No shortage of Ditko stuff in print, but that still leaves a lot of stuff eventually needing reprinting in a nice bookshelf friendly format. Eventually I'm sure we'll see them all, but which would you like to see sooner rather than later? Assume all collections will be complete (Shade including the unpublished #9, Creeper including the unpublished Showcase #106, Speedball including all the scattered short stories). If I somehow missed the one book you'd most like to see, yell at me in the comments.
I'd like to see the Charlton Action heroes reprinted again, this time with decent reproduction--laser scans from the original comics, if necessary. It's horrible that my fraying old copy of Mysterious Suspense # 1 has superior line reproduction to the Archives reprint (and off the topic, they should include the Kaler/Aparo Nightshade stories, and DC should acquire or lease the right and reprint Pete Morisi's Thunderbolt, too). Turning to stuff that hasn't been reprinted yet, I'd definitely like to see a color collection of the best of Ditko's charlton work, a Ditko-only collection of his pre-super-hero Marvel work, and one you didn't mention--Stalker, possibly my favorite of Ditko's series from the 70's. And, oh, yes, quality reproductions of his Creeper and Hawk and Dove stories.
ReplyDeleteMy favs would be:
ReplyDelete* Shade (including #9)
* Creeper (including the stuff you mention)
* Anything he's created on his own that's not yet published (stories or essays)
* Starman
* Speedball
* Warren stuff
* Dr. Strange (something like the Spiderman Omnibus of just Ditko's run on the Doc).
His stuff at Tower have been collected already in the THUNDER Agents Archives, so not interested.
I won't mind seeing collection of H&D, Stalker, Gorgo/Konga, Charlton short stories or the like.
I agree about the comments about the Action Heroes archives. I wished they'd included the Nighshade stories. And I want them to go on and collect the other characters like Peacemaker (including the unpublished #6), Thunderbolt, and Judomaster.
Definitely want to see Shade collected, especially now that they've done a *hardback* collection of Kirby's OMAC (OMAC and Shade had a lot of parallels, I think).
ReplyDeleteAh, Stalker. Ditko only did pencils, but Wally Wood inks over Ditko pencils were a surprisingly nice combination!
I'd like to see a collection of all the short stories that Ditko did for DC in the late 1970s/early 1980s for their mystery & sci-fi titles. (The book could also add the two tales he did for Strange Adventures in 1966 at the beginning of the book, just to be completist.) I only have about half of those Ditko-drawn DC mystery/sci-fi tales myself and it would be nice to have them ALL in one volume. Perhaps such a collection would also cause a reassessment of that work -- causing people to notice it (e.g., "Wow, I didn't know about all these stories... like, "Em, The Energy Monster!" ") and have more appreciation for it.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I was pretty disappointed in a lot of things with the ACTION HEROES books, after getting over just being happy to have some of that stuff (the early Captain Atoms and the stuff that only showed up in 1970s fan publications especially). Hopefully in a few years ago they'll be ready for a second go-round and do it right.
ReplyDeleteRe-reading some of the non-series DC stuff was what inspired the poll, actually. I'd love it if DC committed to set of everything Ditko ever drew for them, like how their current wave of Kirby hardcovers share a trade dress. Ditko's work for DC comes up to about 1150 pages, so four books (v1:Creeper, v2:Shade, v3:Assorted DC Universe stuff, v4:non-series short stories) should do it nicely.
Results for the poll. Nothing too surprising, I expected Shade to come out first. Mr. A I thought would do a bit better, but he got most of his votes early.
ReplyDeleteOddly, one of the ones with no votes is the most likely to see a reprint next year...
Shade, The Chaging Man 17 (44%)
Best of Charlton Short Stories - 1967-1978 16 (42%)
Ditko at Warren 15 (39%)
Beware the Creeper 12 (31%)
Mr. A 11 (28%)
Uncollected Creator Owned Work 9 (23%)
DC Short Stories - 1975-1982 8 (21%)
Stalker 6 (15%)
The Hawk and The Dove 6 (15%)
Konga 5 (13%)
Uncollected Essays 5 (13%)
ROM 4 (10%)
Starman 4 (10%)
Ditko at Valiant 3 (7%)
Gorgo 3 (7%)
Machine Man 3 (7%)
Ditko at Atlas-Seaboard 2 (5%)
Ditko's THUNDER Agents 2 (5%)
Micronauts 2 (5%)
Speedball 2 (5%)
Ditko/Trapani at ACG 1 (2%)
Battlemania 0 (0%)
Ditko at Topps 0 (0%)
Indiana Jones 0 (0%)
I read on Tony Isabella's page that DC bought the rights to the Archie Superheroes. If this includes the orginal art & stories, I wouldn't mind seeing Ditko's short run on "The Fly". A nice Archives edition could include it along with the original Kirby/Simon stories.
ReplyDeleteNot sure if they bought or licensed them.
ReplyDeleteIt also unclear what, if any, reprints we'll see of the older material. There was a discussion on this at the DC Comics forums.
forgive me for leaving a comment on an unrelated topic to this posting but since you have talked about Dikto's work on ROM Spaceknight i'd be curious to know what you think about this posting:
ReplyDeletehttp://romspaceknightart.blogspot.com/2010/08/how-steve-dikto-all-but-ruined-rom-for.html