25 years ago a bunch of Marvel artists left the Big Two and decided to form their company, with blackjack and hookers. This company would eventually become the closest to a third competitor for DC and Marvel (lol) and the best known creator-owned comic book company out there.
This week and maybe the next one I'll be posting some of Image's first series and maybe some of their recent hits as well.
So strap in, 'cause you're in for a trip down memory lane.
Starting with what many consider to be Image's most iconic character, Todd McFarlane's Spawn.
Also yes, the Invincible storytime is coming back, calm down
Spawn was one of the first comics I ever read. It... hasn't aged well.
Hunter Ortiz
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Parker Campbell
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Justin Morales
fucking shit this is such a garbage comic
William Richardson
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Mason Lopez
Coloring was better then
Caleb Evans
I was cleaning out the closet and ran into my copies of the first dozen or so issues of Spawn.
You're right, it really hasn't aged well. Have a bump though.
Carter Moore
Kay
Luke Taylor
Thanks, it's fun to remember in any case.
I don't agree but I don't disagree either, stylized coloring seems to have been abandoned for some reason.
Josiah Thompson
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James Price
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Jordan Diaz
These early Image issues were some of the first comics to use digital coloring in every issue. Looked gorgeous then and still does today. The dude that did coloring on this IIRC I think was the same dude that colored Akira, which is hands down the best coloring job in comics history.
Parker Ward
Not even wrong. Todd's got no sense for panel composition or narrative structure.
Landon Roberts
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Adrian Hernandez
For real? That's pretty cool.
Christopher Young
The coloring in early Image is all over the place desu, like Spawn is pretty and cutting edge, but Youngblood is ugly and very early 90's.
Dylan Williams
I think that was the main thing that made early Image such a phenomenon. It made the art really look miles ahead of what Marvel and DC were doing.
Thomas Cook
>Youngblood is ugly and very early 90's. Youngblood changes to the digital colors at issue 4 or so. I actually love the garish colors from Liefeld's X-Force
Camden Lewis
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Robert White
I was there for the Image emergence...it was a great time for those of us in our teens. Image and Valiant were such a great alternative to the mainstream.
Leo Miller
Too bad most of the early books were garbage, otherwise they might have remained as a larger force after the veneer of 90's aesthetics wore off.
Jason Mitchell
Well, it was ugly but I think it fit Liefeld's art very well, and that's not a backhanded compliment, I honestly think it all started to go to hell when he started to rely so much on digital coloring. Compare his X-Force to his recent Bloodstrike, he was never "good" but his art was a lot more expressive and passionate back then compared to how lazy it is nowadays.
Kevin Cruz
It was a fun, exciting time for sure.
Brody Myers
Does anyone have the Harlan Ellison video where he tells the story of Todd McFarlane saying that you could put the panels of his comics' pages in any order and they'd still make as much sense, and Ellison goes "Yeah, because they never made sense to begin with"?
Lincoln Robinson
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Alexander White
>more expressive and passionate back then Yeah, I read someone comparing his art to punk rock. He never learned the "right way" to do things so he just did whatever. I think the success took his best qualities away from him, by the time he was doing Heroes Reborn it was like self parody
Kevin Foster
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Blake Walker
I often wonder how his career would have turned out had he not become such an overnight success. I mean, he was a superstar by his 20's, that's pretty unprecedented.
Bentley Taylor
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Luke Smith
>he was a superstar by his 20's And what did he do with his millions? He bought the sword from the Conan the Barbarian movie
He's a hero
Jaxon Hill
The untold/forgotten story of Image's success is that it was 100% built on nickeling and diming the speculator market. They once offered a special limited edition variant cover to select retailers and made a mint off of it, then printed thousands of them and handed then out for free at a convention shortly after, rendering the already paid for variants worthless before they even went on sale.
The Image founders were literally the biggest snakes in the history of comics. Not a single ounce of integrity among them. Their recent PR spin of being "alternative to the mainstream" is the biggest lie since "Batman created by Bob Kane". Fuck, it's even less honest. At least Kane contributed something to Batman. Image was founded by guys who were too slimy for Marvel and DC, nothing more, nothing less.
Noah Stewart
Can you tell Todd loved DKR?
Evan Thomas
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Benjamin Hernandez
Malibu/Ultraverse was the only one that actually felt like a real alternative. Valiant was weirdly old-fashioned and kids weren't really buying it, and Image was "Marvel on speed" as Wizard Magazine so eloquently put it.
Jeremiah Bell
That's funny but what never fails to crack me up is McFarlane's Spawnmobile, which I'll post in a few minutes probably.
Jonathan Smith
One of the few 90s anti-heroes that survived to this day.
Pity Angela got bought by Marvel.
Zachary Baker
At that point using televisions to narrate a story in comics was ubiquitous. The Dark Knight Returns made a bigger splash than any comic since Action Comics #1. It just fucking changed EVERYTHING.
Well, the CURRENT company is your best alternative for sales and character rights, so it's not all bullshit. They were fucking terrible to anyone who wasn't part of the old boy's club for the first 10 years or so, yes, but since the early 10's you can't really complain about them as a publisher.
