The comics that first "grabbed" me as a child were the ones of the great JACK KIRBY. The Fantastic Four, Captain America, tons of others. Check out any issue of TwoMorrows Publishing's terrific tabloid fanzine THE JACK KIRBY COLLECTOR...it speaks volumes more than I could of Kirby's monumental body of work.
Jack left Marvel Comics in 1970, and would be toiling for their main competitor National Periodical Publications (later DC) for the next five years. When Marvel (that is, Associate Editor Roy Thomas) went looking for another cover artist whose style could fill the void left by the legendary Kirby, they went to...
GIL KANE
FLASHBACK TO: Kane had been working in the comics business since 1942 (at the tender age of 16) for various publishers before making his mark ("The Mark Of Kane" yeah yeah, let's get that obvious one out of the way) on editor Julius Schwartz's line of western and science-fiction anthologies, such as All-Star Western and Strange Adventures. When National decided it was time to try super-heroes again (after the decline of the genre in 1945, when World War Two ended), they left it to Schwartz to mastermind the revivals of old-favorites such as Green Lantern and The Atom. As Schwartz looked over his stable of artists for ones suitable for dynamic super-heroes, he found Joe Kubert, Murphy Anderson, Carmine Infantino...and Gil Kane.
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By the Mid-1960s, it was obvious to everyone in the comics industry (and especially to Gil Kane, who was always an interested thinker and observer of the art form) that MARVEL COMICS, editor Stan Lee's little company, was becoming the industry leader, in trends and fan popularity, if not quite sales (yet). Many artists working for other companies started getting interested in working for Marvel, including Kane. His first work for Marvel was under a pseudonym, Scott Edwards (his son's first and middle names), since Kane's work was so identified with National at the time. Lee started Kane out doing finished pencils over Jack Kirby layouts (he did this with almost every artist at Marvel in the 1960s, as a learning device to get the "Marvel Look" as successfully defined by Jack Kirby). While Kirby and Kane's styles didn't totally mesh, the latter was a fast learner, quickly incorporating the dynamics and sheer physical power of the Kirby style. After doing a handful of stories and covers and picking up some valuable artistic knowledge, Kane started looking towards personal projects and self-publishing, characters he would have ownership of. This resulted in the creation of two (what would be called later) "graphic novels", HIS NAME IS...SAVAGE and BLACKMARK...both created in 1968 (although Blackmark wouldn't see publication until 1971).
Still, since these projects were self-generated, Kane still needed to make a living and continued to work for National, with occassional excusrsions to smaller publishers. When Jack Kirby left Marvel in 1970, this left a huge void artistically and creatively for the company. His remaining artists were drafted into doing double-and-triple-duty to cover three cornerstone titles of the line: FANTASTIC FOUR, CAPTAIN AMERICA and THOR. The artist chosen by Stan Lee for follow Kirby on FF was JOHN ROMITA, who was at the time enjoying a steady run on the successful AMAZING SPIDER-MAN. This meant, since Romita was never the fastest of artists, that someone would have to replace him on Spider-Man. Romita recommended Kane to Lee. Stan, while he appreciated Kane's talent on many levels, still had quibbles about Kane's artistic style...the ballet-athleticism of Kane was not as appealing to Lee as the brutal boxer-ring rawness of Kirby, or glamorous/slick like Romita. Stan agreed to hire Kane as Romita's replacement, with instructions to Romita to "supervise" Kane's work to ensure it didn't deviate too far from the popular Romita version. As it turned out, Kane ended up producing issues of Spider-Man that were not approved by the Comics Code Authority, since Lee had decided to confront the national problem of drug abuse in that title. When Stan went on a vacation later, Roy Thomas was assigned to fill-in for four months, and was very excited to be reunited with Kane, one of his favorite artists, and one whose collaboration he enjoyed during their brief run on the cancelled CAPTAIN MARVEL title. When Stan came back to the title, his collaboration with Kane lasted only one more issue before Stan brought Romita back to Spider-Man (since John Buscema had since taken over the FF title). In the meantime, Thomas and Kane had forged a great professional relationship, one that would bear fruit almost immediately.
When publisher Martin Goodman sold his company in 1971 to Cadence Industries Corporation, Stan Lee was left standing as the new Publisher of Marvel. This meant he couldn't continue the day-to-day activities as Editor-In-Chief and Head Writer. He promoted Roy Thomas as Marvel's new EIC (really just "Editor" in those simpler days), and it was left to Thomas to supervise the direction of Marvel.
For two years Marvel Bullpenners Marie Severin and Herb Trimpe were the "look" of Marvel, doing the bulk of covers during that period. Stan and Roy felt the line needed a stronger, more unified look...and Gil Kane needed work and found covers easier to do (and more profitable, since covers paid more than individual interior pages). From 1972-1976 Kane did OVER EIGHT HUNDRED covers for Marvel Comics. A feat unequalled since, his artwork defined the company over those important years when they finally overtook National/DC in sales. It was those covers that made an impression of me, a Marvel fan at the time.
Other aspects and details of Gil Kane's life and history will be topics on this blog over time, but I felt it important to note the genesis of my interest in Kane's work and achievements at the beginning. For the past few years I had realized there was a distinct lack of web-presence for Gil Kane and his followers...a bit of information here, some scans there, but nothing really devoted to Kane solely. I believe if Gil Kane were still around today, he would have a website (like his fellow artists Gene Colan and Dick Ayers), but since his passing in 2001 there has been none. I began a Facebook page titled "GIL KANE UNCHAINED!" primarily to organize and feature those 800-plus covers but which has evolved from that to encompass Kane's entire career and work. The page currently has over 300 fans/followers (without any publicity or advertising, just word-of-mouth and links from interested Kane fans). There are limitations to the Facebook format, which this blog is meant to supplement. I hope you'll enjoy what this humble blog offers, a celebration of the one of the greatest comic-book artists ever, GIL KANE!
