Near Mint Condition looks at the sort-of-new but sort-of-not Captain America Volume 4 Omnibus. (Material previously published as Captain America by Jack Kirby Omnibus.) Out this week.
I wanted a running start at another acrylic/wash underpainting to oil overpainting. So I ripped a Kirby pose out of my favorite Kirby book. New Gods, where the art is all grayscale.
The Sandman in “The Seal Men’s War On Santa Claus”
From The Kirby Museum:
“This story was originally intended for SANDMAN #7 in 1975, before that series was cancelled. A few years later it was uncomfortably squeezed into an issue of KAMANDI, which was cancelled before that issue, and only “published” in the photocopied CANCELLED COMIC CAVALCADE #2 in 1978. Finally, in 1982, it was included in this digest of Christmas stories.”
Writers
Michael Fleisher
Pencilers
Jack Kirby
Inkers
Mike Royer
Letterers
Mike Royer
This is one of my all time favorite Christmas comics. A few years back I was lucky enough to actually be able to buy a page of original art from The King for this story. It is one of my greatest treasures. See below
Fantastic Four #1 by Ryan North and Iban Coello. Cover by Alex Ross. Variant covers by (2) Ross, (3) Jack ‘King’ Kirby, (4) Coello, (5) Arthur Adams, (6) Phil Noto and (7) Frank Miller. Out in November.
“‘WHATEVER HAPPENED TO THE FANTASTIC FOUR?’
• It's the start of a new era for the Fantastic Four…and they're already in a ton of trouble.
• Something has gone terribly wrong in New York, and the Thing and Alicia are traveling across America to escape it!
• But when they stop in a small town for the night and wake up the morning before they arrived, they find themselves caught in a time loop that's been going on since before they were born…
• That's been going on since before they were born…
• That's been going on since before they were born…”