| Frank Brunner | |
|---|---|
 Brunner in 2008 | |
| Born | February 21, 1949 |
| Nationality | American |
| Area(s) | Artist |
Notable works | Creepy Doctor Strange Eerie Howard the Duck Vampirella |
| Awards | Inkpot Award (1976) [1] |
| http://www.frankbrunner.net | |
Frank Brunner (born February 21, 1949) [2] is an American comics artist and illustrator best known for his work at Marvel Comics in the 1970s.
Brunner attended Manhattan's High School of Art and Design. He was in the same graduating class as Larry Hama and Ralph Reese. [3] He studied at the New York University Film School. [4]
Brunner entered the comics profession as a horror writer-artist for the black-and-white comics magazines Web of Horror, Creepy , Eerie , and Vampirella . [5] His first work for Marvel Comics was inking an 11-page Watcher backup story in The Silver Surfer #6 (June 1969). [5] Brunner's best-known color-comics work is his Marvel Comics collaboration with writer Steve Engelhart on the supernatural hero Doctor Strange in Marvel Premiere #9–14 (July 1973 – March 1974) [6] and in Doctor Strange: Master of the Mystic Arts #1–2 and #4–5 (June–August 1974 and Oct.–Dec. 1974). The two killed Dr. Strange's mentor, the Ancient One, and Strange became the new Sorcerer Supreme. Englehart and Brunner created a multi-issue storyline in which a sorcerer named Sise-Neg ("Genesis" spelled backward) goes back through history, collecting all magical energies, until he reaches the beginning of the universe, becomes all-powerful and creates it anew, leaving Strange to wonder whether this was, paradoxically, the original creation. Stan Lee, seeing the issue after publication, ordered Englehart and Brunner to print a retraction saying this was not God but a god, so as to avoid offending religious readers. The writer and artist concocted a fake letter from a fictitious minister praising the story, and mailed it to Marvel from Texas; Marvel unwittingly printed the letter, and dropped the retraction order. [7] In 2010, Comics Bulletin ranked Englehart and Brunner's run on the "Doctor Strange" feature ninth on its list of the "Top 10 1970s Marvels". [8]
Other Marvel credits include Howard the Duck's first two solo stories in Giant-Size Man-Thing #4 and #5 (May and Aug. 1975) [9] and the first two issues of the Howard the Duck comic book series (Jan. and March 1976), [10] as well as the anthologies Chamber of Chills , Haunt of Horror , and Unknown Worlds of Science Fiction . He drew covers for the supernatural series The Tomb of Dracula and the swamp-monster series Man-Thing. [5]
Also for Marvel, Brunner adapted Robert E. Howard's sword-and-sorcery pulp fiction hero Conan the Barbarian in the 42-page story "The Scarlet Citadel", and drew many covers for the similar series Red Sonja and Savage Sword of Conan . [5] Brunner left Marvel in 1979 and wrote an essay in The Comics Journal stating that he "felt the romance with comics was over". [11]
Brunner and novelist Michael Moorcock collaborated on a comics adaptation of Moorcock's sword-and-sorcery hero Elric in Heavy Metal magazine. It was reprinted in publisher Mike Friedrich's Star Reach Greatest Hits. [5]
Brunner briefly returned to comics in the early-1980s as artist on the First Comics title Warp! , based on the science fiction play that ran briefly on Broadway in the 1970s. He then wrote and drew the graphic novel The Seven Samuroid (1984), a science-fiction takeoff of the movie classic Seven Samurai . [5]
Brunner moved to Hollywood and began a career in movie and television animation, working on projects for Hanna-Barbera ( Jonny Quest ), Walt Disney Imagineering (Euro Tomorrowland movie), Warner Bros. (preproduction Batman design) and DreamWorks (Invasion USA). He was the head of character design for the Fox animated series X-Men .
Interior art (except where noted) includes:
Dr. Stephen Vincent Strange is a character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by Steve Ditko, the character first appeared in Strange Tales #110. Doctor Strange serves as the Sorcerer Supreme, the primary protector of Earth against magical and mystical threats. Strange was introduced during the Silver Age of Comic Books in an attempt to bring a different kind of character and themes of mysticism to Marvel Comics.
Howard the Duck is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character was created by writer Steve Gerber and artist Val Mayerik. Howard the Duck first appeared in Adventure into Fear #19 and several subsequent series have chronicled the misadventures of the ill-tempered anthropomorphic animal trapped on a human-dominated Earth. Echoing this, the most common tagline of his comics reads 'Trapped In a World He Never Made!'.
Roy William Thomas Jr. is an American comic book writer and editor. He was Stan Lee's first successor as editor-in-chief of Marvel Comics and possibly best known for introducing the pulp magazine hero Conan the Barbarian to American comics. Thomas is also known for his championing of Golden Age comic-book heroes – particularly the 1940s superhero team the Justice Society of America – and for lengthy writing stints on Marvel's X-Men and The Avengers, and DC Comics' All-Star Squadron, among other titles.
