Re-Evaluating Lois Lane

For years now, comics have been quite notorious for handling female characters in very limited ways.   

They’re most often used as an object of romantic desire or frustration, a fan-boy’s big-boobed, big butted pin-up girl dream, a damsel in distress, sidekick, or a female heroic reflection/copy of the main character created more for marketing and copyright protection than for characterization. Comic women have also been used as torture and murder victims to sufficiently motivate the male protagonist on his mission of righteousness.

But more and more, we’re starting to see female characters that are, in many cases, even richer than their male counterparts. For every ridiculous Marvel Divas series, we can at least look to Batwoman and Manhunter over at DC, Ms. Marvel over at Marvel Comics and pretty much every damn female character Gail Simone and Greg Rucka have ever written.

Fan lightning rod Gail Simone’s current run on Wonder Woman is galvanizing new discussion and support of Wonder Woman among readers and fans. 

But what of that other grand dame of the comic world, the original girl reporter, Lois Lane?

A few years, I was working on comic book character entries for a project that hasn’t materialized. I tried to sum up Lois Lane for comic book insiders and out alike thusly:

LOIS LANE

Created by: Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster

First Appearance: Action Comics #1, DC Comics, 1938.

Notable Appearances: 137 issues of her own DC Comics title from 1958 to 1974.

Alias/Nicknames: Snoop, Superman’s Girlfriend, Mrs. Clark Kent.

Powers: Lois’ main power was a highly developed nose for news, a tendency to get into dangerous situations only Superman could get her out of, and a complete inability to recognize the man she loved whenever he donned bifocals.  The modern version was trained as a girl in hand-to-hand combat, firearms and knife fighting by her soldier father and is a notoriously bad speller.

Comments:  Inspired by the snappy, hard-working, girl reporter archetype prevalent in thoroughly modern movies of the thirties and visually based on the future Mrs. Jerry Siegel, Lois Lane was created to be a perfect foil for Superman. Lois was Siegel and Shuster’s revenge on all the glamorous girls who had ignored them in High School.  Despite being smart and independent, Lois couldn’t see that everything she ever wanted in a man was typing away at the desk next to her in the form of nebbish rival reporter, Clark Kent.  Over the course of the forties and fifties, Lois’ role was reduced to plotting elaborate schemes to prove Clark Kent and Superman were one and the same, and fantasizing about married life as Mrs. Superman. In the 70’s, new attitudes toward women helped Lois develop as an individual in her own right and she finally married her Man of Steel in 1996.  The feisty character has finally matured into a fully developed character devoted to, and independent from, her super husband. 

It’s a solid enough overview but there’s so much more to the character that I had to leave out. Lois’ character was created over almost eighty years ago but the initial, essential ingredients of her character have remained relatively consistent.  A tough, nonsense reporter with a highly developed sense of justice and intense competitive drive.


Sure, she was wish fulfillment for the male creators and their male readers … every shy, awkward male in existence wanted to believe someone as dynamic and beautiful as Lois would love them if she could see the superman they really were on the inside. I lucked into that very situation with my own wife so it can be done boys!

But Seigel and Shuster were also smart enough to make Lois a force all on her own, much like the fast-talking, driven female character they saw on the silver screen of the thirties. I suspect in those years she resonated with her female readership as well.

Over the years as Superman went from anti-authoritarian shit-disturber to defender of the status quo, Lois also became a sort of Lucille Ball of the comics. Trying to uncover Superman's identity and force him to overcome his true weakness -- emotional commitment. 

The stories always placed blame for Lois' embarrassing comeuppances on her inquisitiveness and often, on her "femaleness" itself! But the truth of the matter was, like so many intelligent, independent women before her, Lois Lane's Kryptonian boyfriend was a dick.

Blackmailing dick.

Cruel prankster dick.

Married, cheating dick.

Or just your everyday, gaslighting, anything 

to humiliate my loved ones kind of dick. 

Why the Popemobile? Couldn't you just put her 

on a pedestal like the rest of us, Superdick?

