Wayne Markley

by Wayne Markley

This time out I am going to return to a more upbeat subject and look at some of my favorite adventure strips from years gone by from newspapers that have been collected in hardcover collections in recent years. But, before I get to these great books, many of which I have discussed in the past, I would like to say a few words about my last column which a few people told me was too negative. I try to be fair and honest in this column and as a general rule if I do not care for something I just do not review it or mention it. But I still stand by my complaints about Justice League last time. Having read issue number five this week, I was pleased to see there are only two splash pages, instead of five, but if you average out the number of panels per page for the entire book, it comes out to almost three panels a page. I am not asking for Matt Wagner’s 16 panels to a page, but three? Plus there are four inkers and three colorists on this issue, and it was still a week late. This shows you how late the book was really running at one point. It is still a beautiful looking book even with multiple inkers and colorists, and it is a very good story, but again for $3.99, I cannot recommend it. One last thing that Timbotron (who has a very good comics review column at http://comicperday.blogspot.com/) pointed out to me is splash pages sell for a great deal more on the original comic art market than a standard page does. Not that this is a reason as to why DC has so many splash pages lately, but I would not rule it out as a factor. Now on to some positive stuff!

Scorchy Smith and the Art of Noel Sickles

I mentioned a few column back the amazing collection of Noel Sickles Scorchy Smith conveniently called Scorchy Smith and the Art of Noel Sickles. Noel Sickles is largely forgotten by today’s comic and comic strip fans even though he was very influential on Milt Caniff (who shared a studio with Sickles) and many others. Given the time period he was doing Scorchy Smith, 1933, his work is downright amazing. Over the three years Sickles did Scorchy Smith, all of which is reprinted in this beautiful oversized hardcover, you can see how his own art style developed. His work is almost the opposite of what Foster and Raymond were doing in terms of illustration, yet it was perfect for the non-stop adventure stories he was telling, almost like watching a movie in pictures. It is a rip roaring adventure strip that has you turning page after page because the action never stops. It is a shame that after three years on the Scorchy strip Sickles left to do commercial art and other projects not related to comics for the rest of his life. But those three years are breathtaking when read in one sitting.

Complete Terry & the Pirates

Speaking of Sickles, his office mate, Milt Caniff, is another master of the adventure strip. I could not talk about great adventure strips without mentioning Terry and the Pirates. One can see a great deal of Scorchy Smith in the early Terry and the Pirates, in tone and pacing, but Milt Caniff quickly struck out into completely different territory with this strip about soldiers of fortune who traveled the world in search of adventure and a dollar. The stories here are high adventure, with Terry and the gang in constant danger and trouble in the most exotic places. What really makes this strip is Caniff’s constantly involving storytelling and his innovative villains. It is different from Scorchy, yet it has the same rapid pacing and page turning storytelling that Scorchy had. It is very hard to read Terry and the Pirates and not get sucked into it and spending a whole day reading one volume. IDW has conveniently collected the complete run of Milt Caniff’s Terry in six beautiful volumes. While on the topic of Caniff, I want to once again remind readers that the first volume of the complete Steve Canyon recently came out. Steve Canyon is very different than Terry in terms of pacing and the type of stories, but they are just as good.

The Complete Dick Tracy

One of the longest running comic strips out there, and I think one of the most misunderstood is Dick Tracy. Over the almost 80 years the strip has been running it has had its ups and downs. There have been some periods of the strip where I scratch my head and wonder what they were trying to do. But luckily IDW has been reprinting the complete Dick Tracy, so far up to 1950s, and it is great. If you only know Dick Tracy from the movies or the walkie talkie wrist watches or the hokey cartoon from the 60s, then you are missing out. The early work by Chester Gould was a straight adventure strip with cops and robbers. It was about kidnapping, murder, blackmail, and standard material that makes up prime time crime television every night. The strip chugs along at a quick pace and never gets boring. By the mid-1940s Gould had started to ramp up an idea he played around with in the early years, that of the deranged and twisted villain with a gimmick, such as Pruneface or the Mole, or any number of other villains. At this point, in the 1950s, the strip was at its peak in that it was filled with wild and crazy villains, and action packed storytelling and does not have the sillier aspects that crept into the later strips.

Rip Kirby

Another four volume set that is fantastic reading is the complete Alex Raymond’s Rip Kirby. Raymond was a master draftsman who was well known for his beautiful work on Flash Gordon, (now being collected in stunning full color hardcovers), but to me, Rip Kirby was his finest work. Rip Kirby was a detective in the traditional sense. He was more Ellery Queen than Dick Tracy. He solved cases with his head (and occasionally with his fists) and there were always beautiful women by his side and with Alex Raymond drawing them, how could they not be beautiful? Rip Kirby is not an adrenalin thrilled rush like Scorchy or Terry, but it is a stroll through a beautiful world where you have to think and follow the story which can be a challenge as the artwork is so beautiful it is easy to forget what you had just read.

X-9: Secret Agent Corrigan

And finally, we have the first three volumes of the complete Archie Goodwin/Al Williamson Secret Agent Corrigan. This is planned to be a six volume collection reprinting all of the Secret Agent Corrigan strips Goodwin/Williamson did together. (And I hope they reprint George Evens’ work on it after Williamson left). Secret Agent Corrigan is another newspaper strip that goes back to the 1930s, originally called Secret Agent X and drawn by that Alex Raymond fellow. But by the time Goodwin and Williamson took over the strip it was the late 1960s. I have often argued that in addition to being one of the nicest people to have ever worked in comics, Archie Goodwin was one of the best writers in comics. He effortlessly tells stories ranging from Bigfoot in one tale to a mad scientist in the next to a femme fatale threating the security of America in the third story. All are told seamlessly and flow like a beautifully woven rug. Al Williamson is at his best here. Well, it is hard to find a bad Williamson story, but with Secret Agent Corrigan he brings a realistic style that is a marvel to look at. Be it the jungles of South America to downtown Washington DC to Moscow, you feel as if you are there. The pacing of these stories is more akin to Rip Kirby, where it is a story being told, and not a race to finish an adventure, but it is a journey that everyone should take.

That is if for this time. As always I thank you for your time in reading this blog and for your comments and e-mails. Opinions written here are mine and do not reflect the thoughts of Westfield or their employees, though I doubt anyone would argue these columns suggestions. I hope if you find yourself with some extra money you try one of these collections. I am sure you will be glad you did. Comments, feedback, review copies are welcome and can be sent to MFBWAY@AOL.COM.

Thank you.