Gerard Francis Conway is an American comic book writer, comic book editor, screenwriter, television writer, and television producer. He is known for co-creating the Marvel Comics vigilante antihero the Punisher as well as the Scarlet Spider, and the first Ms. Marvel, and also writing the death of the character Gwen Stacy during his long run on The Amazing Spider-Man in the story arc, "The Night Gwen Stacy Died".
John Buscema was an American comic book artist and one of the mainstays of Marvel Comics during its 1960s and 1970s ascendancy into an industry leader and its subsequent expansion to a major pop-culture conglomerate. His younger brother Sal Buscema is also a comic book artist.
Steve Englehart is an American writer of comic books and novels. He is best known for his work at Marvel Comics and DC Comics in the 1970s and 1980s. His pseudonyms have included John Harkness and Cliff Garnett.
Barry Windsor-Smith is a British comic book illustrator and painter whose best-known work has been produced in the United States. He attained note working on Marvel Comics' Conan the Barbarian from 1970 to 1973, and for his work on the character Wolverine, particularly the 1991 "Weapon X" story arc. His other noted Marvel work included a 1984 "Thing" story in Marvel Fanfare, the "Lifedeath" and "Lifedeath II" stories with writer Chris Claremont that focused on the de-powered Storm in The Uncanny X-Men, as well as the 1984 Machine Man limited series with Herb Trimpe and Tom DeFalco.
Amazing Adventures is the name of several anthology comic book series, all but one published by Marvel Comics.
Marvel Premiere is an American comic book anthology series that was published by Marvel Comics. In concept it was a tryout book, intended to determine if a character or concept could attract enough readers to justify launching their own series, though in its later years it was also often used as a dumping ground for stories which could not be published elsewhere. It ran for 61 issues from April 1972 to August 1981. Contrary to the title, the majority of the characters and concepts featured in Marvel Premiere had previously appeared in other comics.
Stephen Ross Gerber was an American comic book writer and creator of the satiric Marvel Comics character Howard the Duck. Other works include Man-Thing, Omega the Unknown,Marvel Spotlight: "Son of Satan", The Defenders,Marvel Presents: "Guardians of the Galaxy", Daredevil and Foolkiller. Gerber often included lengthy text pages in the midst of comic book stories, such as in his graphic novel, Stewart the Rat. Gerber was posthumously inducted into the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame in 2010.
Walter Simonson is an American comic book writer and artist, best known for a run on Marvel Comics' Thor from 1983 to 1987, during which he created the character Beta Ray Bill. He is also known for the creator-owned work Star Slammers, which he inaugurated in 1972 as a Rhode Island School of Design thesis. He has also worked on other Marvel titles such as X-Factor and Fantastic Four, on DC Comics books including Detective Comics, Manhunter, Metal Men and Orion, and on licensed properties such as Star Wars, Alien, Battlestar Galactica and Robocop vs. Terminator.
Michael Golden is an American comics artist and writer best known for his late-1970s work on Marvel Comics' The Micronauts and The 'Nam, as well as his co-creation of the characters Rogue and Bucky O'Hare.
Thomas F. Sutton was an American comic book artist who sometimes used the pseudonyms Sean Todd and Dementia. He is best known for his contributions to Marvel Comics and Warren Publishing's line of black-and-white horror-comics magazines, particularly as the first story-artist of the popular character Vampirella.
Alfredo P. Alcala was a Filipino comics artist, born in Talisay, Negros Occidental in the Philippines. Alcala was an established illustrator whose works appeared in the Alcala Komix Magazine. His 1963 creation Voltar introduced him to an international audience, particularly in the United States. Alcala garnered awards in science fiction during the early part of the 1970s.
John Costanza is an American comic book artist and letterer. He has worked for both DC Comics and Marvel Comics. He was the letterer during Alan Moore's acclaimed run on Swamp Thing. The bulk of Costanza's art assignments have been for anthropomorphic animal comics and children-oriented material.
Notable events of 1976 in comics.
Crusty Bunker, or the Crusty Bunkers, was the collective pseudonym of a group of comic book inkers clustered around Neal Adams' and Dick Giordano's New York City-based art and design agency Continuity Studios from 1972 to 1977. The group was also occasionally credited as Ilya Hunch, Chuck Bunker, or The Goon Squad. Many Crusty Bunkers team members went on to successful individual careers in the comics industry.
Bob Larkin is an American comics artist primarily known for his painted covers for Marvel Comics' magazine-format titles Marvel Magazines in the 1970s and early 1980s and for his 32 painted covers on the Bantam Books paperback reissues series of the Doc Savage pulp novels.
Doctor Strange is a series of several comic book volumes featuring the character Doctor Strange and published by Marvel Comics, beginning with the original Doctor Strange comic book series that debuted in 1968.
We cooked up this plot-we wrote a letter from a Reverend Billingsley in Texas, a fictional person, saying that one of the children in his parish brought him the comic book, and he was astounded and thrilled by it, and he said, "Wow, this is the best comic book I've ever read." And we signed it "Reverend so-and-so, Austin Texas"-and when Steve was in Texas, he mailed the letter so it had the proper postmark. Then, we got a phone call from Roy, and he said, "Hey, about that retraction, I'm going to send you a letter, and instead of the retraction, I want you to print this letter." And it was our letter! We printed our letter!
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