Cube will know that WATCHMEN means a lot to me.  It's a technical masterpiece, a gripping narrative, and a true testament to the power of what comics can do. But one thing has always bugged me about it, and that's the fact that fans, casual and hardcore alike, tend to see it and speak about it as "Alan Moore's WATCHMEN." People who praise WATCHMEN point to it as proof of Alan Moore's genius. Those who don't point to it as a criticism of Moore's status, usually with the word "overrated" involved. When people discuss the controversies associated with WATCHMEN, it's as it relates to Moore.

Lost in the entire discussion is Dave Gibbons, the co-plotter, artist, letter, and designer of WATCHMEN. When people discuss WATCHMEN, they almost make it sound as if the vision is purely Moore's, while all Dave did was put it on paper. If it were true, it in itself is a difficult task and should be commended, but Dave's contributions were so much deeper.

Let's explore those contributions, shall we?

Comics Techniques and Tricks: In the Shadow of No Towers

Welcome to another edition of Comics Techniques and Tricks, in which we showcase techniques that only comics can do! Click here for the archive!

So I can talk about IN THE SHADOW OF NO TOWERS now, right? It's safe? People won't take it as a reason to talk about politics nonsensically anymore?

Okay, good. So Art Spiegelman used IN THE SHADOW OF NO TOWERS as a sort of sequential art diary of his reactions to 9/11 and the World Trade Center attacks. They comprised full-page newspaper comics pages, each done at a different point in time. At first he's reacting to the attacks, and by the end of it, he was criticizing the Bush administration.

Here's the first spread.

Taken from this site.

Spiegelman's layout is evocative of a newspaper page, with seemingly six different "strips" going on at once. and yet, they're all interconnected. From the theme of "waiting for the other shoe to drop" in "Etymological Vaudeville" and the circular panel in the bottom center to the two towers falling (realize how there are two towers falling? A reader too used to the convention of sequential art may see them as the same tower), this is one unified page.

But the technique I really want to point out happens on the upper right corner, because this is where Spiegelman's structural mastery shines. So we have the rather clever (and biting) three panels of the family in the wake of September 11 on the top tier of the page there. Their strip ends with them hanging an American flag in their living room, which then leads your eye directly into the next "strip," because the panel tilts and behind it is the American flag. (The message is the same: flag-waving and nationalism came in the wake of 9/11.) The proximity of the two flags makes the reading fluid. You read the family strip, then you read the right tower falling. Then because of its similarity in terms of graphics, you read the left tower falling. What an unorthodox way to read a comic book. But it works, and all it really proves is that your tricks must match your material.

IN THE SHADOW OF NO TOWERS is a structural and technical masterpiece, and it will hold a place in my heart forever for personal reasons. I can't speak for its relevance in this day and age (probably still very relevant), but if you want to learn about techniques and comic book history, it's a good book to have on your shelf, especially since it's got classic newspaper-era comics such as LITTLE NEMO IN SLUMBERLAND in the back matter as well.

Comic Book Glossary: Polyptych

Welcome to a new installment of Comic Book Glossary! One of the aims of the Comics Cube! has always been to help out the newer readers who may be interested in, but aren't all that knowledgeable in comics, and one thing everyone needs to know if they're interested are the terms.Click here for the index!.

Today's word, dear Cubers, is POLYPTYCH.  In the "regular" art world, a polyptych is one picture broken up into multiple sections. So it is with comics as well. Here's an easy example, from Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' WATCHMEN.

That came from this site, which has been calling
the technique "multi-panel pans."

Easy enough, yes? Dividing the singular background into multiple panels creates the feeling of time passing by, and it gives the letterers an easier way to orient the speech balloons (this is easy enough to read with the gutters; think about reading it without) and the artists a way to convey the entire background without having to draw it multiple times.

Here's an example from an Archie comic. Note that it's not limited to a horizontal direction, and that the artist didn't have to make these panels connected, but it just flows better that way. This way, he draws one set of stairs and Archie and Jughead can still show their journey from the second floor to the ground floor.

The polyptych is not restricted to backgrounds. You can use it on characters as well. Here's an example from Craig Thompson's GOOD-BYE CHUNKY RICE.