(Images coutesy of www.superdickery.com)

Some of the best discussions on what makes iconic, female characters work has been happening these last few weeks over at Kelly Thompson's new She Has No Head! column at Comicbookresources.com.  Her post, Giving Lois a Second Look, For the First Time and the ensuing comments are one of the best discussions regarding the quintessential lady journalist I've ever read.

Thompson starts by admitting she think much of Lois until she read Mindy Newell’s pre-Crisis Lois Lane miniseries When It Rains, God Is Crying. Newell attempted to portray a strong, skilled reporter who is so affected by the story she’s working on (missing children) that she begins to push away her friends and colleagues. 

This series portrayed a Lois who had seen a lot but seems to have been caught at a particularly vulnerable point emotionally. Lois’ sense that she’s discovering a horrifying problem problem too late to make a real difference makes her work all the harder to break the story and find some resolution to a problem she ultimately can never solve. With gorgeous Grey Morrow art (and sadly, lackluster coloring), this is a comic tale with intensely personal stakes.

 

The timing of Newell’s mini-series was unfortunate. It came right before John Byrne’s famous reboot of the entire Superman franchise when all Man of Steel decisions had to pass through him.  But it still stands as a testament to what a writer can do when they take the essential elements of a character and make a real effort to reflect them realistically. You don't have to like this Lois. But you can definitely admire and recognize her.

But the real fun begins, as always, in the comments section below the post. This party turned into a lively, passionate discussion of Lois Lane, both pro and con.

Even more impressive, people also managed to be relatively respectful and articulate even when things took on a personal, somewhat defensive tinge.  I love when restraint, insight and a real exchange of ideas rule the day. When things devolve into mudslinging I click away pretty quickly.

Some posters revealed they too have never liked Lois nor believed Superman would find her attractive but a posting from Blackjak countered that idea.

“…it comes down, yet again, to needing to have a good writer attached to the book that she’s in. A writer who knows how to portray her well and write scenes that actually involve her as a character rather than as a supporting actor with the same amount (or less) “screentime” as Perry White or Jimmy Olsen…”

Poster Rene agreed, insisting, “Lois is so iconic that it’s too easy for her to become uninteresting, more of a symbol than a person.”  For Rene, Clark Kent, small town boy, can’t help but be attracted to “cosmopolitan, cynical, passionate, worldy”  Lois because “she challenges him”. He adds, “Either from Kansas or Krypton, Superman springs from the world of the past; Lois Lane is a woman for today.”

Thompson agreed with Rene and adds her own level to his theory....

“Lois is also incredibly human...so she would not only represent the modern, cosmopolitan, progressive life he is seeking when he leaves Smallville, but she is also human and helps him tie himself to his humanity...”

Micheal P then lamented, “The thing with Lois is, there as many different versions of her as there are of Superman… As a result, she can be all over the map, while also remaining frustratingly similar and flawed in a number of versions (again, just like Superman).”

One interesting conceit of Newell’s Lois was discussed at length. The intriguing and perfectly logical idea that Lois knows Clark is Superman and plays along, even when it costs her personally and causes unneeded frustration.

This makes compete sense to me.  Lois is a sharpie and I too find it hard to believe she’s got such huge blinders on regarding Clark and Superman. The idea that she’s laying along adds an intriguing level to the proceedings. And at the time of Newell’s mini-series, Clark and Lois were broken and he was seeing old flame Lana Lang, his co-anchor on the news. The fact that Lois can barely tolerate his nudge and winking approach to his secret ID adds emotional fuel to the fire.

On the other hand, driven people sometimes see only what they want to see, right?  Poster Omar KArindu, with the power of SUPER-hypocrisy!  reminded everyone that Jerry Siegel did plan on Lois uncovering Superman’s identity early on (in the infamous K-Metal From Krypton story that would have first introduced Kryptonite if DC Comics had published it. The idea eventually made its debut on the popular Superman radio show.)

Poster Dean (and one of the most passionate Superman boosters involved in the discussion) points to the first season of the Superman television show as an example of how effective that approach can be.

