Rob Liefeld On Jonathan Hickman, Greg Capullo, John Romita Jr & More

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Posted in: Comics, Comics Publishers, Current News, Image, Marvel Comics, X-Men | Tagged: jonathan hickman, rob liefeld

Rob Liefeld Says The Funniest Things… on Jonathan Hickman, Greg Capullo, John Romita Jr, Brett Booth, Ryan Reynolds and more

Rob Liefeld recently fully quit Marvel Comics over a) him and his family not being allowed into the Deadpool And Wolverine premiere after party, but b) not getting an upfront credit for the Deadpool And Wolverine movie as the principal creator of Deadpool. Which, you know, is 100% right. Marvel Studios could do this – they did with Jack Kirby and Eternals, or they do with Steve Ditko and Stan Lee on Spider-Man. But not with Deadpool and Wolverine, the top credit is just Based On The Marvel Comics. I think he’d even accept Fabian Nicieza in there. But since then, Rob has been left to his own devices more, with the revival of Youngblood at Image Comics, his new direct-to-consumer series Last Blood and with a twelve-year partially unfulfilled Brigade Kickstarter hanging over his head. Without Marvel PR, he is making his own publicity, which is what he is really great at, and his Robservations podcasts are evidence of that. It just means lately, he has been putting the thumb on the scales a little bit more when it comes to what he’ll do for an audience. The really fun stuff is on his WhatNot and Instagram live videos, where he sells his work and talks about whatever and whoever comes to mind. The videos get deleted after they are no longer live, unless some innocent soul who is still waiting on their copy of Brigade captures them live. And then sends them to Bleeding Cool.

Now I want to make something clear. I am not a Rob Liefeld hater. I enjoy the showmanship he portrays and am regularly reminded of Stan Lee when I hear him talk in that, he is an entertainer in the Robbie Williams or PT Barnum style. I admire his gumption as the principal founder of Image Comics at a time when it seemed impossible for someone so young. In his work, I am enraptured by the kinetic aspects of his art, unmatched by his imitators, and I especially see how a young audience gets a thrill from his ink lines. Also, he can actually draw feet when he wants to. He also drew a cover for my own Image Comics title, Chase Variant, something for which I am eternally grateful – it helped sales and enables me to make an entertaining meta cover gag for a comic book that was already well up its own arse in that regard. More of that in a minute,

But I would be amiss if I didn’t record some of his more outlandish recent moves for posterity. Just remember, don’t always go for the literal when it comes to Rob. Think of him in a top hat, in the middle of a circus ring, barking out whatever comes to mind.

Recently on X, Rob Liefeld went off on one on Jonathan Hickman. This seems principally due to his work on the X-Men and the House Of X/Krakoan Age relaunch, which plenty of current X-readers mourn the death of. As he has mentioned before, Rob Liefeld has called out Hickman for ripping off the concept of Moira McTaggert in this story, reliving her life again and again, making changes, from the book, The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August, a book that Hickman had mentioned he had read. And he is right, while House Of X is much more than that, the founding narrative that sees the creation of the island of Krakoa is heavily based on that version of this not entirely uncommon trope of a story. But this time, Liefeld went further, in a series of deleted tweets, that the reason Marvel wasn’t returning to that storyline or using it in the MCU was because the author Claire North was suing or going to sue Marvel. Which she isn’t and wasn’t. To back his case up, Liefeld tweeted screencaps stating repeatedly that CBR had reported she was. When the screencap was of a CBR forum post linked to a Bleeding Cool article about the issue, which definitely did not make such a claim. Anyway, this went on for days. I got quote-tweeted…

Anyway, he was having fun, and I was having fun. We bonded over our shared love of the movie Begin Again. I tried to get him to watch Better Man because I thought it would really speak to him, the usual thing. But unbeknownst to me, this was having an effect on his WhatNot live channel. Where he started mocking Jonathan Hickman for… doing a cover to Youngblood a while ago? I am not sure how that would work as a mocking strategy.

Especially since Jonathan Hickman hasn’t responded to any of this. It feels like a one-sided feud. As I said, Rob Liefeld did a cover for me a while ago, and rather than mocking him, I love him for it. Here is Chase Variant from fifteen years ago, by me, the late Saverio Tenuta and the late Edmund Bagwell, one cover by Bagwell and by Rob Liefeld. I know, I’m clearly a jinx.

But Rob clearly wasn’t done, while on X he is mostly bemoaning the poor box office performance of Captain America Brave New World and Thunderbolts* calling for Kevin Feige to be fired, as he has extended his online monologues to other targets. Such as Greg Capullo and John Romita Jr…

Greg Capullo has a snappy retort back on social media of course.

Then there is Brett Booth… who drew the Fantastic Four for Heroes Return to fill in for Jim Lee thirty years ago.

But hey, Brett Booth partially agrees with Rob’s criticism of his work, posting “Hmmm… maybe not completely off? Was trying to ape Jim more so it would match. I actually did finishes for issue 5 as well. Schedule was a disaster. Would love another shot at some point to make up for it. It’s fine he didn’t read part, I didn’t read his Cap.” And then there was even Ryan Reynolds himself.

But as I said, Rob Liefeld, continued to entertain, no matter what madnesses he chooses to indulge. And that is why I see him, without a word of a lie, and not a single insult on my lips, as the Robbie Williams of comic books. Which of course, like Robbie, means he’ll be working with Grant Morrison next… and if they ever do make a film of his life, this would be the way, with the rest of Image Comics founders as Take That…

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