Sunday, July 23, 2023

Sunday Splash Page #280

 
"Master at Work," in Joe Kubert Presents #1, by Joe Kubert

A six-issue mini-series that was released shortly after Kubert's death, this was a collection of things Kubert wished he saw more of in comics at the time. At least, that's how he presents it in a text piece in the middle of issue 1. He raised that question with Paul Levitz, and Levitz offered him the chance to put together just such a book.

In practice, that means less superheroes, more war and pulp stories. Sam Glanzman has a U.S.S. Stevens feature in every issue, Kubert and Levitz pen a sort of Sgt. Rock story in issue 5. Kubert has three chapters of someone called "The Redeemer", who is destined to be reborn through time, but if he can avoid corruption, will eventually end all pain and suffering. The character only has vague dreams of his past lives, so the story is framed more through the attempts of the wizened, dark wizard looking "Evil One" to corrupt the Redeemer.

Even the Hawkman story that kicks things off feels more like a sci-fi pulp, with a few pages devoted to Katar and Shayera just flying around on Thanagar before heading to Earth and getting mixed up in an ivory poaching thing. Definitely feels like a pulp story there, right down to the less-than-great depiction of the African natives in the story. Hawkman as the guy who has to explain you shouldn't trust people who want to economically exploit your home, yeesh.

Kubert, Brian Vendetti and Jason Wright put together a Kamandi story in the final issue, that guest stars Etrigan. There's another Kubert story that's more like a horror tale, about a biker who lost a leg serving in Afghanistan, who seeks shelter in an abandoned house for the night. The plots aren't the most tightly scripted things, feels like you have to make certain jumps at times, but they capture a particular vibe pretty well.

Brian Buniak has an Angel and the Ape mystery that runs through the each issue. That one is more of an attempt at a humor comic, with a lot of sight gags, parodies (the leads are annoyed by a snoopy reporter of the "Daily Times Herald World Star Gazette Tribune" named Noel Kurt) and one-liners. Also plenty of cheesecake in the art, but the tone makes for a change of pace from the other features.

Other than the Kamandi story, Kubert draws all the features he writes (and the Sgt. Rock story, which Levitz writes). Most of them are recognizably his art. That thin line, the diagonal skritches for shadowing, lanky limbed heroes who look like they were carved out of stone (I hadn't realized how much Kubert's style seems to influence Tim Truman's until reading this.) Kubert's protagonists aren't the most heavily muscled, but they seem like the toughest because there's nothing soft on them. All of that has been worn away by life or circumstance.

The exception is "Spit" the feature about a homeless orphan that joins a whaling ship for lack of better options. Kubert does that on what looks like grey paper, with lines much thicker and darker than his usual. I want to say he did it in charcoal, but I'm pretty sure that's wrong, and I can't find anything in the mini-series where he discusses it. (There is a bit on the last page of the final issue where Pete Carlsson describes Joe's process for coloring his own work.)

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