“Watch "Night of Terror" from the first season of ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN sometime. It is pretty apparent in that story Lois knows exactly who Clark really is. Apparently, that was a convention from the radio show… “

“…The double identity business became a simple metaphor under Weisinger for Lois' desire for commitment from her boyfriend and Superman's reluctance to give it. Lois saw past the glasses, but Clark lied to her anyway. Her belief was that if only she could catch him, then he would change and marry her. I don't know about you, but I know actual human beings that think an awful lot like that.”

Points like this led to numerous deviations from the main topic, like whether Clark’s glasses had become an insulting comic idea or were still a valid part of the Superman mythos.  

As a sometime cartoonist myself, I suspect originally it was to create a clear visual distinction between Superman and Clark. Superman had tights, a cape and a spit curl. Clark had a suit, tie and glasses.  It was a common trope in films, comic strips and stage comedies of the time to have someone mousy (male or female) remove their glasses and revealing a somehow more attractive version of themselves.

So many of these simple questions start out with simple answers but when a character is published for over eighty years, even simple questions grow more complicated with each passing year.

Other fun tangents included:

-The reasons the Atom can divorce Jean Loring while Superman can’t divorce Lois.

- Superman, a super-evolved being from a super-evolved planet, is stuck on Earth with less evolved people and therefore has few appropriate potential life-mates. 

-The idea that in serialized entertainment like Superman comics married couples are only interesting when there is conflict in the marriage. I agree with that statement but Zor-El of Argo suggest that the only conflicts on such soap operas are affairs and that “happily married couples are boring to those of us watching from the outside.”  I disagree with that idea along with the next poster ChrisM.

“The examples Zor-El cites (televised soap operas) may indeed go dip mainly in that limited well, but the truth is even a successful marriage is dynamic and fluid. As different life issues and challenges arise the couple must adapt anew and sometimes that pulls them a little apart and other times they band together.  Chris suggests professional competition and examples awkward relations with in-laws as two possible romantic obstacles.”

I think it would be more accurate to suggest that most writers aren’t interested in portraying that sort of relationship, preferring instead to continually use the soap opera tropes Zor El cites. It’s just too much work to explore real characters when you can ramp up the drama instantly with betrayal.

-Superman digs Lois because she’s a better reporter. Poster Dean scored again, explaining:

“However, (as Mark Waid once pointed out in a podcast with Marv Wolfman) none of that really translates to your chosen profession. Typing really fast does not help your prose. Being able to lift a tank does not help you convince a source to go on record.”

“It is just in this one context, there is someone better than you are: Lois Lane.  As mild-mannered reporter Clark Kent, you reach up for the first time in your life and she rejects you.  To me, it is an inversion of the Luthor story. Luthor sees someone above him and feels hate. Superman sees someone above him and feels love.”

I’ve gone on enough. Suffice it to say, I was delighted to find myself re-evaluating my thoughts regarding Lois Lane numerous times as I read through this article and the forum.  Check it out for yourself at Giving Lois Lane a Second Look, For The First Time.

I’ll let poster ChrisM have the last word on the topic. Though Chris professes to never have especially liked Lois Lane, he nonetheless sums up the entire conversation nicely:

“I'm agnostic as to whether it was a good idea to marry her and Clark. But that's all water under the bridge; she exists; they're married; and any reasonably talented creative writer *should* be able to tell interesting stories about her in that context. I've seen it happen, so excuses to the contrary are unconvincing.”

Here, here!  Long live Lois Lane!

(And thank you, Kelly)

Next up, Kelly can't stay away from the icons.  A quick peek at Wonder Woman!

Beavers Up! 

What Are Artists Worth?

Over at CosmicBookNews, comic writer  Mike Luoma has been writing a column called Making It Up, about his experiences creating comics on his own and with artist collaborators.  A few weeks ago he wrote Shut Up and Put Out Yer Comic Book! -- a call to arms giving nutshell basics to creating a comic and getting it out there.

Due to the limited space, the column delivered pretty broad but generally helpful advice... Talk to the artist in your own voice being one prime example.

Writing dialogue, you write in the voices of your characters. That's a given. But your descriptions of each panel should be in YOUR voice. Your panel descriptions are one-way conversations with your artist, whoever they will be. Talk to them, and do your best to describe everything they need to see to tell the story. If you have to give away the ending so that the art is correct in the first panel, do it. Don't surprise your artist. And always remember you are describing static action, not movement. Movement is implied between the frames...

