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Topic: Unheralded/Under-rated Greats Post ReplyPost New Topic
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John Wickett
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 5:53am | IP Logged | 1 post reply

Who are the most overlooked or under rated artists?  I’ll start with 3 from the Bronze Age:

Jose Luis Garcia Lopez- certainly well known and respected, but to me he deserves to be in the top 10 or 12 of all time.  He’s hampered by the fact that he’s missing a signature run on a monthly title, and many of his best jobs are overlooked due to poor writing.  

Check out his Deadman stories from Adventure Comics, or the 1986 mini series.  IMO he’s the only artist who’s ever made Deadman look as good as Neal Adams did.  Also Atari Force- not very popular because it was a licensed property that was outside the DCU, but the issues by JLGL are beautifully drawn. 

Trevor Von Eeden- drew backups in Detective Comics and World’s Finest. Also the 1983 Green Arrow mini series.  I think he gets overlooked because he didn’t draw in the house style that was popular then.  To me Von Eeden, rather than Grell, is the definitive Green Arrow artist.  His Batman is beautiful too. 

Mike Nasser- his body of work for the big two is small, and he is generally seen as just a Neal Adams clone, but boy his 70s DC stuff looked great!  Some of the stuff I remember him on- a Martian Manhunter backup strip that bounced around in multiple titles and ended with a full length story in WF.  Unfortunately Nasser didn’t draw the finale.  His J’onn was definitive, and his Hawkman was great.  He also did the last issue or two of Kobra; including a Batman vs Kobra story that appeared in one of DC’s anthologies.  Definitely worth picking up.  

Honorable mention:

Jim Aparo- best known for Batman and Aquaman.  Loved him on The Brave and the Bold.  Ironically I never cared for his version of Batman because the cowl never looked quite right to me.  But his depictions of virtually every other hero to guest star in that book are among my favorites.  Wildcat, Plastic Man, Atom, and Mister Miracle all shined. 
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Doug Centers
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 6:18am | IP Logged | 2 post reply

Aparo is my Batman artist! I just can't see him as underrated or overlooked!

Check out the back up story in Marvel Tales #100 from Nasser.
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Peter Hicks
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 7:35am | IP Logged | 3 post reply

Billy Graham did breath taking work on Jungle Action in the 70s, including the Panther’s Rage storyline that the Black Panther movie was based upon.   But I doubt the majority of readers today have even heard of him.   
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Wallace Sellars
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 8:48am | IP Logged | 4 post reply

Ramona Fradon
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Robert Bradley
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 8:56am | IP Logged | 5 post reply

Love the choices of Jose Luis Garcia Lopez and Billy Graham, they both did some spectacular work.

Here are a few I would add -

Frank Brunner (love his work on Doctor Strange)

Ron Frenz (very underappreciated "old style" artist, he has that classic "Silver Age" energy to his art)

Kurt Schaffenberger (I know I mention him every time we have a discussion like this, but I just love his work!)


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John Wickett
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 9:02am | IP Logged | 6 post reply

Brunner was one of my favorite cover artists. He did some amazing work.

That Billy Graham run was great too.

Since someone mentioned Ramona Fradon, how about Marie Severin?  Her contributions were recognized years ago, but are now almost forgotten.  Loved her on Namor and Hulk.


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Rebecca Jansen
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 12:53pm | IP Logged | 7 post reply

Al Hubbard who drew Scamp was probably my first 'favorite' comic artist, even if I never knew his name then, I knew he drew the best Scamp. Jack Bradbury Chip N' Dale, and of course Carl Barks Donald Duck, were also prized.

My first favorite heroes artist would be Kurt Schaffenberger (on Supergirl and then Shazam). He did some nice complete art for ACG too. I don't think he quite qualifies as unheralded as there is a nice book on him that was published. Later on some of the more affordable '60s back issues I could collect were early '60s The Fly and The Jaguar with great figure art by John Rosenberger, and he seems still to be an obscure name to many if they don't remember one Brave & Bold he did for DC. J. Scott Pike who did one issue of Showcase (Dolphin) I would also like to mention. Bob Powell did some great hero comics for ME in the '50s and was last seen on Tales To Astonish's Giant Man and Daredevil in the mid'60s. His seems a name everyone should know. George Evans and Fran Hopper were to of the best artists on the late '40s onward that might be considered obscure today, they both did great work for Fiction House, and Evans for E.C. There was a nice focus on Evans book "It's Evans By George" I think Al Dellinges published in the '70s which I used to have (they also had really nice ones on Alex Toth and Joe Kubert too).

If you go way back there was a great artist named Ethel Hayes who could sometimes give Hal Foster (Prince Valiant) a run for his money as one of the best newspaper comics illustrators. She mostly did cuter and lighter work though.
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Mark Haslett
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 2:07pm | IP Logged | 8 post reply

Al Plastino on Batman gives me a thrill.

Don Heck gets very little applause compared to how amazing I find his drawing ability.
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Brad Hague
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 3:01pm | IP Logged | 9 post reply

Alan Weiss comes to mind.
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Adam Schulman
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 5:43pm | IP Logged | 10 post reply

The late Don Newton is one of the top five Batman artists ever.
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Adam Schulman
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 5:46pm | IP Logged | 11 post reply

I forgot to mention John Totleben, who inked Stephen Bissette during Alan Moore's run on SWAMP THING and also provided art for Moore's final arc on MIRACLEMAN. A brilliant artist. Tragically, he went blind several years ago, or so I remember reading. 
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James Woodcock
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Posted: 12 September 2020 at 5:49pm | IP Logged | 12 post reply

I remember reading that he had cataracts which severely hampered his
drawing speed, didn’t know he had gone blind.

But yes, his art had a grace to it that I found beautiful growing up.
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