Darwyn Cooke's Richard Stark's Parker

A complicated title for an uncomplicated man.

Parker (no first name) is a thief and killer introduced by Donald Westlake (writing as Richard Stark) in 1962 in the action thriller The Hunter. Shot and left for dead by his partner (and his wife), Parker cuts a swath through New York's underworld to retrieve his money and have his revenge.

Westlake would go on to pen nearly twenty-five Parker novels (ending in 2008 with Dirty Money) and each one has a clever heist, interesting supporting characters (including the charming actor Grofield, the loyal Handy McKay, and the sultry Bette Harlow), and brutal violence.

The books themselves have been adapted to film sporadically over the years. The finest adaptation is probably Point Blank, the fantastic John Boorman adaptation of The Hunter that starred Lee Marvin and Angie Dickinson.

 

However, the series has been given a serious shot in the arm in the last few years by the immensely talented Darwyn Cooke. Shortly before Westlake's death, Cooke began adapting The Hunter to comics. It was a fantastic book (the first adaptation to use Parker's name, too) and successful enough to warrant a sequel. Cooke has indicated that, besides his already-completed versions of The Hunter and The Outfit, he will adapt The Score and Slayground. I can't wait.

It is Cooke's adaptations that inspired me to draw Parker himself earlier this year. I colored the piece, and here it is:

For more information on Parker and his bullet-riddled adventures, I highly suggest the indispensable Violent World of Parker website.

Transformers, Wheeljack, and Nostalgia

I love Wheeljack, and he doesn't get any respect, so here he is.

Wheeljack is an Autobot Transformer, a living alien robot that transforms into a Lancia Stratos Turbo custom racing car. He is an inventor, who creates a myriad of nutty inventions that usually blow up in his face. His greatest creations are The Dinobots, five Autobot warriors who transform into mechanical dinosaurs, but his machines were the engine behind countless plots of the late (but much-beloved) eighties cartoon The Transformers.

I have been watching The Transformers on TeleToon Retro at night quite a bit lately. When the show is on, it is typically the time when my infant daughter is going down for the night. While rocking my darling little girl to sleep (on my also-late-but-marginally-lamented rocking chair) I bathe myself in the warm glow of Nostalgia.

Nostalgia is a funny thing to me. It's like faith, it is a way of thinking that makes something better or more real than it actually is. My wife despises The Transformers (not just because of Michael Bay!), and rightly so; it's a transparent, poorly-animated show that existed purely to sell toys to kids. But when it was on the air, I was a cereal-eating seven-year-old. To me, a maniacal inventor (who transforms into an Italian muscle car!) and his personal army of mechanical dinosaurs was pretty amazing stuff. And that seven-year-old's intense love for robot brontosauruses and scheming jet planes and alien robots named Bumblebee is exactly why I love watching The Transformers again, as an adult.

Plus, Wheeljack is a genius inventor who is also a butt-kicking fighter and transforms into an Italian muscle car. That flies. That's great! I love you, Wheeljack!

P.S. As always, my weekly webcomic That's So Kraven! is updated right over here.

The Gutters

I drew today's episode of The Gutters. It was written by Ryan Sohmer, colored by Ed Ryzowski, and lettered by Rus Wooton.

Since you can see the final colored artwork at the Gutters site, I thought I'd post the line art from the strip. Here it is:

As always, my own weekly webcomic That's So Kraven! has also been updated. Check it out right over here.

Why I Hate Aquaman

Aquaman is a very difficult superhero to wrap your head around. He is nearly powerless on land, so he has to be in the water to use his complement of superpowers: underwater breathing, super-fast swimming, and telepathic control of sea life. However, there's not a lot of crime underwater. Most criminals can't breathe underwater, to say nothing of the people they wish to victimize. So, where does that leave the super-powered fish guy?

Underwater Boss
You can only fight evil industrialists and unscrupulous yacht owners for so long before you run out of things to do, so DC made old Arthur Curry into the King of Atlantis. O.K., now we're getting somewhere. You've got a kingdom of people living under the sea, you've got your political intrigue and your devious relatives and oh god I've fallen asleep.