I particularly love this page because the polyptych's panels
aren't completely aligned. I actually covered this here.

And here's another application of it: in this sequence from AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #561, Marcos Martin actually doesn't align the polyptych's panels and places the rest of the background behind the panels, so there's no empty space, but the placing of the panels still guides your eye toward the action and illustrates the passage of time.

Check out how the first panel is just an interior
view of the corresponding spot on the continuous
background. It's still part of the polyptych. And once
again, I cover this here. Can you tell I love this technique?

You can view some more effects and applications of polyptychs in some installments of Comics Techniques and Tricks!

Reclaiming History: EC Comics and the New Trend

Welcome to a new installment of Reclaiming History, an ongoing series where the Comics Cube! tries to balance out what the history books say and what actually happened! Click here for the archive!

This installment may be unusual in the sense that I'm not actually "reclaiming" history. I found this paper I wrote in university about EC Comics, and I wanted to share it with you. It's slightly revised, because, well, I write better now. But the content is pretty much the same. So without further ado...

If there was no point to being offensive (as with a high number of comedians who frequent the average working men's club), then the perpetrator will either be squeezed out of business or be relegated to working in bottom-of-the-heap sleaze pits where nothing more than vulgarity is demanded. Alternately, if there was some integrity behind all the outrage, the perpetrators become persecuted legends with a fanatical cult following and generally exercise tremendous influence upon the artists that come after them. In comedy, Lenny Bruce is an example. In music, perhaps the Sex Pistols. In comic books, EC would fit the bill.

-Alan Moore, WRITING FOR COMICS

The year 1946 saw the founding of Educational Comics, a small company publishing exactly what they claimed to be, giving life to Bible stories and patriotic American history in the medium of comics.

When William Gaines inherited the company from his prematurely deceased father, Max, he realized that these were not the type of material that flew off the stands and therefore did more work to emphasize their crime, western, and science fiction comics. With freelance artist Al Feldstein, he restructured EC Comics, renamed it Entertaining Comics, and used the medium to express their mutual love for the radio thrillers of the time. This would inspire what became known as the "New Trend" in comics, as pioneered by EC. Gone were the educational books. The science fiction books were made to be darker, with titles such as WEIRD FANTASY and WEIRD SCIENCE. The pre–New Trend crime books were disposed of to make room for darker, grittier interpretations of the genre. And, most importantly of all, horror, which was the backbone of EC, became legendary, and is even known in the comics industry as a martyr of the public crusade against the penny dreadful in 1954–55.

However, EC was hardly the only publisher of these genres, nor were they even the first. Horror, crime, and suspense stories were spanning the whole industry. Even Timely Comics, which would later become the juggernaut that is Marvel Comics, was guilty. Why was EC Comics the linchpin of the Senate's argument that comics were bad for children? Why do the more experienced comics readers, and, more importantly, the writers and artists working in the industry look upon EC with fondness? How is this imprint still so influential, so widely imitated by the creators after all these years? How did EC Comics, with such a small line of titles, a limited number of stock characters, artists who produced such a miniscule amount of work, and a run that only lasted half a decade, make such a big impact which influences and inspires many artists working in the field today?

REPORT: An Interview with David Finch, Part 2: the Batman edition

After the roundtable interview we conducted with David Finch at Fully Booked, I had the opportunity to speak to him individually. Afterward, I went to his talk, where he drew Batman and Catwoman in front of an audience of over 100 people. The following is a consolidation of the questions I asked in both settings (individually and in front of the audience). I'm doing this partly for convenience and partly so I can pepper you with pictures of how his drawing progressed. It's actually amazing how much form it took the moment he started rendering.

David Finch and me

I've already asked you most of the questions I was going to ask about the industry and about the creative process. So I'll ask, why Batman?

Batman is such a great visual character. I love the shadows and I love the city. It's such a dark city and I can be really creative with it. Because it's not a real existing city, I can draw buildings in any kind of configuration I want and it still works. The villains are the most fun to draw in this entire business. Everybody loves the Joker, the Penguin, and even the Riddler is fun! They're all fun.

