New Linko! - Interviewing Stan Lee, Vintage Shuster Shop, Pokémon's Eternal Flame

Yo! Welcome to "New Linko!" which isn't much different from "Old Linko!" except I'ma do it more regularly and the heading is different and self-promotion yadda yadda. Shall we get to some links?

* Insert all "must-read piece of the week" qualifiers here for Alex Pappademas' Grantland profile on Stan Lee. Actually, in a lot of ways it's less a profile on Lee and more a profile on what it's like to interview Lee given the many contradictions surrounding his place in comics history. It was great to hear of another journalist struggling to reflect the full scope of what's happening today with the fact that Stan is a nice old man who's talking up his new stuff not to screw over others but to provide what he views as his part in their creation today. It's especially good to hear that since I'm talking to Stan on Monday (and no, I'm not going to bust his balls about Kirby and the Avengers).

Also: the above image is a promotional one for the documentary about Stan The Man created for some new cable channel called Epix which Pappademas summarizes enough in the article for you to know if you can skip it (though I'll probably watch because I'm totally stuck on archival interview footage). Anyway, I know that the backdrop in this image is meant to be a computery futuristic blast of Marvel energy thing, but it looks like they just threw up a kids bedsheet behind him and snapped a photo, right?

* Here's something I saw a while ago that I'm surprised I haven't seen more comic people discuss: a very one-sided post by animation critic Amid Amidi about how a planned Spumco coffee table book through PictureBox Inc. fell apart. I've enjoyed Amidi's books when I've read them, and I have mountains of respect for Dan Nadel, so I'm really bummed this fell apart, whatever the reason.

* In happier links that have been floating around my computer: Chris Kohler's Wired story about the continuing popularity of Pokémon the card game with kids is SO interesting to me. Raise your hand if you assumed kids stopped buying trading cards of any kinds circa 2004?

* Speaking of trading cards, this gallery of vintage 1940s Superman cards created by the Shuster Shop is fantastic (link via Mr. Tom Spurgeon). They say great art asks questions, and after looking at this art, I found myself asking questions like "Is that dude just throwing dynamite off a building?" and "Why is Superman fucking up that diver's game?"

Seriously though, I wonder if the card above's red-headed mad scientist is supposed to be the early Lex Luthor? God, I love Sigel and Shuster Superman comics.

* Speaking of some classic stuff I swiped from Spurgeon's site, here are some very meta Joe Simon/Jack Kirby kids comics.

* Topical Link to this blog post Link: Infinite Copyright Is Killing Culture.

* Occasionally I got off on a streak where I buy a bunch of random stuff on Amazon without thinking of the price. Next time that happens, I'm getting some of these gorgeous-looking UK kids comics by Luke Pearson.

* In totally different news, here's two links I've been sitting on that have told me all I need to know about the Manga industry in 2012: Jason Thompson's much-linked to piece on how the manga industry is digging its own grave, and Deb Aoki's 25 most anticipated manga releases of the year.

Linko!'s Weekly Crew Round Up

So here's a new feature focusing on links to the work of me and my compatriots. For now, I'm burying it here, but I reserve the right to get cocky and put it up top in the future:

* Rob Bricken at Topless Robot has like a zillion things worth reading every week, but I was very glad to read him on the official timeline of ever Zelda game ever. He found one of his nerd Grails!

* I love that we live in a world where they make Lego-esque toy lines out of obscure Peter David Spider-Man comics, and I love that my friend Zach Oat is in a job where he interview PAD about both.

* Ben had AT LEAST two fun stories worth your time up on Marvel.com this week: Tom Brevoort on the return of Thanos to The Avengers and Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning on New Mutants.

* Meanwhile on CBR, TJ Dietsch has been killing it with pieces like this DC Collectibles interview with Geoff Johns and Jim Fletcher and this one with Robert Kirkman about The Walking Dead #100.

* Finally, I had a lot of copy go up on CBR in the past week or so that I thought turned out well even for me, including this chat with Ed Brubaker on Fatale and my first ever talk with Andi Watson, one of my A#1 all-time favorite cartoonists.

RIP Joe Simon

Captain America co-creator and comics industry legend Joe Simon passed away this week at the age of 98.

In 2007, I had the honor and pleasure of conducting an interview with Mr. Simon that I recapped in pretty thorough detail here. It's high up there as one of the most special memories for me of my time in comics over the past seven years getting to have a frank and pleasant conversation with a man who brought one of our most enduring icons to life and helped build this medium. I spoke in my previous post about the way Joe came up with Cap and how I got to be the one to tell him that his old protege Stan Lee eventually killed off Bucky, two stories that still make me smile. I also mentioned the nice note Joe sent me upon my getting hired by Marvel, something I will forever treasure.

Even though I probably only spoke to Joe for 15 minutes, it was more than enough time for him to make a very positive impression on me. Firstly, here was a guy who was already in his mid-90's at the time, but still sharp as a tack, responding to every question I asked him, be it about events that took place nearly seven decades earlier or stuff he was hearing about for the first time, with wit and eloquence. More than that, I thought to myself as the interview went on that this was the kind of ambassador the comics industry needed; a kind, polite gentleman whose words still crackled with the youthful enthusiasm of the guy who came up with the idea for Captain America on a New York City bus because he needed somebody to punch Hitler in the face. Even 70 years later, with a vast expanse of history between, Joe was still excited to talk about Cap and about comics; he maintained his joy for what he had done and the contributions he had made.

Comics lost a pioneer this week, but we also lost a representative of the creativity that should be inspiring us all in its purest form. Hopefully while Joe has passed, his example will not be lost on those who had the privilege to know or speak with him, and he will endure forever through his creations.

Rest in peace, Joe, I will certainly never forget you.

