Tag: Roy Thomas

Many of my professional comic book and animation friends on facebook and twitter have commented how this was one of the best San Diego Comic Cons they have had. Each say this for their own reasons, and it’s up to them to tell you why, but let me talk about why this is one for me.

As I’ve written about before, when I first got into reading comics I discovered the Justice Society of America before I really knew the Justice League was more than SUPER FRIENDS. Soon after that I found a comic called ALL-STAR SQUADRON. This book was written by Roy Thomas, and in one way or another included every single ‘Golden Age’ hero that DC Comics owned.

For many years, Thomas had his hands controlling the greatest of characters from both Marvel and DC.

Because as a kid he grew up reading all the original Golden Age characters he maintained a passion for all of them when he became a professional writer himself. I’d like to think I’m following in his footprints.

At the first ComicCon I attended, I was excited to attend a panel on Roy Thomas and his books. Unfortunately, for one reason or another, he couldn’t make it to the panel but con personnel said he was there. So another attendee and I mustered up enough courage to go to the info booth and ask to have him paged. (Realize I was a very shy kid in my early teens. Of course I’m still rather shy in my mid—never mind.) But Mr. Thomas never showed up. I was disappointed, but didn’t have any negativity against the man who controlled all these great characters.

Years later after getting my first job in the comic book industry, I met him extremely briefly while attending Pro-Con in Oakland. (Anyone remember that?) But he and Marv Wolfman were in deep discussion that I didn’t want to disturb him.

(I lost a lot of opportunities over the years because I didn’t want to disturb people. Finally getting over that. That’s a blog post all into itself.)

Finally we reach this year. Shannon and I attended a couple of spotlight panels. One on the artist George Perez, and the second was on Roy Thomas. The panel was moderated by Jon B. Cooke (editor of TwoMorrow’s COMC BOOK CREATOR magazine), and they talked about Thomas growing up and reading comics as a little boy, on to writing and editing for Marvel, and then doing what he says is his favorite book for DC Comics ALL-STAR SQUARDRON.

Yay, me too.

Here’s the cover of the very first Issue I bought:

Getting to hear him talk about all that was really good, but the day wasn’t over. After a dinner at the hotel before heading to the Writer’s Guild of America gathering, we were coming down an escalator and knew we had a limited amount of time. Standing in the corner by the Starbucks in hotel’s lounge stood Roy Thomas.

What feels like the first time in my life, I didn’t hesitate or think about what I was doing, and just went up to Mr. Thomas and introduced myself.

He was extremely friendly as I told him how ALL-STAR SQUADRON not only got me into comics, but also into enjoying history of World War II. That pleased him, because he was always incorporating history into the stories.

I told him how I later worked for Brian Murray who had been one of the artists on the follow up series YOUNG ALL-STARS.

Shannon spoke up saying how as an editor at Marvel, Roy had given a writing assignment to Christy Marx who later became a mentor to her which lead to her own career in animation.

I thanked him and his wife once more and headed off to meet more of our fellow writers. I was walking on cloud 9 almost crying with joy. Nothing could have made this Con better, and yet there were other things that we will be talking about for a long time to come.

Though most of those ‘golden age’ characters have dropped back into the shadows as new generations of writers and characters take over, Roy Thomas and the ALL-STAR SQUADRON will forever be the heart of what makes comics special to me and why I write and draw them.

Thank you Mr. Thomas.

Influences to Glory – Writers and Artists

By kevinpsb4

On January 6, 2012

In Uncategorized

Earlier today I was in the midst of a Twitter conversation that brought up our earliest comic book influences.

Every artist, and writer, has their influences. Not all of us will agree as to who the greatest or the worst, the most dynamic, narrative, or the worst is. But we all know who influences us.

For me, it goes nearly to the very beginning of reading comics. I had already read through a digest reprint of JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #100 (written by Len Wein, another important influence to me), which introduced me to the world of the DC Universe that wasn’t the SUPER FRIENDS of Saturday Morning Cartoons.

Here was not only the Justice League of America, but also another team that called themselves the Justice Society of America. As a little kid, all I knew was that these were alternate takes on what I thought were well-established characters.

Over the next few months I would beginning to pick up other comic books. One comic was THE NEW TEEN TITANS by Marv Wolfman and George Perez. The second was an issue of ALL STAR SQUADRON written by Roy Thomas and among many artists was Jerry Ordway.

These two books would truly build my view of the DC Universe. The Teen Titans very ‘science fiction’ based modern stories with highly detailed artwork, while All Star Squadron showed heroes in the midst of World War II and had heroes with magic based powers.

For a while I believe that Earth 1 took place in the modern day, and Earth 2 in the 1940s, so that even when they did a cross over story they were coming from two different points in time. I soon learned that wasn’t true.

Anyway, back to my influences.

For writing, I couldn’t have picked any better writers to follow than Marv Wolfman and Roy Thomas. Yes, I’ll hear people mention who they believe are better with more complexity to their writing, but for me these two men were the foundational influence to me that everything grew from.

Where Wolfman knew who to emotionally grab me in one story and then tell great actions sequences in the next, Thomas knew how to handle dozens of characters sometimes at once. Thomas also knows everything about what I was learning to call the ‘Golden Age’ of comics, and spent time in every issue telling something about it all.

Because of Roy Thomas and the All-Star Squadron, I quickly became infatuated by Golden Age, and I saw out reprint books of the original stories (there was no way I could afford the originals, but I found the stories I wanted).

As with most young comic readers I soon began to create my own characters. But I didn’t want to create them in my modern world. I didn’t fit in a New York that I saw through George Perez’s detailed art. I created my characters influenced by Jerry Ordway that I felt had a more ‘realistic’ style. His faces were and are great.

(Imagine my thrill later when Ordway was hired to ink Perez’s work on CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTH. The two were so perfect together.)

(SIDE NOTE: I would also discover in the back issue bings the John Byrne issues of FANTASIC FOUR, and I bought as many as I could afford over several years of collecting. The greats of these were those where Byrne’s art was inked over by Jerry Ordway.)

So I’m creating my own characters, refining them, turning them into something more than just sketches on a page. I gave them names, and origins, not just the basic how they got power origins, but why and who the characters are with out powers.)

I was looking towards Roy Thomas and his interpretation of the Golden Age, that I began to emulate.

Three characters that I developed the furthest were The Torchlight, Speedstar, and a heroine I called FLYING GLORY.

I have written stories about all these characters, and as you all know, I took FLYING GLORY the furthest.

I’ve told the story already as how publishers were interested in a FLYING GLORY comic, one really liked the story that I told, but eventually it became clear that I couldn’t sells a Golden Age story when I was pitching it.

So with the help of Shannon Muir I updated the Flying Glory character, made her the granddaughter of the original and gave her a group of friends that supported her. THE HOUNDS OF GLORY.

Our webcomic FLYING GLORY AND THE HOUNDS OF GLORY, currently celebrating its 10^th Anniversary of being online. Everything that I put into a script I owe to Marv Wolfman and Roy Thomas, and each panel of my art is so greatly influenced by Jerry Orway and George Perez (though I’ll never be able to draw hi details and crowd scenes).

Thank you Mr. Ordway, Mr. Perez, Mr. Thomas, Mr. Wolfman for you have made me the comic book professional that I am today.

Kevin Paul Shaw Broden

Four Names of Professional Creativity

Author - Artist - Voice Over Actor

Tag: Roy Thomas

Post Comic Con 2013 Blog #2 – Thank You Roy Thomas

Influences to Glory – Writers and Artists