The celebrated Mr. K pays a BIRTHDAY TRIBUTE… By PAUL KUPPERBERG I’ve written a lot of stuff and worked with a lot of artists in my comic-book writing career, some good, some bad, some either already acknowledged as greats, and others on their way to that recognition. Among the last category was a young man named Denys Cowan (born January 31, 1961). It was 1985 and I was a grizzled vet of 10 years. Denys had turned professional half a decade after me, breaking in by penciling stories for DC and Marvel on titles such as Weird War Tales, Peter Parker: The Spectacular Spider-Man, Superman, The Flash, and Moon Knight before settling in for a yearlong run on Marvel’s Power Man and Iron Fist. Then he was back at DC, and nine of the first dozen jobs he was handed to draw were by me. Lucky me! Of course, I knew Denys and was aware of his work, but there’s nothing like having to stare at page after page of an artist’s output as you put words to their pictures to make you really appreciate some of their subtleties. And Denys’ work had subtleties from the very start. Denys was a fan of superheroes from watching afternoon reruns of the George Reeves Adventures of Superman, but it wasn’t until the third grade, when he changed school districts to live with his grandmother after the death of his mother, that he was introduced both to comic books and lifelong friend Derk Dingle. Dingle showed Cowan his first comic book, an issue of Jack Kirby’s New Gods, and he was hooked. Denys attended New York’s High School of Art and Design where he met someone who worked for artist and Deathlok creator Rich Buckler, and an after-school visit to Buckler’s studio led the artist to eventually hire the 14-year old as his assistant. Like a lot of artists of this era, Denys learned on the job, developing his own unique and energetic style that set him apart from many of his contemporaries. My first time working with Denys was when I dialogued Vigilante #19 (June 1985) over character co-creator Marv Wolfman’s plot in what I at first thought was just a fill-in job; it wasn’t, after writing the next issue over Marv’s plot, I became the regular writer and stayed on...