Missed first time around - DC Masterworks Series

Recently I’ve taken to trawling through the back-issue boxes at my local comic shop, or at some of the smaller marts held around Illinois, to find interesting comics that I somehow missed the first time around, or had ignored back in the seventies because they weren’t part of my core collection, and my purchases back then were somewhat limited by available pocket-money.

© DC

Anyway, this past Saturday I picked up a copy of issue #1 of The Masterworks Series of Great Comic Book Artists, a book printed on Baxter paper, and published jointly by DC and Phil Seuling’s Sea Gate distribution company. I have now read that this was the first of an intended series of high-quality comics highlighting the best work of various artists.

The book came out in Spring 1983, right at the point where I was selling my comic collection, so it passed me by. Anyway, issue #1 is dedicated to the work of Frank Frazetta on Shining Knight from years past. It’s a lovely book, as you can see from the interiors.

©DC. Page from issue #1

©DC.

I only knew Frazetta from his painted covers of the Conan paperbacks printed by Sphere in the UK, as well as his later film poster work, and have never investigated his comics heritage.

I’ll track down some decent copies of #2 (more Frazetta) and #3 (Berni Wrightson) as they don’t seem too expensive, although digital copies can be easily located with help from Mr Google.  The back of issue #3 trails the next two issues as being devoted to Neal Adams, but those issues never surfaced, and the comic died a death after three issues. 

The indicia of the books doesn't mention a specific editor, although Junior Woodchuck Allan Asherman wrote some well-researched material on the inside cover on the background to Frazetta's comic book career. Presumably Phil Seuling was involved in the story selection.

©DC

©DC

©DC. Back page of issue #3, trailing the next two unpublished issues

I can find no information on the web about why the comic stopped being published, but I surmise that Phil Seuling’s declining health from a rare liver disease (he died in 1984) was a factor in the termination of the deal between Sea Gate and DC to publish these special editions.

Did any of our readers buy these comics first time around?

Incidentally, I see that Heritage Auctions has a special auction upcoming selling Frazetta’s original painted artwork for the Conan books. Those were amazing covers, and got me to hand over my dosh for the Sphere paperbacks back in January 1974.

Unpublished Comics Unlimited #38 cover

Back in middle of 1976 Alan Austin mentioned that he was planning to do a Sword & Sorcery special edition of his monthly fanzine Comics Unlimited, along the lines of the previous Batman and Shadow specials. If you remember, the early to mid 1970s had experienced a resurgence of the Sword & Sorcery genre, on the heels of interest sparked by the Lancer(US) and Sphere(UK) paperback editions of Robert E Howard’s original stories, and subsequent new content by Lin Carter and L Sprague de Camp. 

This interest was most visible in the comics world through the Conan, Ka-Zar, Savage Tales and Savage Sword of Conan books from Marvel.

Ultimately Alan decided to abandon the project of devoting an entire issue of C.U.  to the subject, for fear of alienating some of the readers; he gave his reasons in the editorial of Comics Unlimited #39.

However, prior to that decision Alan had asked our SuperStuff pal Geoff Cousins to submit a draft cover for the subsequently abandoned edition. We'd all had some success at having our artistic swipes accepted as spot illos in Comics Unlimited, but here was Alan asking for a cover submission from Geoff!

I came across Geoff’s original submission in the SuperStuff files (Alan had returned the artwork to me for some reason) which I have published below for the first time anywhere!

Conan © Conan Properties International. Original cover drawn for Comics Unlimited #38

I decided to try colouring it for my own amusement, which I have included below. (Geoff has approved this).

Conan © Conan Properties International. Colourised cover for C.U. #38

Conan © Conan Properties International - alternate colourisation by IEB

So, in an alternate timeline, this might have been the cover of Comics Unlimited #38.