There's a reason that Conan stories take place before he becomes king (for the most part), and that's something writers have written about since Beowulf decided "I'm going out to fight that dragon, what's the worst that could happen?" And that is that kings don't do anything. They're already the boss. What fun is it to read about a superhero who has an army of guys to go take care of his problems for him? "Oh dear, here comes Ocean Master! Maybe I'll send my army of guys after him." And then he got married! Married guys usually try to stay out of trouble, their wives don't like sharing them with life-threatening peril (I'm speaking from personal experience).

Powers
You know what? I really don't think sending a bunch of innocent whales and squid to fight your battles is cool, Aquaman. What would be cool is sending a small army of angry great white sharks to fight your battles for you, but your battles wouldn't end in your villains going to jail so much as it would end in them floating in chunks in your army's poop.

I am torn whether or not children should read that, pun intended.

Enemies
Aquaman, predictably, has a bit of a weiner rogue's gallery. Listen to these winners: Ocean Master, The Fisherman, Black Manta. I know a ray killed Steve Irwin but it's not generally a threatening creature. One villain, a gomer named Charybdis (rolls off the tongue) managed to get Aquaman's hand off and give the old pufferfish something approaching street cred. But a hook hand is only marginally more effective in combat than a hand holding a knife, which is infinitely less deadly than any dude with a gun.

The Names
And then there's Aquababy and Aqualad. Can you imagine having a name like that? I can understand losing your hand and abdicating your throne is stressful but don't do that to a child.

What Next?
Did you know that later Aquaman became a horrible slime monster and a young, handsome guy took over? Aquaman became the new guy's Yoda-style mentor. That sounds pretty good, but you're still running into the same problems as old timey Aquaman had, such as enemies with names that sound like Ocean Spray and a kingdom full of dudes who haven't invented guns yet and can't breathe on land.

I don't know what's going on with Aquaman these days; I heard he died and came back as Aquaman Classic but then got his hand ripped off again, like he's Optimus Prime and he can only do one thing. Optimus dies in every retelling, and Aquaman loses the ability to high-five.

Aquaman! That's a hard guy to wrap your head around.

Montreal Comic Con roundup

Fan Expo, then two weeks on the road visiting family, then the Montreal Con! Whew!

Well, growing pains notwithstanding, the 2011 Montreal Comic Con was a fantastic show. I was busy nearly the entire show, and here's a few of the thirty or so sketches I did to show for it.

The Batman

Glob Herman  (on a date)

Venom

 Red Sonja

 Kratos sketchcard

 Red Lantern Hal Jordan (this kid's totally sweet name: Merlin)

 A wedding drawing

 Cheetah (running faster than Horse)

Hellboy (I love drawing Hellboy)

 And a caricature! A lot of people thought 'head sketch' meant 'caricature', and since I worked as a pro caricaturist in Calgary for six years it was not hard for me to get back into the groove.

The show was a lot of fun; I was seated next to the marvelous Tom Fowler so I was never bored, and I had the extreme pleasure of chatting with Sergio Aragones for a few minutes. Sergio is a hero of mine, one of the greatest cartoonists ever and a jolly fellow, and I did my best not to flip out while we spoke.

It was also lovely to see the great Stan Sakai for a moment, and getting to meet the legendary Diana Schutz and chat with her for awhile. Other friends such as Yanick Paquette and Ty Templeton also made things a lot of fun. Geez, I have a good time at this show. Thanks, everyone!

In other news:

• I am teaching a class on comic-book storytelling at Syn Studio here in Montreal. Classes run for ten weeks (Thursdays from 6:30-9:30) and start on September 29th, if you're interested get in touch with the gallery: http://www.galeriesynesthesie.com/

• As always, my weekly webcomic That's So Kraven! updates every Wednesday.

• Green Wake, the fantastic horror series I letter for Image/Shadowline, has a trade paperback coming out this Wednesday! It collects the first five issues and it's gorgeous. I can't wait for you to read it, and keep your eyes peeled for Green Wake #6, coming in October.