RIP Steve Ditko
tj_1ca9500b
Posts: 2,057
in The Commons
A very reclusive man, he helped bring us Spiderman, and also created Dr. Strange. And Squirrel Girl...
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I remember Steve Ditko's name well from comic books I read in the 70s. They did bring harmless exciting entertainment to a little boy. I wandered the streets of the city I lived in for miles collecting pop bottles just to be able to afford buying those comics which at 0.25 cents and then higher & higher were not cheap.
I just read a short biography and he had stopped working for Marvel in the 60s but I remember his name in the credits on the opening pages on some of those comic books. It must of been as creator for some of the characters.
WOW... the good Doctor has left the building. He was as much of a prolific creator as Jack Kirby. Doctor Strange was his big one for Marvel but he created Shade the Changing Man and tons of other characters for both Marvel and DC. R.I.P. Steve!
..arrrgh,, no!.
I especially loved his Shade the Changing Man title..
Ditto basically created Spider Man. Stan Lee gave him the name and said come up with something. The rest was Ditko. The costume, the powers, the teenage nerd, all Ditko. Ditko also came up with the plots and did the art for Spidey independent of Lee (they came to hate each other and rarely spoke) and Lee would make up dialogue to fit the art.
He should be rightly considered a comics god on par with with Jack Kirby, maybe Kirby just a bit in the lead.
RIP Mr Ditko
He had a really wonderful, unique drawing style. Those Dr Strange panels were about the most psychedelic things you could ask for in a 12 cent comic book! And, without him, there would be no Spider-man and our imaginations would be much poorer without that.
. Oh my!, very sad. I was a fan and loved his work, especially in the early Amazing Spiderman. R.I.P.
RIP indeed, thank you for sharing!
It's sad to hear he has gone. I loved those Dr Strange comics. I've always intended to try and make something like those settings in Carrara, twsting pathways in the air going through strange portals, strange shapes hovering in the air.... at least that's how I remember them, my old comic collection is long gone.
Reading about him got me looking on eBay to see what some of the comics 1st comics I bought are going for and well the prices are not too shabby. If only my brother had not of sold them when he was in college for party money!
Ditko was definitely one of the most influential artists of the 20th century and still is even today. His weird but relatable character creations and unique mystically STRANGE style continue to influence our culture. Ditko's skill in graphical story telling with great emotional impact was rarely equaled by his contemporaries. And few have come close since. Hopefuly he will get the credit he so greatly deserves for his wonderful creations that live on after him. I distinctly remember seeing that first issue of Spider-Man in a drug store when I was a child and how peculiar it seemed at the time compared to typical comic books.
Ditko was a HUGE influence on my interest in becoming an artist when I was a teenager, eclipsed only by the massive influence of Jack Kirby. And still influences my current art in subtle ways from the things I learned from him. A sample of my early efforts imitating Ditko's style while I was learning to draw, as a tribute to his inspiring genius..
...when he moved to DC and did the Shade title he really went back to his roots. His depictions of the various "zones" were trippy to say the least and I loved the "retro" look of the characters and settings. Sadly the title lasted only 8 issues as it was axed during the "DC Implosion of 1978" along with about a third of their other titles. the character was revived in the 90s as part o DC's Vertigo line but just didn't have the same weird feel as Mr Ditko's creation.
Relevant to people here, Ditko was masterful at telling a story visually. Like I said before, he and Stan Lee barely spoke and Ditko plotted out story arcs later in his run so basically Stan Lee had to make up dialogue just by figuring out what was going on via the art. Since Ditko was very good at telling the story visually, no issue there. Look at Amazing Spiderman #33 (google it, it's very famous and can be easily seen) to see how he showed a trapped Spidey desperate, defeated, re-motivated, and in an amazing full page image, triumphant. Don't read the dialogue, you dont need it. In fact, Spidey doesnt even have facial expressions so ithe story is told totally in the body language. Masterclass.