Today in Comics History, November 16: Happy birthday, Darwyn Cooke!

Born on this day in 1962: multiple award-winning (13 Eisners, 8 Harveys, 5 Joe Shuster Awards) comics scripter and artist Darwyn Cooke, who defined so much of great comics during the 2000s: DC: The New Frontier, Catwoman, Catwoman: Selina's Big Score, Wolverine/Doop, The Spirit, The Twilight Children, Batman: Ego, Richard Stark's Parker, Solo #5, Spider-Man's Tangled Web #21 and more, plus so many great covers for DC and other publishers.

He passed away in 2016 at the age of 63. Wow, that's way too soon.


from Solo #5 (DC, August 2005)



Cooke's issue of Solo is dedicated to family friend Roberta Storms:


from Solo #5; pencils by Darwyn Cooke
He explains why in his autobiographical story in the same issue:




from "World's Window" in Solo #5; script, pencils, inks, colors, and letters by Darwyn Cooke
Darwyn's one of Harley Quinn's choices to create her New 52 comic book (altho' we already knew it was gonna be this page's guest stars Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti):



from Harley Quinn #0 (DC, January 2014), script by Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti, pencils and inks by Darwyn Cooke, colors by see here, letters by John J. Hill
The best tribute you can make to Darwyn Cooke? Read his books! Here's some of the many (and yet, still not enough) books by Darwyn.


Happy birthday, Darwyn. You're much missed, but thanks for leaving us so much wonder and joy to enjoy.


from Solo #5