Todd Mcfarlane said he'd send his art to comic book companies and sometimes they'd send him back constructive criticism and that's how he improved a lot.
So I'm an actual homeless guy that does homeless guy things, and I'd like to answer your question about when and why we move. I personally lucked out. I have a nice, isolated spot all to myself that's in an alley in an upper-class suburban neighborhood. My neighbors that live in the apartment next door are super nice and like my presence because I'm non-threatening and friendly and funny. More importantly, I keep the crackheads away, so as a token of goodwill, they keep a lot of my stuff safe behind their gate, which allows me to freely walk around town. You have to understand that how transient people set up camp is largely determined by the odds and regularity of being raided. In the nice parts of town, they can get away with setting up camp overnight near fancy government buildings so long as they aren't blocking anyone. But in industrial areas? With broken glass coating every inch of the painful, broken gravel surrounding a desolate urban hellscape? Camp wherever. Shit where you please. Shoot up dope with one hand and slug your girlfriend with the other. It doesn't matter. They don't care. Cops sure as hell don't. They know there's a 50/50 chance a homeless person's 911 call is incoherent gibberish about the Federal Reserve and their ex-wife. Even if there is a serious crime being commit, they simply don't care. And the property owners of those quasi-abandoned buildings? You think they hire someone just to shoo the homeless away, knowing they'll be back in an hour? My point is that, in an urban hellscape, people simply give up. On both sides. And I think that was part of what MacFarlane was trying to convey.
@@longjohn7992 Seriously? For starters, just because you're homeless doesn't mean everything you did before that melts away. It's not like once you stop having a place your Facebook account deletes itself and your phone stops working. Besides, technology is absolutely critical when you're living on the street. I managed to avoid having to beg by doing Postmates deliveries on foot. It paid way, way below minimum wage, but every dollar was precious. The problem was having both Postmates and GPS on burned through battery life, and it's not like I had a home where I could charge at will. This last part is a small thing you don't appreciate until you lose it: The ability to charge at home. Huge chunks of your day involve knowing where the non-library public wall outlets/charging stations are available and knowing whether or not the proprietors will be cool with you hanging out there for a long time charging your phone. (Commercial wall outlets seem to generate less power, so every day it was a huge, 7-hour struggle to charge my phone, and even then my battery would mysteriously plummet for no reason. ) When you're homeless, your phone is your life. I had a fantastic spot by homeless standards. Didn't matter; one night I woke up to being robbed, and the asshole stole both my laptop AND my phone. Think about that for a second, dude. Imagine living on the streets, having nowhere to go besides all these incredibly time-consuming errands you have to do daily, no stable form of human connection. And then you lose the Internet, the ability to make calls, the ability to communicate or consume media. Imagine all the different ways that would suck.
Stan Lee came up with the idea for Overkill and coined the name. Rob Leifeld designed the look of the character. Todd McFarlane came up with the logo. Stan joked how somebody might try to take credit, and emphasized that it was his idea. The character was never meant to be taken seriously, it was really just some impromptu goofing around. Then McFarlane, just to be funny I suppose, stole the silly character without giving any credit to anyone as Stan had jokingly predicted someone would do, but nobody expected anyone would ever really want to steal such a ridiculous character. So it was kind of an inside joke.
My memory is a little different, that Overkill was created on a TV special, and that the name had to be changed because of that, but it was one Lee was around for.
I think it's because it was originally a character called "Overkill" Rob Liefeld created on the spot for Stan Lee on a comic related program he used to host. Todd changed a bit about the appearance and dropped the T to avoid a lawsuit I guess? Because Rob is not listed as a co-creator.
As co-creator of Venom, it's NOT likely Spawn's similarities are unoriginal? I don't understand. Todd only created the visual appearance of Venom, not the idea of the symbiote and its abilities. So Spawn's suit is definitely directly derivative of a character he previously worked on. Nothing wrong with that necessarily, but I remember at one point thinking Spawn was so awesomely original, when he's a lot of Ghost Rider, Venom, and Punisher, amongst others.
The Teenage mutant ninja turtles seem pretty homeless... Imagine, your first day of work for the City's Bureau of Water Supply, they send you to the old maintenance room to open some valve... then you hear something. You shine your flashlight over and as you turn, you see a giant four foot tall rat wearing a kimono.
