Tom Brevoort

Prince Valiant by Hal Foster
#comicstrip #princevaliant #arthuriana #middleages #comicstrips

Today's #XMenMonday is delayed until tomorrow morning. Be sure to visit @aiptcomics.com then for Peach Momoko and other artistic superstars discussing the upcoming 'Sai: Dimensional Rivals'! #XMen #MarvelRivals

The original Captain Marvel and Flash Gordon movie tunics.

I thought about Louise Jones, but she would have still been too new at Warren for them to have handed her Superman.

I think the resistance wasn’t to hiring Marvel talent, it would have been more about trying to ape Marvel’s approach. That was the problem they had with Kirby, he wasn’t doing things the DC way, whereas Len mostly stayed inside the lines.

I think, much like at Marvel, if he proved that he had sales chops they would have let him try. Might have done so nervously, but it would have been cost of doing business.

But there were certainly more modern guys who might have been able to do FLASH on hand.

Yeah, I don’t know what I would have put him in at that point. He was very much out of vogue going into the 80s, so it’s tough to find him a home in the line.

True, but if DC was offering them Superman, they’d have to assume that Julie was going to be losing it regardless of whether they took it. So they might have asked about Julie, or they might not.

It definitely could have been. I’m just slightly skeptical given how much resistance there was to Marshall, whose storytelling was wilder than DC liked but whose finish was slick. Frank strikes me as being like that but without the polish on the finish. But since we’re simply imagining, sure.

Much like at Marvel, they certainly don’t let him write it at first. After he proved his bona fides, though, possibly he may have won the trust of some editor enough to get to try writing.

It’s also possible and even likely that as Sol got nearer to retirement, he cared less. So let Jeanette do whatever crazy thing she wants, won’t be my problem when it crashes, if it does.

Possibly so. But as I try to think that way and look over the landscape of available options, I don’t really see an obvious path to victory, especially working with the knowledge of the era. I’m sure it could have been done, but I’m pretty good at this and I don’t really see it until 1980 or so.

Marv I think DC was more interested in as a writer than an editor. Len too, but they’d were happier to take him on editorially to get the part they wanted. I don’t think there would have been enough confidence in either to hand them Superman to edit.

I hate to put it this way, but I think it was the nostalgic drive that put Carmine back on the series that doomed the book.

I agree totally. Whether they’d have always gone along with what Stan wanted to do is a separate question. But they’d have wanted him to have a big impact fast, and there was no bigger impact he could have had on 70s DC.

I think that makes sense in retrospect, but not at the time. Miller’s work was always more stylized than what DC considered mainstream, even in those days. Frank would have needed a powerful advocate (like he got with Shooter at Marvel). Alex looks like a way safer bet.

My guess would be that Jeanette liked him.

I don’t have any proof, but just by the timing of it, I expect that he may have been. He was always relatively vocal about his disdain for Marvel’s “inferior product”, so it seems like if you wanted to chase Marvel, you’d need to do so covertly.

At that time, the Bat-books weren’t seen as being as crucial as the Superman books, though. I don’t see it as likely that they’d have given them to a relative newcomer. Too big a risk.

BC: DETECTIVE COMICS #441

There would typically be some specific reason why I asked to borrow a particular comic book from my grade school friend Donald Sims. Usually, it was because I'd gotten interested in a specific character and was invested in learning more about them. So it was with this…

BHOC: ACTION COMICS #497

Despite the overwhelming global popularity of SUPERMAN THE MOVIE, DC for years refused to make any but the most cursory moves towards reflecting that iteration of the Man of Steel in the comics. It's really wasn't until Post-CRISIS when John Byrne took over the character…

Thinking back to that time, I think it was likely the death, and the fact that it was so unexpected and shocking. The fans suddenly were paying attention to a series where nothing really of note had changed in years. Of course, they also drifted away quickly when nothing much changed thereafter.

Yeah, that's still a bit of a pop, so it is noteworthy.

I don't disagree. I suspect that the hope was that they could train up some home-grown new talent, especially with a bunch of their mainstays like Novick and Dillin getting on in years. And Ross giving artistic feedback seems like a solid mentorship arrangement, even if it didn't quite work out.

Oh I agree, but between Sol departing and the focus shifting more to the fan-oriented Direct market, that's where you really see a sustained effort. Prior to that, it feels like different people dabble with the notion at different times, but nobody's truly committed to it.

But I think another aspect of this question is the artwork. again, if Jenette had succeeded in luring John Buscema to DC, he could have helped modernize Superman even with the same coterie of writers.

...he might have been a viable option. Not saying that he'd have fared well with it, but he had the sort of pedigree where you could see hem trusting him to take a crack at it. Otherwise, I don't really see another viable contender on the editorial side.

As I look over the playing field, I see only a scant few viable options, especially since Superman was the crown jewel of the place and bringing in an outsider to helm it would have set off shockwaves among the staff. I think that if they'd managed to lure Stan over to DC in the early 70s...

I’d have to look at the sales numbers to confirm that, but I also think those were short-term gains that did some lasting damage long-term. So I can’t really pronounce it a success.