Underground Comix

Of the Old Guard and the New Kids

Author Brian Doherty’s forthcoming narrative history of underground comix, “Dirty Pictures”, is a big one – so big, an entire chapter had to be deleted for space. Today, we present to you that lost chapter as a standalone reflection on the generation gap (or lack thereof) between the underground cartoonists and their older, straighter inspirations.

Steve Ditko

Ditko Con 2021

A visit to the first-ever comics convention dedicated to the life and works of Steve Ditko, held in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, on September 11, 2021.

Ditko’s Code: “A World of His Own”

Helen takes a fresh look at Steve Ditko’s creativity under the content restrictions of the 1950s: a force that burned brighter than the comics code, by embodying the code’s ideology with a perfection the censors couldn’t match.

Steve Ditko and the Comic-Book People

A big-picture/close-reading appreciation of Steve Ditko through the lens of his relationship with the world known as Comicdom. (It’s also a story about a cartoonist’s profound investment in words and his hostility toward editors who didn’t understand his unusual approach to language.)

Steve Ditko 1927-2018

A reflection on the life of Steve Ditko, best known for his many contributions at Marvel and across the comics industry.

One-Artist Anthology Comics

As if it weren’t enough that comics are the domain of the obsessive control freak, there is a cartooning sect that perfectly defines the creative mania responsible for some of our greatest works: the one-artist anthology. This is its history.

Steve Ditko — HA! / AH! — Laughing at Death.

Ditko is a satirist — Ditko creates Black and White Black Comedy with Sick Humor. Ditko’s Creeper: Performance, Heroism, and Mania. Ditko is the single most innovative artist/humorist to come out of the Mainstream Comics Industry. Discuss.