A Cover a Day

[Steve W]

Ok, how about this for an idea.  We take it in turns to post a favourite (British spelling) comic cover every day.  This went really well on the comic fan website that I used to frequent.  What we tried to do was find a theme or subject and follow that, until we all got bored with that theme.  I'd like to propose a theme of letters of the alphabet. So, for the remainder of October (only 5 days) and all of November, we post comic cover pictures associated with the letter "A".  Then in December, we post covers pertaining to the letter "B".  The association to the letter can be as tenuous as you want it to be. For example I could post a cover from "Adventure Comics" or "Amazing Spider Man".  However Spider Man covers can also be posted when we're on the letter "S".  Adventure Comic covers could also be posted when we're on the letter "L" if they depict the Legion of Super Heroes.  So, no real hard, fast rules - in fact the cleverer the interpretation of the letter, the better, as far as I'm concerned.

And it's not written in stone that we have to post a cover every day. There may be some days when no cover gets posted. There's nothing wrong with this, it just demonstrates that we all have lives to lead.

If everyone's in agreement I'd like to kick this off with one of my favourite Action Comic covers, from January 1967. Curt Swan really excelled himself here.

Date	Page/Reply	Theme (and clickable link)	Pages	Replies
Oct 2016	1/1	Letter A	19	228
Dec 2016	20/1	Letter B	17	207
Jan 2017	37/4	Letter C	18	214
Feb 2017	55/2	Letter D	17	208
Mar 2017	72/6	Letter E	15	178
Apr 2017	87/4	Letter F	15	184
May 2017	102/8	Letter G	13	157
Jun 2017	115/9	Letter H	16	195
Jul 2017	131/12	Letter I	12	133
Aug 2017	143/1	Letter J	16	194
Sep 2017	159/3	Letter K	19	237
Oct 2017	178/12	Letter L	24	285
Nov 2017	202/9	Letter M	24	280
Dec 2017	226/1	Letter N	19	236
Jan 2018	245/9	Letter O	21	245
Feb 2018	266/7	Letter P	25	295
Mar 2018	291/2	Letters Q & R	20	243
Apr 2018	311/5	Letter S	22	270
May 2018	333/11	Superman’s 80th anniversary	21	250
Jun 2018	354/9	Letter T	21	250
Jul 2018	375/7	Letter U	17	207
Aug 2018	392/10	Letter V	19	228
Sep 2018	411/10	Letter W	20	233
Oct 2018	431/3	Letter X	15	180
Nov 2018	446/3	Letter Y	13	156
Dec 2018	459/3	Letter Z	13	156
Jan 2019	472/3	Person being carried	16	190
Feb 2019	488/1	Real people	17	214
Mar 2019	505/11	Homages/parodies	19	224
Apr 2019	524/7	Green-skinned people	17	207
May 2019	541/10	Wanted posters	17	201
Jun 2019	558/7	Boxing rings	15	180
Jul 2019	573/7	Empty uniforms	15	177
Aug 2019	588/4	Beaches	25	297
Sep 2019	613/1	Apes	28	340
Oct 2019	641/5	Haunted houses/graves	21	250
Nov 2019	662/3	Motor bikes	21	254
Dec 2019	683/5	Foreign language covers	17	209
Jan 2020	700/10	Playing cards/tabletop games	23	275
Feb 2020	723/9	Valentines and Cupids	22	259
Mar 2020	745/4	Statues	21	256
Apr 2020	766/8	Elephants	22	263
May 2020	788/7	Heroes & villains cooperating	17	198
Jun 2020	805/1	The Moon	26	322
Jul 2020	831/11	Flags & patriotic symbols	18	215
Aug 2020	849/10	Foreign locations (non-US)	20	233
Sep 2020	869/3	MST3K (with commentary)	24	292
Oct 2020	893/7	Vampires and Werewolves	20	245
Nov 2020	913/12	Giants	24	286
Dec 2020	937/10	Snow & winter scenes	24	289
Jan 2021	961/11	Doppelgängers	32	377
Feb 2021	993/4	Movies	23	275
Mar 2021	1016/3	Cats/cat-themed adventurers	22	263
Apr 2021	1038/2	Dogs/dog-themed adventurers	25	305
May 2021	1063/7	Big guns/Heavy weaponry	25	302
Jun 2021	1088/9	Dinosaurs/Time Travel	28	338
Jul 2021	1116/11	Big Questions/Question Marks	28	330
Aug 2021	1144/5	Highways, Travel etc	19	232
Sep 2021	1163/9	Favourite Covers/Comics	28	330
Oct 2021	1191/3	Lineups	21	260
Nov 2021	1212/11	JSA 80th Anniversary	23	269
Dec 2021	1235/4	Logos in the action	26	317
Jan 2022	1261/9	Dynamic Duos	29	348
Feb 2022	1290/9	Romantic Scenes	26	313
Mar 2022	1316/10	Bridges	29	339
Apr 2022	1345/1	Unexpected Green	23	286
May 2022	1368/11	Neal Adams	26	310
Jun 2022	1394/9	George Perez	19	227
Jul 2022	1413/8	Parents	30	356
Aug 2022	1443/4	Fairgrounds and Carnivals	24	285
Sep 2022	1467/1	Joe Kubert	19	238
Oct 2022	1486/11	First and last issues	27	324
Nov 2022	1513/11	Classrooms and Education	22	264
Dec 2022	1535/11	Robots and Cyborgs	33	392
Jan 2023	1568/7	Trials and Courtrooms	28	330
Feb 2023	1596/1	Doctors, Nurses and Hospitals	24	292
Mar 2023	1620/5	Detectives & Murder Mysteries
Apr 2023		Birds and Winged Creatures
May 2023		Strength in Numbers