Something I've always wondered... does DC have a scale model of Gotham City that you guys have to follow, or do you just make it up as you go along?

It's very much made up as we go along. I think there are certain landmarks that we try to bear in mind, and lately there's been more of an effort to make things a little more cohesive. So as people are creating and drawing different landmarks and different things in the city, and also the political figures, we're putting that in a list or database for everybody to refer to to make things a little more cohesive, because it is pretty easy for things to start falling apart.

Stage 1: Placing the characters

Yeah, things like how far Wayne Manor is from the police station.

Right, yeah.

Is there someone keeping a record of that?

There really isn't. I think there's a reason. Mike Marts is a great editor, and he's really good at spotting things that are obviously going to clash with establishing the reality, but I'm not personally aware of an exact distance between anything. Because comics is a still-frame medium, there's really never even an instance — even if this were a movie, you would never actually see Batman get in the car and see the entire drive real-time anyway. So if I were to draw Batman coming out of the cave, I would draw a shot of him coming out of the cave, a shot of him driving to the city, and a drive of him at his location. That's the structure of how it would be done. That leaves it open to interpretation, but it also means that it never gets fully established.


Fully Booked gave us a challenge basically to talk about Batman. And they had a list of questions related to Batman, so I'm just going to ask you those questions. Who's your favorite Batman villain?

The Joker.

Visually speaking or generally?

Both. Visually speaking, I think he's great. But just in general, he's crazy, which makes him so difficult to write, but when he's well-written, he's so interesting because the things he does are so off-the-wall and unpredictable that it keeps it really interesting, but he always has a point. No matter how twisted it is, it's never completely random, which I think is really interesting about the character.

What's your favorite Batman story?

I think BATMAN: YEAR ONE, by Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli. It's just such a beautifully structured story. I think it's such a crime that that comic in that format wasn't used for the movie. I can't argue with Christopher Nolan, because those movies are great, but if it would have been me, I think I would have just done that. That would have been by Batman movie, YEAR ONE.

You would take YEAR ONE over DARK KNIGHT RETURNS?

Oh yeah. I love DARK KNIGHT RETURNS, but I think YEAR ONE is the apex of Batman.


So Mazzucchelli over Miller?

In terms of art, that's a tough question. Dave Mazzucchelli has so much going on and I love it. He's a great visual storyteller and great at arranging panels that I think is just incredible. But Frank Miller has a vicious power with his characters sometimes that I really love. I think the thing I like about art is that I don't really have to choose. I can like them all, which is really nice.

Step 2: Let's start shading

How important to you is a dynamic layout over a clear one? Let's say you have three panels and one of them is coming right out at you, would you rather make it as clear as possible or as in-your-face as possible?

To be totally honest with you, it really depends on the situation. There are times when the impact of that big panel is important enough that I feel like it's worth getting that in there, and I would make the other panels smaller, which would sacrifice some storytelling. And there are times that's a conscious decision. I know it's a bigger panel over more procedural storytelling. I'm willing to make that sacrifice, because I know if I were picking up a Batman comic, I'm going to flip through it and see that big picture of Batman looking pissed off and crazy, and that's what gets me excited. So I feel that to not have that there, I can't have that. At least to some degree, I'm willing to bend the rules to make that happen. But at the same time, I always try to be aware of the story. The story's really number one. It's rare that I'm in the position where I'm making that decision. There are times when I make the decisions that really affect the storytelling. That's really not intentional. Maybe I know I want to get a panel, I know I want to get something across in there, and I just don't give much thought to figuring out how to get the storytelling to work  too. It's really not a conscious decision to sacrifice the storytelling, ideally.

Gregg Hurwitz. The way he writes, how tight is it? Do you have to follow it or do you lay it out on your own?

