In this thread I'll tell you about something that's bringing me more enjoyment than any comic book has in years.

I read classic comic strips in archived editions.

Every morning.

Small doses.

Multiple strips by the acknowledged masters, the greatest talents of the 20th Century, and the men who inspired all the early comic book artists that we came to know from their work at Marvel and DC.

First and foremost, I cannot overstate how much I've enjoyed Terry and the Pirates, the inaugural strip by Milton Caniff. I bought the volumes in one of Steven Clubb's sell-offs. It was published from 1934 to 1946, when Caniff switched to his self-owned Steve Canyon strip. (I've been buying up Steve Canyon volumes as they come out).

Each day, I read one week's worth of Terry and the Pirates -- the Sunday comic followed by 6 dailies. So I finish a year in about two months (52 days with some allowance for missing days). Right now, I'm in 1941, approaching Pearl Harbor.



Set in China, Terry and the Pirates refers to the Japanese as "the Invader," and the Third Reich in general terms as well. Once America enters the war, the strip goes full blown WWII.

It is unmistakable that Caniff thought the threat from the Japanese and Germans was growing, and that America should not sit on the sidelines. His comic strip famously depicted collaboration between Germany and Japan at a time when such talk was considered alarmist and warmongering. I have no doubt that Simon and Kirby showing Captain America punching Hitler was influenced by the work that Caniff was doing.

In the days to come, I'll post more info about TATP, but also my readings of Hal Foster (Tarzan and Prince Valiant), Alex Raymond (Rip Kirby and hopefully Flash Gordon).

For Alex Raymond, I love Rip Kirby -- Rip Kirby is an ex-marine who becomes a private detective in 1946. But obviously I have to do Flash Gordon. I've been trying to decide between the Titan editions and the IDW. This video gives a comparison.

I wonder if Rip Kirby inspired Jack to take the surname as his pen name.

It didn't come out until 1946. When Alex Raymond came back from serving in WWII, the Syndicate wouldn't fire the guy they had doing Flash Gordon, and he had to come up with his own new strip. He did Rip Kirby until his death in 1956 (in an auto accident).

Rip Kirby is some of the best, most pioneering "photo-realistic" art of all time.

I should try the read-a-week a day plan for Little Orphan Annie.

I have a few of those, too. And will one day do Annie and Li'l Abner in this way.

Comic strips are well-suited to a small amount of daily reading, because they are written in that "catch up" style for daily newspaper readers. The Sundays have a character going "What? You say there are henchmen waiting outside to nab us when we leave? What's that letter in your hand?"

And if you read a Sunday plus six dailies each day, you'll cover about 6 years worth a year. In 2 or 3 years, you'll have read all the classic run.

How do you get this good at sequential art, this early in history, without anyone else blazing the trail? How is possible that one of the greatest to ever walk the earth was almost the first?

By the way, I have all of the archives for Eisner's The Spirit, and intend to work them in to the daily thing somehow. Once I finish up Kirby's Sky Masters, I've got to consider the rotation again.

I read two Hal Foster Tarzan's a day, and was going to continue with Hogarth's Tarzan when that was done.

By the way, the Hal Foster Tarzan book is HUGE.

But don't forget Prince Valiant. If you are not getting those Fantagraphics Prince Valiants, you are wrong.

In an auto accident with fellow strip artist Stan Drake.

I'd hate to think what the superhero comics of the Golden, Silver, and Bronze ages would've looked like without the influences of Caniff and Foster.

Dave Sim is supposedly working on a series about it, drawing upon some of the material from glamourpuss but with new content.

Well, some feel that Raymond was trying to commit suicide, since he was in four accidents prior to that one. Drake was thrown from the car, while Raymond had on his seat belt.. By the way, Raymond is the great uncle of actors Matt and Kevin Dillon.

I received my beautiful copy of IDW's Flash Gordon and Jungle Jim, Vol. 1. You wouldn't believe how beautiful Raymond's art is, way back in the mid-30's. And these are touched up scans from newspapers. I imagine the line work would have been even more amazing in the original art.

I also received the latest Steve Canyon that just came out, and the second volume of Rip Kirby.

The art in Sky Masters is insanely good.

Comic strip work was expected to be the very best at one time. It was Peanuts that ushered in a "primitivist" fad, and the old masters were no longer the trend-setters fro there on.

Sky Masters is another brick in my whole Ditko/Kirby/Marvel theory -- that Kirby was kind of phoning it in on early FF, and when it soon became clear something special was happening with superheroes in the Silver Age, he started unfurling all his best cosmic ideas and more polished artwork style.

That and the shrinking amount of space devoted to individual strips. It started to make less and less sense to have carefully rendered illustrations when less and less of the detail would show.

I suspect there was an element of changing tastes at work as well. Readers in the TV age had less desire for elaborate continuity strips, and began going more for gag-a-day humor.

And Claremont dialogue so early in the century!

That Kirby/Wood magic appeared again in Challengers of the Unknown, BTW.

What's interesting is that there were adventures strips with gorgeous art, such as Prince Valiant and Flash Gordon, yet also strips with very crude art like The Phantom and Buck Rogers sitting right next to them. Didn't bother the audience I guess, since those strips became massively popular as well.

I find myself considering the Tarzan by Russ Manning and 60s Batman newspaper strip collections that were recently put out.

I've sometimes considered attempting an online comic done in a Sunday newspaper strip style, since doing a full comicbook is such a large undertaking.

I suggested that to you a long time ago, but it fell out the ADD hole.