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Thanks Martin, I think you actually helped with my comments and fleshed it out more of what I didn't share.
Yea, the way I write my angels is for the storytelling and they're suppose to represent Christians.
One funny thing about creating something unique and different in the Christian media world is you'll be praised, but also criticized. It's a Catch 22. All you can do is blow it off and have fun with what you're doing.
Hey Melchizedek,
Good points.
Please note - The following is GENERAL COMMENTARY, and not always directed specifically at Mel Todd, though I do address some of his specific statements.
Yup. Then we get things like One Bad Pig (which I thoroughly reveled in as a youth. Use Google peeps if you don't know the reference). HOWEVER - "Foolish" and done piss poor are two different things. Though that's not to say that God can't use chicken scratch, terrible dialog, terrible story, excessive typo's, hideous coloring and poorly thought out theology.
I'm not sure...is it glorifying to God or edifying to anyone if someone hacks something out and they don't have the talent to produce the product? Does not God expect our best? I'm pretty sure that if I were to lead worship at my church, or put on a concert for the general public - even though I have no musical skill, people would still be thoroughly blessed.
Now...where the person who puts a lot of blood sweat and tears into something, and that is their best, but it's still poorly done, but they're extremely earnest about it...I'm not sure where they fit on the totem pole. I keep coming back to: If the Holy Spirit is behind it, no matter what, it will do the task it was set out to do. (Though, again, being earnest about and having the Holy Spirit behind it are two different things. Do keep in mind, the Spirit may tell you need to do something...but sometimes that something takes training and time to get to)(That.
As per "Angels and Demons" - I'm torn on this. My initial position is opposed to it since I feel it's been overdone and it seems to be the easiest thing to jump into, and seems to be the only thing that most Christian creators seem to be interested in... (and Captain Bibleman variations) BUT I've been thinking about it. The Bible verse "We don't battle against flesh and blood, but principalities etc." (poorly paraphrased) has been percolating.
Even secular comics present these types of things - particularly demonic possession - as in a demon or entity is controlling characters to do things outside of their norm. Stories can easily veer into this space, sometimes for the better. I just think Angels and Demons needs to be done right or not at all, and most definitely not as a catch-all crutch.
Your Allegories of the Way does a most definite interesting approach - which I thoroughly appreciated. (Though, depressed and despondent angels is kind of bemusing...it does however lend itself to interesting storytelling.)
As all have said: Christians need to make sure they're doing good work - BUT they need to be able to self-assess where they are, and how their doing. I don't think we're doing ourselves or our Father any favors by putting out stuff that is substandard. As always a conversation this thick has a billion caveats - more than I'm willing to go into or I'll write a book.
Anyway: Everybody: GO. Create! Be fruitful and multiply. Iron sharpens iron. Assess yourself. ASK for honest critical feedback. Suck it up when it hurts, and find ways to improve. IF you can't improve, or produce the work at a quality level, then hire someone to do it for you.
Shalom be upon you, and welcome to the new year.
I'm late to the conversation, but I have been reading the posts, so here's my opinion on some of what been said.
I definitely agree that the quality of Christian work in comics could be better, though there are many good Christain artists and writers out there. They may not be the majority, but it's no different than in the secular world. I have read a plenty secular comics from DC, Marvel and so on that sucked. Check out the print on demands sites and you'll see a whole lot of secular books that don't look great, but then there are some that look professional. I think to compare "us" to "them" is we're still a minority in crappy artwork and stuff.
I know for myself I try to improve my art and writing skills to become better and I do look at secular comics to help train me just like when I was a kid and use to copy Arthur Adams and Mike Zeck work. I see and know my shortcomings. And we all can see others shortcomings and at times I can be hard on myself and others in the "Christian comic world ". But there is one thing we have that the thousands and thousands of SpiderMan, X-men, Superman comics, etc. sold out there don't have and that is immortality. What I mean is the work we do "preaching the kingdom of God" has eternal ramifications that secular comics don't have. Not to say that God doesn't use secular comics, because I learned a lot growing up from Uncle Ben and Peter Parker. But it was a gateway God used until I truly had a relationship with God the complete Father.
