Plug, Plug, Plug. Baby needs new size twelve shoes.

Plug.

Plug.

Spider-Man Plug.

On Sale Tomorrow.  I wrote it (Dan Slott helped).  Matt Clark drew it.  Marvel printed it.  You’re going to love it, I promise.  MOST. FUN. MARVEL. STORY. I’VE. EVER. WRITTEN.

Plug.

Ultimate Spider-Man Adventures #3.  Coming next week.  I drew one of this issue’s interior stories.   Two Spider-Man Comics in two weeks!  Plus:  Spider-Man in the movies, yo!  Spider-Man on the comics’ stands! I’m at pop culture ground zero, fellow babies.

Batman plug.

Plug.

On sale in July.  I drew this one.  The true story of Batman’s creation, finally giving due to BILL FINGER, the REAL creator of Batman.

Plug.

Some pages from Bill  The Boy Wonder.  This scene recreates the moment Bob Kane “created” Batman.

Plug.

Another scene from Bill  The Boy Wonder.  This the moment that Bill Finger explains to Bob Kane how to fix that first version of the character so that people will actually read it.

plug.

On Sale in July.  The Bat-Fan in you needs this book.

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here, now your Bonus Plug:

naughty Halloween revellers ruin it for the rest of us.

Jerry Robinson 1922 – 2011

Jerry Robinson passed away yesterday, just a few weeks shy of his 90th birthday.  He was the last surviving member of the group of four men who created the mythology of Batman :  Bob Kane, Bill Finger, Dick Sprang and Jerry Robinson.   Jerry was Bob Kane’s first ghost artist, and probably the most important of the Batman artists of the Golden Age.

Along with writing partner Bill Finger, Jerry Robinson created the Joker, Alfred the Butler, Robin, the Batcave and a host of other important parts of Gotham City while Bob Kane watched from across the room and pretended to be the one doing it.  Though Kane spent his life lying about the huge contributions that his partners made, comics historians did eventually see through the nonsense, and Robinson lived long enough to get his due as one of the seminal creators of our industry.   There was at least THAT justice.

Batman and Robin, keeping the cartoonists' drawing table safe, thanks to Jerry Robinson!

I had the rare chance to meet him a couple of times over the years, at awards ceremonies and conventions, etc, and Jerry was delightful and awe-inspiring company whenever I was fortunate enough to be around him.  I’ll never forget the first thing he said to me, though:  When I told him I was a Batman creator, writing and drawing the characters he helped create, he reached out to shake my hand and said (with a twinkle in his eye) “Where’s my cheque?”

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Jerry Robinson…my world would not be the same without having shared the planet with you for the last forty-eight years.  You gave me a childhood filled with unbridled joy and fun and I cannot conceive of who I would have turned out to be if you’d never been there before me.

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your Bonus Jerry Robinson moment:

I have a bunch of images of Jerry Robinson on my computer because I recently had to draw his portrait for a project about Bill Finger (see the top of this column for the drawing) but I went searching for a photo of the man to adorn this blog post and was astounded to discover the first two or three images of Jerry that pop up on google search are photos of Jerry posing in front of one of my drawings of the Joker.  Why Jerry would pose in front of MY drawing of his character, rather than one of his own drawings, is baffling to me, and I assume the photographer didn’t know he’d matched up the wrong artist.  But I am humbled and honoured to have Mr. Robinson and I share a few photos like that.

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NOTE:  For those in the Toronto area:  The Toronto Cartoonist Workshop Faculty Art Show for its instructors is tomorrow night, Friday December 9!  I’ll have at least one framed image of the Joker up on the wall, but I’ll make a point of bringing the original art for my portrait of Jerry with me to show off as well as sharing the wall with fellow instructors LEONARD KIRK, DAVE ROSS and ERIC KIM.

Come on down and see how comic book artists live and work, but don’t feed us, we have a very specific diet and might become ill with real food.

587A College Street (at Clinton), Toronto, 7-10pm

The Flying Fickle Finger of Fate points at ME!

That’s a trading card from a “Comic Book Creators” collector’s series put out by Eclipse Comics in ’92.   For those who don’t know, Bill Finger is more or less, the secret creator of BATMAN, never credited in print, never acknowledged by the general public, and badly mistreated by Bob Kane (the “official” creator of Batman).  What was done to Bill was a crime, pure and simple, and he deserves the recognition that he never got while he was alive. Somebody should DO something about this.

Well, somebody is, and I get to play along.  Mark Tyler Nobleman has written a book about the creation of Batman and Bill Finger is the center of the story FINALLY.  And I get to do the illustrations for this important story!!  As a lifelong Batman freak, I’m thrilled to be involved.  As a lifelong Bill Finger fan, I’m hyperventilating with joy that I get to be part of setting the record straight about Bill and Bob.

This isn’t Mark Tyler Nobleman’s first foray into the world of comic book origins-behind the scenes.  Mark gave the world an excellent book about the creation of Superman a few years ago called BOYS OF STEEL:

Illustrated by Ross MacDonald, it’s a delightful telling of the story of Seigel and Shuster and their moment of genius in creating that strange visitor from another planet who can bend steel in his bare hands.   The success of Boys of Steel led Mark to want to tell the story of Batman’s creation, and he’s done it in a succinct and touching narrative that will pull at your heart strings.

I’d love to show you some of the artwork that I’ve been working on for the last while (this is the secret Batman project I’ve mentioned once or twice here in the last few weeks) and as soon as I’m allowed I will….but for today, I’m happy to finally let people know I’m working on this.  I want people to buy it when it comes out, not just because it includes my work, but because Bill Finger deserves it.

Is it just me or do those look like bat wings on the finger?

Ty the Guy OUT!

Here now, your slightly inaccurate Bill Finger Comic Card moment:

The back of Bill’s trading card needs two corrections:  Finger did not die on today’s anniversary as stated…he died on January 18th.  Don’t know why they got that one wrong.  Also:  He was born in Denver.  Oops!