Thursday, September 23, 2010

Hello Yellow Brick Road

Hey, comics fans? How well do you know your Oz! No, no, not the land down under, where women glow and men plunder, cool as that sounds. I'm talking about L. Frank Baum's Marvelous Land of Oz, which coincidentally has just been released as a graphic novel in Marvel's new Oz series written by Eric Shanower with art by Skottie Young.

Shanower's actually been an Oz creator for many years: he's scripted and drawn original Oz graphic novels, and he's written and illustrated several brand new Oz novels in the manner of Baum but in his own inimitable style, continuing the adventures told by each generation's Royal Historian of Oz. (I highly recommend Paradox in Oz by Edward Einhorn with illustrations by Shanower—it's basically Crisis on Infinite Ozes, with a wonderful two-page illustration of Ozma encountering every other version of her Her Royal Self throughout reality!

Paradox in Oz

And speaking of other Ozian realities, check out this cartoon by Eric Shanower from the beautiful and very-much-missed Oz journal Oz-story. It's a piece that asks the musical question (altho' not to the tune of "Over the Rainbow") "What If™...Comics' Biggest Names Drew Oz?" How about it...how many can you guess? (aw, c'mon, take a guess!)

OzStory #2
"If Six Cartoonists Had Drawn Oz Comics!" by Eric Shanower from Oz-story #2 (May 1996)


Leave your answers and guesses in the comments; don't cheat by looking at anyone else's comments, and remember, there is no money in Oz, so no wagering!


5 comments:

Edward Einhorn said...

Thanks for the mention of Paradox! Eric also illustrated The Living House of Oz, which I'm very proud of as well.

Definitely check out the new Land, it's great. And one last Eric related plug--his own Adventures in Oz book.

Edward Einhorn

Unknown said...

Ok, from upper left hand panel clockwise:

1) Winsor McCay
2) Harold Gray
3) Carl Barks
4) This one's trickier than the rest...Gilbert Hernandez?
5) Robert Crumb
6) Jack Kirby

Jayunderscorezero said...

Yup, I too guessed exactly as dhaxton above (sorry, I guessed, then peeked) and yes, I too am having trouble with the bottom right one.

AlephZ said...

And speaking of artists who really should draw Oz? Why isn't there some kind of Colleen Coover Oz spin-off? That would be -amazing-.

joe ackerman said...

bottom right's gotta be Hernandez. the lettering gives it away. that's a great page!