Thursday, January 06, 2011

Ditko Madness!


Two more purchases for my Ditko archives:


I landed this book in lower grade just this week. Strange Suspense Stories #20 from Charlton Comics, 1954. I think this is the earliest Steve Ditko comic that I currently own. During the time when he was heavily influenced by Joe Kubert's work, but developing that distinct Ditko style.

This is Amazing Adult Fantasy #14. Don't let the sub-title fool you. The stories were just plain silly, but the comic was illustrated by Steve Ditko from cover to cover. Generally each issue of Amazing Adult Fantasy contained three stories. As I recall, all of the books were drawn by Ditko, including the covers. This title followed the numbering and a name change from Amazing Adventures. One issue later (#15), it would change its title again, dropping the "Adult" to become merely Amazing Fantasy. That was the issue that introduced the Amazing Spider-Man by Steve Ditko. And there was never another issue of Amazing Fantasy, for the book then became The Amazing Spider-Man and the numbering started over with #1.

This is a very young Neil Young. Why is this photo here? Because I've always thought that Neil Young looked like he was drawn by Steve Ditko when Young was...well, young!

2 comments:

POP CULTURE DEBRIS said...

Zoinks! Ol' Shakey does look like he stepped out of a Ditko panel!

James Robert Smith said...

I have a comic with a Ditko character in it that I would SWEAR was patterned after that photo. Except that the Dikto illustration was done when Young was probably four years old. I'll scan it and post as soon as I can find it.