I think Mark Evanier was once quoted as saying that a person’s favorite Jack Kirby comics are the ones they grew up reading. Meaning that for many of us who grew up in the 1960’s the Fantastic Four, Thor and Captain America represent the watermarks of Jack Kirby’s career. For others who grew up a few years later it was Jack’s work on the Kamandi and The Demon. For others still, the yardstick for measuring Jack Kirby’s creativity is with the books he produced during his second stint at Marvel -- books like Devil Dinosaur, The Black Panther and The Eternals to just name a few. The important thread here -- and actually there are many -- is that Jack Kirby produced a heck of a lot of comic books and comics characters during his illustrious career. And because of that -- in my humble opinion anyway -- you can’t just pigeon-hole one specific time period showcasing “the best work” Jack Kirby ever did.What I find even more interesting is that for lots of fans -- me included -- we may have grown up reading Jack’s work in one decade, but actually prefer his work from another.

For example, I grew up in the mid-to-late 60’s with 3 brothers, and the four of us were completely immersed with Jack’s run on the FF, Thor and any thing else he happened to produce. By the time I finally got my hands on one of Jack’s books there usually wasn’t much left to it. It had literally been devoured during the shared reading of my siblings. But the period I really enjoyed -- call me silly -- is the body of work Jack produced during his second tenure at Marvel (1975 - 1978). I thoroughly enjoyed The Eternals and Captain America and 2001: A Space Odyssey. Maybe I was a little older and not quite so in need of substance per se, so I just took Jack’s writing in stride. I tuned in to the elements I liked and tuned out the stuff that annoyed me (like Jack’s constant use of quotation marks) and just had a great time.

But the joyride didn’t stop there -- a few years later I chanced upon Captain Victory and felt like I was enjoying a sci-fi adventure from the 1940’s. The only thing missing was the popcorn.I’d like to think that for most of us fans it’s the same. We all grew up reading specific Jack Kirby books but deep down in our heart-of-hearts we enjoy other Kirby titles. When you want to impress your friends you mention the literary merits of The New Gods. But when no one is watching you’re a sucker for adventures of Machine Man or Devil Dinosaur.Jack’s books have never gone out of style. Whether it’s the Boy Explorers from the 1940’s or Jack’s Romance titles from the 1950’s, there is something for everyone. Great artwork and great writing from on of America’s least known (outside of comics anyway) but most talented artist-writer-editors.

As long as I’m basking in the glow of so much of Jack Kirby’s work, allow me to provide a free plug for Greg Theakston’s fantastic series of books entitled “The Complete Jack Kirby” from Pure Imagination Publishing. Greg has been systematically publishing Jack’s work beginning with his early strip work and I believe he is up to volume 5 by now. The Complete Jack Kirby is a great way to get to know the art of Jack Kirby and like I mentioned earlier, after reading a volume or two of this great series you’ll understand why I said that you can’t possibly pigeon-hole Jack’s work to one specific decade or genre.