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Every Comic-Con, IDW sells lots of copies of their oversized “Artist’s Editions”. These massive tomes reprint comics stories of well-known comic book creators, photographing the original art of seminal stories and reprinting the stories at original art size (usually 11×17 inches, or larger). Here’s a photo for scale, of Walt Simonson signing a copy of the Eisner-Award winning book!
This year, IDW was offering convention exclusives of both Sergio Aragonés’ Groo the Wanderer and David Mazzucchelli’s Daredevil Born Again. Both sold out, and if history repeats, the regular editions will sell very briskly!
These are beautiful volumes, reprinting the black-and-white art in color (that is, a color photograph of the black-and-white art boards), and last years’ Walter Simonson’s Thor Artist’s Edition won the Eisner award for Best Archival Collection/Project – Comic Books last Friday!
IDW also uses Comic-Con to announce their next volumes in the series, and did so Friday. (Another reason why it’s not good for comics companies to announce news during Comic-Con… it gets buried under the Hollywood hype.)
The first volume, MARK SCHULTZ’S XENOZOIC TALES: ARTIST’S EDITION, is planned for a June 2013 release. It will total some 144 pages, and will definitely showcase Schultz’ amazing artwork! Younger Beat readers might remember the brief “Cadillacs and Dinosaurs” cartoon which aired on CBS in 1993, which was based on Xenozoic Tales, and which is available for download at Amazon. To quote the PR:
Schultz creates a story that is beautifully told and exquisitely illustrated. A student of classic comic strip and comic book artists, Schultz’s influences include Al Williamson, Wally Wood and others, but, like all great artist’s, evolved into his own, unique self.
Flesk Publications recently collected the series, and preview pages can be found at their website.
RED NAILS by BWS Last I saw, they were all complete in one collector’s possession but that was long ago.
SWAMP THING by Wrightson
MORT CINDER by A. Breccia
MASTER OF KUNG FU by Paul Gulacy
Michael Golden at Marvel Comics
Thanks for the update on the Eisner edition. I had thought that one had fallen off the list and was forgotten.
My list of books I’d like to see get the Artist’s Edition…..
Brian Bolland’s Killing Joke
Byrne’s Uncanny X-Men #137 (and maybe any other issues of the Dark Phoenix storyline)
Paul Chadwick’s Concrete
Dale Keown’s Hulk
Gary Frank’s Hulk
Alan Davis’ Excalibur
Steve Rude’s Nexus
George Perez’s Teen Titans (the obvious choice would be that Terra storyline but I prefer the earlier stories with Tanghal’s inking rather than Giordano’s).
Kirby’s FF with Sinnott inks
Any Michael Golden (Micronauts and that Star Wars story would probably be asking too much, right?)
I had Xenozoic Tales on that list too but I can happily cross that one off. I’m hoping that it will be all later issues as Schultz really hit got better and better later in the run. This really should be a marvelous book and, I hope, will inspire future inkers as to what is possible. But please, IDW, if you do a con exclusive, let us know early enough. :)
I got the Mazzucchelli Artist’s Edition, and glorious though it is (and believe me, it is), the price tag is high enough that I probably won’t buy any more unless I have some special emotional/nostalgic connection to the contents. On that note:
Bill Sienkiewicz’s New Mutants run
Art Adams’s Uncanny X-Men/New Mutants specials
Wendy Pini’s ElfQuest
Kirby’s Kamandi inked by Royer.
Kirby’s New Gods inked by Royer.
If they let people vote on these I bet it’d start some punchin’ fights.
I’d shell out for Man of Steel, anything Rude, anything Garcia-Lopez — would love to see a Schaffenberger Superman one.
How about Mad Love filled out with other Timm stories and maybe the original character designs and stuff from the show?
I second the call for Garcia-Lopez!! A Batman collection would be EPIC. I love Gil Kane, but would rather see some of his other work that he inked himself, like ‘The Ring’.
I’d also like to see:
-Ditko Spider-man
-Kevin Maguire’s JLI
-Dave Gibbon’s 80’s Green Lantern run (because it deserves more than a crummy paperback!).
-Neil Adams Batman or GA/GL
I hope they do a Dave Sim volume or two.
Hint, hint. Nudge, nudge.
I keep hoping for a hardcover run of Cerebus.
Dream projects aside, inclusion in this series seems to require that either (1) an artist kept his/her original art, (2) the publisher retained the original art, or (3) a single collector acquired the original art of complete stories.
I wish I knew more about what material fits those criteria.
Dave Sim/Gerhard Cerebus
Jaime/Gilbert Hernandez L & R
Charles Burns Black Hole
Michael Zulli Sandman
Hal Foster Tarzan and/or Prince Valiant
Anything by Kirby and Ditko
Chris Ware Acme Novelty Library
Rob Liefeld X Force
Bernie Krigstein at EC!
Or–how about this–a LITTLE ANNIE FANNY Artist’s Edition that reproduces the colored layers that Kurtzman would prepare on vellum? THAT would be a monster of a book!
I don’t think there would be any fist fights over these. Lots of great choices, especially the ones I didn’t think of. But the Liefeld one was to see if I was awake and paying attention this morning, right? :)
More than anything I’d love to see them put out something by Alex Toth (maybe “Bravo for Adventure” or a collection of some of his DC work from the 1970s).
Other than Toth:
“Man of Steel” by John Byrne
“The Next Nexus” by Steve Rude
BTW, I have the Mazzucchelli edition and the Wally Wood edition and both books are unbelievably beautiful.
And just so people know, the Wood book is really, really huge. Much bigger than I expected it to be. I know the publisher’s intention is to present the artwork at its original size, but the Wood book is so big that it is actually difficult to read. I’m probably in the minority, but I would not have minded if that book had been reduced a bit in size (to, say, the size of the Mazzucchelli book).
That said, if you’re on the fence about any of these, I highly recommend taking the plunge and getting them. I’m still kicking myself for not getting the Dave Stevens edition when I had the chance.
I can’t believe nobody mention first six legendary episodes of ” Monster of Frankenstein”, by also legendary Mike Ploog! Please Idw!
“I’m still kicking myself for not getting the Dave Stevens edition when I had the chance.”
IDW announced a second printing of the Dave Stevens book at SDCC. You still have a chance!