In this particular case, I think it’s probably “Things Everyone Loves About Comics: Karl Kesel”. Because really, who has bad things to say about Karl Kesel? He’s a phenomenally talented inker who’s been working in the indsutry for decades, alongside everyone from John Byrne to Rob Liefeld, and who has a gift for making everyone he works with look better. (If you’re thinking, “He sure didn’t make Rob Liefeld look good,” remember that I just said “better”. Industry legend has it that Rob turned in the pencils for the final issue of the ‘Hawk and Dove’ mini-series late, without and hands or feet drawn in for any of the characters, then took the metaphorical phone off the hook. Those hands and feet you see there? All the work of the inker, which means they may be the only correctly drawn feet in a Liefeld book ever.)
In addition to his art, he’s got a lot of great writing work under his belt. The 90s ‘Hawk and Dove’ series he did with his then-wife Barbara remains a cult favorite, with all sorts of the things I absolutely love about comics that we never get to see enough of. (They actually created new villains for the series! It had unironic humor! The heroes used their powers cleverly, and were sympathetic and likeable! There was a really strong supporting cast, and good love interests for each of the two leads, who despite being male and female didn’t spontaneously fall in love! …until after the series ended, but in the interests of staying relentlessly positive I will not touch ‘Armageddon 2001’ with a twenty-meter cattle prod.) (And neither should anyone else.)
He did a phenomenal, well-remembered run on ‘The Adventures of Superman’ that’s perhaps best known for introducing the new Superboy…who wasn’t always that emo, I swear! As with ‘Hawk and Dove’, his run was always characterized by well-written, funny dialogue and fast-paced adventure (which he carried over to his two excellent runs on ‘Superboy’. Probably my favorite moment in the history of the character was when Knockout tried to manipulate him into becoming a supervillain, finally trying to cement his corruption by telling him to kill another villain in an issue-ending cliffhanger…only to told, at the start of the next issue, “Are you nuts?”) He wrote ‘The Final Night’, which was a nice, tight, one-month crossover of the kind we saw for about four years from DC and then never again, which gave Hal Jordan a noble, dignified send-off that undid a lot of the poor treatment he’d suffered at the hands of DC’s editorial crew and probably should have stayed as the final end for the character. He also did some nice work for the probably-misconceived but still well-written Tangent line from DC (he was the one who did the Joker stories).
Over at Marvel, he had a tragically underappreciated Daredevil run (anyone remember the awesome story where Mister Hyde was framed for murder and Matt Murdock had to defend him? That was Karl Kesel.) He also wrote the first few issues of ‘Fantastic Four 2099’, the really high quality ones before the line utterly imploded because Marvel fired the line editor and all the talented writers walked in protest. (There is, somewhere, an alternate universe where Marvel kept Joey Cavalieri on, and Peter David and Warren Ellis and Karl Kesel kept writing their respective titles for another few years at least. I want to go there and steal all the comics.) He wrote an awesome FF annual where Ben Grimm traveled to a parallel universe where Marvel time mapped to real time one-to-one, and Johnny was in his late forties and thinking about retiring and leaving the whole “super hero” business to his kids. (High concept, and funny as hell.) He also wrote some great fill-in issues of the regular FF series, including the one where Ben Grimm was revealed to be Jewish (in what was ultimately a very touching Jack Kirby tribute. Another thing that Kesel loves to do is to tribute Kirby in ways both small and large. I approve.) I’m still hoping that someday he’ll get a regular gig writing the FF, because he has their voices down perfectly.
Oh, and he also did a really cute and clever “inverted X-Files” series called ‘Section Zero’ that was a victim of the implosion of the Gorilla Comics company, but that was way ahead of its time and presaged series like ‘The Middleman’ and ‘Warehouse 13′. It’s a frustrating theme of Kesel’s writing that all too often, he’s not considered to be a “hot” creator, and his work gets short shrift as a result. Either someone more famous comes along to write the book (like Kevin Smith on DD), or sales aren’t high enough to sustain a series. Which is a damn shame, because I’ve never read a Karl Kesel comic that hasn’t brought a huge smile to my face.
