My friend Harvey
Do you remember when I talked about Carl Andre and how he made me an artist? Well, that’s only half the story… the other half is how Harvey Pekar made me, and many others, comickers.
Whilst everyone else was writing comics about men in spandex or war-hardened heroes, Mr Pekar took the novel approach of writing about his own life in American Splendor. He’s an autobiographical comicker.
By all accounts (including a superb film) he’s not much of an artist in the traditional sense, so here’s the deal – Harvey writes the comics, about his life and thoughts, and then someone else draws him… He’s had artists such as Robert Crumb and Dean Haspiel draw him, and quite a few others, and each time he looks a little different, however each artist sees him.
If you haven’t read any of his stuff, I’d highly recommend it… it’s the sort of comic that I give to people that don’t normally read comics. You can pick any of them, they’re all good.
The reason I see him as at least partly responsible for me making comics is that he really opened up the field. Sure, I imagine a lot of comics had autobiographical content in them previously, but Mr Pekar turned that content into the actual point.
And whilst I rarely write or draw about my physical life – my day job, my relationships, my house – most of what you see is autobiographical… it’s the stuff that goes on in my head whilst I’m at work or watching television or talking to loved ones – You’ll notice that there’s not a lot of spandex in there.
I realise that I’m hardly scratching the surface here, but I don’t want this to sound like a love letter. The guy’s great for so many reasons… I tell you what, I’ll leave you with a link to some footage of Harvey in action on Letterman and answering some quickfire questions.
Ms Em on 
justine on
If I wrote a comic that was actually accurate to my actual existence it would be really hard to make it funny. And funny’s kind of what I do. Also it would be really boring without all the time travel and evil twins.
But Joe, we all know that you really do have an evil twin, and that you own a tardis with which you make frequent trips to both the past and the future.
you told us all that…
… right after you requested that we refer to you as ‘doctor’.
You don’t have to try to be funny Joe.
Just do what comes naturally.
Funny does come naturally, it’s just that my life has taken a turn for the not funny. I’m not interested in writing a tragedy.
I strongly suspect that TFFU would benefit greatly from spandex.
Mmm, but in what capacity?
I mean, I can’t think of an acceptable use for that fabric…
Elastane.
It’s all hair-metal, disco jeans and superheroes.
The fact that most of the well known comic characters, such as those men modelled on bats, spiders and super, pre-date the invention of spandex, leading to the question, ‘what exactly are they wearing?’
Nylon?
I hope not, ’cause that’s not going to be pleasant for any damsel rescuee… and besides that stuff is really difficult to keep crease-free.
I suspect it may be paint that they are wearing….
But that could be messy.
That is a really good point and one worthy of investigation.
OK it’s settled, we’ll conduct a survey with experimentation to work out what exactly the golden era superheroes were wearing, costume material-wise.
I suspect body paint has a couple of drawbacks, namely that no one wants to see Spiderman’s hastily coloured-in genitals flopping around as he swings between skyscrapers.
Perhaps a pants and paint combo would solve that, but that leaves him open to a spidey-wedgie.
I have a feeling this is going to take over and become my life’s work.
I am inquiring about this matter at a science forum.
I’ll post the results (if any), when I get them.
Nice one… bring the science.
Probably they were supposed to just be wearing regular clothes but because of their bulging ripply muscles their clothes would be ridiculously tight and show everything off (so that the readers would get the impression that the heroes have major muscle definition without having the heroes have to run around all the time not wearing shirts.)
What I want to know is how does the Question see through that blank face mask he wears?
He probably doesn’t, it’s just blind luck* that he doesn’t wander into traffic.
*no pun intended.
Have you noticed nobody says “adult” anymore.
Harvey’s work is described on Amazon as being
“post-adolescent.” I guess there could be a
distinction between post adolescence and
adulthood, but it’s splitting hairs, isn’t it? Or
has the use of adult been appropriated by
the porn and shoe sizes industries???
I think you’re right, ‘adult’ has been appropriated to mean ‘naughty’ rather than ‘mature’.
Post-adolescent suggests a very specific period in a life though, as if the elderly and the middle-aged wouldn’t like it…
But it’s a folly no matter what, to suggest things on age rather than intellect. I know some 30-somethings that aren’t able to handle violence in books, and some teenagers that have a better grasp of ‘adult’ situations than most… maybe they should make you take an aptitude test at the till?
