Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.37: Bill Everett

No.37: Bill Everett

Bill Everett’s time in comics could be characterised as a series of happy accidents, along with an unwarranted development as an artist, especially in his 1950s pomp. Words: Andrew Colman…

photo taken in 1970 from online

Getting his start at early golden age publisher Centaur, where he co-created Amazing Man, Everett’s arrival at the medium was a case of drifting into it as a means to an end. With his move to Lloyd Jacquet’s packaging company Funnies Inc., Everett, who was still a freelancer at this point, developed an anti-hero called the Sub-Mariner for a one-off magazine, Motion Picture Funnies Weekly. This was then reprinted in Marvel Comics 1 with additional material – Everett, a man who considered himself an outsider in the industry, had created a different type of character that chimed with his sensibilities as well as readers. It just happened to feature in one of the most important comics ever published and would be a perennial figure for Timely / Atlas / Marvel, as well as hugely influential within the medium for later generations of creators.

He continued working on the title until its termination with issue 32 in 1949, along with spin-off book Namora and further Sub-Mariner stories in the Human Torch and Marvel Mystery Comics. By the 1950s, Timely had morphed into Atlas, its focus moving away from superheroes towards horror, crime, science-fiction, war and other genres. Everett’s style had evolved by this point, and despite or perhaps because of it being an off-kilter combination of fine line, caricature, baroque and realism, it fit Atlas’s needs very well. Particularly excelling in horror, Everett’s beguiling and often slightly grotesque art and stories exuded classic 50s tropes of paranoia, alienation, conformity and fear, his sense of mood echoing that of Basil Wolverton and Jack Cole. His key works featured in Adventures into Weird Worlds, Marvel Tales, Journey into Unknown Worlds, Astonishing, Spellbound, Uncanny Tales, and above all Menace and Venus. His work on Menace 5’s Zombie and the classic tales and covers in Venus #s 17-19 were an inventive and stylish tour de force, his garishly cinematic covers marking him out as one of the best pre-code artists and certainly the best at Atlas. The outsider had become the maverick artist whose work at times bordered on genius.

Everett continued to work after the code was enforced, working on myriad titles for the company as well as the abortive golden age revival in the mid-50s, including Sub-Mariner, Young Men, Men’s Adventures and the Human Torch. By the 1960s Everett had moved away from the industry but began pencilling again by the middle of the decade, his co-creation of and artwork on Daredevil 1 lighting the touch paper for his return. By the late 60s, Everett was drawing the Hulk on Tales to Astonish and Dr. Strange in Strange Tales, before returning to the Sub-Mariner, in both Astonish and his own title. While there, a significant amount of his golden age Sub-Mariner material appeared in various reprint titles. Despite being commissioned for many projects at Marvel in the early Bronze Age, Everett’s health was by then in decline, and he died in 1973. Although there could’ve been considerably more work from the reluctant virtuoso, he still managed to contribute a sizeable raft of excellent material that at times elevated the art form.

Here’s links through to the other entries in our 101 Greatest so far as well

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.38: Robert Crumb

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.39: Mac Raboy

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.41: Jim Starlin

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.42: Mike Zeck

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.43: Adam Hughes

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.44: Daniel Clowes

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.45: Gene Colan

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.46: George Perez

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.47: Michael William Kaluta

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.48: Cary Nord

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.49: Frank Quitely

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.50: Mike Ploog

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.51: Johnny Craig

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.52: Darwyn Cooke

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.53: Steve Dillon

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.54: Gil Kane

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.55: Michael Zulli

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.56: John Romita

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.57: Joe Maneely

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.58: Marshall Rogers

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.59: John Severin

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.60: Alex Toth

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.61: Brian Bolland

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.62: David Mazzuchelli

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.63 Reed Crandall

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.64 Harry Anderson

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.65 Nick Cardy

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.66 Matt Wagner

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.67 Bryan Hitch

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.68 Shawn Martinbrough

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.69 Al Feldstein

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.70 Nestor Redondo

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.71 Tarpe Mills

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.72 Eduardo Risso

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.73 JH Williams III

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.74 Irv Novick

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.75 Dan Zolnerowich

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.76 Gilbert Shelton

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.77 Tommy Lee Edwards

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.78: Sean Phillips

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.79: Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.80: Dan DeCarlo

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.81: Marie Severin

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.82: John Paul Leon

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.83: Jim Lee

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.84: Denys Cowan

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.85: Ross Andru

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.86: Paul Gustavson

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.87: George Evans

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.88: Michael Golden

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.89: Matt Baker

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.90: Todd McFarlane

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.91: Fiona Staples

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.92: Carl Barks

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.93: Carmine Infantino

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.94: Alan Davis

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.95: CC Beck

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.96: Syd Shores

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.97: Bob Fujitani

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.98: Tim Sale

Tripwire’s 101 Greatest Comic Artists Of All Time: No.99: Jim Aparo

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https://tripwiremagazine.co.uk/headlines/tripwires-101-greatest-comic-artists-of-all-time-no-101/