Daredevil: Born Again is a sensation revitalizing the streaming show and on Friday, April 11, David Mack spoke about working on the series! The talk was held at the Ahmanson Auditorium located at the ArtCenter College of Design, Hillside Campus in Padadena. It was hosted by Humanities & Sciences Professor Michael Dooley. Mack spoke abut his first comic book that he read, around nine years old, Daredevil by Frank Miller and Klaus Janson. He said, “I read it and it blew my mind.” Miller had started writing and art on the title with Daredevil #168 (1981) with Janson inks. The issue introduced Elektra and led to the death of Elektra in #181 (1982). They are probably one of the best creative teams on comics. Miller finished his run on #191 (1983).
Mack also brought up The Daredevil Chronicles (1982) which was a comic book sized collection of interviews and checklist. This was the best way to get an overview of the series up to that point, the Omnibus and other trade hardbacks are too expensive, this was $1.50. Other issues covered the Fantastic Four, X-Men, The Avengers, and Spider-Man. He also mentioned one of the essentials of comic books, Comics and Sequential Art (1985) by Will Eisner. The creator of The Spirit, Eisner is one of the pioneers of comic books as an art form, and created designs with panels and brought a noir sensibility to comics. Mack mentioned the Eisner Awards, the industry’s highest honor, named after him and started in 1988. In 1991, the ceremonies for the awards began at San Diego Comic con. I also recommend Eisner Award winner, Scott McCloud for his Understanding Comics (1993) book. Also, recommended is McCloud’s Making Comics (2006).
Dooley and Mack also talked about How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way (1984) by Stan Lee and John Buscema. It set many young readers with ambition to make comics. I found the Buscema art to be fascinating and broke down foreshortening and perspective. Mack attended the Northern Kentucky University and was working on his comic book, Kabuki, as his senior thesis! Mack explained that the series is about “crime stories in Japan through the lens of a Japanese ghost story.” This was eventually published as a one shot in 1994 by Caliber Press, then the limited series, Kabuki: Circle of Blood (1995). 1996 started with the Kabuki Color Special #1 that also had art by Joe Quesada and Rick Mays. Image Comics began publishing the comic with Kabuki: Reflections which began in 1998 and over the years lasted until #15 (2009). There was also Kabuki: Agents Scarab (1999-2001) written by Mack with art by Rick Mays. This year, Dark Horse published The Complete Kabuki: 30th Anniversary.
Mack joined the Daredevil title with issue #9 (1999). This was under the Marvel Knights imprint. David Mack was asked by Marvel editor, Quesada, to “create a brand new character for the story.” He did so with the following issue #10 (2000), the first appearance of Echo, the female assassin. Since she is not part of the “audible world”, Mack said, “Echo percieves so much of the world visually. Interesting artisically and also a great contrast to Daredevil. Mack was best friends with Brian Michael Bendis who was the co-writer and artist of the Torso (1998-1999) limited series. He joined Mack with Daredevil #16 (2001). In 2016, Bendis had Mack paint the covers for the Marvel NOW series, Jessica Jones, he had said, “I want this cover to be like no other comic out there.” David Mack’s artwork was collected in the The Marvel Art of David Mack (2024). Imaginary Forces forked on the opening credits for the Jessica Jones series. Creative Director Michelle Doughery was asked, “make it like David Mack did it.” Mack recieved an e-mail from Quesada to work on the title sequence and helped design it.
He was also asked to make a pitch for the end titles of Captain America: The Winter Soldier and was drawing on the plane for the pitch! The sequences was one of five pitches and it won out. The deisgns were very much in the style of Jim Steranko who was a mentor for Mack. Entering the talk was Michael Shaw, via computer, the production designer of Daredevil: Born Again. He was also the production designer for Orange is the New Black and Billions. Shaw introduced the character of Muse whose artwork for the series was supplied by Mack, a “super talented painter who paints with blood.” He joked about worrying about Mack turning into Muse. Shaw said it was a “unique experience designing for a blind man.” He added, “He has lots of windows and views he will never see.” Then, scenes were shown of the Kingpin’s mayoral office, Shaw explained that he wanted “Kingpin as uncomfortable as possible” since he was in a place that was new for him. ere were excellent questions at the Q&A and during the comic book trades that Mack had available to sign! The Daredevil: Born Again talk was insightful into David Mack’s artwork and also the show from Michael Shaw’s perspective!
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