I know the thread of discussion about superheroes costumes wasn’t serious but I’ll go ahead and give the answers anyway. I’m just weird that way.
1. Golden Age superheroes often wore fairly regular clothes. Green Lantern (Alan Scott) and the Flash (Jay Garrick) for example have pretty regular pants and baggy, not at all skin-tight shirts. When you get to the silver age (the debut of Spider-Man and modern DC heroes like Hal Jordan as the Green Lantern) you get into that skin-tight, kind of iffy period. Spider-Man’s costume was probably a set of longjohns he modified and, over time, he found new materials and made better costumes. On the other hand, a lot of heroes wear unstable molecules, something invented in Marvel comics by Reed Richards (Mr. Fantastic). The fabric conforms well to the body, helps get rid of sweat so you’re not all icky and gross after a fight, and most importantly, adjusts to your powers. Its why the Human Torch’s costume doesn’t burn up when he flames on.
As for the Question, there’s actually a breathing mesh and a lenses in that mask. They’re just cleverly disguised so no one can tell from the outside. Think flesh colored one way mirror. Does it make sense? No. But then again, we’re talking about a guy who uses a gas to change his hair color (seriously, think of how much money that gas would make on the hair product market). Realism isn’t exactly part of the program.
We like that here, a bit of genuine knowledge, as much as we like to speculate.
Though I’m also partial to putting fictional characters and situations under the scrutiny of real life logic… may a few decades in the future when we have something closer to the unstable molecule solution I’ll be mocking the fact that they wore something as impractical as spandex.
So, points awarded, mostly of the geek variety.
Oh good, that Question was going to bother me to no end.
Last night I started to go to sleep but then I couldn’t fall asleep because I couldn’t remember the fourth original Avenger (it was Ant-Man (and I also forgot the Wasp but she was basically Ant-Man’s sidekick at that point (how pathetic is THAT?))).
The science forum came to basically the same conclusion.
Well, now she’s a full Avenger (and even led them at one point) while Ant-Man’s a Skrull. Go figure.
my sister’s eager to take up the novelish style of comic making, but she’s having trouble finding a real writer and keeps yelling about how she’s gonna end up in a cardboard box.
maybe someone can save my ears?
She an artist after a writer? Does she know how rare that is?
If you have a look at all the usual forums such as onlinecomics.net you’ll find hundredds of writers looking for artists… some of them aren’t that good, but I’m sure she’ll be able to find one that she gets along with.
The other thing to do is perhaps convert out-of-copyright texts to comic form. It takes a bit of editing skill, but I’m sure she’ll be OK at that, and I’d be happy to help out if she needs it… depends what sort of stuff she’s into, but I could make some recomendations.
thanks, i’ll have you reply to you herself as soon as she wakes up from her nap
(it’s been four hours now?)
The best naps are the ones that last a REAAAALLLY long time and leave you disoriented like Rip Van Winkle.
embarrassingly, it seems like i was a lot more exited at obtaining your advice than she was.
i would like to hone my sequential art skills (if only to irk her), if you could give me a tip. i’m interested in making stories that suck you into the setting
Wow I’m kinda in the same boat with my Evo comic… not that my art in that comic is great shakes, but it’s difficult trying to write the overall story when my nose is stuck in a single panel.
I’m sorry it took me so long to respond, I was trying to think of what to say, and then it slipped my mind.. And now I’ve forgotten what I’d thought up.
Well, I first fell in love with manga, (I’d list my influences as Hiromu Arakawa’s Fullmetal alchemist, Hakase Mizuki’s The Demon Ororon and Tite Kubo’s Bleach) So of course I’ve mostly looked in manga/anime communities, which seem flooded with fanservicy harems and charming vampires.
That idea of Adam’s about using materials that have lost their copyright seems good, I’ll start looking around! I’d love to hear any other advice you’ve got, about the art too. I need it! http://zappakai.deviantart.com/
Seriously, there are a lot of writers out there looking for artists. I know I spent months looking for an artist for my upcoming webcomic. If she’s interested in perhaps making some money off of it and doesn’t mind losing her IP, she can check out the zuda.com forums. People are always looking for artists there to enter the competition.
thanks, are minors allowed to participate?
i’m not sure how IPs work…