Yea and houdini never came back like bruh he was fucking cool! 💀 This is my issue with todd he just introduces a character and then he just forgets about them don't even get me started with Bobby
I enjoy your videos. I'm an old comics guy (early 1970s-90s) who enjoys a look back at titles, charactors and creators. Your presentations are well done.
also I'm pretty sure when ultimate spider woman first appeared she was homeless. Where most clones in comics just walk in off the street and secure a job, and apartment with out things like work history, credit report, social security number, birth certificate and all the other shit that's essential to proving you're an actual person, ultimate spider woman had to do a couple favors for nick fury and have him set her up with an espionage level fake identity.
I was a fan of Spawn for a bit until McFarlane stopped pencilling duties. I was driven to collect titles based primarily on who was pencilling. I'm also a huge hockey fan and recognized immediately the Tony Twist character was a lawsuit waiting to happen. Stuff from the 90's was just so overt-the-top fun. A lot of it didn't make sense but I look back and realize how much fun I had reading that stuff. Love the vid, Chris and thanks for the trip down memory lane.
Initially, when Greg Capullo took over for him, he had a pretty bland and amateur 90's Marvel intern style, but by issue 27 he really came into his own. I ended up liking his stint more from then on. It would have been one of the most legendary runs in comics if it wasn't interrupted a couple times when Todd wanted the book to be bi-weekly and alternate artists for a few issues. Now Greg Capullo is one of the most highly regarded pencillers out there after his run on Batman with Scott Snyder on writing. Loved his Creech miniseries.
10:05 A $15M ruling for using someone's name as a minor character seems ridiculous. It was wrong of McFarlane to use Tony Twist's name without permission but there's no way that this somehow inflicted $15M worth of damages to the guy. No one with two functioning brain cells is going to think that a hockey player has something to do with a cartoon mafioso.
America's interpretation of homelessness for the past century has been pretty defined by the Great Depression, a period where homeless camps, or Hoover Towns, the size of small towns existed. That's faded from the popular consciousness recently, largely I think because of the internet and being so connected all the time, but for a long time that's what people associated with homelessness. It's kind of fascinating to look back on that evolution, and to realize how quickly as a species we forget our history.
It's not that it was forgotten exactly, it's that those who haven't lived it don't understand it. I can understand different values and morals for a different time, but I certainly can't understand what it feels like to be in something I have never lived.
Idk what part of tent cities exist in the past for you, I literally justoved out of an apartment building this month that was beside a street that had people camping up and down both sides in everything from plywood lean-tos to tarp city's to straight up tents
Spawn Comic: "His name is literally 'Overt-Kill' but sometimes some are known to call him Overkill" ComicTropes: "I don't understand what the comic is trying to tell us."
@@darkartsdabbler2407 overkill was a character mcfarlane did when he worked for marvel, he used the same character in spawn but changed the name to overtkill.
@@karlvallerand1004 yes, thank you captain obvious. Doesn’t make it less dumb. But seriously, that was a genuine thank you, you’re trying to be helpful and I am grateful for your efforts.
The character of Overkill/Overtkill was originally drawn in collaboration with Rob Liefield on a comic creator VHS series that Stan Lee hosted (I forget the name now but you can find them in RUclips). I imagine the change from Overkill to Overtkill was to fend off any ownership claims by Lee or whoever produced the videos. I thought that as a pretty neat bit of comic history when I first saw it.
The episode was on RUclips a couple of years ago. It was a show where Stan Lee interviewed various comic creators. I think the OvertKill episode featured McFarlane and Liefeld showed up or maybe it focused on both of them! Check them out! BTW McFarlane has acknowledged Byrne, Michael Golden, Keith Giffen and Gil Kane among his primary influences! I think he also said he was influenced by "bad" artists who still got work which might have helped him become such a powerful storyteller! He's still one of my favorites but I admit to enjoying cartoonists more that slick illustrators!
Much respect for making it to issue 100 of Spawn, Chris. Despite having the series up to issue 140 or 150, my credulity has only ever lasted until about issue 50. After that, I'm gone. It just became sillier and sillier. Anyway, I'm really enjoying your videos, mate. You really know your stuff!
Good eye! Now that I think about it, I feel like marvels icons aren’t as universal for whatever reason. A superman or Batman symbol is ubiquitous, one with the character. But a spider-man symbol? Not nearly as much. The most iconic marvel symbol is probably the avengers logo or cap’s shield (and that’s basically a flag)
Loved the comic and HBO animated series. I actually met the real Al Simmons during the tour of McGuire's baseballs. Really nice guy and I still have some autographed action figures.
