Best of Wally Wood from Witzend

Definitive collection from the creator and publication that inspired the underground comix movement.

Hall of Fame comics creator Wallace Wood's revolutionary, self-published Witzend (often spelled in all lower case) has always been hard to define-the birth of the pro-zine, underground, independent... Whatever you call it, Wood's witzend was a mid-'60s milestone event that represented all of the loftiest Fine Art goals of the Underground Movement including art-for-art's-sake, freedom from censorship, and creator rights. The vast majority of the underground comix movement creators were directly inspired by the EC Comics and Mad work of Wallace Wood and Harvey Kurtzman (as well as psychedelics). Until R. Crumb's later and eminently notable Zap Comix, no underground had the impact of witzend which combined top-flight comics pros like Wood, Frazetta, Steranko and Ditko side-by-side with up-and-coming Undergrounders like Art Spiegelman (Maus) and Vaughn Bode (Cheech Wizard)

For the first time ever, this single volume collects all of Wood's own contributions to his groundbreaking publication including Animan, Sally Forth, The Rejects, Bucky Ruckus, Pipsqueek Papers, The Wizard King, Snorky, Lunar Tunes, and more.

"...including the ULTRA RARE Wood EC story, 'Spawn of Venus.' Originally created for EC's cancelled EC 3-D Classics #3 in 1953, the masterpiece went unpublished until EC/MAD publisher Bill Gaines gave Wood his blessing to premier it in Witzend #6 (1969). In the decades since... the layered [3-D original art] version ran in IDW's [expensive, out of print] Wood Artist Edition... but... has not run in other EC collections. All of which means Wood's 'Spawn of Venus' may still be the rarest EC comic-book story of all and, it is by EC's biggest fan-favorite star talent. ...Fantagraphics' Best of Witzend [isn't comparable as it] only has 42 pages of Wood [while] this new ultimate Wood collection has 160 pages of Wood." — First Comics News (June 18, 2024)

"Witzend; What is this?" — Pablo Picasso, legendary fine artist

"Wally Wood may be the top comic book artist for a unique style. With Witzend Woody expanded the borders of comic books wider and deeper than Marvel and DC." — Steve Ditko, Spider-Man, Dr. Strange, and Mr. A creator

"Wood was very enamored of Tolkien and was reading Freud, so he began doing things that didn't have any place in what was then a far more rigid marketplace than exists now. It was really pure impulse, wanting to just make stuff that would be interesting to him. Since there wasn't a venue, he made one, which is not dissimilar to the impulse that got Raw to happen." — Art Spiegelman, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Maus

"I'm a big Wally Wood fan. WITZ-END! I subscribed from the very first issue." — Gene Simmons, KISS rockstar

Wallace ("Wally") Wood is one of the most celebrated cartoonist-illustrators of all time. Wood's creative efforts on such properties as Daredevil, Weird Science, T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents, MAD, Witzend, Mars Attacks, Power Girl, etc., have earned him great acclaim both during his lifetime and posthumously. For his science fiction work, Wood received various Hugo Award Nominations including: 1959 Best Professional Artist; 1960 Best Professional Artist; and 1997 for Best Dramatic Presentation: Mars Attacks! Other awards include: National Cartoonists Society for best Comic Book Artist, 1957 (MAD), 1959 (MAD), and 1965 (T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents); Alley Award, Best Pencil Artist, 1965; Alley Award, Best Inking Work, 1966; Best Foreign Cartoonist Award, Angoulême International Comics Festival, 1978; The Jack Kirby Hall of Fame, 1989; The Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame, 1992; and The Inkwell Awards' Hall of Fame Award, 2011. J. David Spurlock is an award-winning author, historian, educator, advocate for artists’ rights, documentary filmmaker and associate to star talents Frazetta, Basil Gogos, Neal Adams, Steranko, Joe Kubert, Carmine Infantino, Julius Schwartz, Wally Wood and many more. Spurlock's book How to Draw Chiller Monsters, for Random House, rose as high as #18 on the Bookspan best-seller list. Spurlock's IPPY Award-winning book, Alluring Art of Margaret Brundage, has been universally acclaimed including by MTV and by the Village Voice who proclaimed it one of The Best of 2013. Spurlock's works have been lauded by the Rondo Awards, The New York Times, IPPY Awards, Entertainment Weekly, Eisner Awards, National Public Radio, Time Out New York, Library Journal. Publishers Weekly, the Hugo Awards, The Village Voice, Locus Awards, The Society of Illustrators, and MTV.He lives in Dallas, Texas.

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