Mike posted a link to his post over at LinkedIn, a business networking site that is finding more comic book people signing on. The response to the LinkedIn was furious focused primarily on one sentence, which has since been removed from the original post.

Basically, Mike was saying that unless it's a true (and by that I mean, pre-negotiated and agreed upon) partnership or collaboration, you should assume you'll be paying your artist. Mike suggested $50 as a fair figure.  Since I knew the article was not an in-depth how to guide, I understood that to mean Mike was just trying to say, be fair to your artist. But reaction was swift as artists took issue with Mike insisting upon such a low page rate.

Soon, the chat exploded into a lengthy exchange discussing everything from status of the artist, work for hire, context and being up front in all business dealings. I commend all the contributors to the talk for being able (eventually) to move past their initial, emotional responses and move on to passionate debate and civil discussion.

I had planned to provide an overview of the discussion but Mike himself has gone further, providing a blow by blow account of the debate for your enjoyment, with extensive quotes.

You can read it all at Making It Up! - Part 13 - What's An Artist Worth?.

All the points are well worth considering if you're thinking of putting out a comic book.  My takeaway? Be up front and honest in all dealings, realistic in your expections, and save the raging passion for the work not for negotiations.

And waht the hey.  Check out some of Mike's work... Panthea Obscura, Red Hot and Lady Fight: Escalation.

As for how to find artists, writer Liz Argall has  afew suggestionsover at her blog post, How to find a comics artist part 1.

For another persepctive on artists working for free, read these the three articles by Mark Evanier, Unfinanced Entrepreneurs (part one starts here).

Beavers Up! 

Art Inaction Comics - And lo, there came a Supervisor!

I thought I'd post a comic I did years ago for your enjoyment.

I put out a mini-comic called Art Inaction under my pen name Pinc to give away at my birthday party.  It featured pastiches of original old comic characters (based on familiar archetypes) spouting philosophical/artistic discourse uniquely suited to their art styles as a counterpoint to the action.  Smashed together in a week it was one of the most satisfying things I've ever done.

I enjoyed it so much  I did a few more (learning to check my spelling somewhere along the way) and eventually printed this story below in "Your Comic Here", a sample comic I put together for Ricter Web Printing, who were eager to help comic artists print their wares.

Presenting the inaugural adventure of... Supervisor!

Beavers Up! 

Bendis' Daredevil teaches us to remember the comic reader

I vacillate between enjoying Comic Book Resources When Worlds Collide column and giving it a pass.  Timothy Callahan’s terrific two-part chat on comic book archetypes with author Steven Withrow really sheds intriguing new light on a much discussed, yet much-misunderstood topic. But I’ll have more on that later.  The whole discussion was a decidedly worthy follow-up to Tim’s article on why characters fail to “stick” in comics and stay forever on the sidelines.

Check out Part One here and Part Two here.

But for every interesting discussion at When Worlds Collide about say, Jacques Tardi, I find there are many more chats about the usual suspects we hear about constantly; your Warren Ellis’, your Geoff Johns’, your Frank Millers, your Alan Moores, et al. I’m overloaded with information about the heavy hitters.

Case in point. This week, Tim begins a multi-part look back at Bendis' Daredevil, Part 1: Back to the boards.

Now, I have no stake in this other than as a pure craft issue. As a writer I strive to make what I write effective and enjoyable. But I have to keep the basic form and structure of its presentation in mind at all times. Tim's article raises an interesting point in that regard.

Tim writes of not enjoying Bendis and Alex Maleev’s Daredevil run not so much for the individual stories but “mostly for their contrast to other mainstream comics.” He then summarizes his overall memory of the series thusly.

“In retrospect, it was a series in which nothing happened, except Daredevil hiding out from the paparazzi and then finally getting sent to jail, or so it seemed. And it felt like about 100 issues of that. Dragged out. Not so much bloated, as static. Or incremental.”