Oh, and if all that doesn’t convince you that he’s awesome, he just sold his whole comics collection. Why? To pay the medical bills of a special-needs baby he adopted. Even if he’d never written or drawn a single comic, that’d make him special. When you add it to everything else, it makes him one of comics’ unsung heroes…but I like to think that everyone who knows anything about him knows that he’s one of the great ones.
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I agree. I never consider Kesel my favorite writer, but I am never less than at least entertained by his books.
You point out his Kirby references, and that’s something he shines on…because he’s wants to use them, but not in some slavish way to what Kirby did. Kirby stuff showed up all over Superboy, but it never felt like “And here’s some Kirby stuff, lets fap to it.” like, say, Morrison does. It always felt “Comics are a weird place, and here are some weird parts to it.”
(And you mention his 2 runs on Superboy, but don’t forget the superlative Superboy and the Ravers)
I love the story behind “Final Night” (and I’m going by memory here): Kesel was looking for someone in the DC Universe smart enough to figure out what was happening, but still capable of being cowed by Lex Luthor. At which point someone said, “You know Brainiac 5 is back in the 20th century, right?” At which point Kesel was all, like, “yes YES PERFECT,” and proceeded to set up one of my favorite lines in all of comics: “Wow, Mr. Luthor, you and Brainiac make quite a team!”
And the juvenile part of me will always appreciate his Superboy’s first meeting with Matrix-era Supergirl: “Aww, I was chest choking…I mean, just joking!”
I’ll just say that “Hawk & Dove”, the mini-series and the ongoing, are my favorite comics ever.
The “Hawk & Dove” mini remains Rob Leifeld’s finest work. It took me years to realize that it was because of Kesel’s inks.
Personally, my favourite story of Kesel’s was the issue of “Adventures of Superman” which guest-starred the original Challenges of the Unknown, and actually took place between panels of an issue of their original series.
Such a strong mainstream comics creator. I always hope that, in our understandable rush to diversify the medium away from its dominant genre, we never start disrespecting such talented pros who have brought such spark to what they do.
Has Karl Kesel given me more pleasure over his career than Chris Ware? Yes, of course he has. It’s not a competition, but …
Hawk & Dove mini, yeah, probably the only Liefield comics I own. And I glanced at some of the Superboy stuff, in a moment of comics-weakness. Final Night, that was some Sun-Eater thing, right? Didn’t green Arrow die too? Yeah, well, don’t worry, none of those stories ever happened. YET. I remember when DC did the same thing, back in the Eighties and all these older fans were crying in their beer*(the letter pages of Amazing Heroes, mainly) about the lack of Beppo the Super Monkey and Comet the Super Horse (who was actually Supergirl’s BOYFRIEND …)and all that crazy Silver Age crap (that was actually AWESOME – except for the horse-boyfriend, I guess ..) … DC just cherry-picked what they wanted from the Silver Age repackaged it to be “gritty” and “neon” and ran their company into the ground. AGAIN. How many times have they hit the Reboot Button? Then again, the Reboot Button is very tempting, in a Ren & Stimpy kinda way.
Anyway. Wow. Today I learned that I also love Karl Kesel. Sold all his comics too? For a special needs baby? Jeez. Whatta guy.
I finished rereading the Hawk and Dove a few months back. It’s the only time I’ve actually liked any version of the characters. I knew I’d enjoy it when the villain’s secret in one issue turns out to be that he’s immortal but way younger than he lets everyone believe, so if it gets out, he loses status.
Kesel also did the Challengers of the Fantastic for the Amalgam universe, and the Iron Lantern title. Both fun.
Patrick: Green Arrow didn’t die during Final Night; we found out later that he was reborn in it from bits and pieces still on Superman’s costume after he exploded.
Fraser: Kurt Busiek wrote Iron Lantern; the issue ended on a cliffhanger, and someone wondered on (I think) Usenet what would happen next, and Busiek gave the plot synopsis to the second issue that he knew he’d never get the chance to write.
Kesel DID do Spider-Boy, and came up with a really clever reveal that dips into the same Silver Age territory as the Luthor-Brainiac team: The clone was named after the scientist who discovered the spider-powers (Peter Parker) and the military man who raised him (Gen. “Thunderbolt” Ross, known to Spider-Boy as “Uncle Gen.”) So at the midway point of the book, we realize that Spider-Boy is named “Pete Ross.”