Bentley Thompson
I still maintain that all the shitty edgy 90s heroes could have been legitimately worth reading with better writers and less incoherent art. Alan Moore's Violator miniseries is probably the closest we'll ever see to Spawn's full potential as a series.
Austin Garcia
wait wasn't she black?
Colton Long
Young 18 year old dude here. My dad used to love spawn in his teens because he loved Todd MacFarlane, especially in spiderman and X force. Would You Say He's A Great Artist? My dad used to love him and even tried to draw like him
Jeremiah Miller
Spawn by George Perez is such a weird, err, image.
Elijah Sullivan
Well, nothing is perfect.
Julian James
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Isaiah Allen
probably because coloring back then was still in a traditional comic book printing sense. sorta like the cgi in Jurassic Park, still used basic principles before everyone got lazy and lost in the sauce.
Justin Smith
>with better writers At least hire a scripter. They could keep full creative control of the plot, but have someone write your dialogue for you.
Zachary Parker
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Elijah Butler
You definitely can complain about them as a publisher, between the hipster garbage, the total lack of talent, the fact that they're literally movie pitches for Marvel writers, etc.
Dark Horse was 1000000x better in the 90s and still is at least slightly better and has all the alleged advantages to writers/artists in comparison to Marvel/DC/Archie/Boom/etc.
Lucas Peterson
>wait wasn't she black? Oh god, Spawn is the most successful black superhero of all time isn't he?
Mason Jackson
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Aiden Clark
>the total lack of talent I think they have more than Marvel and DC, but less than Dark Horse
Connor Thompson
None of the 90s Image guys ever really learned to draw from a fundamental/technical/formal standpoint. Of them all Lee was probably the best and McFarlane was arguably second, but that's purely relatively speaking.
Angel Brown
okay this coloring is terrible
Nathan Perry
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Jose Ross
BY FAR.
Hunter Gutierrez
I dunno, I enjoy a lot of their stuff and not all of it is movie pitches, guess we'll have to agree to disagree, old chum.
Colton Hall
Todd's a fantastic pinup artist but a terrible comics artist, and there's a huge difference.
See, Todd is good at making an appealing single image, like a cover or a poster or a design for an action figure or model. He's TERRIBLE at coordinating different images, being consistent, creating motion through images, and conveying a wide range of tones and emotions. He's also shit at subtlety. These traits make his comics really shitty to read, even when he's not writing, but his covers and splash pages enticing.
David Sanchez
actually i love his take on it. really wish they went for more a of traditional inking thing and this image would be so much better.
Evan Lopez
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Jeremiah Martinez
Shit, it worked for Sam Kieth.
Caleb Bennett
He reminds me of a lot of webcomic artists. I wonder how the "Image revolution" would have gone had it happened nowadays.
Juan Wilson
that page looks weird
it's like all the colors bled into each other or there was a printing error or something
Christian Wilson
Yes. Mostly because a lot of his fans don't know he's black. The irony!
Colton Green
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Henry Gonzalez
you know what i think it is that the early image founders had when compared to the more traditional comic book artists of their time? there was a real sense of kinetic energy. the fact it was a little rough, but raw was very appealing. it really felt different from the more traditional stuff. to kids who were just learning how to draw, the technical failings were more than made up for with just the rawness of the art
Lucas Cook
Old guy here. EVERYONE knew Spawn was black back in the day.
James Gomez
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Jacob Thomas
Please take it somewhere else, Groth.
Jack Green
I've always liked "raw/rough" looking art in comics, but guys like Mark Texiera did it so much better and had actual rock solid fundamentals, unlike the Image guys.
Christian Brooks
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Joseph Powell
>kinetic energy HAH! Spawn has a consistent flow of action between two panels ONCE in all of issue 3.
No, it's not kinetic energy, it was creativity and being distinct. While derivative of what was in at the time, each artist at Image had a very distinct style from one another and were unlike other artists at work at the time. When Marvel and DC were pushing a safe house style, this made them stand out
Hunter Turner
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Jaxon Morris
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William Adams
I think you underestimate Valiant at that time...Bloodshot and X-O and Shadowman were killing it, Magnus and Solar were a bit oldschool. Darque as their Dr. Doom analogy was perfect. Valiant was the best universe to take over only the media (Wizard) wouldn't let them.
Jackson Reyes
DH has lots of series with potential but the cancel everything in under a year.
Angel Morris
Yeah everyone who read the fucking book, because he'd never shut the fuck up about it. But Spawn's always had tertiary fans and it has gotten far more pronounced since the 90's ended. A lot of fans struggle to remember his name these days (and some don't even know that he was replaced).
Ayden Reyes
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Adrian Lewis
Never read Cyberforce I guess.
Aaron Cooper
Wizard pushed the shit out of Valiant. The problem was that it didn't appeal to kids, who still read comics back then. Valiant knew this and even tried pushing "young readers titles" to make up for this.
Christian Gray
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Gavin Brown
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Zachary Hill
Marc Silvestri was ass.
Christian Evans
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Jacob Rodriguez
I think once they came out with Bloodshot they really broke into that market, the press and hype for Unity ramped up to it
Hudson Perry
this was the last time al simmons was actually drawn with a nose