With Bendis is now a leading light at the new Marvel Tim has decided to reread the collected run and has found himself re-evaluating it. It’s decompressed brilliance apparently sparkles in collected form. I think it’s terrific that Tim has changed had his mind changed. I delight when I find new things to appreciate in something years after the fact. Bendis is a talented writer.

The interesting thing here is why Tim has changed his mind and now considers Daredevil to be brilliant.

"I was wrong to dismiss Bendis and Maleev's "Daredevil." I was wrong to consider it an interesting failure, or a series that never lived up to its potential. Because reading it on a monthly basis, serialized amidst dozens of other releases, that wasn't really reading "Daredevil." That was experiencing it in tiny doses. That was catching it out of the corner of my eye as the crushing oppressive force of more traditional superhero comics began taking more and more of my attention."

There’s one tiny sticking point where the above statement loses me. I was bothered enough to post the following on the CBR Forum.

Despite how much better Bendis' run may read as a collected work, the fact that it can only be appreciated this way means it was a failure as a serialized release, the way it was originally intended to be read.

if I'm buying a monthly comic that can only be enjoyed once it's collected then it should have been released as a graphic novel because I'm being ripped off.

Please don't label a Bendis hater. I am not dissing Bendis, Alex Maleev or their Daredevil run. I think they are both talented artists.  And as for that particular set of Daredevil stories... I haven’t read it so I’m only going by Tim’s description of the series.

I simply see this as an excellent opportunity to discuss how important it is to give your readers a well-written, well-drawn, well-executed tale at every stage and not use excuses like “Oh, you have to read it all together for it to make sense.”

Now, obviously many people did enjoy Bendis’ run on Daredevil issue by issue. It sold well and is still one of the preeminent runs for the series. For those readers it’s not a failure. But Tim readily admits he wasn’t that into the run as a monthly. It didn’t work for him. The fact that it works as a collected set for Tim is wonderful... even revelatory from a personal standpoint.

But artists... when approaching comics as a craft, the first viewers -- the ones who buy your book month in and month out -- deserve to read something that works right now.

Just something to think to think about when we creators put fingers to keyboard and pen to paper.

Beavers Up! 

Ty Templeton - The Life and Times

Ty at a Paradise Comics signing.

I have been thinking of a career spanning interview with comic creator Ty Templeton for a while now. Ty's mastery of the comic form have been criminally underrated for years. And while I support whole-heartedly efforts to tease Ty, just to keep his head small enough to avoid a painful neck injury, the plain truth is the man lives and breathes comics. He also is one of the most approachable, supportive dudes in the industry and is always ready to share his knowledge. Heck, sometimes he'll even wait till you ask!

And you thought Ty drawing himself as a bunny was creatiive licence, didn't you?




Thankfully, Micheal Fiffe and the new online version of the Comics Journal have saved me the work. While there still needs to be a more in-depth discussion or Ty's contributions to the form, this is a terrific overview of the various eras of Ty Templeton's comic book life.

Here are links to part one, part two, part three, part four and part five.

For more on what's up with Ty, check out Ty Templeton's Art Land, your one-stop resource for all things Ty, hosted by the most awesome Keiron Smith.

Beavers Up!

Top 10 Comic Book Top Ten Lists of 2009!

We all know that year-end top ten lists are the last bastion of the lazy and desperate. An attempt to create content out of previous writings and get some time away from the damn computer to hoist some nog.

And a top ten list to start the new year off? Holy crap, that is even worse.

Any writer who tries that is too big a hack to even do his lazy top ten list when the season calls for it. Talk about deadline issues. They couldn't even come up with the creativity for a list of resolutions? A pox on their houses.

This then, is my start of the year Top Ten List for your enjoyment.

Now that everyone else has done my work for me creating their own lists over the holidays while I was in several countries... er, holidayizing, I can simply cherry pick a selection that I think may brighten your day and illuminate your mind. I also get to show off some writers who have brought me some enjoyment. It's win/win, right? So here's your chance to catch up on what other people think the cool kids should be reading.

TOP TEN TOP TEN LISTS of the DECADE

1 - Let's start with the National Post, who printed their Best Books of the Decade list. Indie comic artist turned literary darling Chester Brown's Louis Riel made the list and they mention the ascent of the graphic novel as well.

