CBI Archive
Judging (Image’s October) Books By Their Covers
Sunday, July 30th, 2006 at 11:47 PM EST
Updated: Sunday, July 30th, 2006 at 11:47 PM EST
Image’s October Solicitations went up a couple of days ago, so let’s make some prejudgements based just on the covers (as we all love to make prejudgements, don’t we?)!
Let’s begin!
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Okay, I don’t actually LIKE this Bomb Queen cover by Jimmie Robinson all that much…
…however, MAJOR props to Robinson for the teddy bear wearing underwear and sleeping on the bed. Way cute.
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This Nick Postic and Nick Marinkovich cover for Impaler #1 isn’t bad, per se…
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but it sure looks pretty generic, don’t it?
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This is a pretty sweet cover for The Pirates of Coney Island #1 by Vasilis Lolos.
I can’t wait to see what Becky Cloonan’s variant cover will look like.
I am betting on “cool.”
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TWO COOL GODLAND COVERS!!!
First, the cool normal Tom Scioli cover…
Next, an even COOLER Keith Giffen/Erik Larsen cover!
I love the thought balloons.
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I like the illustration by KHARY RANDOLPH for this Noble Causes cover, but I don’t know if I think it is striking enough to work as a cover.
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I love Andy MacDonald’s artwork.
That being said, I don’t think this cover is clever enough to support the simplistic nature of the design.
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This Victor Santos’ cover for the Zombee Graphic Novel looks quite interesting.
I only wish I knew more about what type of book this Mile Gunter-penned graphic novel will be like.
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Neat Stephen Griffin cover for this collection of the last Hawaiin Dick mini-series.
That’s a new cover, right?
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Nice use of silhouettes for this Waterloo Sunset cover by Trevor Goring.
This should be higher, like an honorable mention!
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Man, this Ant cover by Mario Gully is creeeeeeeeeeeepy.
I wonder if THIS Savage Dragon appearance was read by Erik Larsen.
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Not a bad Casanova cover design…
but it reminded me a bit too much like an earlier DMZ cover to be higher…
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This is a strong Joe Madureira variant cover for Elephantmen #4 MADUREIRA.
Cartoonish enough to clearly be Madureira, but solid enough to be an imposing display.
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A well drawn comic SCENE, I do not think this Tony Moore Fear Agent cover is striking enough to work as a cover…
I love the desisn of Fear Agent, by the by.
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See!!
Not even the CHARACTERS want you reading this book! Look at how they warn of anyone foolish enough to try to read it!
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Farly striking Ken Meyer, Jr. cover for Negative Burn…
except for the fact that we have no reason to be drawn to this particular character, which robs the cover of a good deal of its drama.
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Tony Shasteen’s work for this “Draw Rosario Dawson as a comic book character” series has been strong.
Here, once again, he does a good job at making the character look A. Like Dawson and B. Like a comic book character.
That doesn’t leave much room for a dynamic cover design, I’m afraid.
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Funny Chris Moreno cover for Paul Jenkins’ Sidekick.
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Like them or hate them…
you’re PROBABLY not making a decision on whether you pick up Scott Kurtz’ PVP characters based on the covers of the comics, am I right?
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Is this Savage Dragon #130 cover an homage?
One cool point to the person who can tell me what comic Erik Larsen is homaging here, if he is, indeed, homaging a past cover.
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This big-time showdown in Strange Girl is drawn oddly low-key by artist Nick Stakal.
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Not a fan of this Greg Capullo cover, but I have to say that I admire his seeming willingness to, for his Spawn covers, to just experiment with some new styles.
Good to see.
What’s Capullo up to nowadays?
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Not a BAD cover for Task Force 1 by Carlos Rodríguez and Joël Séguin, but not all that original/stylized, either.
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What’s astonishing is that the “uncolored” version of this same Michael Turner Witchblade cover is not any more coherent of a drawing.
vs.
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You have to give Joseph Michael Linser credit.
He gives his women, for how they are meant to be drawn, realistic enough anatomy, like for this Witchblade cover.
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I am highly disappointed in this Marc Silvestri cover for Hunter/Killer.
It is not playing to Silvestri’s strengths as an artist at all.
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HONORABLE MENTIONS
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This Ryan Ottley Invicible cover has one of the best illustrated Ottley covers in months.
The detail of the work really brings out the forcefulness of Invincible’s punches.
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This City of Heroes cover is surprisingly strong.
I think the brightness of the cover really brings out the pencils of David Nakayama.
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Strong Last Christmas cover.
The book hasn’t been great, but the covers sure have been.
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TOP FIVE!
5. This Walking Dead cover is pretty damn ominious.
It’s too bad it sorta gives away how long this current storyline will last.
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4. Michael Avon Oeming does a great job with this Cross Bronx cover, creating just the right kind of crazy ass background that would make an ominious figure really stand out against.
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3. Speaking of ominous covers with swords (and I was, see #5), this Manny Trembly-drawn Samurai Detective cover is plenty ominous…
and has a whole lot of “style points.”
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2. Evoking rock ‘n’ roll covers is an idea that has been done before, but rarely done as well as this Jamie McKelvie cover for Phonogram #3.
1. That leaves a familiar face at #1 this month (which wasn’t exactly a stellar month for comic covers), with Ladronn’s Elephantmen #4 cover taking the top spot…
There are very few artists out there who I think can pull off what Ladronn did with this cover.
