Welcome to the first WALT WEDNESDAYS!
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Welcome to our newest feature here at 13th Dimension — WALT WEDNESDAYS, a weekly spotlight on the work of longtime contributor Walt Grogan! Click here for more on this new smash hit! — Dan
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By WALT GROGAN
Jerry Ordway is well known for his stints on both Superman and the original Captain Marvel But he’s also connected to the Darknight Detective as the artist behind the comic book adaptation of the Tim Burton-directed 1989 Batman movie.
The film, produced by Benjamin Melniker and former DC Woodchuck Michael Uslan, was a distinct departure from the Pow—Bam—Zap days of Adam West’s 1966 TV show and ushered into popular culture a more serious Batman.
The movie’s comic-book adaptation, written by Denny O’Neil and penciled and inked by Ordway, was a master class in bringing a movie to life on the four-color page, with a taut translation of the story, compelling layouts and spot-on likenesses of the main cast.
In the 35-plus years since the adaptation’s release, Jerry has produced multiple Batman commissions based on his interpretation of the film’s Dark Knight. Check this one out:
My favorite aspect is how he draws the Masked Manhunter’s cape. His shading produces such realistic folds, and really brings the costume to life! It’s almost like the cape is a character in its own right.
Which is why I’ll never understand why Jerry didn’t get the nod to do an extended run on Batman or Detective Comics, or why DC didn’t continue the movie as an ongoing monthly after the film’s release.
Well, to see what might have been, I colored and trade-dressed the image above and — Holy Missed Opportunity! — I would have bought the heck out of it!
As a bonus, here’s a faux house ad promoting the series!
I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that DC came around back in 2021, and published a six-issue Batman ’89 miniseries by original movie screenwriter Sam Hamm and artist Joe Quinones (with an Ordway variant cover for the first issue), and a follow-up, Batman ’89: Echoes, in 2024.
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Want more WALT WEDNESDAYS? Come back next week!
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MORE
— Introducing… WALT WEDNESDAYS! Click here.
— THE SUPERNATURAL SOIREE: Dig This DC WHO’S WHO Halloween Jam Piece — a WALT WEDNESDAYS Preview. Click here.
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A 10-year-old Walt Grogan fell in love with the Big Red Cheese thanks to essays written by Dick Lupoff and Don Thompson in the paperback edition of All in Color for a Dime, released in 1970 and bought for him by his father off a paperback spinner rack in a liquor store on the South Side of Chicago. Walt runs The Marvel Family Web Facebook page devoted to all incarnations of the Fawcett/DC Captain Marvel and blogs about Captain Marvel at shazamshistorama.com.