My condolences to Joe Simon's friends and family

Cap's Last Supper

Yesterday I wrote a bit about my chat with the legendary Joe Simon about, among other things, the "death" of his most famous creation, Captain America. I related a story Joe told me about painting a version of Jesus' last supper with Cap seated center one of the times Marvel had told him they were killing the character off.

Though it's been over two years since I heard about this piece, I've never actually seen it...until today.

The esteemed Kevin Melrose over at Robot 6 gave my post a nice plug and then, upon reader request, unearthed the famous painting.


So cool! Every bit as rad as I imagined it would be and I'm so glad Kevin found and posted it. For those wondering, the "Gail Simon" whose name appears in the bottom corner is Joe's daughter ("Leonardo" of course is Leonardo da Vinci, who did the original painting of Jesus' final meal, and I love that Joe credits him in the same way somebody would put "After Byrne" if they did a knock-off of that Days of Future Past cover).

Ok, so I can pick out The Red Skull, 3-D Man, Captain Marvel, Spider-Man, The Thing and The Fighting American among the assembled diners, anybody know who the rest are? And anybody know enough about da Vinci's piece to comment on if there's any significance to the placement of folks?

Chatting With Legends: Joe Simon

It goes without saying that one of the coolest parts of my six-year career in comic books has been the opportunity to speak with some really incredible creators, be it in brief exchanges or extensive conversations that have in some cases led to some great friendships. From stars of today like Brian Bendis and Geoff Johns, to my own childhood heroes like Jim Lee and Fabian Nicieza, to undisputed industry icons like Stan Lee and Jim Shooter, I’ve been incredibly fortunate with the laundry list of legends that reside in my rolodex.

But one of my very favorite interviews I’ve gotten to conduct since getting into this crazy business was the brief but memorable phone chat I got to have with Captain America co-creator and a bonafide pioneer of comics: Joe Simon.

Back in 2007 after Steve Rogers, the original Captain America, seemingly met his demise, we devoted the bulk of an issue of Wizard to the character, his creators and the future of the franchise. One feature my editor Brian Cunningham and I put together was a Wizard Retrospective on Captain America, our goal being to speak with every writer who had ever worked on the character and put together an oral history covering 66 years. We were fortunate in that we were able to speak with just about every man who had put pen to paper on Captain America for a significant period of time; for the most part I was responsible just for assembling and editing the work of my dedicated team of writers, but the one interview I did want to conduct myself was with the man who along with Jack Kirby dreamed up Steve Rogers in the first place.

My buddy Jim McCann over at Marvel was able to secure me Mr. Simon’s phone number and I cold called him one afternoon. Though he was 94 when I called him, Joe was quite eloquent from the moment he said hello and also not at all surprised to hear from me; I don’t think he fully knew what Wizard was, but his phone had been ringing quite a bit during the media frenzy surrounding the death of Captain America and interviews with the character’s living co-creator had become quite in demand.

I initially expected that Joe would be a bit taken aback that his signature creation had met his demise after over six decades even if I wasn’t the first reporter to call him up, but he could not have been more laid back. As he informed me, this was hardly the first time he’d received a call from the Marvel powers-that-be to let him know Cap was being offed; the time before, he had celebrated by doing a painting recreating Jesus’ last supper with Steve in the lead role and cheesburgers, fries and sodas replacing bread and wine.

Joe was gracious enough to share with me some great stories about working with Jack Kirby, the Golden Age of comics, and of course his experiences with Captain America. Two anecdotes in particular stand out in my mind, so I’d like to share those.

The first was in regards to the actual genesis of Captain America, and was the kind of story that both had me chuckling a bit and yet made perfect sense. Explaining how he came up with Steve Rogers, Mr. Simon explained that he didn’t exactly; he was actually on a bus travelling through New York City and attempting to come up with a new character he and Kirby could work on that would hopefully lead to some decent paychecks in those tough times. Rather than create with a hero, Joe instead decided he would come up with the best villain he could first and then let things develop from there. As World War II was in the forefront of everybody’s minds, Joe realized that there was one villain he knew would be universally loathed by anybody who saw him on the cover of a comic: Adolf Hitler.

So that famous cover of Captain America Comics #1 where Cap is decking Hitler? Joe Simon envisioned the Hitler portion of that visual equation with the guy doing the punching as a blank slate. He pitched this to Kirby and together they came up with history.

I just thought that being the origin behind one of the most iconic characters—comics or otherwise—ever was incredibly cool, and that Joe Simon recalled it that distinctly was even cooler.

The second thing I remember about that interview was my opportunity to carve a little niche in history in a way I certainly never expected.

In asking the questions I had prepared for Mr. Simon, I came across a few involving the then-Winter Soldier, at which point he asked for clarification, having no idea who that character was. I explained that it was Bucky—who he had also co-created—and he responded with a simple “Huh.” Assuming he was referring to Bucky being alive after all these years, I told him it had taken a lot of us by surprise, and he replied thusly:

“Bucky died?”

So though it didn’t make headlines, Ben Morse became the guy who informed Joe Simon that Bucky Barnes, a character he had co-created in 1941, had in fact been thought dead for the better part of 40 years. Mr. Simon had no idea and was even more taken aback that his old office assistant, Stan Lee, had been the guy who did the deed. As he put it: “Stan killed Bucky? Well good for him.”

I haven’t had the pleasure of speaking with Mr. Simon since that one time, but he did give me his e-mail and we’ve corresponded a couple times, exchanging pleasantries on holidays and whatnot. When I left Wizard for Marvel, I sent a mass e-mail to everybody I’d made contact with over the years and got a nice note from Joe reading “Congratulations, Ben. I am happy for you.”

That meant the world to me, as did spending an afternoon on the phone with the guy who brought the world Captain America.