Great comic book covers

[Otomofan]

 

[Otomofan]

 

[Shoo]

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I've always loved this one. I had a poster of it on my wall as a teen.

 

[xipotec]

Sent from the inside of a giant slug in outer space.....

 

[goatchumby]

Just stumbled on this thread. There are dozens that you folks have listed already that are pure classics and really take me back. Here's a few more that are dear to me:

Roger Rabbit: The Resurrection of Doom

 

[Sweet Rabbit]

Planetary always had great covers, it was just never on time

 

[Surge Diaclone]

Punisher Anniversary Magazine


Punisher #100

 

[Otomofan]

I never bought any of the late Michael Turner's books, but I appreciated that he had a unique style. It still fit in with what was going on at Image at the time, but you could look at one of his pieces and instantly recognize it was his. Not exactly anatomically correct, but still very stylish and expressive. I especially liked seeing his takes on the DC heroes later in his career.

Here's my favorite cover by him, the variant to Wolverine Origins #1. I'll always love the brown costume best for Wolvie, so it's cool seeing interesting takes on it:



Speaking of Wolverine Origins.....Joe Quesada did some absolutely stunning covers for this series. The best, hands down, is this intricate homage to Alphonse Mucha:



Here's some other good ones Joe did:

 

[slynger]

It was Michael Turner’s work that really sucked me into the comic world when he created Fathom. Such a great artist. Now I enjoy all different takes on my fave characters by different artists. Gabrielle Dell’Otto, Adi Granov and Artgerm are awesome.

 

[yodasan]

This is such a great thread - whenever I see a new post I usually end up looking back at many of the old posts.

 

[Otomofan]

Man, even back then my man Frank had a style all his own.

(yeah, I know he's been accused of being too liberal in borrowing from influences but other than Sin City resembling Aiden Hughes' stuff I don't see it.)

 

[Otomofan]

OK, time to look at some all time classic (as well as lesser known) Todd McFarlane covers.

(I haven't included any Spawn or Image stuff cause in my humble opinion he peaked before he went to Image.)

So let's see if I can do this in chronological order.

One of my early favorites is All-Star Squadron 47 featuring one of my all time favorite DC heroes Dr. Fate. Not a truly remarkable cover, but it shows how he already had a thing for big capes and a unique sense of layout.

Around the same time (1985) he was drawing the obscure team book Infinity, Inc. featuring a character named Mr. Bones........hmmmm.....does Mr. Bones' costume bear a certain resemblance to anyone?

McFarlane's next notable DC work was drawing about half of the 4-parter Batman: Year Two. I love this cover:

The only other notable work he did at DC was the crossover series Invasion, which he didn't finish in time and Bart Sears had to take take over. But at some point he managed to draw this now-iconic Batman cover (423). Sometimes the girl is edited out, as is the case for the Black and White statue being released based on this image. His cape fetish is in full swing here.

And then there was Spider-Man. No exaggeration to say he left his mark on the web-slinger forever, from giving him those giant expressive eyes, the crazy spaghetti webbing, and designing Venom.

Arguably his most famous cover, Spidey number 301:

And then there's number 316, the greatest Venom cover of all time.

There was a crossover next, called "Assassin Nation Plot" and I don't remember the story being memorable, but it gave some amazing cover shots of McFarlane's take on Captain America and Sabretooth!

Next, Spidey got cosmic powers and beat up the Grey Hulk....this is an absolute classic image.

And speaking of Hulk......here's one of the biggies....arguably in the top two or three of all of McFarlane's covers. This book is worth huge bucks based on the cover alone. If you've never seen it, you were NOT a collector in the 80s/90s.......Hulk number 340. What an image!!! What an amazing design!!

And that brings us to to arguably the second (maybe even first?) most iconic McFarlane Spider-Man cover of all time. Imitated dozens of times, but this was the original, and it sold like a million copies so I'm sure we all have at least one in our closet somewhere.

Todd's Spider-Man number one.

Now....I'm a big Wolvie fan, so I absolutely loved when Todd brought Wolvie in to guest star. Here he is sporting the brown costume on issue 9:

But then Todd did something which we might think is mundane now but was absolutely innovative at the time: he brought back Wolvie's yellow costume. This was months before he started wearing it again in Jim Lee's X-Men book. When he wore it in Spidey, it hadn't been seen since what...the 70s?? Now it's so common it's boring, but at the time it was eye-popping!!

