Dan Gordon Comics Reprints in The Comics Journal #291

A number of months ago, after posting a bunch of Dan Gordon comic stories on the CartoonSNAP blog, I got an email from Michael Dean, the editor of The Comics Journal. He asked to borrow some Dan Gordon comic books so they could scan them and run the color pages in an upcoming issue of the magazine.

ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009

Of course I said YES because I would love to have a part in helping comics readers discover the unbridled joy of the comic art of journeyman cartoonist and animator, Dan Gordon. 

The Comics Journal made super-high-resolution scans of Cookie and Funny Films for inclusion in their full-color comic-reprint section. I can't wait to see what it looks like. They even asked me to write an introductory article for the section -- only problem with that was I didn't really know that much about Dan Gordon's life. So I put out a call for help!

 ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009

Fortunately, there are a lot of cool cartoonists and comics-aficionados who were more than eager to help me fill in the gaps. Thanks to: Mike Kazaleh, Kent Butterworth, Scott Shaw, Leonard Maltin, Mark Kausler, and Milton Knight, who were all very generous with their time and knowledge.
Of course, any shortcomings that may be in the article are mine, but there's no doubt that the big Dan Gordon comics section will look fantastic!

The Comics Journal #291 comes out TODAY... Wednesday July 16th, so If you'd like to have some full-color Dan Gordon comic book reprints on real paper (rather than reading them on your computer screen), make sure to pick up issue #291 of The Comics Journal at your local comics shop, bookstore or Amazon.com.

Update:

I just looked through the finished printed copies of the book on the stands at my local comics shop, Burbank's awesome House of Secrets. Bottom line: Fantagraphics did a great job with the reproduction and printing. The comics look sharp and clear, but still retain that "old comics" yellowed-page look.
There are 32 full-color pages which include a Cookie story, two funny animal comedy comics starring Puss and Boots from ACG's Funny Films, and one story of the rabbit inventor, Blunderbunny!

Cookie's Pal, Jitterbuck in a One-Page Comic by Dan Gordon

Here's a quick one-page story from Dan Gordon
starring Cookie's best pal. Jitterbuck!


From ACG Comics' "The Kilroys" #45

Click on the comic page below to see it nice and big.

ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009

...that's it! Just a li'l one-pager for a busy Monday.
But there'll be lots more this week!


For ALL the previous Dan Gordon posts, click HERE!



UPDATE: There's LOTS more comic book scans
to look at and download! Click HERE

• Coming next time:

Another Super Rabbit comic book story!

One-Pagers from Kilroys Comics by Dan Gordon

ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009

For ALL the Dan Gordon posts, click HERE!

UPDATE: There's LOTS more comic book scans to look at and download! Click HERE

• ...And if you liked this post, please help me share it
  

(Click one or more of the links directly below) Thanks!

Cookie Comics FIRST Issue by Dan Gordon

Last month, a whole lot of CartoonSNAP readers (from all over the world!) downloaded Dan Gordon's Cookie Comics story from Cookie #20, so I decided to go back to the very first issue of COOKIE Comics to see how it all started...

ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009

Cookie Comics #1 was published in 1946 by Michel Publications
of St. Louis, Missouri. 48 pages plus covers for only a dime.



Instead of putting up little thumbnails of the pages,
I picked out some of the best panels from the story
to show you up close. There's a link at the bottom of this post
which you can click to download all the pages in one file.

Meanwhile...here's a sample of what you'll find inside Cookie #1--



Contrast in character design
________

Check out the shadow under the old guy's beard.
Really makes it pop! His head is as wrinkly as his suit!




Foreground + Middle ground + Background = DEPTH of staging
He does this in almost every panel.



Silly situations, funny drawings and painful violence. That's a cartoon!

Dan Gordon poses = mayhem

So much action and movement!
In the panel above, notice how the colorist
pushed Angelpuss back into the background
by coloring her in monotone.

...and these detail shots
are from a Jitterbuck solo story:

(check out the SOLID construction and anatomy on that dog!)

I love that shadow against the fence as the dog is climbing up!
Dan gordon puts in a lot of blacks like that in his inking
which really gives his drawings a super-solid feel.
The shadows also let us know that the dog's right leg is toughing the fence,
but his left leg is still trailing behind in mid-air.

You don't notice these details while reading the story because they go by so quickly, but if you stop and admire any of these pages in detail, you can really see what a master craftman and master cartoonist Dan Gordon was!

See that big black shadow on Jitterbuck's leg? You can just feel the weight of that dog against Jitt's body! Even the cans are rendered differently. And the light source is consistent and well-planned to give everything weight. But it's still so cartoony!

Dan Gordon excels at drawing the backs of characters' heads.

