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.
Next up is one of Image's longest running series, Erik Larsen's Savage Dragon
This one was the strongest out of the gate, no question. Everything Kirkman does in Invincible in regards to violence and character death and shit Larsen did here first. It holds up really well for about the first 100 issues. Then it just turns to shit. It was easily my favorite cape comic of the 90's.
Chase Ortiz
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Jaxon Wood
It's pretty good, but there's a moment towards the end of this mini that I really don't like. It feels cheap and unearned.
Hunter Rivera
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Ryder Cox
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Cooper Ward
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Noah Thomas
That's fair, but it gets stronger fairly early in the monthly run. At the time, people were surprised as hell that Larsen had anything to bring to the table at all as a creator. He was seen as the Todd the lesser, really. Out of all the founders, he is the only one that I think really appreciated what Image had to offer from a creative standpoint. A good example of this is how he went back and did his own issue 13 replacing the crossover one that Jim Lee did.
My real beef with the regular run is there is cross over with TMNT like two issues in.
Aaron Hernandez
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Caleb Allen
Yeah, and he re-worked his original mini like two times, what I'm posting is like Savage Dragon Vol 1 3.0.
Kayden Anderson
And that's not counting his appearances before Image.
Jose Perry
how do they know he has power? "our only hope"?
He's just green and muscley
Jacob Scott
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Jonathan Gutierrez
this writing makes no goddamn sense.
Christian Brown
IIRC superheroes already exist in this universe, so they may just be assuming he's like a superhero
Oliver Hughes
They are really, really, really desperate. Like trying to jold it together desperate. It's one of the major themes of the ongoing.
Ethan Lee
but "only hope"? They could't even put in a scene where he lifts really heavy shit? Or a car slams into him and he's fine?
Like, he has to demonstrate *some* value before you put that kind of load on him.
Elijah Nguyen
There were a SHITTON of crossovers happening right in main Savage Dragon book. It should warrant a Guiness or something. TMNT, Hellboy, Madman, all the other Image superheroes...hell, even the full cast of Wanted dropped by for an issue.....
Austin Lopez
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Oliver Campbell
That's pretty much what Dragon says, too.
Blake Campbell
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Logan Anderson
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Wyatt Torres
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William Robinson
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Cooper Roberts
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Henry Ross
The Hellboy crossover is solid and fun. None of the others stick out in my memory as exceptionally good or bad.
Jackson Powell
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Benjamin Phillips
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Isaiah Brown
Well, Mignola had a hand in it, so it's expected.
Evan Collins
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Brayden Gray
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Owen Reed
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Asher Jackson
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Evan Myers
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Nicholas Edwards
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Henry Watson
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Jaxon Campbell
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Joshua Brown
I like how Glow Bug is just orbiting TnA. We've lost so much.
Nicholas Hill
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Mason Miller
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Justin White
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Andrew Richardson
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Colton Rodriguez
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Xavier Thomas
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Luis Foster
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Andrew Brown
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Luke Walker
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Juan Long
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Hudson Walker
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Liam Green
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Brody Murphy
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Lucas Wood
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Mason Lewis
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Chase Wilson
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Kevin Thomas
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Isaac Williams
I really think a lot of these artists squandered their potential at Image instead of realizing it. Who of them *improved* over the course of their respective series? The relative intellectual immaturity of Image's first wave of titles really makes these guys look like spoiled divas, at least to me. These days there's some proof of the group's merit as businessmen and creative executives, but in the context of their exit from Marvel....these early Image books are just like...."THIS is what you fought for the freedom to do?"
Having said that, it applies the least to Savage Dragon. There's some actual creative zeal coming through in these pages.
Henry Myers
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Luke Cruz
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Camden Davis
damn
dragon shows up, tells you your cousin is dead and you don't give one fuck?
Owen Rodriguez
They were definitely working on their comfort zone instead of pushing real boundaries, yeah. Valentino's Normalman is way less self-indulgent than Shadowhawk, for example.
Cooper Roberts
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Jace Barnes
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Jaxon Russell
>guy nearly gets kicked off the force for SEVERELY beating an inncocent black man
>NEARLY kicked off for what he did, no probation or anything else
fuck i miss the 90s
Nathan Ward
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Mason Carter
That's because Frank set his cousin up to die as a scheme to convince Dragon on the force. I'm not sure if he was ever straight to Dragon about it.
Jose Fisher
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Grayson Sullivan
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Jack Collins
captain marvel and lobo?
Aiden Thompson
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Joseph Russell
5th panel >average Sup Forums use for super powered people
William Adams
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Carson Jackson
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Kevin Taylor
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Nicholas Howard
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Cooper Price
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Luis Wright
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Isaiah Taylor
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Gabriel Ross
>BABALOOSH!
Jose Flores
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Elijah Martinez
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Kevin Hill
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Alexander Cooper
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Brayden White
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Cameron Morris
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Aiden Anderson
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Jacob White
I got the impression that Savage Dragon was reactionary in nature; that Larsen was doing things with it because they wouldn't let him do those kinds of things when he worked at Marvel or because superhero comics in general don't do those things.
Some of the results are OK but there are flops to that approach too; unlike most superheroes Dragon is consistently interested in long-term romantic relationships and some of them are with normal women rather then superheroines. This avoids the cliche of his superhero life being "too much of a burden" to allow him to love and mate but the real result is too often just a bunch of tedious soap opera.
Justin Collins
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Hudson Taylor
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Ethan Butler
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Gabriel Robinson
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Austin Watson
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Blake Bennett
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Michael Roberts
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Chase Gomez
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Hunter Peterson
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Jack Stewart
It depends on how you look at it. None of them would be as well known today if not for Image. Lee would have probably stayed in a dead end at Marvel if not for selling Wildstorm to DC. I think in not having editors their art didn't reach its full potential. But in terms of success they definitely did.
