A**holes and opinions.

So, a few days back I referenced a recent column by Erik Larsen up at CBR.com.

I like Erik Larsen, not that I know him personally or anything. I mainly know him through the aforementioned column and some dim memories of his run on Spider Man. It’s not as if I’m a Savage Dragon fan (although I do have this Image Anniversary book with a Savage Dragon story in it).

During this year’s New York Comicon, I was wandering around the floor at one point and just happened to bump into Erik Larsen (speaking to another pro at the Image booth). I introduced myself and told him what a fan I am of the column. Specifically I really liked one column he wrote (you can read it here).

Erik, a guy who is around my age, has a lot of common experiences of comics I have. When he writes about a comics-related topic, it’s similar to those days long ago when I would excitedly talk comics with friends and peers. Anyway, I put up a link to a column and I got a comment. Rather than bury the thing, I felt it deserved to be out in the main body of the blog:

Your article, as well as Larsens essay, is stuff that has been tossed around the internet by Vin-haters for years. In our conversations, as well as in the article, I am surprised that Erik has given Colletta as much credit as he has, actually. My blog is the flip side of the coin-mostly because I am not one of these goofballs who thinks they are being “fashionable” by knocking Colletta. I’m glad I started posting, it seems there are a shitload of people who loved his work that were actually sacared to profess it!

Regards, Dan McFan
http://ismarkevaniermentallyill.blogspot.com

Now, flattered as I am, what I wrote wasn’t much of an article being more of a pointer to Larsen’s column – a column I read and found pretty balanced.

Larsen talked about a prevalent view of someone’s body of work (Vince Colletta’s), went back and tried to put it into a better context. He didn’t approach the subject with the unreasonable passion of a fan, in fact he tried to break it down on a more adult level. At one point, he even went as far as to say how his earlier opinions of Colletta’s work may have been greatly off the mark.

In essence, he admitted he was wrong and how over the years and in the context of his own experiences as a working professional, he had come to have a better appreciation and greater respect of Colletta’s lot it terms of the demands and sacrifices he had to make to meet his deadlines and keep food on the table.

When I got the comment with an inference I was a ‘Vin-hater,’ it seemed a little bit of an overreaction. I don’t take these things to heart though and I felt (like I do in most instances) all voices deserve to be heard. I’m glad the guy in question took the time out to comment! I like it when people comment, good or bad.

Personally, I even have enough of a sense of humor to appreciate the guy’s blog address: is mark evanier mentally ill (seems like there should be a question mark there).

Yet, the ‘Vin-hater’ thing was a bit off-putting so, in my ‘defense,’ I wanted to a back and forth email I had with someone shortly after I published the entry:

Peej-

Coletta gets a lot more kicks in the ass than he deserves, in my opinion. One of the first times I saw his work was over Joe Orlando in DD #2. I thought it was a little too sketchy, especially compared to Kirby inked by Chick Stone, Dick Ayers or Geo Bell. And I was convinced that Ditko was so tits that nobody compared with him! Ditko was hands down my favorite super hero comic book artist. Until he got weird later on.

But people forget that this work was never supposed to see the light of day again after publication. It was supposed to be disposable. Maybe it might be reprinted in a 25 cent Annual, a new publishing concept at the time in the early ’60s. But would this work be looked upon as art? No way — these were comic books for goodness sake!

It’s very easy to sing the praises of all things Kirby, so maybe it’s Coletta’s unfortunate association with the King that places him under such a harsh light. Tell the truth; you really wouldn't give a crap if he eff'ed up an inking job by Don Perlin or Paul Reinman, but poor Coletta had to be assigned to the King.

I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that Coletta had to bang out a late delivery from Joe Orlando to Marvel on DD #2. Things happen. It’s hard to crank out penciled pages when you’re trying to raise a young family. Most people don’t realize how much concentration and physical time it takes to produce storytelling. It’s a real pain in the ass. And most of the time you’re drawing a story by a writer that you'd never concoct for yourself to illustrate. It ain’t easy. Or always enjoyable. But in the days when Mr. Coletta was slinging ink it was a good job for a kid who wanted to be an artist. Nothing more, nothing less.

Thank god for people like Kirby, Eisner, and Ditko, who showed what you could achieve artistically. But for every Kirby or Eisner or Ditko there were thirty other guys out there hacking it out. Slinging ink.

If comic book history were put in its context, it would be a lot kinder on the likes of Mr. Vince Coletta.

Take care pal,
*****

Hey *****,

I’ve heard various things about Colletta through the years.

I found Larsen’s column interesting not because of any particular reason other than the fact that I saw a lot of Vince Colletta inking while I was growing up on comics.

Some of it I liked and some of it, not so much.

I can remember him inking Sal Buscema and not minding the output so much. I don’t have a strong opinion either way about his run on Thor over Kirby and I seem to remember him being paired off with George Tuska a lot (maybe Iron Man?). I also
remember seeing him do a lot of those horror books from the seventies as well.

Some people you wind up liking and some people you just can’t stand (in terms of their work). It has to do with your own personal preference more than anything else. I could never really like Don Heck’s work, there was something about it that just always rubbed me the wrong way. When Frank Robbins took over Captain America I was absolutely horrified.

I did like the context Larsen put things in though. The fact that although he worked to a certain level, he met his deadlines and that was what separated him from the amateurs. It’s something that is even more relevant in today’s comic book industry where people can’t meet a deadline to save their life.

Kind of amazing when you think about it – comics is perhaps the only business where they ALLOW people to blow deadlines!

Understand, I find myself moving away from the whole “comic book’ thing - a New Year’s resolution was to end the weekly fix of buying comics and 6 months in it’s stuck. Now to get rid of the many boxes of them I have lying around here!

On another note, I had heard through our mutual acquaintance at one point that Colletta... (I’ve edited this because it’s not right to publicly give credence to unfounded rumors) Again, other than the story I heard through BP I have nothing to confirm this.

You know as more time goes on, I think comics missed out somewhere along the line by becoming the specialty product it now is - there is something to be said for those newsprint treasures of our youth.

PJ

At the end of the day, I’m a bit amazed of what seems to be controversy over Colletta’s work. As much as I’ve enjoyed comics over the years, I wasn’t aware of any particular bias before now. I will say though that even though Vince Colletta is gone over seventeen years now, it’s nice to see he still has his defenders.

I like that.

Fortunately though opinions are like... well you probably know where I’m going. The bottom line is it’s not worth getting upset about.