Is it always Halloween in the art world of Tom Mandrake?
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| The Dark Knight of Tom Mandrake, circa 1983 |
My first exposure to Tom’s art was the BATMAN and DETECTIVE
COMICS work he did in the mid Eighties.
I dug his compositions and use of ink, but found his characters a bit
blocky. By pure chance, I met Tom
at a comic show at Eastern Michigan University and he drew a Batman pencil
commission for me. I was blown
away- his delicate pencil shading conveyed more depth than the inked stuff in
the comics- and hooked forever after that.
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| The Wraith of the God, by Sir Tom of Mandrake! |
For my money, Tom hit his stride in his collaboration with
John Ostrander on THE SPECTRE. It
was the perfect match for the character, as Ostrander understood how to blend
the horror and mystery genres with the potent consideration of The
Spectre as the biblical Wrath of God.
Tom took this narrative as a prime directive to - literally- unleash
Hell onto the page. Serial killers
looked more depraved and the tropes of super-villains took on aspects of a
Hieronymus Bosch painting. Like
Rodin’s Gates of Hell, the pages became wrought with the writhing damned.
Recently, Tom was featured in BATMAN RETROACTIVE 70’s, a new
Batman story set in the conventions of his mid-1970’s appearances. At the time, Len revived a large number
of old villains, slightly updating their goofy appearances to make them more
action-adventure story oriented.
While this new story was penned by Len Wein, the writer of those stories
and the creator of character Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman in the movies), Tom might seem an odd choice as he wasn’t working on BATMAN at that time.
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| Tom's most recent BATMAN publication (2011) |
It’s become one of my recent favorite stories. Len pitch-perfect nailed his style from
those old BATMAN comics. The new
Retro story fits to his stories like a lost chapter, advancing the sub plot of
Lucius Fox and inserting a new twist into the motives for all of the returning goofy golden age villains.
Tom’s pages are
filled with black- shadows, skyscrapers, and night scenes. Mandrake returns the Batcave to an
appearance of 40 years ago, with huge lumbering banks of computers with
magnetic tapes maintaining the Bat Crime files on dated-looking terminals. The colours also match Tom’s art- deep
blues, dark greys, and none of the bright palette found in the reprinted story.
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| Tom Mandrake takes the Batmobile out for the night! |
I couldn’t resist and grabbed my favorite of Tom’s original
pages for the book. The top panel
has Tom’s sole rendering of the golden age Bat-villain 3-pack, THE TERRIBLE
TRIO. This group of gangsters super power was to wear ridiculous masks while plotting crimes. Then we get classic Alfred and Bruce in the 70’s Batcave illustrations
in the center panel. Finally, the
bottom third of the page is the crème de la crème: Tom’s loving take of the
classic “Super Powers Batmobile”.
Tom used a great deal of splattered paint to convey the movement and
energy of Batman heading off to kick some Batusi. I love it.
So, if you’re tired waiting for the new season of WALKING DEAD episodes, do yourself a favor and pick up Tom’s SPECTRE comics, or if you need
more superheroics with your Halloween monsters, grab his BATMAN AND SUPERMAN
VS. VAMPIRES AND WEREWOLVES and it’s sequel BATMAN VS THE UNDEAD and celebrate the man!
Happy Birthday!
