Comments on: Month of Art Stars: Artist's Choice - Reed Crandall

By: Johnny Bacardi

Johnny Bacardi — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 02:00:58 +0000

A little disappointed to not see his Warren work represented here; it's a whole step up from all this, as good as it is (and it's very good indeed).

By: DanLarkin

DanLarkin — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 13:02:18 +0000

Man, Crandall was awesome.

By: Edo Bosnar

Edo Bosnar — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 11:19:20 +0000

What a great choice - he was definitely one of the best Golden Age artists (if not the best in that earlier phase of the Golden Age); it's unfortunate that you didn't mention (or post scans of) his Firebrand stories from the first 10 or so issues of Police Comics in the early 1940s. The art just makes those stories stand head and shoulders above all of the other features in any given issue (and that even includes the early Plastic Man stories by Jack Cole!)

By: Lt. Clutch

Lt. Clutch — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 09:20:22 +0000

Man, I know the gore in those EC comics is what made the company's name, but Quality sure knew how to up the body count ante! That's a lot of death in just a couple of pages. I want to see how the Hawks made it through those two stories now! Reed Crandall was a master at his craft. I read once about how Dick Giordano tried to get Reed back on Blackhawk before its first cancellation but things didn't work out somehow, probably due to his personal troubles. I wonder if anyone who worked or knew Reed at that Pizza Hut in the 70's had grown up reading his comics and not known who he was. Sad way to go, but his legacy lives on in the many artists he's influenced.

By: jazzbo

jazzbo — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 08:20:34 +0000

I didn't know there was an Archive edition of any Blackhawks comics. Thanks for the tip, Ajit.

By: Bill Reed

Bill Reed — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:28:57 +0000

Those Blackhawk pages remind me of Mike McKone.

And those horror tales! The facial detail! Marvelous. That Vault of Horror twist ending is brilliantly grotesque.

By: benday-dot

benday-dot — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 22:27:17 +0000

Crandall's pencil is all over the the past century of comics, from the Golden Age to the early Bronze Age. And his quality of work never diminished. As Brian highlights his Blackhawk was king; however, I'll only mention that some of the work he did for Warren Publishing in the 60's is just as good as his earlier EC or Quality work. Thank you Aaron and thank you Brian.

By: Ajit

Ajit — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 18:03:45 +0000

Jazzbo, DC reprinted the earliest Blackhawk stories in an Archive edition that includes the first story posted above. (And just in case anyone was wondering, the Blackhawks foiled Chinese water torture -- the drip-drip-drip in the last panel of that tale -- by singing "She’s the sweetheart of Sigma Chi”!)

By: jazzbo

jazzbo — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 17:34:59 +0000

Man, that is some nice looking stuff. Are there any collections of the old school Blackhawk comics? I'd love to read those.

By: Mark Irwin

Mark Irwin — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 17:11:20 +0000

Great choice by Aaron; Crandall was really underrated, just beautiful work. Huge influence on Bernie Wrightson as well, who in turn influenced Aaron early on in his career. Great stuff!