However, secular comics to me are an escape now, Christain comics are an escape but also encouragement, knowledge and life. Even if the Christian comic may not be up to a certain standards, if it showing and telling who God is in a simple or complicated way then kudos. The seeds from a Christian book will be more important than all the Spiderman comics I have read(And I've read a lot).
As artists and writers we should all be trying to improve, but a news flash to me is where the bible says God uses the foolish things in the world to confound the wise. And comics are considered foolish to many people who don't understand the art form. But God has and will use Christian media that may be professional or not professional to change souls. The funny thing is I wouldn't be surprised if a non-professional comic is anointed by God to save millions. To me it's encouragement and hopefully it'll encourage anyone else who is reading these posts who may not think they are up to any standard. God can use anything.
Also, I think angels and demons should never be thrown away in Christian comics(yes I'm bias), because they are our "superheroes" in some ways. Plus for people in the world, seeing illustrated angels and demons are the only thing that helps them even acknowledge there is a spiritual world. Plus, I like to see different interpertations of angels.
Yes I know that the Bible doesn't glorify evil things and that is not what I was saying at all. My point was that their are alot of things in the Bible that would be considered R-rated by todays standards and when I was talking about the blood I was refering to all the sacrifaces that took place in the Old Testament, and the violence in the Bible is not PG either. like when David killed Goliath, alot of people leave out the fact that David then cut off his head with Goliath's own sword. I am in no way trying to glorify that stuff that Bible considers wicked or evil. The whole Word of God points to Jesus anyway, you could say that since Jesus is the Word, that the Bible is Jesus in written form!... I'm sorry if what I said came across the wrong way.
What I am really trying to get across here is that as Christian storytellers, comic book artist, and writers we shouldn't be afraid to step out of our comfort zones and tell things like it is. We shouldn't be afriad to say that sin is sin, and that there is a hell, and that Jesus is the only way to God. And in our stories we need to stop watering down everything that we create and making them boring, and none entertaining. We need to step up our game and produce things that bring Glory to God, but still is relevent and presents the gospel in a way that people will understand it and still be entertained by what we produced. I am also sick of the lack of originality amongst the Christian community. It seems like we are always riping off of something the world is doing. I mean God has given us our minds, one of His most complex creations, in order for us to create and imagine things that are not only original but bring glory to Him. But we feel like in order to be relevent, we have to do what the world is doing. That is not being relevent, that is simply trying to be like everyone else. We have the ability as the people of God to produce things that are so extravagant that it rivals anything the world could ever produce. The gospel never gets old and it is always relevent. And we in Body of Christ, have the potental to make stories, comics, books, music, and movies that are not only original, but relevent because our source is the Creator himself.
Now I'm not tring to come across hard on anyone particular, because even I am guilty of trying to take things from the world. And I know that there is nothing new under the sun (Eccelesiastes 1:9) But I simply want all of us as Christians to step up our game and start using the talents God has given us to try and be more original, relevent, and making things that people in the world would actually want to see, without having to take from the world in order to do that.
Mattaniah Gladman said:
Lesson #1: God does not rejoice in that which is bloody, violent, and R-rated. That's not His heart. Psalm 11:5 "The LORD trieth the righteous, but the wicked and him that loveth violence His soul hateth."
The stories that I publish are all true, and if they deal with bloody, violent, and R-rated situations, I try to handle the visuals in a tasteful and discreet way. I do not want to glorify evil, but to glorify God.
