Monthly Archives: September 2018

“Jiraiya Goketsu Monogatari” (# 7, pp. 4-5), ca. 1850

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“Jiraiya Goketsu Monogatari” (# 7, pp. 4-5), ca. 1850
hanshita-e artist: Kanwatei Onotake
8.5 x 6 inch pages, woodblock print book
Coppola Collection

Jiraiya (“Young Thunder”) is the toad-riding character of the Japanese folklore Jiraiya Gōketsu Monogatari(The Tale of the Gallant Jiraiya). The story, first recorded in 1806, was adapted into a mid-19th-century serialized novel (43 installments, 1839-1868) and a kabuki drama, based on the first 10 installments, by Kawatake Mokuami, in 1852. In the 20th-century, the story was adapted in several films, in video games, and in a manga.

Jiraiya is a ninja who uses shapeshifting magic to morph into a gigantic toad. Heir of the Ogata clan, Jiraiya fell in love with Tsunade, a beautiful young maiden who has mastered slug magic. His arch-enemy was his one-time follower Yashagorō, also known as Orochimaru, a master of serpent magic.

Here is a great image of Jiraiya wrestling with Yashagorō.

Books printed by carved woodblocks were all hand-printed and limited to a print-run that was determined by the fidelity of the woodblock used to page the pages.

Grendel #19 Interlude p 23 (1988)

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Grendel #19 Interlude p 23 (1988)
by Matt Wagner (1961-)
13 x 17 in, acrylic on paper
Coppola Collection

In between Mage: The Hero Discovered (Feb 1984 – Dec 1986) and Mage: The Hero Defined (Jul 1997 – Oct 1999), creator Matt Wagner published two Interlude stories. The first of these, a 24-page story, ran serially for 4 issues as a backup in Grendel #16-19 (Jan-Apr 1988).

This is the penultimate page from the first part of the story, told in French, in which Etienne and Marie rendezvous. Etienne becomes a horse from a sculpture in the fountain.

Things get steamy, then things get weird. Evil yellow horse eyes, and Kevin finally dispatches the horse.

“The Mirror Man” (Tip Top Comics 89, October 1943, p 11)

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“The Mirror Man” (Tip Top Comics 89, October 1943, p 11)
by Fred Methot and “Sam Singer” (attributed)
13 x 20 in., ink on paper
Coppola Collection

This is the fifth page of a 6-page story, featuring Mirror Man, a former super-hero comic that shifted to the war-hero genre after the outbreak of WWII.

I love this one frame. The space is composed so deliberately as the two characters talking yet the space is opened up by the circle of guards.

The term “wizaroo” was apparently a common colloquial expression in the “jerk.. idiot.. varmint” category. There is a reference to it in a line of dialogue in a 1957-62 TV series (“The Tales of Wells Fargo”) during the final season, between some gunslingers: “I’m a ring-tailed wizaroo if I’m pressed.”

Grendel #16 Interlude p 6 (1988)

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Grendel #16 Interlude p 6 (1988)
by Matt Wagner (1961-)
13 x 17 in, acrylic on paper
Coppola Collection

In between Mage: The Hero Discovered (Feb 1984 – Dec 1986) and Mage: The Hero Defined (Jul 1997 – Oct 1999), creator Matt Wagner published two Interlude stories. The first of these, a 24-page story, ran serially for 4 issues as a backup in Grendel #16-19 (Jan-Apr 1988).

This is the sixth page from the first part of the story, told in French, in which Etienne and Marie rendezvous. Etienne becomes a horse from a sculpture in the fountain.

Things get steamy, then things get weird. Evil yellow horse eyes.

“The Death Strain” (Killmaster #60, 2E) 1976

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“The Death Strain” (Killmaster #60, 2E) 1976
by Steve Holland (1925-1997)
19×25 inches, acrylic on board
Coppola Collection

The fictional Nick Carter began as a private eye in 1886, in a serialized crime series appearing in the New York Weekly. In the 1930s and through the 1950s, with the genre moved towards the more “hard-boiled” and rough-and-tumble detectives who bordered on super-heroes (The Shadow, Doc Savage), Nick Carter was upgraded to match the times. In 1964, the year that Bond-author Ian Fleming died, Nick Carter was revived in the secret agent Bond mode (Nick Carter, Killmaster), with a secret organization, a gadget master, and the sex, and survived in a series of 260 paperback novels between 1964-1990.

“The Death Strain” was the 60thnovel in the Killmaster series, and it was written (uncredited) by Jon Messman (1E, 1970; 2E, 1976).  The cover text lays out the usual picture of science: “A crazed, power-hungry scientist threatens the world with a lethal virus. Nick Carter’s mission was nearly impossible! The Death Strain is a lethal virus which there is no antidote and which kills in a hideous, painful way.”

The artist for this piece, Steve Holland, has a particularly interesting history. He was primarily a model and a sometimes actor, having appeared as Flash Gordon in the 1954 TV series. And when the “Doc Savage, Man of Bronze” stories from the 1930s began to be reprinted as paperback novels (also in 1964), Holland was the model that artist James Bama used to give Doc Savage’s iconic covers their look over the nearly complete run of 181 books, from 1964-1990 … the same period as Nick Carter.

His biographies do not list him as an artist, but Holland provided the cover for this second edition of Nick Carter #60, and he painted himself into the cover as the guy in a trench coat with the gun.

“Dr. Strange” (4) 12 p 19 (December 2016)

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Dr. Strange (4) 12 p 19 (December 2016)
by Chris Bachalo (1965-) and Victor Olazaba
12 x 17 in., ink on paper
Coppola Collection

In the olden days, the penciled page was physically handed (in the studio) or shipped to the inker, and the combined work appeared on the same physical page.

These days, everyone works from home and communicates electronically. The pencil artist can scan and send a high-resolution copy of the penciled page, and the inker can print it out in blueline format (light blue does not photocopy or can be easily eliminated during scanning) for inking. So there are two original art pages: the penciled and the blueline-inked.

“Blood in the Aether: Chapter One”

Doctor Strange is on the brink of death, his magic nearly depleted. And Baron Mordo is about the return to take advantage of that.