But scroll down and you'll find the more interesting "Top Ten": the Top Publishing Stories of the Decade. It's an excellent compendium of the storms that have rocked the publishing world for this first decade of the new millenium.


2 - Inkstuds. I wanted a podcast in here and this is one of the best and longest running, if you count its life on Vancouver radio. For the Inkstuds Best of 2009 comic book wrap-up, host Robin McConnell was joined by a "bevy of comics bloggers": Timothy Hodler from Comicscomics, Sean T. Collins of, wait for it, Attentiondeficitdisorderly Too Flat, and Chris Mautner of Comic Book Resources Robot 6.


3 - Speaking of Robot 6, Chris Mautner and the gang went the extra-mile and have begun posting their list of the 30 Most Important Comics of the Decade. the reasons are varied but good arguments are made for all the ones I've seen so far.


4 - We move onto the A.V. club, the real-news other half of satirical newspaper The Onion's weekly print edition. These guys put the "pop" in pop culture with the AV Club's Best Comics of the Decade.


5. - The Architect's Journal. You might be interested in this list of the Top 10 Comic Book Cities as voted by the men who design real cities!


6 - Cardboard Monocle. After all this serious discussion of comics as an artform we're ready for something fun. This Art and Design Blog has put together a list of the Top 20 Comic Book Weapons. Some are cool, several are disgusting though you may be more shocked by what isn't included in favour of a few surprises. No utility belt (not a weapon, persay) nor a batarang to be found.

7 - Pop Culture Addict provides some laughs with their list of the Top 10 Lamest Superheroes of All Time. It's a bold declaration but they've hit the nail on the head with some of these suckers, though I think they favour heroes whose ridiculousness makes them at least entertainingly lame, as opposed to truly unreadable. The original list proved popular enough to spawn a sequel, Top Ten Lamest Superheroes of All Time II: the Next Ten. These guys would make the most awesome super team ever.

I think Arm Fall Off Boy has a real future.

8 - Comics212. The manager of The Beguiling, one of the best comic shops ever isn't afraid to share his opinions culled from extensive knowledge. Chris has begun posting Manga Milestones 2000-2009: 10 Manga that Changed the World. It really is a short history of manga in North America and a fascinating read.


9 - Comic Book Resources editor and writer Brian Cronin has almost finished (for some reason he's skipped #50-45) notating the Top 100 Comic Book Storylines Master List as voted on by their readers. Despite a Marvel and DC focus, they do cover some pretty terrific storylines and their impact. It's a pretty staggering read that you can chip away at oveer the next month.

10 - i09.com. Just to cleanse the palette, sci-fi site io9.com presents 10 of the Decade's Best SF Comics.

There you have it; a varied dance through the top ten list clutter form the last month.

If you truly can't get enough you can check out comic book blog, I Love Rob Liefeld (evening typing that gives me shivers), which has posted a Meta-List of the Best 130 Comics of 2009, combining the results of over 130 Best Comics of 2009 lists from reviewers and bloggers across the net. They are also kind enough to discuss the trends discovered once all the results were tabulated.

And for those with a lot of time to kill, Largeheartedboy has posted a one-stop resource for Best of the Decade (2000-2009) Online Book Lists, including comic lists.

I must confess, I am reeling after all this Top 10 Listing business. I think I may take asome time together to gather my thoughts or I may end up like this poor woman from one of io9.com's top ten sci-fi comics, Y-The Last Man by Brian K. Vaughn and Canada's own Pia Guerra.

Beavers Up!

Dingle Bell Rock - Merry Christmas, Nelvana Creator John Adrian Darley Dingle! (68 years late)

Merry Christmas, Mr. Dingle.

The Toronto Star's online archive are a treasure trove of nuggets from the past -- if you're willing to spend hour after hour slogging through their labour intensive and slooooow search engine. But for every dozen wrong turns, you also find things both surprising and inspiring.

1941 was a banner year for Adrian Dingle, one of the leading lights of the Golden Age of Canadian comics as the founder of Hillborough Studios, the collective behind Triumph-Adventure Comics and birthplace of Nelvana of the Northern and the classiest comics of the Canadian Golden Age.

