MARVEL COMICS: THE UNTOLD STORY
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"A WILD-RIDE ACCOUNT" —The Hollywood Reporter
"EPIC" —The New York Times
"INDISPENSABLE" —Los Angeles Times
"DEFINITIVE" —The Wall Street Journal
"SCINTILLATING" —Publishers Weekly
“FASCINATING” —GQ
"AUTHORITATIVE" —Kirkus Reviews
"GRIPPING" —Rolling Stone
"PRICELESS" —Booklist
"A MUST FOR ANY SUPERHERO OR POP-CULTURE FAN" —NY Post
"ESSENTIAL" —The Daily Beast
"A SUPERPOWERED MUST-READ" —USA Today
"REVELATORY" —The Miami Herald
"AS FULL OF COLORFUL CHARACTERS, TRAGIC REVERSALS AND UNLIKELY PLOT TWISTS AS ANY BOOK IN THE MARVEL CANON" —Newsday
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Here’s the cover to DAREDEVIL #5 by Wally Wood. Wood working for Marvel was such a big deal to Stan that he actually ran cover blurbs highlighting the fact on most of the books he started working on, which simply wasn’t done in those days.
In 1965, Dick Ayers drew this page as an audition to replace Wally Wood on Daredevil, an assignment that ultimately went to John Romita. Layouts by Jack Kirby.
Wally Wood, 1978. Photograph by Gilbert Ortiz.
This photograph has often been pointed to as sad evidence of the ways in which the comics industry spat artists out, sending them into poverty and declining health. However, according to Bhob Stewart, “this small studio was just outside a two-story house where Wood lived at the time.”
JIM SHOOTER IN THE 1960s
For four years, the teenaged Shooter worked for Mort Weisinger on various iterations of the Superman mythos—Superboy, Supergirl, etc.—not only writing scripts, but providing cover designs as well. He also won the good graces of artists Gil Kane and Wally Wood by providing stick-figure layouts for each page. But as high school wore on, the allure of the money began to wear off—it never seemed to be enough for his family anyway. What mattered now was the accolades.
Unfortunately, praise was limited to the occasional article in the Pittsburgh newspaper or segment on the local TV news. “My father probably said four or five words to me the whole time I was growing up,” said Shooter. “One of the greatest men to ever walk the earth … but not at connecting with people. He made no comment whatsoever.” And Weisinger didn’t just withhold praise—he cruelly berated his teenage employee, calling from New York every Thursday night, following the weekly Batman television broadcast, with a litany of complaints: It’s not on time. It’s over the page limit. How the hell can we get a cover out of this? Why can’t you write like you used to? He referred to Shooter as his “charity case.” “He caused a kind of pathological fear of telephones in me,” Shooter once told an interviewer. “I felt more and more inadequate … and my last chance to be a kid was slipping by.”
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Like Luke Cage, the Cat was subjected to medical experiments that gave her super powers. Instead of just super-strength, though, Greer Grant, formerly a docile homemaker, was given an intensified “women’s intuition.” (Two years later, the character was subjected to radiation, which transformed her into a furry, striped feline named Tigra. Her costume was simply a bikini.) Alas, the message of empowerment was lost on Wally Wood, who sent back the cover of The Cat #1 with the heroine’s clothes removed, and Marie Severin—who’d had more than her fill of boys’ club shenanigans over the years—had to white out the Cat’s nipples and pubic hair.
Here’s Wally Wood’s original unaltered version of the cover to DAREDEVIL #10. The Comics Code forced marvel to alter the figure of Cat-Man carrying off Debbie Harris.
By 1967, the popularity of the Batman TV show faded, and with it the idea that publishers could cash in on a comic-book craze. Harvey’s Thriller line and Archie’s Mighty Comics both fell by the wayside. Tower Comics started to crumble, plagued by poor distribution that was, according to artist Wally Wood, a result of Independent News’ bullying tactics toward wholesalers. Wood commemorated the company’s demise with a fanzine cover that depicted Marvel’s Daredevil throwing Tower Comics’ Dynamo off the side of a building.
