We hear so often that Jack Kirby was such a consistent 3-to-5 page-a-day comic book artist that I think the full impact of such a produce-or-starve work ethic starts to lose its luster after awhile. Sometimes I try to picture myself illustrating three pages of artwork a day and in my mind’s eye it doesn’t seem that difficult. But then I sit down to actually try to do it and I find the results are far, far different.

There have been times when -- after reading a stack of The Eternals for example – that I’m so pumped up and motivated that I’ll grab a few sheets of paper and a pencil and sit down at the ‘ol drawing board with the full intent of illustrating non-stop for one Herculean 10-hour stretch. If I’m lucky, I may get a cover penciled. Maybe a pin-up. If I’m real lucky I may get a few pages of simple layouts sketched out. But then reality hits me in the head and I have to mow the lawn or take my daughter somewhere or repair a leaky Fawcett. I’m pretty positive that even if I was just drawing 20 pages of stickmen I still wouldn’t get very far.

Which brings me back to Jack Kirby. The man was a virtual production line when it comes to making great comic books. And I urge anyone to attempt at even faking what Jack did -- regardless of your level of talent. While I write this I’m glancing over at my light table and seeing the same handful of drawings staring back at me. They’ve been sitting there in various stages of completion for about two weeks now and I’m not really sweating it. I wonder if Jack ever wished he had that type of flexibility in his schedule -- to choose not to pencil anything if he so desired. Apart from the fact that he probably couldn’t, I wonder some times if he would have blown off a day at his drawing table even if he had the chance. I’m more convinced than ever that Jack had to draw. Much in the same way that gamblers have to play cards or smokers need another cigarette. All of us fans are the ones who benefited the most from this “vice” of Jacks. But maybe if Kirby was making a lot more money and had some kind of ownership in his creations he would have been a little easier on himself.

Before I wrap I want to point out some way-cool news that I just stumbled across: A Newsarama article states that Eric Larsen is going to be penciling a new Silver Star on-going series. Silver Star -- as you may or may not know – was one of Jack’s last major undertakings before he more or less retired from penciling. Here’s an excerpt from Eric Larsen:

“…It will be two books to begin with. Silver Star covers Earth - Captain Victory covers all space and both will be packed with awesome Kirby characters and concepts many of which have only appeared as sketches. The idea is to introduce these characters one after another the same way that characters were introduced in other Kirby books over the years. What I'd like to do is feature Jack's original drawings and whatever notes he might have had in the back of the books to give readers insight into what Jack drew and what we had to work with. In the Silver Star book, for example, there are a few drawings that feature characters that didn't make it into the book. In Jack's original Silver Star pitch there was a whole gang of guys that wound up on the cutting room floor and Jack redesigned his "Angel of Death" character so much that he doesn't look like the same guy. That original design was cool as all hell and I want to put that design to good use. Jack has numerous cosmic characters that would fit right in to Captain Victory and Earthbound characters would be right at home in Silver Star and we can mix and match as well, having cosmic characters appearing in Silver Star and non-cosmic characters popping into Captain Victory…”

You can read the entire interview/article by clicking here!.

Eric Larsen is one artist who is keeping the Kirby flame alive with his unbridled enthusiasm for the medium.