Karl’s one of the solid journeymen out there who can always be relied on to tell/draw/ink/etc. a good story. I think he often gets short shrift because many people think of him (when they think of him) as being “only” an inker (and thus not comics-superstar-level talent), not noticing everything else that he’s done (as well as what being an inker entails when the penciller is someone like Liefeld).
However, I think he’s at his best when teamed up with Barbara, who is a *superlative* comics writer, hands down. Can we get a sequel post for her justly deserved lauds?
That is an awesome thing for Busiek to do for the fans. I never got to read Spider-Boy, so I can’t speak to the actual quality of the story, but I always felt that it was one of the more infuriating ideas in the Amalgam universe, since Superboy and Spider-Man have literally nothing in common other than (at the time) they were both clones. Completely different character with completely different ideas at the center. One of many Amalgam character that were based on character with superficial similarities and lack the subtle appeal of the originals. See Dark Claw and Super Soldier for other characters that missed the mark conceptually.
OT though, to my shame, I hadn’t heard of Karl Kesel before now, given his low profile role in comics, but now that I have I just might have to track down some of his stuff. I firmly believe that comics need more creators like Kesel is described. Solid, unpretentious creators who understand the characters and how to have fun with them, but also understand that not every story needs to be an earth shattering, ground breaking, nothing-will-ever-be-the-same epic that ultimately means nothing.
I want to live in the alternate universe where the Kesels have never stopped doing Hawk and Dove. And Superboy.
I finally got curious enough to go sifting through 1997 Usenet postings (I’m stuck at work on Friday nights). I know it’s off-topic, but here’s Kurt Busiek’s synopsis of the never-to-be-published “Iron Lantern” No. 2. found under the April 4, 1997 posting titled “Immortal Reviews: Iron Lantern #1 [SPOILERS]”:
“Pepper Ferris does not know that Hal is really Iron Lantern, but Madame Sapphire does, and when she realizes just what that shooting star is, her submerged love for Hal spurs her to save him. She powers up his
armor with sapphire energy, and the two of them go looking for the lantern. They catch up to Kyle just as he’s realized that Mandarinestro is about to kill him, and save both his life and the battery. Kyle becomes the Green Guardsman, and the three of them open up a can of whupass on Mandarinestro — which, for all their power, would go badly
for them if not for the timely arrival of Tagak, Lantern-Lord.
“Mandarinestro escapes, but Tagak has some revelations for Hal about Oa, the Living Planet — and Janice Doremus is back at Stark Aircraft, and she’s got secrets of her own, secrets that involve the deadly Lamplight Phantom…”
Brian, thank you!
Silverhammer, I liked Spiderboy but I agree there didn’t seem to be any clear rules for who got merged with whom (other than what someone thought would make an interesting story). For example Amazon isn’t a merging of Ororo and Wonder Woman, it’s more like an alt.history where Ororo got adopted by the Amazons but stayed herself.
IIRC, Ellis didn’t quit Doom 2099 in response to the firing of Cavalieri, but I think he left sooner than planned because he saw the writing on the wall. Tom Peyer, his successor, did quit as a show of solidarity with Cavalieri.
Kesel’s run on Daredevil is the last time i really liked Daredevil until Waid came on the book. Kesel gets that the character is supposed to be a fun character, not a brooding douchebag. He gets Stan Lee’s vision for the character and so does Waid.
Kesel’s run on Daredevil was really great. Just before the Mr. Hyde issue, he had DD meet with Ben Reilly as Spider-Man. One of my favorite DD issues ever. Karen Page, Peter Parker and Ben Ulrich trying to cover up for DD without realizing they all know who he is was classic. Also, “Despicable Daredevil” should have stuck.
Kessel’s run on Daredevil was one of my favorites, especially considering it had to follow the “Jack Batlin/armor costume” era. And his Superboy was the first monthly I followed from the beginning (and the only “Super” book I followed after the “Death and Return” story)
I assume Tucker Stone would have bad things to say about Kesel because he is Tucker Stone.