OK.......some more Wolvie, and these are honorable mentions cause they're NOT covers....

This was the back cover pin up in Wolvie's solo book back in 1988:

And this was an interior page pin-up a year or two later:

And then there's this....I have no idea what it is, but it looks like a recent Marvel book, and what they do is grab old art, recolor it, and pretend it's "new" art from their former superstar artists. I doubt anyone is fooled. This was probably an interior splash page from a 25 year old issue of Spider-Man, but like I said, I love Wolvie, so heck, let's check it out.

And finally......honorable honorable mention.

We all know Rob Liefeld can't draw, but just take a look at these iconic covers from New Mutants, such as the first appearance of Cable, and look at how McFarlane's inks transformed a crap drawing into a thing of utter beauty that's now in the annals of comic book history.

I actually prefer the second print with the gold ink cause I think it "pops" more.

And lastly.....one more Liefeld/McFarlane New Mutants cover featuring my main man Wolverine. Liefeld truly owes his career to McFarlane for making him look so good in the early days.

Did I miss any? Anyone wanna throw some post-Marvel stuff in there too?

 

[Otomofan]

When I was in middle school, the best day of the month was when the new issue of WIZARD magazine would arrive in my mailbox.

I read and re-read every issue hundreds of times. I was part of the reason that comics had that big boom in the 90s and then the bubble burst, and they've never been the same again. But as a dumb impressionable kid, I read what they printed in WIZARD like it was gold.

I loved seeing what the current "hot" books were each month. I could never afford them of course, so I just enjoyed living vicariously through the magazine.

Well, after everything went bust, a lot of the stuff that was "red hot" in the 90s was "ice cold." One of my biggest regrets was not buying a near complete run of Liefeld's New Mutants books around 2003 or so....some guy was basically clearancing out his store and I think they were in dollar bin. He didn't have #87, but all the rest were there. And my thinking was "Eh....I have all these already in the paperback." Uggghhh. Still haunts me to this day.

But there was another time I made the right move. I was at a local convention, probably early 2000s, and some dealer was getting rid of all the previously "HOT" books for just a few bucks. I grabbed three that I remembered seeing every month in WIZARD, thinking they had the coolest damn covers. They still do!

I never read these books, but I bought em for pennies for the covers:





And now, to my surprise, these books are now considered "hot" again. Weird. I guess things go in cycles.

Actually, WIZARD itself had some pretty good covers over the years. At one point or another, they had the top talent in the industry doing original pieces for them. Let's look at some of the best:

 

[Otomofan]

 

[Otomofan]

Man, Mike Zeck really did a lot of killer covers didn't he?? I didn't realize how many of these all time classics from the 80s were his. Dude deserves more recognition than he gets, if you ask me.

A few posts back, someone mentioned Keith Giffen.

I didn't like a lot of his stuff cause he just made a jumble of lines that were really hard to follow, especially later in his career. But he'll always have a special place in my heart for the 1987 Dr. Fate mini-series.

Not a commercial success, not a critical one. Completely forgotten as far as I know, but it was special to me cause I had the Super Powers figure and knew nothing about the character, so I was really excited to get the mini-series and learn more about him. It was pretty baffling stuff to a ten year old. Lots of Hindu mythology/mysticism courtesy of writer J.M. DeMatteis, but I think it was good for me to get exposed to some of that esoteric stuff at such a young age. I doubt any other kids in my class had any idea what the "Kali Yuga" was.

(He wrote 24 issues of a Dr. Fate ongoing not too long after, but it wasn't nearly as good, but how many mainstream comics can say they featured cameos by real life spiritual guru the late Meher Baba, essentially portraying "God?" I bet none!)




What first caught my eye was the eerie house ad DC ran in their other comics:



And the covers were awesome too...very atmospheric and dark:






Ah heck. Now I'm on a Dr. Fate kick.....I already posted the early Todd McFarlane, so here's just one more, from an earlier mini-series...this time drawn by the one and only Walt Simonson:

 

[Otomofan]

In case you couldn't tell, Wolverine is one of my all time favorites.