You got one heck of an enjoyable TV show format, man, and enough trivia chops to make it authoritative. Big league geeky subject matter approached with intelligence. Rare, and good, thanks.
Todd MacFarlane, Rob Liefeld, and Stan Lee did a home video back in the 90s where they invented a character called Overkill. Todd creatively borrowed it.
I really appreciate how goofy a lot of your jokes and bits are. They're silly, they're ridiculous, and you don't take yourself too seriously. I love how you commit to the bit, I'd be too embarrassed to look silly and probably half-ass it lmao. This channel is excellent with analysis of technical skill, themes, a critical eye towards stylistic choices, and above all it's just good fun. Keep it up man, I love the channel and I'm glad to see someone make such great and insightful content about something that obviously brings them joy.
This brings back memories of other 90s comic characters, like Bone, Savage Dragon, Lady Death, Wildcats, Gen-13, and Hell Boy. I think alot of iconic characters came out of the 90s from the majors, like Gambit, Cable, Doomsday, Deadpool, Jesse Custer, Bane, and Squirrel Girls. I was just a little kid, but I know I would occasionally hear older readers say the industry would be dead by the mid to late 2000s.
Todd actually did roughly 20 or so issues of SPAWN! I think GREG CAPULLO took over the pencils around Spawn 25 or 26 I actually enjoy the contrast of "realistic" backgrounds combined with a cartoony style--WILL EISNER (whom you mentioned), JACK KIRBY, ERIK LARSEN and others were masters at this while Manga creators made it their definitive style! You also mentioned JOHN BYRNE but the problem with Byrne is that he seemed to go out of his way to eliminate the "cartoony" approach and make his work more "realistic"--of course, the more he did that, the less I liked it!
i always felt like the cartoony designs made the story feel even darker. like you could see how innocent or twisted a person might be by their look. for example, Twitch looked so fragile that i'd feel worried that something might happen to him lol
I will forever hate hate hate the real Tony Twist for the frivolous lawsuit. Tony lied saying that naming him after a Mafia character affected his income (merchandise, etc.)
Yea he ran out of power when he cured Terry's cancer. This was the 1st time spawn was dragged to hell after this is when i think they got rid of the counter.
Wasn't the whole point of the power counter that Spawn would have to go to hell again if his necroplasm ran out?It's an interesting tension, disincentivizing Spawn from using his greatest powers.
I see I'm not the first one to add this, but The Maxx was also a homeless superhero. He also debuted around the same time as Spawn, and was part of the original first wave of Image comics series. The Maxx was a much more adult comic though, it dealt with psychological themes and existentialism. One of my all time favorite books, for Sam Kieth's unique art style, and his hallucinogenic mystery driven story. The Maxx wasn't successful enough to be remembered, but for those who were fans, it will never be forgotten.
Spawn (especially back then) was something new, something different, something exhilarating, very well executed and Todd Macfarlane created the character and all that was so new, different and exhilarating about it all by himself. This in a day and age where it wasn't so evident to come up with something so new, different and exhilarating that on top of it all would stick around for so long. Spawn and the mythos surrounding the character was- and to me still is Awesome. I hope the next silver screen adaption will be equally new, different, exhilarating and well executed this time around. There's the potential and the means for it.
The text that introduces Overt-Kill, with the line “Some people call him Overkill”, is an obvious reference to Stan Lee and Liefeld creating the character, while he did the masthead in the video of the 3 of them. McFarlane was basically saying “SOME people call the character Overkill(the other 2 who helped create him) but this is my version”. Seems like a jab/nod to character being Co-created.
POWER COUNTER: Like you I read and loved Spawn as a kid. My memory is vague on this, but I'm 99% it was resolved. (In a kinda anticlimactic way). Basically, I think McFarlane wanted to drop the counter idea. So Spawn started getting low. There were a couple issues in which this was starting to be a problem--but then Coglistro taught him how to use and harness the power of the symbiote (costume). Draw his power from the symbiote instead of from Hell (the counter). From that point on his powers were basically limitless and they stopped talking about both the counter and that he draws his power from the symbiote. Part of me wants to say this happened around the time Spawn's costume changed (early 30s). But part of me remembers there still being this problem going into ish-50 or so.
