Few creators in comics history have been the beneficiaries of an adoration for their work as most collectors hold for John Byrne's run on the X-Men. Following a wonderful run by Dave Cockrum, Byrne (in collaboration with inker Terry Austin) launched Uncanny X-Men into the stratosphere. From that point, Byrne parlayed his success into lengthy runs illustrating the Fantastic Four and then on to DC where he was allowed to revamp the Superman mythos. At times controversial, Byrne never shied from either the spotlight or from speaking his mind (or from creative decisions such as his dismantling of the Vision).
Today I am featuring sketches of Marvel characters (and thanks to the various owners of these pieces for making them available on the Web); perhaps at some future point we'll take a look at some DC characters as rendered by Byrne.
From the standpoint of my own satisfaction, I tended to enjoy Byrne's work most when he had an inker who would exert some degree of positive influence. Whether Joe Sinnott, Austin, Bob Layton, or Dick Giordano, I wanted an inker to add some boldness to Byrne's lines. During his Fantastic Four tenure, and then on into some creator-owned projects like Next Men, I felt that Byrne left to his own devices could produce work that seemed a bit scratchy. My eyes prefer "polished", and that is what Austin, et al. lent to Byrne's pencils. Feel free to disagree with me in the comments below.
Onward!
This is me feeling free to disagree; since there are few other comics artists whose work I like as much as Byrne's, there's very little of his art I've seen that I did not like. While I'll readily acknowledge that Byrne and Austin in particular are an artistic match made in heaven, and Giordano, Rubinstein, Palmer or, say, Mark Farmer are almost at that same level of divinity, I also like the stuff he inked himself quite. And off the top of my head, I can't think of any other inkers who so overpowered his work that it was 'ruined' (heck, I even like that issue of Spectacular Spider-man, #58, with Byrne's pencils inked by Colletta).
ReplyDeleteBy the way, Doug, thanks for taking the effort to find these images and post them. Even after all the time I've spent browsing the galleries at Byrne Robotics and other sites, you've managed to find a few I'd never seen before.
Thanks for the comment Edo. Yes - you and I have a long history with certain eras of Byrne art (Walter Simonson, too). I love that we're always able to have discourse civilly!
DeleteI am not familiar with the Spectacular Spider-Man issue, but it sounds intriguing enough that I shall try to find some pages online. Thanks for the heads-up!
Doug
Yeah, I liked Byrne's work on X-men and of course FF and Shulkie. Edo mentioned the Spidey stories Byrne did in the Bronze Age, which I thought were great. (Although the less said about later stuff like Chapter One the better, in my opinion.) Being Canadian, I liked his Alpha Flight stuff too ... still the definitive version for me.
ReplyDeleteI haven't seen much of Byrne's DC work except Man of Steel (which didn't really do much for me) and Legends (which I liked).
Mike, later on I'll feature some line work from John Byrne's DC output. It's also pretty awesome.
DeleteDoug
Ah Doug, more wonderful images to admire. You've brought a smile to my face this evening!
ReplyDeleteByrne may be my favorite artist in comics. He could draw anyone, and anything, with a style and vivaciousness that very few others could match. I'd agree that his later work could get a bit 'less polished, but it still satisfied. I loved his run on Fantastic Four. Loved his Alpha Flight. Inkers? Austin, obviously, first choice. Layton was sharp on that Hulk Annual.
I'll go out on a limb here and say my least favorite Byrne inker was Joe Sinnott. Certainly not bad, but Joltin Joe seemed, to me, to pretty heavily cover over Byrne's style.
One more Byrne apocrypha- perhaps my greatest regret from my collection sell off in the 90's: parting with my Byrne/DeZuniga original art page from Marvel Team-up. Had Spidey, Thor, Havok, and was absolutely stunning.
Yep, Red, for me Byrne is in the company of a select few artists who seem to be able to draw pretty much any character if not perfectly, than 'on spec.' Others I'd put in that category are George Perez, Jose Luis Garcia Lopez (PBHN) and Alan Davis.
DeleteHi, Redartz -
ReplyDeleteJohn Buscema's my guy, but Byrne is certainly lurking near the top for me. I've generally liked everything he's touched - visually. Sometimes the decisions he's made as a writer have been irksome.
Doug
Hi Doug, that Milleresque Wolverine is a surprise. Everything else looks like classic Byrne - smooth, soft, rounded - but that Logan sketch is stark, angular and graphic. Richard.
ReplyDelete