Comments on: Month of Art Stars: Artist’s Choice – Jon J. Muth

By: BDaly

BDaly — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 19:27:02 +0000

Muth is awesome. He did some great work on the Silver Surfer. But alas, ’twas cancelled.

By: Tuomas

Tuomas — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 20:35:50 +0000

About the end of The Mystery Play…

(SPOILERS!)

The coats symbolize guilt. Carpenter was identified by the police because of his raincoat, which symbolizes his guilt for what he did. And in the end, when he is absolved, he leaves his coat behind at the cross. Annie, however, has to wear her coat even 10 years after what happened, because she’s the Judas of the story.

As for the actual murder mystery, like Carpenter keeps saying, the answer is in the big picture, not in the details. You got to look at the whole story, the whole community of Townely. I think Morrison leaves it kinda open, though, whether Satan is right, or whether Carpenter ends up redeeming the whole town.

By: adam!

adam! — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 13:20:12 +0000

Forgot to mention that Muth’s DRACULA was first published as an EPIC GRAPHIC NOVEL before it was published by HEAVY METAL, as EPIC issued out quite a lot of very very good graphic novels (= more or less square-bound novel-length “mature” work) back when they were still doing stuff, and some of them were even maturish takes on MARVEL superheroes, like Spider-Man fighting off Lovecraftian monsters, with art by Bernie Wrightson. Even De Matteis had a DR STRANGE book with Muth (I think it was Muth. It could’ve been Sweetman or Williams, though). I think the Lee-Moebius SILVER SURFER was part of that line, and they also did the coloured reprints of AKIRA, and the then-complete set of Moebius’ books. Ah, EPIC.

By: adam!

adam! — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 13:13:32 +0000

@ Blackjak

Yeah, they got a pretty nifty creator-owned deal from Archie Goodwin at EPIC, as most (if not all) of the artists there did, too. Funny how MARVEL was actually the first “mainstream” company to do the VERTIGO thing. JMDM had a few projects there that eventually saw republication in VERTIGO. Muth even had his DRACULA book published by HEAVY METAL (NBM, I think). Veitch serialised his ABRAXAS there, and Dave Sim even did a few CEREBUS shorts for them. EPIC was Goodwin’s baby, and he treated people right, so they were happy to give stuff to EPIC. Maybe CBSBG should do a Goodwin retrospective? Quite the career, when you think about it, from EC to EPIC to DC.

By: Blackjak

Blackjak — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 09:46:29 +0000

Ok, sorry, De Matteis and him took Moonshadow to Vertgo… I take it one or both of them owned the title?

By: Blackjak

Blackjak — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 09:45:14 +0000

Wow, never realised this before, but he managed to take a property from Marvel to DC! Epic to Vertigo..

Didn’t he also do Havoc/Wolverine: Meltdown?

By: DanCJ

DanCJ — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 08:01:22 +0000

Great artist, but if Swamp Thing: Roots is anything to go by, terrible writer.

By: Bill Reed

Bill Reed — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 03:37:34 +0000

Which part? The crucifixion? The bit with the coats? No, not really. I can’t explain any of it. I think that’s why I like it so much…

By: Rob III

Rob III — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 01:01:47 +0000

Bill, can you please tell me what happened at the end of The Mystery Play?

By: Rob III

Rob III — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 01:00:40 +0000

I love Muth’s work. That Sandman issue he did is amazing. I’m also glad you posted the original Moonshadow covers, I’ve never seen them before.

By: Aaron

Aaron — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 23:53:14 +0000

Muth’s art is beautiful, no doubt. But Moonshadow left me absolutely cold, as a story – I remember very little about it except that it bored me to no end.

By: Jason Thibault

Jason Thibault — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 23:18:24 +0000

It seems like it’s only once per decade, or era that you see two amazing talents like Jon J. Muth and Kent Williams interact so seamlessly. I still treasure my Wolverine / Havoks and my Williams / Muth art books.

Two artistic giants. Nice choice featuring Muth.

By: Tom Fitzpatrick

Tom Fitzpatrick — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 21:39:36 +0000

I could never understand why Ellis didn’t continue GLOBAL FREQUENCY, that was SUCH a terrific series.

By: Brian Cronin

Brian Cronin — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 20:40:49 +0000

Good call, Tim! My bad – changed it!

By: Bill Reed

Bill Reed — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 20:35:13 +0000

Muth is awesome. He illustrated one of my favorite comics (The Mystery Play) and wrote and drew one of my new favorite children’s books, Zen Shorts.

By: Tim Jarrett

Tim Jarrett — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 20:30:33 +0000

Muth’s always been a favorite.

One minor nit–didn’t Kent Williams paint the cover of the original Moonshadow #6? Not to take away from Muth’s accomplishments…