McFarlane has always been a business genius, and as an artist he's always pushed to improve his strong points rather than spending years fixing his weaknesses. That takes courage and an incredibly clear vision.
When spawn was pretty new I was a kid and just getting into comics. I started with spiderman 2099 of all things because I wanted something I could collect from the first issue.
Todd also tried taking credit for Neil Gaiman's work, Neil apparently came up with Angela (who would later be sold to Marvel and I believe Medieval Spawn was a Gaiman thing. Gaiman definitely added a deeper layer to Spawn where I just felt Todd's stories were typically more shallow.
Spawn ran out of his power in issue 50 when he used every drop of it to save Terry fritzgerald life and was sent back to hell. There he confronted Malebogia and was subsequently sent back with his powers restored. The counter acts as a literal clock for spawns to recharge.
Fun fact: I had a #0 Spawn with both McFarlane and Al Simmons' authographs. Unfortunately, I had to sell it to a friend because I really needed the money.
Ultimaetor I still have my autographed issues #1-3, autographed at the 1992 Philly Comic-Con. They’re in the shed with the rest of my collection, which I’ve not touched in twenty years and are probably all ruined by now. Whoops.
I find funny that there's probably-influenced-McFarlane-Michael-Golden (wackier, loose anatomy and more random crosshatching) and also probably-influenced-Jim-Lee-Michael-Golden (somewhat more academic anatomy, more rigid but not stiff, and more highly disciplined, cleaner crosshatching, including the use of long parallel lines for secondary lights within shadows). These are the "extreme ends" of style on early Image comics, and somehow they must have spawned (no pun intended) from a common influence, even though at different phases.
That bit at the end had me LMAO. And on the topic of those poorly drawn guns, i saw a solicitation for a rob liefeld book coming out in April 2019, and his guns look worse then EVER!!
I don't know if I'd consider hanging out with the homeless a "trope" as much as a plot point and I'd say tropes are deliberate so a lawsuit probably wouldn't qualify. But don't get me wrong, love the show.
I believe he actually only runs out of his power when he's dealing with the man of Miracles and he's just about to kill the last of the man of Miracles Guardians when he told to stop and apparently that was the right decision this was around like spawn 175 or so
I never liked spawn, it seemed to me a mixture between spider-man venom and batman. The eyes are and black color from venom, the cape and mistery from batman. It never got me engaged. Thouhg the art is atractive. The Greg Capullo Spawn looked great.
When you look closely at Spawn and Venom you realize just how goofy Todd McFarlane is and how fun his comics are. That's really why he's been so enduring over the years.
I would like there to be an episode about Mike Golden. I remember him as having a great sense of form, like Arthur Adams but rounder. BTW, I've really enjoyed binging on your channel for the last hour or so.
I'm probably 195 comments too late but look for the video where Stan Lee gives MacFarland & Liefeld the task of creating an "original" character named Overkill. It's so full of Liefeld tropes, you'd probably have to explore remote areas of SE Asia to find peppers hotter than ghost pepper, and even Stan seems to get on the trope-spotting train during the drawing process. Anyway, I heard somewhere else, that one or the other added the character to their repertoire since they created his *ahem* image, but called him OverTkill because Stan had come up with the name.
Todd Mcfarlane said he'd send his art to comic book companies and sometimes they'd send him back constructive criticism and that's how he improved a lot.
That's crazy, I wonder how his art used to be when he started out or when they gave him that critique.
To everyone sayin Rorschach was homeless, he had a landlord that complained about the smell of his apt
Skeemz Now there’s an eye for detail!
Wutt
I was just wondering if Jubilee was technically homeless in the comics, living in a mall after running away from home.
But he still would steal food from his friends... pretty close to homeless
@@yasutorasado6971
Huh?
So I'm an actual homeless guy that does homeless guy things, and I'd like to answer your question about when and why we move.
I personally lucked out. I have a nice, isolated spot all to myself that's in an alley in an upper-class suburban neighborhood. My neighbors that live in the apartment next door are super nice and like my presence because I'm non-threatening and friendly and funny. More importantly, I keep the crackheads away, so as a token of goodwill, they keep a lot of my stuff safe behind their gate, which allows me to freely walk around town.
