Friday, July 5, 2013

The Atom and Machine Man



The first Machine Man mini-series that came out during the 80's was a revelation for me.  Mini-Series were still relatively new at that point , so it was cool to see one of my favorite lower tier characters get a chance to shine.  It was a fun, inventive story as well - set in the future with appearances by Iron Man 2020.  What stood out the most for me though was the artwork of Barry Windsor-Smith.  It was the first time I had seen BWS' pencils and inks, and I was blown away.  Then there were those covers - the 4-issue format gave him the opportunity to do something really neat.  Each cover featured a close-up of Machine Man's head, being assembled more and more with each issue.  They were so eye-catching and unlike any covers I had seen before, they really made the comic stand out on the racks.  It was a great design choice that I remember fondly to this day.

10 comments:

snell said...

I like how this echoes Ant-Man's journey inside of the Vision...

John R. Platt said...

I love that Machine Man mini-series for all of the same reasons. What a blast to the ole brainpan it was back in the day, and what a blast it is seeing your interpretation of it now!

AARDVARK said...

I was always hoping that you would do a Sword of The Atom meets Conan cover. Since you've done a lot of Conan lately, how about Sword of The Atom vs. Red Sonja or Skaaar, Son of Hulk, or She-Ra?

Ross said...

This isn't the last we will see of Sword of the Atom...

Anonymous said...

I remember stumbling on covers of this mini when reading about machine Man on the web. I enjoyed their creativity, thanks for remaining me about them.

I hope you're still accepting fan suggestions because I have one. I don't know if you ever heard about Runaways - it's one of my favorite teams and series and Marvel wasn't treating them very well lately. this month it's their tenth anniversary and I thought I will cheer myself up by suggesting this to you - could you do a cover with them?

Ross said...

I must confess that I have never read an issue of Runaways, so I don't really know anything about them. Kids of super-villains or something like that, right?

Anonymous said...

Yup, they're kids of supervillains who ran away from home and try to defeat their parents. I felt in love with it recently and it even made me interested in other books by their creator, Brian K. Vaughn (who before never seemed like my kind of writer). It has interesting cast, with very three-dimensional characters, a lot of well-put humor, it gets really good when it's dramatic, heck, I even liked guest-starring characters (like Cloak & Dagger). If you'll ever have a chance, give Runaways (vol.1 and 2 to be specific, vol.3 is...wierd) a try.

I'm not really confortable with requesting you to do cover of something you don't know, so I'm withdrawing my request. I chered myelf up by recommending you this series. Thanks, I needed it.

Ross said...

Never say never, I have done other covers with characters that are new to me...

Brian Hague said...

First, I love this site. It is immense fun. Also, I don't know how you feel about Joss Whedon, but he has a few issues of the Runaways that he's written, if you're looking for a somewhat self-contained version of the team to visit. Finally, I'm commenting specifically on this cover (another one that is extremely well-done) to point out that Herb Trimpe pencilled the Machine Man mini-series of the 80's. BWS was the inker and embellisher.

Ross said...

BWS did full art chores on issue #4 and all the covers.

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