Comic Book Artist JOE SINNOTT – Early Days of ATLAS Pre-Code and MARVEL Silver Age
HAUNTED THRILLS Video Archive Part One – JOE SINNOTT: The Early Days Working for STAN LEE at Timely/Atlas which would roll into Marvel Comics. Remembering John Severin, Marie Severin, John Buscema, Jack Kirby, John Romita, and more. Interviewed by Mike Lyddon during Albany Comic Con, 2019.
This is unedited video of the Joe Sinnott interview used in Mike T. Lyddon’s documentary HAUNTED THRILLS now playing on YT.
Joe Sinnott – “You could always fall back on the westerns and in fact the first story I ever did was a western called “The Man who Wouldn’t Die.” It was a three-page filler for one of the Western Comics. From that time on I’ve been with Stan ever since. At that time as you know June 1950 the Korean War started so naturally we started doing a lot of war books. I did so many war books we had so many titles and of course EC started it all they they put out some great books. They had some great artists like John Severn and and Wally Wood. Stan tried to duplicate what they were doing and we we turned out some good books. We had Gene Colan who did excellent work and people like that.”
EC comics line Folds
“Of course later on when EC comics folded, John Severin came over and did some work for for Stan at Atlas. Al Williamson people like that that had worked for EC but EC was one of the first Comics to fold because of the comics code which came out in the early 50s. We had so many good artists, Johnny Romita for example and of course Russ Heath. He did some great westerns and Great War Stories. He did great covers.”
The great artist John Severin
“My all-time favorite was John Severn. I thought he did the best. No one could do a western or war story like he could but John was not big on superheroes. He was so versatile, look at all the crack magazine covers he did down through the years. I talked to him on the phone but I never met him never got to meet John. I knew his sister Marie very well and we did a lot of things together. Marie she was a great a great penciler she had a great sense of humor she was a great colorist. She was just a great all-around Talent and she’s not doing too well now physically. We all think a lot of her and try to keep in touch with her.”
John Romita and John Buscema
“Johnny Romita came came over from DC where he was doing a lot of romance books. He did great Romance Books. He came over probably in the early 60s and the same way with John Buscema, the greatest talent in comics. No one could draw like John Buscema. His Conan and Tarzan! He hated superheroes but he he did great stories for Thor, The Fantastic Four and and he and I worked together for many years. Some of my best stuff I feel was when I did work for John Buscema. I can’t say enough about him and of course Kirby. He was the king of comics and he was really a cartoonist whereas Buscema was an illustrator.
Jack Kirby
Jack was he was a great cartoonist and he could tell a story like no one else, especially his fantasy type work. We all know his Fantastic Four changed the whole direction of comics in the 1960s. It’s amazing if if you look at the the volume of work that that Jack did. I’m not saying he couldn’t ink but his work was not the same when he Inked it but he was a beautiful penciler and uh I never had a bit of problems with any of his stuff. Once in a great while with any any penciler you had to help them along a little bit. Stan used to give Frank and myself and Tom Palmer, people like that, young artists that were just coming into the field. Rich Buckler for example and Jim Starlin. Stan knew how to juggle his artists and look at all the great books he turned out.”
Joe Sinnott On Working For Stan Lee in the early days
“I started with Stan like I said in 1950. I did my own pencils and inks right up until about 1962. So in other words, for 12 years I did nothing but my own pencils and I ink my own work. There were westerns, war stories, horror, science fiction, romance…the whole bit. In the early 60s, Jack Kirby came over to Marvel. Stan couldn’t get us couldn’t get anyone to Ink Jack’s story and it was a monster book. He called me up and said, ‘Joe could you ink the story? It’s a short story by Jack Kirby.’ “And so I told him I thought I could so I inked Kirby’s story and he liked the combination of my ink and Kirby’s pencils. Looking back, I often say to myself, you know, maybe I changed too much of Kirby’s art but then I got back on the track and tried to Ink them just the way Jack penciled his stories because he was a great penciler.”
From the pre-code comics documentary HAUNTED THRILLS now available on Youtube.
