--Link-- Bissette on Charlton monsters

Steve Bissette has a post up about some of the Charlton monster mags and comics of the early 1960s, including Ditko's work in MAD MONSTERS #1 and his KONGA and GORGO comics.

Ditko on... Mercy

That's what Mr. A said.

Splash - Footsteps at Midnight

originally from Amazing Adult Fantasy #14 [1962]

Micronauts Annual #1 [1979]

The Micronauts were a toyline that spawned a surprisingly long-running Marvel comic. Steve Ditko teamed up with writer Bill Mantlo for a trio of issues from 1979 to 1982, as well as several stories featuring the Captain Universe concept, which spins out of events in the comic. Ditko's works on the title first in this annual, which has three short stories telling some of the backstory of the main characters, I gather leading directly to the early issues of the regular series.  I don't think I ever read a Micronauts story other than those by Ditko, but since this one goes back to the beginning, and Mantlo provides the needed exposition, it reads pretty well.

Each of the three stories is 11 pages, including an introductory splash page featuring the narrator, "Time Traveler, emissary of the Enigma Force".  The first story is "Timestream", and features explorer Arcturus Rann and his robot companion Biotron on the final day of their 1000 year exploration of the Microverse, when they encounter a long-dead world in the Force Nexus with a single resident, the armoured Galactic Defender.  I'm sure all that makes sense to someone.  Anyway, the point is that Ditko's art is well suited to this story, with lots of weird space scenes, alien landscapes and some especially good work on the Galactic Defender character, who rapidly ages once his helmet is shattered.

The previous story ends with Rann heading back to Homeworld, where the next story takes place.  "Coup" follows the royal family of Homeworld, and lays out some of the events that lead to Baron Karza successfully executing the coup of the title, killing the king and queen, sending their children Mari and Argon on the run. The final story, "Arena of Death" follows two prisoners who had a cameo in the previous story, Price Acroyear and Bug, as they're forced to fight various beasts in an arena for the amusement of Baron Karza. Ditko does a good job with this combination sci-fi/fantasy milieu, and his style works well with the characters, who are pretty well designed for a bunch of toys.

Ditko also does a 2-page spread of the characters in the regular series, including Captain Universe, and plugging and upcoming appearance by the Fantastic Four and their old villain Psychoman, and does the cover for the issue. This is a surprisingly entertaining comic for something called MICRONAUTS ANNUAL #1, with 36 pages of quality Ditko pencils and inks.  The introductory splash pages are especially well designed.

Who's Who - The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #20 [1986]

Of the various Ditko creations for DC, Shade is probably the most Ditkoesque. A very inventive series, with a lot of great imagery, a constant stream of new ideas and a lot of potential.

He made a brief return to that world for this profile page almost a decade after it was abruptly cut short (with one completed issue still not published, and I'm sure plans for more). A nice taste of just some of the stunning visuals that Ditko designed for the book.

Who's Who - The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #22 [1986]

Ditko returns to Starman about six years after he'd spent a year chronicling the adventures of Prince Gavyn in the pages of ADVENTURE COMICS, along with Romeo Tanghal, his inker on those stories.

Starman's a really nice Ditko design, as were his supporting characters, as this design with the vignettes in the background show.

I also really like Tanghal's inks on this one, which are a definite step up from his inks on the original run. He was okay then, but it's clear from this that he'd learned quite a bit (I'm sure spending much of that time inking George Perez helped), and this is just a gorgeous piece of work.

E-Man #4 [1974]

One of my favourite Ditko stories of all time is this 8-page gem, the second of the two Killjoy stories to appear in the back of E-MAN in the 1970s. I'm not sure exactly how I wound up with a few issues of E-MAN a few years later (maybe around 1982?), but I did, and I loved them. The lead stories were fun enough, but I found this strange unsigned backup feature especially captivating, and is probably the biggest reason I didn't stick with Ditko's mainstream stuff, but sought out the more off-the-beaten-trail works.

Still a pre-teen, I really didn't know comic book history, but I think I knew enough at the time to recognize that this was the drawn by the guy who did those Doctor Strange stories I liked, and I think I'd read his Starman by that point, maybe a few Spider-man stories. But this was just plain strange. Killjoy has this great costume, pure red and black, with a theatrical comedy mask, who just leaps into the scene of a crime, every bit as acrobatic as Spider-Man, beats up the bad-guys without a word and vanishes. Visually quite amazing, but it's the other characters who make the story. Killer Ded, an armed-to-the-teeth gunman who Killjoy keeps defeating handily, upset that he's been taken alive, and then escaping jail vowing not to be taken alive again. Muggers with weird dialogue like "I'm a $ have not, you are a $ have!". The slippery S.S.S. Snake, who manages to escape Killjoy, giving much joy to Mr. Hart and Mr. Sole, who walk around talking about the rights of criminals. The dozen diamond-themed villains who crash the last diamond heist. There's a lot of quality strangeness in just 8 pages. In here, Ditko manages to hit a lot of the same points he does in his Mr. A and Avenging World stuff of the era, but with a succinctness and humour that those often lack.

As I said, a favourite of mine, I've read it dozens of times and it never grows old. Fortunately, Ditko got the rights to Killjoy at some point, so this story, and the first Killjoy story from E-MAN #2 (which I read later, so isn't quite as close to my heart, but still great) have been slightly revised and reprinted a few times (including THE DITKO PACKAGE #1 [1989]). It's untitled in the original form, titled "Killjoy and Killer Ded" for one of the reprints. Ditko did a new Killjoy story a few years back but it felt quite different (for one thing, Killjoy talked. A lot...).

Who's Who - The Definitive Directory of the DC Universe #21 [1986]

Another of the four profile pages for this series that Ditko provided, this time he returns to Stalker, the short-lived fantasy character he had done a decade earlier with Paul Levitz and Wallace Wood. Levitz is a contributing writer to the issue, so may have had a hand in the write-up. Wood, of course, was sadly no longer around by then to complete the reunion, so original series editor, and damn fine artist in his own right Joe Orlando provided the inks, and makes me wish that was a combination we'd seen on at least one story.

Great bold central figure, and while the story vignettes are a bit cluttered (and with off-register colour), they nicely capture the fantasy world that the creators had only began to explore when the series was cancelled.