Which side are you on?

 Cover Art Team vs Interior Art Team

A while ago I was tweeting with a friend of mine, Lee Stone twitter tag @nwcomics, about what DC Comics New 52 titles he'll keep reading and he tweeted ”@nwcomics: @AliasJoeG @dccomics I, Vampire: More Bram Stoker & Dark Shadows than Twilight. Much more interesting than the covers give credit for”.  That made me think because there has been some comics were the cover art team didn't, to me, sell the issue the right way. I can see what he ment with I, Vampire, the interior art by Andrea Sorrention with colors by Marcelo Maiolo does not have the look or feel of the cover artwork by Jenny Frison. Now I love the interior art, it has a really nice Jae Lee feel to it, it's dark and gritty. But the cover art. . . . It's  has a "Teen Comics" Twilight feel to it. And I know that Twilight is a BIG deal with movies, novels, and has a storm of teenage girls (& boys?) obsessed with the franchise. So I can see why DC would want to try puling them into reading I, Vampire just with the cover alone. It will draw their attention and as new readers they'll get a really enjoyable comic. But that's where this post is going. The cover doesn't "sell" what's inside the issues. Heck! Make a 50/50 cover shipment. Let Andrea Sorrention and Marcelo Maiolo have a shot at doing some covers as well.

This isn't the first time I've felt this way. To me the most recent and noticeable one was DC's Identity Crisis. Before I go any further let me say I'm a big fan of Mr. Michael Turner's art.  I've loved his work from Witchblade to Soulfire and then some.  But seeing Rags Morales, Michael Bair, and Alex Sinclair's interior artwork was just . . . in a word: Breathtaking. Turner's cover art seemed to give Identity Crisis a different feel then what was inside the comic. As if to say the covers were an Action Movie but the interior was a Drama. When i see that I tend to worry that the company doesn't feel the comic will sell well without a "Big Name" cover artist or that the art team on the book just won't sell the numbers they want.

Now if an indie comic company is doing this then I can understand why you'll want/have a big name artist doing your covers. It's a great way to make your comic stand out and have more eyes on it. But having a Marvel/DC comic with a cover done by a Big Name that doesn't show the same style as on the inside that always turns me off.

There are exceptions, unless the Big Name is an artist who made a huge impact on the title. Like Todd McFarland coming back to Spider-Man. (that'll never happen, but it would be awesome to see) Stuff like that I wouldn't mind. Then there's Dynamite Entertainment line of comics which get shipped with 3 to 4 different cover for just 1 issue.  You can pick and choose which one you want. Granted, not all comic company's can do this with every issue. That's an  idea i would like to see more often though, having the option to choose what cover I'd want with out having to pay anywhere up to $25 bucks for the art team i like. I could go on and on about this, how I want to see more cover art done by the interior team and not just some Big Names or even an art team that looks nothing like what's in the interior of the comicbook.  But as long as comic fans keep buying them I guess they'll keep making them.

-Joseph (AliasJoeG)-