I dig the Syd Shores art!

That dig at New York City in the Pterodactyl story has gone unanswered for nearly forty years. I call on our NYC-based comics writers to add a baseless swipe at Englehart’s home base of Oakland CA to their next published work, so that the scales are balanced at last and this East Cost/West Coast beef can be put to rest without bloodshed.

Wow! How is it that we never got more art from Englehart?

I kinda dig that Englehart artwork. I had never heard that he was originally also an artist.

Englehart on his art:

I began my comics career as an art assistant to the great Neal Adams. I have no idea what Neal saw in me other than a love of comics, and perhaps a kindred spirit, because I was not really much of an artist when he took me on. He taught me, fed me at his house, taught me to distrust authority, and was in all respects the man who solidified whatever it is I’ve become.
He had, at this time, a script by Denny O’Neil for the VAMPIRELLA magazine, and he threw me right into it. I did layouts for some pages and he did the pencils; then he did layouts for other pages and I did pencils. I inked it; he inked it. And when we were done, he insisted that my name go on it beside his! Now this, folks, was and is unheard of. Many artists have assistants, and none of them credits his assistant. But Neal wanted to get me a published credit so I could start a career. That’s the kind of guy he is.

As it turned out, I never could get my hand to draw pictures as well as my mind envisioned them, and so I became a writer – but a writer who thinks like an artist, thanks to Neal Adams.

Man, you can sure look like an artist with Neal helping you.

There are a lot of guys who are now just writers who started out as artists. Bendis and Brubaker immediately pop to mind. Bruce Jones (of that Hulk run several years back, among other things) started as an artist also. I hadn’t known that Englehart had been an artist.

I know there are others, but they aren’t coming to mind right now. Perhaps Brian would want to do some sort of feature about artist/writers turned just writer?

I’ve been blogging about my experiences in reading a large portion of the Marvel catalog. I’m currently in the early 70′s and have been reading a ton of Englehart lately and I have to say that he is amazing at getting what makes characters interesting and highlighting it. I love it.

Yeah Englehart in the 70s was just a wonderful writer. Not sure what happened later as most of his work after the 70s I found pretty mediocre with a few exceptions.

@Travis Pelkie

“I know there are others, but they aren’t coming to mind right now. Perhaps Brian would want to do some sort of feature about artist/writers turned just writer?”

Alan Moore was also an artist.

Yeah Englehart in the 70s was just a wonderful writer. Not sure what happened later as most of his work after the 70s I found pretty mediocre with a few exceptions.

Yeah, when I got into my early teens and started really noticing who the writers were, Englehart was on West Coast Avengers and Silver Surfer, and I formed an impression of him as kind of a hack with a tendency to pile on mob scenes of guest stars. It was only later that I looked back on some of the comics I’d loved for years and realized he’d written a lot of them. I stand by my dislike of his ’80s stuff, but that doesn’t lessen my enjoyment of the great work he did in the ’70s.

@buttler

“Yeah, when I got into my early teens and started really noticing who the writers were, Englehart was on West Coast Avengers and Silver Surfer, and I formed an impression of him as kind of a hack with a tendency to pile on mob scenes of guest stars.”

What? No. Englehart’s West Coast Avengers and Silver Surfer were awesome. And who could forget his Coyote and Green Lantern? That was awesome defined.

Oh yeah, I enjoyed Coyote. I wasn’t crazy about his GL run at the time, but it sure looks better now than most of what followed it (except Gerard Jones, whom I did like).