I didn't comment on this earlier in the week, but what a find! This is one of the coolest, most interesting things I've ever seen on your blog (and that's entirely a compliment on how awesome this post is, since the overall quality of the blog is top-notch). When you consider how big of a star Jim Lee became not too long after this, it's absolutely insane to think that he was getting this kind of criticism. Great reads, all, though! I only wish we could see the accompanying work (especially the hands; he really seems to have had a problem with hands).
Intriguingly, some of the comments still apply. Particularly, "your figures tend to be stiff, and unrealistic" from the third letter down. I don't know about "unrealistic;" all comic book art is "unrealistic" to some extent. But "stiff;" man alive. He still falls into the "posing" of characters for one- and two-page spreads, where they look very stiff, as if there is no action going on, but rather that they are just standing for panels. The one and only New-52 thing I own (it was a gift from a friend who's a DC-zombie, for ol' Marvel-zombie me) is the first arc of Justice League. And every single character who's introduced, he's posed in very stiff, very non-fluid ways - as if they're posing for a picture.
All that being said, he's a wonderful artist. And his designs of the X-Men, which were reflected in the 1990s cartoon, he has forever-shaped "my" version of the X-Men.
I didn't comment on this earlier in the week, but what a find! This is one of the coolest, most interesting things I've ever seen on your blog (and that's entirely a compliment on how awesome this post is, since the overall quality of the blog is top-notch). When you consider how big of a star Jim Lee became not too long after this, it's absolutely insane to think that he was getting this kind of criticism. Great reads, all, though! I only wish we could see the accompanying work (especially the hands; he really seems to have had a problem with hands).
ReplyDeleteIntriguingly, some of the comments still apply. Particularly, "your figures tend to be stiff, and unrealistic" from the third letter down. I don't know about "unrealistic;" all comic book art is "unrealistic" to some extent. But "stiff;" man alive. He still falls into the "posing" of characters for one- and two-page spreads, where they look very stiff, as if there is no action going on, but rather that they are just standing for panels. The one and only New-52 thing I own (it was a gift from a friend who's a DC-zombie, for ol' Marvel-zombie me) is the first arc of Justice League. And every single character who's introduced, he's posed in very stiff, very non-fluid ways - as if they're posing for a picture.
All that being said, he's a wonderful artist. And his designs of the X-Men, which were reflected in the 1990s cartoon, he has forever-shaped "my" version of the X-Men.