Adams, Neal

As Julie Andrews once sang, “let’s start at the very beginning.”

A is for Adams (Neal), indisputably one of the most influential, recognisable and important comics artists ever to put pencil to paper.
His career in comics began slowly, as throughout the 1960s he drifted in and out of the medium while plying his trade in advertising graphics. During this time he worked on a few newspaper strips (most notably Ben Casey), did some fill work for Archie Comics and a couple of stories for Warren’s horror mags led him to get cover work for DC’s titles, including Superman, Lois lane and Brave & the Bold.
His big break came when he took over the Deadman strip in Strange Adventures from Carmine Infantino in 1967. Adams’ style was unlike anything that had been seen in mainstream comics; a hyper-realistic, yet still very dramatic mastery of page and panel design whose legacy stemmed from Will Eisner’s layouts combined with the muscular realism of Alex Raymond and Burne Hogarth.

 

His run on Strange adventures lasted 10 issues & both editors & fans recognised that here was a major new talent.
One of the things that put Adams at the forefront of a new vanguard of artists and writers was that he was of the generation that had grown up with comics and had been influenced by them. He wasn’t slow to acknowledge the work of others who were also breaking new ground (notice the gasses in the panel below spelling out “Hey, a Jim Sterakno effect!”

In the same issue (Strange Adventures #216, 1969) Adams goes further, designing the elements in each panel so that the page as a whole created a single image:

This was something most readers had never experienced and everyone sat up and took notice.
Adams got a short run on the Spectre next, but that was but a short interlude before what was to become his signature work at DC – The Batman.
We’re quite lucky, because normally I would make a remark such as “before (XXX) came along, the character of (YYY) was seen as….” and be sure that the casual reader was not aware of such details, but with Batman (or as he became, The Batman – the difference is relevant, as you’ll see) we are lucky, because BA (Before Adams…) Batman was seen as a camp, comical figure, and we are well aware of this because of the popularity of the Batman TV show starring Adam West.
Under the writing of Denny O’Neill, Adams and regular inker Dick Giordano, the character was transformed (or even taken back to his very early roots) into a mysterious dark avenger whose adventures took place in the moonlight shadows of night time. In other words, he went from this:

to this:

A significant difference, I think you’ll agree. Other great teams were to follow (most notably, Engelhart, Rogers & Austin, Miller & Jansen and Miller & Mazzucchelli), but Adams’ visual reinterpretation launched an entire “new wave” of realism among comics artists & publishers.
Adams himself was soon re-teamed with O’Neill & Giordano on another DC title, and one that had seemingly run dry of ideas – the story of the intergalactic policeman, Green Lantern and his friend, the Robin Hood clone, Green Arrow.
DC had seemingly put these two characters together because they shared the word “Green” in their names, but O’Neill turned the characters into political polar opposites in order to made a series of statements about where the US was, politically at that time (Vietnam, race riots, hippies, assassinated Kennedys, etc). The result was a series which made headlines and brought new levels of realism and authenticity to mainstream comics.

Adams also did some work for Marvel during this period, including illustrating the Kree-Skrull war in Avengers and a few issues of the Uncanny X-Men not long before it was cancelled.

Throughout the 1970s, Adams was at the forefront of the campaign to restore comics creators’ rights to those people who, throughout the medium’s history, had been unfairly treated by publishers (especially Marvel and DC). His unceasing battle led directly to the likes of himself and Jack Kirby having artwork returned to them by publishers who had exploited their “work-for-hire” contracts for decades.
Adams established his own studio, Continuity Publishing, along with other comics professionals, and this company survives today, paving the way for creator-owned companies such as Image, and he continues to publish comics by himself and others, as well as doing some work for the “majors”.
There are very few people in the field of comics whose legacy is felt in as many areas – both creative and business - as Neal Adams. Offhand, only Will Eisner, Osamu Tezuka and Harvey Kurzman spring to mind. That’s the sort of company in which Neal Adams belongs, and rightly so.

Neal Adams – Selected bibliography.

DC ComicsStrange Adventures #207-216 (1967-69)
The Spectre #2-5 (1968)
Detective Comics #395, 397, 400-402, 404, 407-408, 410 (1969-71)
Batman #219, 232, 234, 237, 243-245, 251, 255 (1970-74)
Marvel
Uncanny X-Men #56-63, 65 (1969)
The Avengers #93-97 (1971-72)