We missed 1979 Semi Finalists’s list of the 100 Best Comic Book Covers … it’s a highly subjective list — big on Jaime Hernandez, James Jean, Adam Hughes and 80s X-men. But glancing at it is surely enough to rekindle some thoughts about the greatness and variety of comics, and their indelible imagery. Actually the most startling thing about the list was the above…the cover of ACTION COMICS #2 by Leo E. O’Mealia.
Seriously in all our years of comics research, we never even THOUGHT about the cover to ACTION #2, let alone that it might be so cool.
Bonus #1: After Ellen singles out some of the Top 100 covers that feature women.
Bonus #2: the cover to Action #3 also by O’Mealia! It is such a shock to see that famous logo without Superman underneath it. Also how sophisticated the cover design is — without Shuster’s simple drawing, it really pops.
Imagine if THIS is what had kick started the American comics industry. What a world we would live in.
That’s awesome. It could be a whole series- the cover after the famous one. I like how the first 3 issues had a wrecked car, plane and boat- there really was some action there.
Those are some nice covers, but I guess I’m showing my age when I say: “What? No Gil Kane covers?”
Marvel recently held an online reader’s poll of the 70 best Marvel covers. Results here:
http://marvel.com/seventy_years/countdown/winners/covers/
Most are voted for the story depicted, not so much for the cover design itself.
In 1993, Abbeville Press published Superman in Action Comics: Featuring the Complete Covers of the First 25 Years, which reproduced the covers of every issue of Action Comics from #1 to #300. They also published a similar volume for Batman in Detective Comics. The only drawback is the small size – approximately 3″ x 4″.
I love the old pulp adventure DC covers that were around before the first of the DC superheroes appeared. Check out Adventure Comics #37. THAT’s awesome.
http://www.coverbrowser.com/covers/adventure-comics
damn, those really are some great covers!!! O.O
thanks for that H!
As a Fu Manchu mark, I love the cover for Det 1
Those O’Mealia ACTION covers are incredible — and, I gotta say, way more thrilling than some of Shuster’s awkward Superman pieces.
O’Mealia apparently did a bunch of newspaper strips too, in various styles that are sometimes Herriman, sometimes Segar, and sometimes something else entirely. I’ve never heard of him but he’s all over the place.
Leo O’Mealia had a career as a sports cartoonist. Robert Cole offers some analysis on and praise for O’Mealia and two other cartoonists:
I’ve always admired the O’Mealia covers … too bad they didn’t make him the steady cover artist, no matter the subject.