Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I'll be honest, I'll listen. He's a big fan of comics and I love comics so why not?

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I want to hear Liefeld talk about the days of Stephen Platt.



https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...bafa8d974.jpeg




https://bleedingcool.com/comics/fanb...stephen-platt/

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

Platt's work was gorgeous. Looking as that drawing though there is no way he belonged anywhere near a monthly.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I was always a fan, but his monthlies sucked due to the wait. I also hated when people compared his work to Todd McFarlane. Please. Platt buried Todd in terms of technique and style.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I always felt they were pretty similar styles. Both Todd and Platt has a very detailed but busy artwork with exaggerated but incredibly vivid anatomy. Platt knew that there was more money for his art that in Hollywood, so he basically left the business and does a variant cover every now and then.


https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...a078b67e8c.jpg


https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/dvdtalk...94bcadbbd7.jpg

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

$40,000 per issue? WTH??

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

Wat? No. Unless he improved a lot in his later years (like Travis Charest starting off as a pretty poor Jim Lee impersonator and then making his own style). Splatt (at least early on) was like someone looking at McFarlane's drawings, thinking the tiny lines and details were what made it great, and focusing on that and not composition.

Here's an article about him featuring a lot of his early art on Moon Knight. The panel composition, and then that group shot. I realize they kind of threw him into the fire there with those Moon Knight issues so hopefully someone can point to him improving greatly later down the line:
https://scans-daily.dreamwidth.org/1842318.html

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

Early Image rates were insane.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

Wow, I was never able to get the Moon Knight Splatt stuff, but it's not as good as he got with Prophet and his later works. I'd say his compositions were more in line to what Todd was doing but not the artwork.

As far as Travis Charest goes, I was not a fan of him early on, because he used to give all his male characters these full ass lips -- all the guys had Val Kilmer mouths. He got much better as time went on.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

When Wizard announced that Moon Knight was a “hot” comic because of the McFarlane-like art, I ran out to the comic shop and got a copy of his last MK issue, which was also the last of the series. I didn’t know what the hell was going on, same with Prophet, but it looked awesome. When someone else started inking his work on Prophet it really diminished the effect.

And I also didn’t like Charest at first. Same reason, feminine-looking male faces, that were really wide for some reason. He was like a cross between Liefeld and Jim Lee. Despite my criticism, Batman briefly looked like an Image Comic, but it was just bait-and-switch because the interiors were completely different. They did a similar thing with Action Comics at the time.

The guy’s style changed dramatically though. Fantastic artist. I got some back issues of his second Wild Cats work and the X-Men cross overs. Great art and great dialogue by Lobdell.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

Yeah, the Charest transformation is amazing. I remember getting his earliest work in Showcase and that Flash Eclipso annual because hey, I liked Jim Lee, and then collecting Darkstars. I still remember that Batman cover he drew of Bane choking out a skinny Killer Croc with like Batman jumping in the background with a severely undernourished leg. Ironically by the time he made it to Lee's WildC.A.T.s his art was already vastly improved and I actually preferred him to Lee. His output diminished greatly when he went over to Paris to work on Metabarons, though. I also remember being surprised that inker Art Thibert also had a Jim Lee style for a second, there.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

And it happened. These people always have an angle with social media. Stir up shit just to keep your name/brand "relevant" and they flip that into something.

I love the visual vibrancy he gave 90s comics. All that early Image stuff like the various Youngblood titles, Bloodstrike, Brigade, Supreme, and Glory are so much fun to look at, even today with all their horrendous anatomy. The writing is either a bunch EXTREME ACTION!!! going on all over the place, or it's extremely basic, simplistic and painfully amateurish stories.

But just the ways he's promoted himself and how he's handled previous working partnerships I wouldn't be interested in listening to his podcast.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

Stephen Platt seemed to get compared to Todd McFarlane at the time because he drew Spider-man in Moon Knight in the McFarlane style: big eyes, spaghetti webbing, and crazy physical contortions. In fact, I'm looking at the cover and interior and his Spider-man looks EXACTLY like McFarlane's Spider-man illustrations. He also does the exaggerated cape capes, and the highly exaggerated anatomy thing. He also seemed to have a Jim Lee influence the way he shaded muscles in particular and the way he drew women.

As far as Platt vs McFarlane, yeah, it seems like the former had a better grasp of anatomy and light source and shading. But did Platt's style allow him to meet monthly deadlines? I don't know about Moon Knight, but the way in between issues for Prophet was insane even when he got someone else to ink. McFarlane on the other hand was cranking out two issues of Amazing Spider-man per month AND doing covers for Marvel Tales at one point.

Platt would be an ideal artist for Conan the Barbarian.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

Jae Lee has some truly terrible, nightmarish art at Marvel in the early 90s. Around the time he did Inhumans in 2000 his work was gorgeous.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I wouldn't call it horrific necessarily, even in the early Namor days it had a ton of style that I liked. But yes, his Inhumans was awesome.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I first encountered him filling in on X-Factor during the X-Cutioners Song crossover. Maybe he can was just rushed or something, but his issues were bad.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I hated Jae Lee's early stuff but grew to like later on. I love Hellshock.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

Looking through it I can see how his style was jarring, but I still quite like a lot of the layouts. I mean it's not Jon Bogdanove on X-tinction Agenda level (and I liked Bogdanove on Superman).

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I'd add Brandon Peterson to this list of artists that I couldn't stand when I first started seeing him on fill ins then on X-Men. He went over to Cross Gen and something just clicked.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I've always thought it was unfortunate that Splatt and Charest never had a great, definitive work, and their limited output was mostly wasted on forgettable superhero books like Moon Knight, Prophet, and DarkStars.

Closest either came was probably Charest doing part of Alan Moore's brief WildCATs run.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I find it funny that all these recent posts are about artists who improved on their early work and became fan favorites as contrasted by Rob Liefeld who started as a fan favorite and his art just got worse and worse.

I was admittedly buying Liefeld's New Mutants and X-Force stuff because it was "hot" at the time. But even then his art was bad. The tiny waists and ankles. The loooong leg and terrible proportions. The lack off feet. All of it was there then. But things got worse as he went on to Image and beyond. And he hasn't improved. I'll admit that there is sometimes an energy to his work, when he's at his best, but it doesn't make up for all of the problems for me.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I think Cross Gen either had incredible inkers or they had so much lead time (early on) that artists could really go to town without feelling the deadline crunch, because I feel like several artists did just incredible work there. Jim Cheung, for instance. And while Steve Epting did a long run in Avengers, I never appreciated his art until Crux (and he carried that style onto the excellent Brubaker Captain America run). I was very sad the company couldn't make it work.

That's my biggest complaint with Rob is that he never really addressed his weaknesses past his early career. I guess if people are giving him money no need to. It did seem like he was trying new things when Youngblood first started up, but then he did Heroes Reborn and I just couldn't believe it.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I enjoyed Brandon Peterson's work at Top Cow. I could never really get into CrossGen. Art was really nice, but not my thing at all, despite trying to make it work for me for a while.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

I could also never get into CrossGen, the Art was good, but the stories and even titles seemed generic. Scratch that, I did enjoy Ruse.

Re: Rob Liefeld - Worst comic book artist ever?
 

Stories weren't for me either but the art/coloring was beautiful on pretty much everything I saw, at least early on.