[Richard Willis]

The end of the Kupperberg Doom Patrol and another fake death for Robotman

[Steve W]

[Peter Wrexham]

Superman cradling Supergirl wasn't the only Crisis on Infinite Earths cover that matched the specification.

[Peter Wrexham]

[Philip Portelli]

" I vow it to the bitter end or the next two issues! Sorry that's all I got!"

[Dave Palmer]

Does carrying around someone’s skull fit the theme?

[Jeff of Earth-J]

[Dave Palmer]

Given our theme this month this letter to CBG from George Perez in 1992 might be of interest.

Originally published in COMICS BUYER'S GUIDE #954 (28 Feb 1992), Krause Publication

George Perez writes:

After 17 years, imagine my surprise to actually be writing a second letter to your publication within one month's time. I am addressing my comments to Mark Engblom's letter (and, indirectly, to John Byrne's message to you by voice mail) regarding my comments about homage covers in general and the cover of Crisis on Infinite Earths #7 in particular.

First, Mark, thanks for bringing this particular subject out into the light. I originally had a statement in my letter pertaining to this exact case but decided to delete it because it made me sound self-serving and it took away from the intent of the letter. If I recall correctly (and I may be wrong, since I don't have a copy of my original letter in front of me), I said that the only conscious instances of my copying another artist's cover design were the Action Comics and The New Titans covers to which I referred. The incredible similarity between the Crisis #7 cover and the Uncanny X-Men ("Death of Phoenix") cover was simply one of those crazy coincidences that pop up in this industry from time to time. (And provide for great subjects of speculation in the recurring deja vu feature.)

MIGHTY THOR #127 (Apr 1966) 
Marvel Comics

UNCANNY X-MEN #136 (Aug 1980) 

Marvel Comics

CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS #7 (Oct 1985)
DC Comics

For those who tuned in late: The Uncanny X-Men cover to which Engblom referred showed Cyclops cradling a dead Phoenix in a pose eerily similar to the one of Superman cradling the equally dead Supergirl on my later Crisis cover. When I was first approached about it by a fan years ago, I admit that I was bowled over. I hadn't read an issue of Uncanny X-Men in some time and could honestly not recall ever having seen John's cover, and I definitely didn't use it as my design guide. However, the layout was so startlingly similar that even I began to doubt whether or not I was inadvertently inspired by it.

For the record, my original inspiration for the cover was an early Jack Kirby cover showing Odin cradling Thor. I wanted to get the same impact, but designed it totally on my own without actually referring to the Kirby piece to suit the needs of the comic book on which I was working. It's like having a super-hero fly and immediately imagining Curt Swan's Superman as an inspiration without deliberately aping his style or composition. If John (or anyone else for that matter) thinks I actually took my Crisis cover idea from him, I just want to say here and now that it wasn't so. If it were, I certainly would have acknowledged it. However, having been a fan of John's work for many years, it wouldn't surprise me if some of his design sense just rubbed off on me, much as it has with so many artists whom I have admired.

Thanks for giving me the chance to clear things up.

From:  

https://sites.google.com/a/comicbookseries.info/gpz/news/georgepere...

[JD DeLuzio]

This is apparently a variant of Comic Book Guy, the Comic Book Guy #1, and this is the best size I could find:

[Richard Willis]

Two Thors

[Jeff of Earth-J]

[Steve W]