It was a different time for painters in the late 1930's. One could still make a living with portrait commissions and gallery showings. Young Dingle was very much a part of his local art scene. One can find numerous mentions of his portraits for various school officials and appearances at local art shows advertised in the Star as the forties approached.

Most people with any knowledge of Canadian Comics are aware that in the early forties, restrictions were placed on the import of US paper products like magazines, books and comics due to foreign exchange issues. Several publishers rushed to fill the void, with Maple Leaf Publications' Better Comics and Anglo American Comics' Robin Hood And Company virtually tying as the first to hit the newsstands.

Ever mindful of an opportunity to make money from their artistic chops, Dingle and several Toronto-area, artist friends formed Hillborough Studios and began to create their own comics. The Hillborough comics are some of the most intrinsically Canadian comics of the era and it's hardly surprising. In the early twentieth century Canada began to explore a more nationalistic approach to painting in an effort to define the country and provide its art scene with an independent identity. The most famous examples of this are painters like Emily Carr and the Group of Seven. The success of this approach encouraged the Group of Seven to expand in the thirties, renaming themselves The Canadian Group of Painters to reflect their enlarged roster of artists.

The fact that the public so embraced the Group of Seven as a national institution gave rise to the Eastern Group of Painters, founded in Montreal, Quebec in 1938. This group felt the Group's limited focus was too limiting and fought to restore more variety of subject, substance and geography to Canadian Art. Thus, by resisting a national approach to art, the EGoP, actually helped bring Canadian to a new, mature level of variety.

All this could not have been lost on the young artists who joined Dingle in his desire to create their own comic book. Since they were Canadian artists they were going to create decidedly Canadian comics. The pages were peopled with canuck characters through and through: Dingle's own Nelvana of the Northern Lights (easily the most famous character to emerge from the period along with Johnny Canuck) and Clue Catchers, co-written with his fiancee and later bride, Pat), H.B. Ohrt and Leon James' Spannner Preston", Canadian pilot and squadron leader, Rene Kulbach's Tang and Out of the Woods, a sweeping western epic and the misadventures of a hapless Canadian bear in the deep woods, A. L Alexander and Glen Guest's Derek of Bras d'Or, based on the life of Angus MacAskill, the Cape Breton giant and Jon Darian's amusing one-pager the Mums, featuring the fueding couple Maxie and Minny Mum.

Dingle's Nelvana of the Northern Lights and her brother,
Tanero. She's a native Goddess and he's... oddly blonde.
Perhaps he's an albino Inuit?

The first issue of Triumph-Adventure Comics is dated August, 1941. Since magazines were cover dated ahead to allow for more newsstand time, it is likely Dingle and crew had been working on the book since early 1941 and it was released in July. But in the mean, time, the young artists still had rent to paid and profile to keep up.

According to this Star article, (amusingly placed next to an announcement that Adolph Hitler would the target of choice at a coming archery tournament) Dingle and fellow Hillborogh artist, Rene Kulbach (creator of the western saga, Tang) still found time to contribute to the war effort. The Peel Kennel Club hosted a garden party in which artists Dingle, Kulbach and artist Andre Lapine would sketch your pet for free in exchange for a contribution to the Red Cross Bomb Victim Fund.

The Estonian-Canadian Kulbach, was already an acknowledged "expert" on the fine art of rendering animals and Tang still resonates today due to his fine draughtsmanship. Dingle is referred to as "a portrait painter of note" known for his "fine oils of familiar scenes along the Lakeshore" while Lapine was considered an "A-1 animal painter". The article further enhances the value of the experience by declaring, "The work of these artists is well known and is prized by those who possess sketches." Seeing Dingle and Kulbach's work in Triumph-Adventure Comics, it is apparent that the Star article was a masterpiece of understatement.

The first two pages of Rene Kulbach and Frank Brookwood's Tang from

Triumph-Adventure Comics #1. I wonder if Brookwood is a pen name for Rene,
who took on sole credit for Tang soon after its debut, save for his brother, Andre?