You have to understand that how transient people set up camp is largely determined by the odds and regularity of being raided. In the nice parts of town, they can get away with setting up camp overnight near fancy government buildings so long as they aren't blocking anyone. But in industrial areas? With broken glass coating every inch of the painful, broken gravel surrounding a desolate urban hellscape? Camp wherever. Shit where you please. Shoot up dope with one hand and slug your girlfriend with the other. It doesn't matter. They don't care. Cops sure as hell don't. They know there's a 50/50 chance a homeless person's 911 call is incoherent gibberish about the Federal Reserve and their ex-wife. Even if there is a serious crime being commit, they simply don't care. And the property owners of those quasi-abandoned buildings? You think they hire someone just to shoo the homeless away, knowing they'll be back in an hour?
My point is that, in an urban hellscape, people simply give up. On both sides. And I think that was part of what MacFarlane was trying to convey.
LAVATORR hang tough my man
Hang in there Man
LAVATORR my nigga I hope you the best but .... something is a bit off how did you get a google account if you’re a quote on quote homeless
@@longjohn7992 Seriously? For starters, just because you're homeless doesn't mean everything you did before that melts away. It's not like once you stop having a place your Facebook account deletes itself and your phone stops working.
Besides, technology is absolutely critical when you're living on the street. I managed to avoid having to beg by doing Postmates deliveries on foot. It paid way, way below minimum wage, but every dollar was precious. The problem was having both Postmates and GPS on burned through battery life, and it's not like I had a home where I could charge at will.
This last part is a small thing you don't appreciate until you lose it: The ability to charge at home. Huge chunks of your day involve knowing where the non-library public wall outlets/charging stations are available and knowing whether or not the proprietors will be cool with you hanging out there for a long time charging your phone. (Commercial wall outlets seem to generate less power, so every day it was a huge, 7-hour struggle to charge my phone, and even then my battery would mysteriously plummet for no reason. ) When you're homeless, your phone is your life.
I had a fantastic spot by homeless standards. Didn't matter; one night I woke up to being robbed, and the asshole stole both my laptop AND my phone.
Think about that for a second, dude. Imagine living on the streets, having nowhere to go besides all these incredibly time-consuming errands you have to do daily, no stable form of human connection. And then you lose the Internet, the ability to make calls, the ability to communicate or consume media. Imagine all the different ways that would suck.
LAVATORR You got a cashapp or somethin bro
Stan Lee came up with the idea for Overkill and coined the name. Rob Leifeld designed the look of the character. Todd McFarlane came up with the logo. Stan joked how somebody might try to take credit, and emphasized that it was his idea. The character was never meant to be taken seriously, it was really just some impromptu goofing around. Then McFarlane, just to be funny I suppose, stole the silly character without giving any credit to anyone as Stan had jokingly predicted someone would do, but nobody expected anyone would ever really want to steal such a ridiculous character. So it was kind of an inside joke.
My memory is a little different, that Overkill was created on a TV special, and that the name had to be changed because of that, but it was one Lee was around for.
McFarlane helped liefeld design the character too though
Stan Lee taking credit for something? Shocking?
*Overtkill (there is that stupid T in there) It has the T in all the associated medias.
Well, Stan Lee said it was his idea, so obviously must be true...
I'm guessing they used "Overtkill" as a way of saying "Not only does he take his violence to an extreme, he's very out in the open about it."
I think it's because it was originally a character called "Overkill" Rob Liefeld created on the spot for Stan Lee on a comic related program he used to host. Todd changed a bit about the appearance and dropped the T to avoid a lawsuit I guess? Because Rob is not listed as a co-creator.
If Spawn wants to camp behind your store, Spawn will camp behind your store.
A great security system.... When he wants to be.
I'd give him a McDonald's cheese burger on the daily as a form of tribute.
Spawn camping, huh?
Todd co-created Venom so it's not like he's totally unoriginal with Spawn's symbiote similarities.
As co-creator of Venom, it's NOT likely Spawn's similarities are unoriginal? I don't understand. Todd only created the visual appearance of Venom, not the idea of the symbiote and its abilities. So Spawn's suit is definitely directly derivative of a character he previously worked on. Nothing wrong with that necessarily, but I remember at one point thinking Spawn was so awesomely original, when he's a lot of Ghost Rider, Venom, and Punisher, amongst others.
@@baileymoore7779 I only referred to his symbiote characteristics. He's definitely inspired by Ghost Rider and Punisher.
Spawn: Dr Strange's cape, Spider-Man's costumes, Ghost Rider's chains, Faust's storyline. Not one original aspect worth mentioning.