If you like these samples from the comic, you can download all these stories at once below. I've been experimenting with different methods of posting these comics, so I'd appreciate it if you'll leave some comments to let me know what you think is easiest. I just don't want to make people have to click and save thirty different images, because it really bugs me when I have to do that.

Click on the COOKIE #1 COVER below
to DOWNLOAD all of these stories
in one convenient 67Mb PDF file

Or click HERE to download the all the stories
in a .ZIP file which contains all the pages as separate jpegs.

...and remember...

If you missed the previous post where I shared
Cookie #20, you can find it HERE.



ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009
For ALL the Dan Gordon posts, click HERE!

UPDATE: There's LOTS more comic book scans to look at and download! Click HERE

• ...And if you liked this post, please help me share it
  

(Click one or more of the links directly below) Thanks!

Dan Gordon's "Cookie" Comics

 ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009

Look at this amazing stuff! A week ago I didn't know this comic even EXISTED, and now it's one of my favorites! COOKIE by Dan Gordon was published by ACG in the mid 1940's...the same folks that brought us HA HA and GIGGLE comics, as well as Dan Gordon's Superkatt. This character must have been created in response to the incredible success of Archie, but look how LIVELY and ZESTY and totally JOYFULLY-DRAWN these strips are!

As usual, click on the thumbnail images below for the NICE BIG PICTURES!

I've also added links below to download the whole story at once! Let me know which options you like, okay?






























ACG Comics images © Roger Broughton 2009  
I fell in love with Dan Gordon's work a few years ago when I found his work on the covers of some old tattered back issues of Ha Ha Comics in a used bookstore in Dayton Ohio. But I had no idea who had done them because they are unsigned. Only after seeing a lot of his work recently in a stack of Giggle Comics and Cookie Comics did I realize that they were done by the same guy. I first heard the name "Dan Gordon" a few months back in an article by John K at his amazing blog. There were also some follow-up links that sprouted in the wake of that article. Follow the links below for more info and lots of scans of Dan's Superkatt series that he did for Giggle comics in the 1940's.

UPDATE: There are lots MORE Dan Gordon comics on this blog to look at and to download!
Take a look at these stories here:

COOKIE Comics FIRST Issue #1 by Dan Gordon
DOPEY DOGG by Dan Gordon from ACG Giggle Comics #8
MORE Dan Gordon Comics - Funny Films #1

ALL Dan Gordon stories in one place HERE

More info on Dan Gordon at these links...

all kinds of stuff: Dan Gordon and what makes a cartoonist

ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive: Comics: Dan Gordon's Superkatt

http://potulentpalaver.blogspot.com/2007/01/john-k-wrote-about-dan-gordon-today-so.html

Mucho thanks to Aussie500 who scanned these comics and posted them up at http://goldenagecomics.co.uk
...or, more specifically: http://goldenagecomics.co.uk/index.php?cid=123

If you want to download a PDF file with ALL the Dan Gordon art from Cookie #20, click HERE: http://www.mediafire.com/view/3yqzm3mzke9/Cookie_20_-dang_only.pdf

If you'd like to download the whole comic (non-Dan G. backup stories included) in .cbz format, click HERE:
http://www.mediafire.com/view/3meyminh5mf/Cookie_020_c2c.cbz

--If you don't know how to view a .cbz file, it's easy. Read about it HERE. http://nosheep.net/story/digital-comics-unleashed-cbrcbz/


There are 55 issues of the "Cookie" comic series posted at http://goldenagecomics.co.uk, (or more specifically: http://goldenagecomics.co.uk/index.php?cid=123 )along with hundreds (probably thousands) of other unusual golden age comic delicacies! ****************** Please NOTE that you have to register at http://goldenagecomics.co.uk BEFORE they let you download from their website. And THEN you gotta make sure to log in (I wish they made it a little easier...) They allow users to download 100 files per day or 2Gigs of bandwidth, whichever comes first. Sometimes when they say you've used up your bandwidth for the day, you have to wait until the next day to download again. But even then you might need to log out and log back in again. It's a little hinky, but now I'm in the habit of visiting once a day and grabbing what I like. I also get corrupted downloads when I use a download manager like iGetter and FlashGot. If you have any problems with corrupted downloads, just disable any download managers and try again.

Anyway, if I hear from some of you readers that you like these comics, I will post more, and keep posting them as long as there's interest!



Most of the Cookie issues are drawn by Dan Gordon, with other stories by the usual ACG crew. So ENJOY! And --please-- pass this post around so more people can enjoy the work of this fantastic cartoonist.


UPDATE: There's LOTS more comic book scans to look at and download! Click HERE