That Triumph-Adventure Comics hit the stands in August is impressive. What is more impressive is the fact that for the next six issues, Dingle and his compatriots kept up a remarkably high level of quality throughout the run. For the rest of the year , Dingle was putting out a top quality comic and prepping a second title for the Hillborough line.

Top-Flight Comics, billed as a "new Canadian magazine of illustrated stories". For the new book, Dingle secured the aid of more artist friends: Hugh Caulfield, Clayton Dexter, Dingle himself and "well-known Canadian artist" Hunter Barker.

Top Flight Comics was well-named indeed, with its
top line-up of young, Canadian artists.

Caulfied contributed the strip Happy Holden, featuring a pilot who gets lost in a prehistoric world beneath the Arctic with his passengers, a scientist and his lovely (naturally) daughter. The strip insists the tale was written by Jack London but I have not found anything in London's works that matches up. I sent copies of the tale to a Jack London expert (whose actual response, sadly seems lost in alaptop crash earlier this year) who did not think the tale corresponded to anything London wrote either. Perhaps, "inspired by" would have been a more apt description. Or perhaps Caulfield truly did know Jack and persuaded him to contribute a tale. At this point, I am more inclined to believe the former and yet, the credit is there, bold as you please.

Hugh Caulfield's Happy Holden splash page fromTop Flight Comics #1. Is the Jack London story credit
a caseof wishful thinking or a tremendous coup
for Hillborough Studios?

Clayton Dexter contributed an extremely, well-drawn tale of The Rapier, the swashbuckling adversary of pirates along the Spanish Main, who are led by the dark-hearted Captain Sinister. Barker, apprently a keener, drew two strips for the book, The Searunners, a tale of two boys adventures on the high seas, and Trigger Dunston, a two-fisted mountie who always gets his... well, you know the drill. For his part, Dingle turned to the classics for inspiration and created The Sword of Destiny, about a young who is transformed into a hero by the sword Excalibur and transported to wherever evil needs a thumping.

Dingle's Sword of Destiny from Top Flight Comics #1.

Like I said, 1941 was a good year for Dingle. And he capped it off sixty-eight years ago today, December 13, by marrying Patrica Neville Symmes in St. James cathedral with a reception at Maloney's Art Gallery. The wedding was described in a lengthy Toronto Star article dated the same day. Descriptions of the gowns and wedding party take up a good paragraphs, making the ceremony as lush as the wedding of Prince Charles and Diana and give one a sense of actually having been there. The gown, worn by Patricia's mother on her wedding day, is sumptuously described:

"...the bride wore a gown of heavy ivory duchess satin. the draped bodice of chiffon had a low V-neckline; the long ruffled sleeves were designed with a banding of satin from the shoulder to the wrist. The full skirt, finished with a wide ruching of double box pleating fell into a train over the long court train, lined with gold and silver metallic fell and a panel of heirloom lace belonging to the bride's grandmother. Her veil of Brussel's lace, belonging to the groom's mother, was arranged from a Russian coronet or orange blossoms.

Her only ornament was her mother's gift, a tiny rose diamond cross that had been given to her great grandmother on her wedding day. From her mother's prayer book, which she carried, fell gold streamers, knotted with tiny cream rose buds."

But you don't have to imagine it. You can see it this admittedly poor quality photo published in the Star the following Monday, Dec. 15th!


Have you ever seen such a happy, dapper groom outside of a Fred Astaire movie? Dingle's matrimonial style is second only to that of his disguised detective character, the Penguin! (No relation, of course.)

The following year would see Dingle abandon Top Flight and continue Triumph Comics under Cyril Bell's Bell Features imprint. I suspect the decision stemmed from the difficulty of juggling the publishing and sales of two comics with drawing the books, coupled with the likelihood that Dingle may have lost artists to the war effort and perhaps, simply appreciated the security of being Bell's art director.

But that in no way diminishes the tremendous accomplishments of 1941. What a year!

And thus, to mark the holidays and the anniversary of the Dingle's wedding, we wish Nelvana's creator and one of the torchbearer's of Canada's golden age of Canadian Whites a very happy holidays.

Merry Christmas, Mr. Dingle.

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