Well, I lay it out on my own but he writes a full-panel structured story that's pretty clear. And we also talk before I start drawing the issue, we talk through every page panel by panel. So we know what both of us are thinking. We make sure we're on the same page, so there are no real surprises. And that makes things a little stronger, because there are times — and it's happened with issue 1, there are a couple of places where what he described is really clear, but what I was thinking about doing was completely opposite from what he actually had in mind. Just a miscommunication. And me describing what I was thinking, we have a chance to say "Oh no, no." It really helps. With Gregg Hurwitz, he really has full control over the story, so my input really comes down to framing the shots and making things as dramatic as I can make them. Gregg is very good at establishing the beats in the storytelling, so I absolutely don't alter his structure.

I need to know, since the Joker's your favorite villain. What's your favorite Joker story?

KILLING JOKE. Of course.

I solicited questions from my readers, and they already asked a lot. More than one person asked this, so I'm just gonna ask you since we have the time anyway. Do you like bacon?

(At this point, everyone around us laughs, and David gets this suspicious look on his face, as if he's waiting for a punchline. Then he answers slowly.) Yeeeeeesssss. Yes, I like bacon. I heard a comedian say that bacon even sounds like people cheering when it's cooking.

One of the other questions that Fully Booked asked us is what kind of cake would you bake for Batman?

What kind of cake would I bake for Batman?


I know, I didn't answer that one either.

I'm not much of a cake-baker. I think it would be awkward to present Batman with a cake.


I wrote down, "Batman would not eat cake." Anyway, since you've taken on Batman at this stage, where he's not as dark as he used to be, but he's really serious, what do you think of things like the Adam West show or Brave and the Bold, you know, the lighter takes on Batman?

I think there's a place for it, and there's a place for it right now. DC is still doing the younger audience comics. I think Batman is a strong enough character that he can survive the darkest, most cynical, and vicious takes, and he can withstand the lightest and goofiest take out there in the same month. He kinda embodies both of those things really, really well. And you know, I love the old cartoon.

Step 3: Almost done

What do you think it is about Batman that gives him that kind of range? Other icons, like Superman or Spider-Man, they don't really have it. You can't really make them too dark—

Spider-Man is a very optimistic character. He's a character that has a lot of self-doubt, but he likes to joke and cover his own insecurity with joking, so it's difficult to make a character like that too dark. I think with Spider-Man, if you want to make him dark, the best way to do that is to put him in a dark spot with villains, because his villains can be really really dark.


Like KRAVEN'S LAST HUNT.

Yeah, he can be a counterpoint to that, so you can have a dark story with Spider-Man, but Batman is a much more serious dark character. I think so much so that you can actually spoof that a little bit and that's when you get to something a little more campy, and it still works. Now, a character like Superman, he's all good, so much so that — Superman's an icon, obviously, but I don't think he has the same dimensions Batman has. He doesn't have the same internal conflict. That's the stuff that really makes Batman.

Final product. The cylinders are there to
illustrate how he shades.

Any interest in doing the lighter Batman stuff? You have a really dark style. Any interest in doing the exact opposite?

No, not really. When I first decided I wanted to get into comics, it was Marc Silvestri, Jim Lee, Jae Lee, Simon Bisley... that's the stuff I really gravitated to. We were just talking about James Jean today, and I'm a huge fan of James Jean and a huge fan of a lot of the much more cartoony artists — Humberto Ramos I love — but whenever I think about the kind of work that grabs me the most, the kind of work I want to do is always something darker, so that's probably where I'm going to stay. I always want to grow and not just do the same things, but at the same time, I have to stay true to who I am.


Is there an animated series from your childhood that you may have an affinity for, maybe something you'd like to do in the comics?

I guess the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. That would be fun.

Yeah, and they're darker in the comics, so it would fit your style.

Yeah. You know, now you have me seriously thinking about it.


Who's your favorite Turtle?

They all look the same.

What do you think of the Philippines?

I think it's been great so far. We went out for lunch today, after that interview earlier. It was great, we had all Filipino dishes.

(to Jaime Daez, the owner of Fully Booked) Where'd you take him?

Abe.

It was great. We had pigskin.

Chicharon.

Oh, how'd that taste?

It was great. It was really good!

Oh, right, you like bacon!

(laughter) It's a huge, huge city. This is my first time in the Philippines, and it's my first time in Asia, so it's really been kind of a thrill.

Here's the drawing he did the second day.
Admittedly, he hates drawing feet.