Lit Anyone Else feel underwhelmed by the marvel art?

I think i've just been too spoiled by Jan Duursema during Dark Horses tenure. Here are some scans.

 

Besides Mike Mayhew, who will always be one of my favorites, I haven't seen any Marvel art I've liked. Even the art of Lando seemed like a crappy version of Gabriel Hardman's beautiful Legacy art. Most of the art just looks cheap. The Harbringer art in particular, seemed very poor to me. The heroes' faces and the Stormtrooper armor were very off. I also don't like Salvador Larroca's art. This panel in particular is incredibly cluttered.

It's so hard to make out what's going on! I'm a real stickler for Stormtrooper art, and the troopers in his art have very wonky proportions. The individual plates look nice, but all together it looks like a mess. I probably pay too much attention, but it's a real problem!

 

Yes. Most of the Marvel art hasn't been awful by any means but I really miss the artistic talent at Dark Horse. I would love to see Wheatley draw an issue of Star Wars again...

 

My only problem with Stuart Immonen, is that nine times out of ten there is no background, just a usually blank backround, opposed to Jan Duursema (of Dark Horse) who would focus on characters at the center point but also having a vibrant fully fleshed background.

 

Here are two compromises for us to see Dark Horse talent again.

• Have Certain Writers and Artists make a book (namely Jon Ostrander and Jan Duursema) This is the most likely and safest route.
• Since Star Wars is bigger than Marvel itself and is starting to branch out to other comic publishers, have Dark Horse make books in conjunction with Marvel (this will happen no matter what, but i would like to see it as a 50/50 split rather than one book)

 

I think that GrandAdmiralJello summarized it best here. Art can be pretty subjective. In my opinion, there's been some fantastic art in certain Marvel series - Mark Brooks (Han Solo) and Marco Checchetto (Obi-Wan&Anakin, Shattered Empire, the upcoming Phasma, etc.) have delivered phenomenal artwork that is worthy to be considered as some of the best in Star Wars comics overall. Like many of you however, Doug Wheatley and Jan Duursema are my personal favourites, and so far nothing from Marvel is even close to the artwork quality produced by those artists. Then again, I am such a fan of those two, that I don't think I'll find any artist to be a sufficient substitute for them.

In short, the best art from the Dark Horse comics is better than the best (so far) from Marvel. And the worst from Marvel is worse then the worst from Dark Horse (I believe most of you know what I am specifically referring to here). But again, all this is just my opinion.

Agreed 100%! Come on Marvel, how many more years do we have to beg you for this?

ETA: I've been advocating that on these forums since 2015! I don't know if you follow Jon&Jan on Facebook, but it is obvious that they care about Star Wars and are proud of the work they've done in the franchise. Jan posts Star Wars artwork pretty often, and Jon's profile picture is him with a lightsaber. So if they don't want to work on Star Wars again, then it's pretty weird as they "promote" the franchise a lot on social media. It's not like they don't have other work to show off, and it's only Star Wars or nothing. You can't go wrong with Ostrander&Duursema.

 

Cough*Larroca*Cough

 

People seriously need to stop making comparisons to Duursema and Wheatley when talking about Marvel's art overall, because they themselves were high points. DH also had some comics with pretty poor art.

 

They had at worst sub bar quality art, Marvel has had BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAD art. I mean have you read Darth Vader?

 

Vthuil
Cough*Knight Errant*Cough

 

See...we have common ground!

Sent from my Moto X-Wing

 

There's been good and bad but it's all personal taste really. This thread has reminded me how much I'd love to see John and Jan do a series in the new canon though...

 

I think the art in Knight Errant was fine for the most part. It was pretty inconsistent overall as there were several different artists in just 15 issues, but certainly not bad. What I find ridiculously bad from Dark Horse is the art in Union. The tracing was as blatant as it is by you know who in the current Marvel stuff. They had freakin' Bruce Willis, Tommy Lee Jones and a few other 90s super star actors as SW characters (can't remember who exactly). I find it hilarious.

