Ah, Steve Ditko. One of the all-time greats. Up there with Stan Lee and Jack Kirby as an awesome architect of the Marvel Age of comics for co-creating Spider-Man and Dr. Strange. Captain of the Charlton Action Heroes line for his work on Captain Atom, the Question, and Blue Beetle. A major T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agent contributor. A DC darling for creating Hawk & Dove and the Creeper. Then came the early 70s. Ditko's political leanings took him pretty much out of mainstream comics, so he spent a lot of the decade back at Charlton, churning out horror/mystery stories, along with odd little gems like these two Killjoy strips that ran in the back of E-Man issues 2 (September, 1973) and 4 (May, 1974). Here, Ditko's libertarian beliefs were given a chance to run wild, embodied by the enigmatic Killjoy. Rather than the straight-laced, serious fare like Mr. A (produced for mags like Witzend), Killjoy was a snappy social satire. Weird, funny, and thought-provoking stuff. Check 'em out, Groovesters!
7 comments:
most cool. I've never seen these in colour before ( " there is black and there is white, and there is nothing, nothing in-between, " 'ey? ). I remember them from the old DITKO'S WORLD FEATURING STATIC comics.
God, but I love Steve Ditko.
My Grandad bought me E-Man No. 4 when I was about seven years old, and that Killjoy strip in the back... let me tell you: weird, yes; funny, yes; slightly crazy and confusing to a seven-year-old in the mid-70s? Yep.
They were quite crazy and confusing to a ten-year-old young Groove, as well, Aldous! But so cool!
Yeah, Joe, Ditko is far-freaking-out, man!
Ahhh ... you beat me to this story! One of my all time favorites that seriously bent my mind when I first read this back in the mid-70s. Your blog just keeps getting groovier and groovier!
Thanks, Keeper! Compliments from the guy running one of the most outta sight blogs around? Far out!
God thank you for this! I had the E-Man comics as a kid but like so many others they were lost to the sands of time. I've always had a very strange place in my heart for Killjoy. It's very cool to see them again. THANKS!
snoid
Thanks for posting this! I really loved seeing this again. It's been years since I've read E-Man comics, but these pages make more sense today than they did years ago. Great work!
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