Samples can be seen here:
www.calvarycomics.com
In Christ's service,
Alec Stevens
Hey Alec:
Thank you for your reply! First off, we've already met before! Yep, that's right; I am "jazzdre" from the tothfans discussion forums and website! I commended you on your artwork/storytelling on that forum, and while I like your work in color, I really dig your black and white work the most. I like the way you used zip a tone to get your effects in your graphic novel, and the minimalism in your work(that's why you go to the Alex Toth website,I see!) Also, we met in person, at the New York ComicCon about two to three years ago,ironically enough at the Steranko booth! Our meeting was very brief;you had to leave,I believe to catch up with some acquaintances of yours.
However,I believe that you somewhat misunderstood what I was saying, and I'm going to try to clear up some things.What I meant to say was that we should look up to the artists that I cited;we should look up to them ARTISTICALLY.Not emulate them in their private behavior, or anything like that, but emulate the way they draw, how they solved their problems artistically and storytelling-wise. We all know(or I guess some of us know)that Wally Wood was an alcoholic, and was caught up in the world of hardcore pornographic cartooning in his later years, but this does not negate the fact that he produced great work for EC Comics as well as Marvel and DC. While there is some suggestion of sensuality in these works,it DEFINITELY is nowhere near the stuff that he produced in the years before he took his life. His EC Comics works were well crafted,beautifully drawn stories that dealt with the evils of prejudice,racism,drug addiction,hypocrisy-at least that's what I remember when I read the stories drawn by him.And his sci-fi and war stories for the same company were masterpieces of detail(what detail!) and design.Now am I suggesting that people go out and become alcoholics and porn obssessed like Wally was? CERTAINLY NOT!! Also, from what I read, he was pretty much a emotionally disturbed guy, and was married about four or five times,did not take care of himself health-wise,and took his life because he was in such physical pain.He also suffered a few strokes,which probably caused him to have some "skewered sensiblities"(thanks for that line,Alec).Pete Hamill,noted columnist/writer is also a comics fan, and was a big Wood fan, and he also said that when he saw Wally's later works, he knew that something had truly gone wrong in Wood's life, and that made him sad.
This is not the Wally-Wally the man-that we should emulate.Rather it's Wally Wood, the artist of the EC Comics/Marvel/DC era(he was the one who redesigned Daredevil's costume from the yellow costume to the all red costume which is his trademark,even today.)whose works we should look at and study,when he was younger,and for lack of a better word,"pure",the works of the 50s/60s era,rather than the dark-obssessed artist he had become in the late 60s/70s era. Also Alec, you yourself said that you were familiar with these artists' works-before you became saved-and there in a way lies the problem. What also I was saying is that a lot of Christian( and non-Christian artists as well) don't know about most or even ANY of those gentlemen that I mentioned,so they feel that the work that they do doesn't have to have any level of quality because they are so obssessed that the work they produce must come from the Holy Spirit,that there can be no other influence;it has to come out "raw","straight from God's own heart thru me",et al;when what they really mean is that didn't get a good artistic educational foundation,and were too lazy to seek out other influences that would have helped them to grow as artists and as storytellers.Remember,like I said before, the aforementioned talk is very manipulative when it comes to Christians, so the so called artist,while he talks the holy talk, his heart may be a million miles away from God. It's just that he may not know what to do with his life at the moment, so he writes/draws and says anything that comes to his mind at the moment,rather than truly listening to the voice of the Lord.In short, before said artist speaks piously, you lookat his work and say,"ewww". However, after you hear his righteous words, you look at his work again, and say "ooohhh..." Get what I'm saying?
You are absolutely right;every good gift IS from above, but not used for the perfect will of God.Yes, you're right,but let's face brutal reality,these guys thoughts were as faaaaaar from God as you can get! And I really don't think this was malicious on their part. A lot of these guys got into comics,if it was comicstrips,it was for fame,glory and money;however,if it was comicbooks,they got into them for different reasons such as: they needed to make a living,it was a great training ground to prepare them for when they got into the comicstrip field,they couldn't break into the commercial art field,so they settled for comicbooks,the only thing that they could do well was draw,so they broke into comics because of that;so many different reasons. But the bottom line of it all is money. they got into comics to make a living, and like so many billions of working stiffs out there,got stuck in their jobs.They were drawing stories for pretty much a children's audience;they probably wanted to do something more meatier and more 'adult',but the closest they got to that was those post code "love" comics,or horror comics, the only reason why some of them experimented was because they were bored out of their mind with the banal and cliched stories they had to draw, and also, they were at the mercy of their editors. A lot of them were brutally verbally abused by their editors(like the infamous Mort Weisinger), the pay they got wasn't that great considering all the work they had to do, but they stuck in it because they had families, and had bills to pay, and also prayed that no hot young talent would usurp them from the book that they were accustomed to draw, because said editor would tell them that their work was too "old-fashioned",so that they had to leave the book that was making them a living.
I'm not making any excuses here, but truly it is hard to do the "perfect will of God" under these circumstances. However, you get someone like Jack Chick,who is able to do what he wants to do because he is a SELF-PUBLISHER.In fact, Jack and his artistic assistant Fred Carter are PERFECT examples of what I'm talking about,with what I said about influences and professionalism! Jack was a cartoonist/illustrator for an aerospace company in the 50s/early 60s, but his heart was with doing Christian comics that would reach the masses.In the beginning, he published the comics on his own,money borrowed from a credit union, but even the CHURCH didn't like his work!! However,God was with him! He took his book that caused him much controversy to the boss of his company,multi millionaire George Otis,whom he heard was a Christian,and gave it to Otis' secretary. Soon, he was summoned to Otis' office, and upon meeting him, Otis declared Jack "a man of God" and offered to help finance Jack's second book, A DEMON'S NIGHTMARE.Chick exclaimed, "I couldn't BELIEVE my EARS!!" 40 years later,FOUR HUNDRED MILLION COPIES SOLD.
One of the posters on this forum said that Jack was an "amateur" cartoonist. NOT SO AT ALL! Jack's work is to me, very professional looking, but he is more a "cartooning" cartoonist. He is a minimalist;kind of like Alex Toth,or C.C. Beck,or Irwin Hasen,his art is great, not crude at all, and is a dynamic storyteller.His use of zip-a-tone/grey tones for shading is outstanding,and to me ranks up there with the best. Also, when you get a Chick comic, there is no hint of unprofessionalism whatsoever! The cover print is set in bold helvitica, the typeset is absolutely perfect, he claims to have studied to be an actor and also director, so he knows how to balance and set the story up to its climax. There are MILLIONS of people who have bought Chick's comics,even outright atheists and agnostics who want NOTHING to do with Jesus,but pick up these books anyway,just for the quality alone! He has been an innovator, and has been an influence on GENERATIONS of cartoonists;particularly the independent ones! You can see his influence on the Hernandez bros,Adrian Tomine,Dan Clowes,et al. They won't come out and admit it,probably for fear of being labeled "Jesus Freak", but the influence is there just the same. Now as for Fred Carter: some comic "scholars" feel that Fred;who is more of an "illustrative" comics artist was influenced by those great Filipino comics artists,whose work began appearing in the DC books of the 70s,primarily the DC horror books. Artists such as Jesus Jodloman,Alfredo Alcala(whose work I really dug when I was a kid)Nestor Redondo(who himself was a believer),Ernesto Cruz,Ruben Yandoc,etc layed down heavily detailed lines in their artwork, so it could look Fosteresque;more "illustrative". Carter most likely looked at these artists, and studied their work intensely, and their INFLUENCE most likely came out in his work. Fred,from what I understand, is an artist who won't finish a page until atistically, his t's are crossed and his i's are dotted. See, Alec this is what I mean by influence.Fred looked at these artists, studied them, didn't live on them,but brought their influence to his work, until he too, probably got a message from the Lord,saying now,"you learn from Me".
As you probably can tell, I have a lot more to say, but I'm tired right now, it's getting late, and I'm going to call it a day. I definitely look forward to hearing a reply from you again soon, and I thank you for your words.
andre jardine said:
Calvary Comics said:
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