The bit about Larsen bringing up King criticizing JK Rowling doesn't really jibe with the King quote I'm familiar with. He does however insult the author of Twilight while praising Rowling. King is actually a huge fan of the Harry Potter books.

Stephen King: "Both Rowling and Meyer, they're speaking directly to young people. The real difference is that Jo Rowling is a terrific writer and Stephenie Meyer can't write worth a darn. She's not very good."

By the way, one Twilight fan responded to King's diss of Meyer with:

"King is no Gabriel Garcia Marquez so I don't understand why he gets to say who is a good writer and who is not."

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Before I can answer that, we must be clear on what we mean by "peer".

In my mind, a "peer" is someone of equal talent, not just someone working in the same field. Erik Larsen is not the "peer" of Neal Adams, for instance.

Also part of this equation would be the whether the artist making the changes is superior to the subject of the changes. Again, Neal Adams is a better artist than Ross Andru. (This is simply fact, and not a negative judgement of Ross's work in any way.) This does not give the superior artist carte blanche to make changes, but it does mean that such changes as are made are likely to be an improvement.

Joe Sinnott made a LOT of changes when inking Kirby on FANTASTIC FOUR. We think of those comics as some of the best ever created, and they are clearly better than contemporary issues inked by Vinnie Colletta, or even Dick Ayers. ("Even" because I really like what Ayers did over KIrby, but there is no question in my mind that, artistically, the Kirby/Sinnott combo was superior.) In contrast, when Sinnott inked Neal on THOR, the match was not completely successful, and the pages, while still spectacular, were somehow LESS spectacular than what we were seeing in AVENGERS or X-MEN inked by Tom Palmer. (On the other hand, I don't think Tom's inking style would have been a good pairing with Kirby.)

A couple of decades ago, I was offered the job of inking an issue of a comic drawn by Ernie Colon. I am a great admirer of Colon's crisp, clean style, but looking at the pages I realized my own style, at the time, was so different from his that I would not be able to prevent myself overpowering his pencils. He would simply disappear, so I declined. Unfortunately the book was then given to another inker who is notorious for overpowering the pencils, and Colon did, indeed, disappear. And, doubly unfortunate, the end result was not nearly as good as the pencils had been. The inker, who had not been trained as a penciler, made arbitrary changes based on how he'd learned to ink, and the result was a mess.

So you believe yourself to be of equal talent to Neal Adams?

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Not in a million years. Which I have made perfectly clear on many an occassion.

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JB: Also part of this equation would be the whether the artist making the changes is superior to the subject of the changes.

And superior to Jim Lee?

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No -- but at least as good.

You seem to be struggling -- and without great success -- to bend my words to fit some kind of agenda of your own. I suggest you make it easier on yourself, and just take what I say as what I say.