Wrightson pushed Batman into the realm of surreal, elongating the ears on his cowl until they were a foot off his head, and lengthening his cape 20 feet just because of how cool it looked billowing out between his legs while he straddled across the ledges of two rooftops. Even in their twisted, misshapen forms, Swamp Thing, the Patchwork Man, Anton Arcane and his Un-Men still looked like real beings, and they were all the more horrifying because of it.Īnd man oh man, the cool things that Wrightson did with Batman when he showed up in the Swamp Thing book. Wrightson made the incredible look utterly believable but no less spectacular. I think that’s part of what made his run on Swamp Thing so memorable. You’d look at a Wrightson panel and feel like you could reach out and touch the characters inside of it. When I think of Wrightson’s stuff, the word that leaps to mind is Bulk. Because of his mastery of form and shadow, Wrightson’s characters had a solidity and a weight to them that you didn’t typically find in comics. If you’re not familiar with his work, this interview with him from the 1987 documentary Masters of Comic Book Art is a good primer: He was the Master of the Macabre, an artist’s artist, and by all accounts, a very nice guy. In the world of comics, Bernie Wrightson was one of the greats.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |