George Pérez is known for his ability to fill a drawing with dozens of characters. So has an editor ever told him that he'd gone too far?
"Oh, no," he told me last month at Wizard World. "Because the thing is, I know the difference, at least in my style, between detail and clutter."
Pérez is best known for Crisis on Infinite Earths, the mid-1980s series that featured almost every character DC Comics owned. Pérez said his cover to the Crisis on Infinite Earths collection featured more than 500 characters.
"That probably ranked as the greatest number in a single piece," he said, as several adoring fans waited for a sketch. "But then you get things like the cover to JLA/Avengers No. 3, which had a lot of characters, but it was a smaller image. ... So if it averages out, the JLA/Avengers cover probably had more characters per square inch."
If you can name everybody on the
JLA/Avengers No. 3 cover, you need a life -- or a weekly column.
GEORGE PEREZ
Pérez, 52, was at Wizard World representing the Hero Initiative, a not-for-profit corporation that raises money to help comic book pioneers who have fallen on hard times.
"Everyone was just paid a page rate," Pérez said of the industry's early years. "There were no royalties. There were no pensions."
Pérez chairs the organization's disbursement committee. "I am proud to say that I am, according to the people who handle the books, the single biggest fund-raiser for the entire organization," he said.
To raise even more funds, Pérez is participating in a contest that will have him spend 24 hours at the winner's home. To find out how to enter, visit the "News" section of www. actorcomicfund.org.
If I win, Pérez can expect to spend some time drawing a portrait of my family – my entire family.
DC Comics today releases a collection of Sachs and Violens ($14.99), a series for mature readers that George Pérez (left) did with writer Peter David in the early 1990s. Pérez will return to monthly work in February when he and writer Mark Waid release the first issue of The Brave and the Bold, a re-launch of DC's classic team-up title.
David Hopkins, the Arlington-based writer of Emily Edison (left), has revamped his Web site, Antiherocomics.com. To entice people to visit, he's giving away signed copies of his comics. All you have to do to get your name in the hopper is post a comment on his blog.
DC is re-launching Justice Society of America today with a new No. 1 ($3.99) written by Geoff Johns and drawn by Dale Eaglesham. The cover (left) shows Wildcat, Power Girl and Mr. Terrific sifting through a table full of glossy photos as they decide the team's roster, just as Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman did in the recently re-launched Justice League of America. What's with all the photos? Don't these heroes have computers?
Back in 1986, Marvel created the New Universe. It was an attempt to set stories in a place with fewer fantastic elements and more real-life challenges. For example, the hero in the flagship title, Star Brand, had to stop and consult a map on his way to a disaster site.
The entire thing was hyped beyond belief, and none of the eight titles lived to see the '90s. But the New Universe returns today with the release of newuniversal ($2.99), a series in which Warren Ellis has been given free rein to re-imagine the characters. God help them.
Dan wants to hear your favorite New Universe story at dkoller@quickdfw.com.
