Friday, January 29, 2016

Superman & Captain Marvel Artwork by Dave Stevens

One of my personal favorite artists is the late great Dave Stevens, who is probably best known for his creator owned project, the Rocketeer, which should come as no surprise is one of my favorite characters. (In fact I'm even working on making a Rocketeer Helmet of my own, which I will have to share here once it's completed). The Rocketeer made his first full appearance as a back-up feature in Mike Grell's Starslayer #2 from Pacific Comics (the Rocketeer made a cameo appearance via a house ad in the first issue of this same series).

Now despite the Rocketeer not appearing until 1982, his story is routed in the Golden Age, that magical time for super heroes and adventure comics set during the World War II. So in this was, despite coming 40some years later, the Rocketeer is spawned out of that same classic era of Americana that birthed both Superman and Captain Marvel. So naturally, this makes Dave's work and tone perfect for tackling the Last Son of Krypton and the World's Mightiest Mortal. Unfortunately Dave never got the chance to tackle either character in a sequential story, man that would have been amazing, but we are lucky enough that Mr. Stevens cranked out a few commission pieces over the years before his untimely death in 2008. Unfortunately I wasn't able to find much information accompanying these pieces I came across. If anyone out there knows any of the details behind, or better yet, possibly owns one of these pieces, please feel free to share any details you have behind them.




Dave's other claim to fame is perhaps being one of the all-time greatest artists at drawing superheroines. Dave made quite the career for himself with his beautifully painted pin-ups and covers starring female heroes of action. His entries in DC's Who's Who are second to none. I would have loved to see what Stevens could have done with a Lois Lane series following the adventures of Lois as she does some hard-nosed investigative journalism, undercover amongst the criminal underworld. Oh what could have been.
 
 

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