I posted this already, but it's so iconic, here it is nice and big and clean:



Also posted just a bit ago, but I found a better scan of the classic Mike Zeck vs Wolverine cover. (Man, Zeck is an absolute master at covers....he doesn't get nearly the recognition he deserves!)



One of the other all time great cover artists, Wolverine artists, and artists in general is the one and only Art Adams....here is his recreation of Zeck's cover....I'd never seen this.....amazing!!



When I was a kid I had Art Adams' perfect rendition of Wolvie as a poster on my wall....



Looks like he decided to redraw that one too with a little modern flair.....(I still prefer the original!)



But looks like this drawing was super-imposed over an X-Men drawing too....when I met Mr. Adams at a con two years ago, I bought this print and he signed it for me!



And lastly, here's some recent Wolvie by Art Adams, as variant covers...I gotta track them down and buy them if they're not too expensive, (but they are):






And now for something completely different.....one of my other all time faves was Iron Man. (Again, apologies if I posted this already.)

In the early 90s, Marvel printed a poster by the famed French artist Moebius of Iron Man. Apparently people thought it was "ugly." I loved it and wished I'd ave bought it. Now it fetches big bucks on ebay, IF you're even lucky enough to find a copy that it's all ripped or damaged.

Well, not too long ago, Marvel re-used the image as a variant cover to a new Iron Man issue. I absolutely love it.....isn't it amazing??

 

[Unclechopchop]

In case you couldn't tell, Wolverine is one of my all time favorites.

I posted this already, but it's so iconic, here it is nice and big and clean:

View attachment 475674

Also posted just a bit ago, but I found a better scan of the classic Mike Zeck vs Wolverine cover. (Man, Zeck is an absolute master at covers....he doesn't get nearly the recognition he deserves!)

View attachment 475673

One of the other all time great cover artists, Wolverine artists, and artists in general is the one and only Art Adams....here is his recreation of Zeck's cover....I'd never seen this.....amazing!!

View attachment 475675

When I was a kid I had Art Adams' perfect rendition of Wolvie as a poster on my wall....

View attachment 475676

Looks like he decided to redraw that one too with a little modern flair.....(I still prefer the original!)

View attachment 475677

But looks like this drawing was super-imposed over an X-Men drawing too....when I met Mr. Adams at a con two years ago, I bought this print and he signed it for me!

View attachment 475678

And lastly, here's some recent Wolvie by Art Adams, as variant covers...I gotta track them down and buy them if they're not too expensive, (but they are):

View attachment 475679
View attachment 475682



And now for something completely different.....one of my other all time faves was Iron Man. (Again, apologies if I posted this already.)

In the early 90s, Marvel printed a poster by the famed French artist Moebius of Iron Man. Apparently people thought it was "ugly." I loved it and wished I'd ave bought it. Now it fetches big bucks on ebay, IF you're even lucky enough to find a copy that it's all ripped or damaged.

Well, not too long ago, Marvel re-used the image as a variant cover to a new Iron Man issue. I absolutely love it.....isn't it amazing??

View attachment 475680

Supposively he drew a bunch of marvel characters without even knowing who they were, which in turn made the drawings super unique. I have a poster of that iron man and it?s been one of my favorites. The punisher one is super dope as well

 

[Otomofan]

If that poster is in good condition, hang on to it....it's rare.

I still kick myself for not buying it back at the comics shop back in 1990 or so. I absolutely love that image. One of the most unique takes on Iron Man I've ever seen.

 

[punisher1974]

I have the Moebius Punisher Poster. I liked a lot his designs on the characters. Zeck is my favorite artist and I have all of his posters except the Silver Centurion Iron Man Poster. Punisher was always my favorite character so his covers really stood out to me. Love his Captain America and his Spider-Man art too.

 

[Otomofan]

I saw Mike Zeck at Baltimore Comic Con in 2018.....he was at a table not far from Michael Golden.

There's those two legends sitting right there.....and all my GI Joe comics were in my parents' house and I didn't have a change to have anything signed cause I flew in directly from Japan.

UGH. That killed me to miss that opportunity.