Tuesday, March 1, 2011
The Grooviest Covers of All Time: Golden Treasures
What it is, Groove-ophiles! It's a fact that Michael Golden was a genuine super-star artist during the last days of the Groovy Age (and continued to be one throughout the 80s and beyond). His blend of cartooniness and realism, eye for detail, slick line, and superb design sense is so awe-inspiring that his work is still influencing artists to this very day. In the 70s he was most associated with the Batman Family of mags over at DC and at Marvel, where he really rose to super-stardom, on the Micronauts. Now, Ol' Groove could not find one single Groovy Age Michael Golden cover on the DC end, and I have plans for a future post on Golden's Micronauts covers, so I thought I'd share some forgotten Golden genius applied to a handful of other Marvel comics. Some, like the ROM covers are the stuff of legend, the others might surprise you...
And of course, a special thanks to the folks at Grand Comics Database for the dyn-o-mite cover scans!
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Golden! He was one of the last great Golden boy artists Marvel had of the 70's & 80's. I used to be a huge fan of his & bought everything he ever drew. Remember that big rectangular poster he did of the marching Marvel Universe? It was a give away or sold super cheap through the mail. You should use it as a banner here!
ReplyDeleteAny character Michael touched, was Golden! Ha! I had to say it. But it is so true. Batman, Micronauts, Doctor Strange. Love 'em all. Just sort of lost track of him when he was doing The 'Nam; just never cared for the subject matter.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful covers. I would add to these the covers to the original She-Hulk series, issues 8 through 11, probably the lovliest art done for that entire run...
ReplyDeleteGreat stuff. Looking back now, ROM was a cool comic but it never really grabbed me. I was hooked on the toy though!
ReplyDeleteOnly DC cover I remember from Golden with any certainty was for The 1984 Batman Special. Mr Miracle 25 May have been him, inked by Russ Heath, but I'm not sure.
ReplyDeleteI bought the ROM books because of the covers!
ReplyDeleteGolden ruled, making The Micronauts into a stellar property worthy of Star Wars, and then making ROM look utterly awesome. That one scene of ROM plowing through a jet fighter is worth a thousand words. Who else would do that and looks so awesome? Iron Man, probably, but it took 30 years for film to catch that level of cool.
ReplyDeleteGolden's work on the Batman Family, especially the issue where Ragman meets Batman, was awesome. I mean, AWESOME. The way Bats fights, and the way he gets hit by Ragman makes you go OUCH!
I gotta stop. But Golden KNEW intuitively how to make our heroes have weight and power and glory while doing seemingly normal stuff. It was Berni Wrightson meets Todd McFarlane or Frank Frazetta meets Jose Garcia Lopez - just breathtaking stuff.