John Buscema

My greatest memories of John Buscema are when I was a kid just getting into comics and drawing at the same time. Me and my friends actually made little notebook paper comic books. We got into it a great deal. One of my friends got the book "How to Draw Comics The Marvel Way" and it taught us more than any art teacher or other book ever had about comics. He certainly made us draw our figures more dramatically and taught us how to get the most out of our shots. Hey, we werent great comic artist by any means, but now we were drawing punches better. Out lunges at the villains were better. Our backgrounds were better. John Buscema taught us how to just plain draw better.

As I grew up I always tended to like John Buscema's work. It was always quality work with lots of movement and great backgrounds. But, like others. I really didnt search out his work. I just happened upon it. As I got older, it was easier to see he was more a great artist of the late 60s and 70s. By my day his art was appearing "dated". But, it was apparent he was drawing at a higher level in those days than most (but not all) of his counterparts.

Upon my return to comics in 2002, I started collecting Conan. There is a vast array of many nice Buscema works in Conan. I feel almost more than Silver Surfer, Conan was his signature work. I also sadly feel he stayed on the title far too long. After awhile his work on Conan started looking the same to me with each interior looking as familiar as the one before and the one after it. It grew stale to me. I think his early works in Conan (anything below issue #100) is far superior than anything that came afterwards.

A few years ago I was able to see an actual video of How to Create Comics The Marvel way, and it was nice to see him bring the book alive. He made it look easy as Stan sat there and narrated how to get that legendary Marvel look. Even though I was obviously looking at an old recording, I still loved what it was showing me.

I have been thinking he deserved to have his own thread here and I finally got around to doing it tonight. I must admit although I am not surprised, that he had passed in 2002, I actually did not know that it had happened. He died about the time I was coming back into comics and I believe probably when I seen the video he and Stan did. I swear, he was as Brooklyn as they come. He looked like he was just as likely to make you a great pizza as he was to draw a great comic.

Compared to today's works, John Buscema may not appear flashy enough. But, from the era he came from, I feel he is more than worthy to be included among the greats.

pages.ca.inter.net/~owenandsusan/