Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Red As a Lobster / Jim Mooney (R.I.P.)

I have a bonus story for you today, paying tribute to the late great Jim Mooney who sadly passed away last weekend at the age of 89. Mooney is best known for his legendary work at Marvel and DC on major superhero titles, but he also delivered a handful of really great pre-code Atlas horror stories as well for titles like Strange Tales, Astonishing, Journey into Mystery and more. R.I.P.
From the March 1953 issue of Adventures into Terror #17






Thanks to Patrick Owsley for bringing this news to my attention.

9 comments:

The Vicar of VHS said...

Wow, that Paul is one of the most bastardy bastards I've seen on any of your posts! And that's saying a lot!

"Of course it feels pain! It'd be no fun if it didn't!"

"I must insist that you join me in tasting its delicious flesh!"

"Once we're married, I'll crush that spirit of hers!"

What a charmer. I wonder how he got her to agree in the first place.

And is it just me, or does the bride-to-be in the bottom panel of page 1 look like she should be on one of those velvet paintings at the flea market? :)

Great fun, this one. Who's up for a crawfish boil?

Anonymous said...

I AGREE WITH THE VICAR, WHAT A BASTARD! BUT WITHOUT CRUEL BASTARDS WE WOULDN'T HAVE A MAJORITY OF THE GREAT PRECODE HORROR STORIES!

MOONEY'S ART IS BEAUTIFUL. ITS SO SAD WHEN A COMIC LEGEND PASSES AWAY BUT THEIR WORK LIVES ON FOREVER!

Anonymous said...

Nice Mooney tribute, thanks for posting.

Mr. Karswell said...

>"Once we're married, I'll crush that spirit of hers!"

This was actually a line from my own wedding vows. Fire up the pot Vicar, I'm ready for some crawfish!

Something I found interesting and very cool about Mooney from the wikipedia entry:

Mooney drew the backup feature "Supergirl" in Action Comics from 1959 to 1968. For much of this run on his signature character, Mooney lived in Los Angeles, managing an antiquarian book store on Hollywood Boulevard and sometimes hiring art students to work in the store and ink backgrounds on his pencilled pages.

Zen Wizard said...

I can't help wondering where the lobsters are going to get some drawn butter and some bibs.

Mr. Karswell said...

Hurrah!! The Zen Wizard is back! Where ya been bub?

Anonymous said...

cool story, sad about mooney.

hey that patrick owsley guy is great!!!! i followed his link and love that old hanna barberra style.

Todd Franklin said...

Great to see some of his scary stuff! The man could draw anything and thanks for posting this!

Mr. Karswell said...

>hey that patrick owsley guy is great

Indeed he is, me and him have worked together on many projects over the last 4 or 5 years, he's a very reliable artist with a multitude of fantastic styles and ideas. His blog is updated numerous times a week too so keep checking it for more stuff. It's all great!

>Great to see some of his scary stuff!

I think people are much more familiar with Mooney's superhero work so it was an honor for me to exhibit one of the darker, lesser seen sides of his awesome output. R.I.P.