This one starts off with two of my favourite pages in comics. A scuba diving saboteur breaks into an Alaska factory, plants an explosive device and escapes. It is beautifully rendered by Jim Aparo, with the action moving crisply from panel to panel with nary a caption nor a single word of dialogue. It is a lesson in comic book storytelling. The rest of the story is also quite sharp. Aquaman and Aqualad try to track down the saboteur in a great self contained mystery with environmental undertones. The thing I love about Steve Skeates is that he knows how to be topical without being preachy. There's a rather bittersweet ending to the whole mess, which was a novel way to leave a reader in 1970. There is even a neat Atlantis-based interlude, hinting at some of the drama to come. Aparo draws an awesome Ocean Master. Did I mention the explosive Nick Cardy cover? A first ballot Hall of Famer.Thursday, October 29, 2009
Single Issue Hall of Fame: Aquaman #49
This one starts off with two of my favourite pages in comics. A scuba diving saboteur breaks into an Alaska factory, plants an explosive device and escapes. It is beautifully rendered by Jim Aparo, with the action moving crisply from panel to panel with nary a caption nor a single word of dialogue. It is a lesson in comic book storytelling. The rest of the story is also quite sharp. Aquaman and Aqualad try to track down the saboteur in a great self contained mystery with environmental undertones. The thing I love about Steve Skeates is that he knows how to be topical without being preachy. There's a rather bittersweet ending to the whole mess, which was a novel way to leave a reader in 1970. There is even a neat Atlantis-based interlude, hinting at some of the drama to come. Aparo draws an awesome Ocean Master. Did I mention the explosive Nick Cardy cover? A first ballot Hall of Famer.
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3 comments:
All these years I had just assumed that Jim Aparo drew that gorgeous cover along with several others, but I am not surprised that the extremely talented Nick Cardy drew it instead. Cardy is one of the most underrated masters.
Great post!
Yup - Cardy still did most of the covers during Aparo's time on the title.
I more of an Aparo fan (not to knock Cardy at all), so I would have liked to see Jim get a few cover assignments.
I don't have this issue,but I have some that followed and the Skeates Aparo team was really wonderful.
That was a great time to be reading comics.
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