 

It is different I will tell you. Dark Horse had all those backgrounds that added to the story, Marvel has been flat out straight forward. The same can be said about the NEU as opposed to the old one. I think what I perplexed is that Disney decided to go with IDW for the sub-contract on the star wars adventures and not Dark Horse. I understand that IDW over the last 8 years has been a rising force and have clocked at number 3 behind Marvel and DC which switch the number 1 and two spots a lot. But, for loyalty maybe, they should have been considered. I do definitely miss those grandiose titles like Dark Empire, Crimson Empire, Legacy, Tales of the Jedi and Dark Lords of the Sith. Those were epic storylines that sprang a lot of issues and had everything from romance to action to acrane force powers. Heck even the power of levitation was in one of those.

 

To nitpick, IDW is usually around 4 or 5 (Image is 3).

But the reason they chose IDW is because IDW already has a pre-existing relationship with Disney to do all-ages comics, as IDW is the company that does all of the Mickey Mouse/Ducktales/etc comics. So, from a business perspective, they were the most logical choice to do all-ages comics for Star Wars.

 

What I'm most disappointed by in the NEU Marvel series is the sheer amount of tracing. I know there are many who don't mind, but it is one of my pet peeves. I'd gladly wait longer between issues to give artists time to breath and put out solid work.

On a more positive note: I loved the pencils and colors in the Lando, Han Solo, and Darth Maul minis and in the Kanan series. I also enjoyed the coloring in Obi-Wan & Anakin.

As far as Dark Horse -- and I know I never shut up about this mini, sorry -- but Darth Vader and the Ghost Prison is one of my favorite examples of consistent artwork and ability to set mood by wonderful coloring and lighting. (There is a LOT of Dark Horse material I've yet to read, though, so please don't take this as a snub toward any other series or artists. I have much more Star Wars to explore and appreciate. Ghost Prison just happens to be the highlight of my current Dark Horse collection when judging solely by the quality of the artwork.)

 

To be fair, Alessio did quite the art job on Ghost Prison.

 

edit: oops, wrong forum....

 

I mean, art is by definition subjective, and personal taste does come in quite heavily, so I think it's unfair to deem all of the marvel art bad. I mean, they haven't had Greg Land or Humberto Ramos do anything, at the least. But they have had some spectacular artists, too: Mike Mayhew (who I am ordering a commission from, and so, so psyched for), Stuart Immonen, and the art for Han Solo and Lando. I don't get the Larroca hate, either -- I mean, this is him, and I don't have an issue (beyond the Emma costume, and that's not his fault.)


Anyway, besides Cam Kennedy, Dark Horse had some seriously wonky art. KOTOR could be strange at times, the last ToTJ trade is atrocious, and even Duursema . . . well, let's say that Jan and Jon wrote and drew about three different characters, and there's only so many times we can get "woman in tank top and tight pants with midriff showing" and "Quinlan Vos but w/x"

 

I think we should give more credit to the colorists too. Good colouring can improve bad pencils, but it can ruin good ones too. So pencil works aside, I think that so far the colouring in the new Marvel stuff has been pretty good. For example, as much as I dislike the art in the (otherwise excellent) Darth Vader series by Gillen, I have the impression that the colouring gave the pencils a much needed depth.

 

Yeah, people tend to focus a bit too much still on the pencils aspect, but there's inking, lettering and colouring that go into a finished comic.

 

It's a pattern across most Marvel comics. It's owner is known for being very cheap, and great artists ask for a lot. These days they hire whoever they find on social media as they're cheaper with no reputation to demand a bigger paycheck.

 

I don't like a lot of the art in the SW marvel comics.
A lot of their Luke portrayals look terrible to me.

 

I thought that was really cool in Union. Steve Buscemi was in it too, and 90s Denis Lawson was Wedge. It's like an adaptation of a movie that never was.


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I assume most of the people who are only reading the SW comics and nothing else probably don't even know lettering and coloring are specific jobs. Simonson's Thor run with John Workman's lettering shows just how important those jobs are