Maybe Quitely…that’s all I can think of - the amount of force, emotion (from a mutated animal, for crying out loud) and sheer dynamism…it’s a real beauty.
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Okay, that’s it for me, folks!
Feel free to share YOUR prejudices (and YOUR top five)!!
17 Comments
Bill Reed
July 31, 2006 at 8:02 am
I love how it seems whoever “colored” Turner’s Witchblade cover actually just scrapped it and started over with a better style. I mean, they look nothing alike, besides the pose.
Scott King
July 31, 2006 at 8:22 am
Brian any chance of ever comparing covers from different publishers against each other or even talking about themes and styles you see differently between pulishers/on going themes overall with covers?
The Mutt
July 31, 2006 at 9:12 am
I took me about five minutes of looking at the Witchblade cover before I figured out that she didn’t have a hand growing out of her breast.
lee
July 31, 2006 at 10:25 am
“One cool point to the person who can tell me what comic Erik Larsen is homaging here, if he is, indeed, homaging a past cover.”
well, it’s clearly influenced by Kirby’s Eternals, but there’s not really one cover that there is an obvious reference to here. Kirby did a lot of those great poses of giant Celestial-types reaching their hands toward the reader throughout his Eternals run. the closest you’re going to find to a pose like that ON A COVER will be on issues 7, 10, or 11.
as far as actual character design, the “Celestial” on Larson’s cover most closely resembles “Eson The Searcher”, who was featured in Eternals #9 & #10, and who participated in many such dramatic “giant-hand-of-DOOM!” type poses, especially in issue #10.
here’s a reference page if you are interested: http://www.immortalthor.net/bio-esonthesearcher.html
cool point?
Zack Smith
July 31, 2006 at 12:35 pm
The character Dragon is fighting most closely resembles Captain Thunder, a Captain Marvel analogy Superman fought in the early 1970s. (http://members.tripod.com/originalvigilante/captainthunder/img012.jpg)
Both Thunder and the Dragon-character have nearly identical chest-insignias.
I hope this qualifies for a cool point…
Jordan D. White
July 31, 2006 at 1:33 pm
Erik Larsen typically doesn’t do “homage” covers that directly lift a pose or layout from another comic (unless it’s another comic he drew himself). He sometimes does covers that are reminiscent of other things, or have a “feel” of other things (like lee said about the Kirby Eternals stuff) but not direct “lookalike” style homages.
Brian Cronin
July 31, 2006 at 2:03 pm
Excellent point, Jordan.
I know he HAS done them before, but mostly, you are correct, in that he just homages his own past covers.
So while I would gladly hand out cool points…I’m just not sure it’s an actual homage.
Brian Cronin
July 31, 2006 at 2:27 pm
Definitely a good idea, Scott.
I don’t know if I’ll be able to find the time, but if I do, it’s a great idea.
jorge f. muñoz
July 31, 2006 at 5:51 pm
That Elephantmen cover by Mad is recycling the same image from Hipflask:Unnatural Selection as seen here:
http://www.hipflask.com/gallery/unnatural_covers/
they just changed the coloring, man, that’s lame, they have Moritat and Ladronn, why they need to reuse not-so-old art?
Brian Cronin
July 31, 2006 at 5:54 pm
Wow.
Great call, Jorge.
Weak!
Clobberin Time
July 31, 2006 at 8:25 pm
Lemme see if I have this right… the Nick Postic and Nick Marinkovich cover for Impaler #1 is “generic”, but the City of Heroes cover with the seen-it-a-zillion-times, two-sides-face-each other design is “surprisingly strong”? I don’t care for either cover, but I think there needs to be consistency in your critiques.
Brian Cronin
July 31, 2006 at 10:42 pm
The cover was surprisingly strong because of the colors.
I believe that’s pointed out above. Let me check.
I just checked, and yes, I mention the brightness of the colors. I think Blond did a great job with that cover, really saved it.
If it were not for the coloring job, I would put it right there with Impaler for generic covers. That’s why it was a surprise that it was strong, because it IS a generic idea. Just one that was executed well with the coloring work.
Had I said “What a fascinating layout!” then yeah, you’d have a point.
Try another example, if you’d like.
Clobberin Time
August 1, 2006 at 2:17 pm
Ah, thanks for clarifying. Generic art + bright colors = Surprisingly strong. Sounds like you’re working with a water-tight rating system there, BC.
Most people contribute to a blog because they have something of consequence to say. The ‘content’ (for lack of a better word) of your column consists of cover images and embarrassingly banal declarations about the merits of those covers. When do you plan to start posting something of substance to this site?
Mac B
August 1, 2006 at 3:45 pm
you want to talk about generic, that city of heroes with its character face-off corridor has been done to death. recent example, civilwar: frontline #1
also, not to mean, but this is a pretty weak post
Omar Karindu
August 1, 2006 at 10:47 pm
So, Clobberin’, which covers did YOU like best, and why?
FantomasPR
August 2, 2006 at 10:24 am
I believe the Hunter - Killer 11 cover is not done by Marc Silvestri but by Kenneth Rocafort, who will be also do the interior art according to Top Cow.
Brian Cronin
August 2, 2006 at 2:29 pm
Thanks, Fantomas!
That would definitely explain why it didn’t seem like Silvestri.