He created Venom/Eddie Brock, not the symbiote, the suit was revealed to be an alien symbiote years before Todd drew or wrote Spider-Man
@@jfrsnjhnsnwho cares? Deadpool is a blatant rip off of Deathstroke 🤷♂️
The Teenage mutant ninja turtles seem pretty homeless...
Imagine, your first day of work for the City's Bureau of Water Supply, they send you to the old maintenance room to open some valve... then you hear something. You shine your flashlight over and as you turn, you see a giant four foot tall rat wearing a kimono.
I'd open the valve really fast and then bolt out of there screaming like a prostitute.
Technically they're not superheroes.
That's what happens when ignorant people jump into YT's comment section.
@@Changetheling chill
Why aren’t they Super Heroes?
Then you see for giant anthropomorphic turtles eating pizza.
I really love how silly Spawn can get at times. The issue with Houdini is a lot of fun
hy man
Yea and houdini never came back like bruh he was fucking cool! 💀 This is my issue with todd he just introduces a character and then he just forgets about them don't even get me started with Bobby
The Max was a homeless superhero.
Excellent point. Can't believe I forgot the Maxx.
I enjoy your videos.
I'm an old comics guy (early 1970s-90s) who enjoys a look back at titles, charactors and creators. Your presentations are well done.
also I'm pretty sure when ultimate spider woman first appeared she was homeless. Where most clones in comics just walk in off the street and secure a job, and apartment with out things like work history, credit report, social security number, birth certificate and all the other shit that's essential to proving you're an actual person, ultimate spider woman had to do a couple favors for nick fury and have him set her up with an espionage level fake identity.
I think Spawn pre-dates Maxx
First appearance Spawn #1 (May 1992)
The Maxx created by Sam Kieth First appearance in 1993 and originally published monthly by Image Comics
I was a fan of Spawn for a bit until McFarlane stopped pencilling duties. I was driven to collect titles based primarily on who was pencilling. I'm also a huge hockey fan and recognized immediately the Tony Twist character was a lawsuit waiting to happen. Stuff from the 90's was just so overt-the-top fun. A lot of it didn't make sense but I look back and realize how much fun I had reading that stuff. Love the vid, Chris and thanks for the trip down memory lane.
Initially, when Greg Capullo took over for him, he had a pretty bland and amateur 90's Marvel intern style, but by issue 27 he really came into his own. I ended up liking his stint more from then on. It would have been one of the most legendary runs in comics if it wasn't interrupted a couple times when Todd wanted the book to be bi-weekly and alternate artists for a few issues. Now Greg Capullo is one of the most highly regarded pencillers out there after his run on Batman with Scott Snyder on writing. Loved his Creech miniseries.
Nobody commented on your overt-the-top joke so here I am many years later to say, good joke man :)
10:05 A $15M ruling for using someone's name as a minor character seems ridiculous. It was wrong of McFarlane to use Tony Twist's name without permission but there's no way that this somehow inflicted $15M worth of damages to the guy. No one with two functioning brain cells is going to think that a hockey player has something to do with a cartoon mafioso.
It's not that they inflicted damages to him, it's that they profited from his name without paying him.
America's interpretation of homelessness for the past century has been pretty defined by the Great Depression, a period where homeless camps, or Hoover Towns, the size of small towns existed. That's faded from the popular consciousness recently, largely I think because of the internet and being so connected all the time, but for a long time that's what people associated with homelessness. It's kind of fascinating to look back on that evolution, and to realize how quickly as a species we forget our history.
It's not that it was forgotten exactly, it's that those who haven't lived it don't understand it. I can understand different values and morals for a different time, but I certainly can't understand what it feels like to be in something I have never lived.
Idk what part of tent cities exist in the past for you, I literally justoved out of an apartment building this month that was beside a street that had people camping up and down both sides in everything from plywood lean-tos to tarp city's to straight up tents
Spawn Comic: "His name is literally 'Overt-Kill' but sometimes some are known to call him Overkill"
ComicTropes: "I don't understand what the comic is trying to tell us."
Because that’s stupid and why would they do that? That’s why it’s confusing
@@darkartsdabbler2407 overkill was a character mcfarlane did when he worked for marvel, he used the same character in spawn but changed the name to overtkill.
@@karlvallerand1004 yes, thank you captain obvious. Doesn’t make it less dumb.
But seriously, that was a genuine thank you, you’re trying to be helpful and I am grateful for your efforts.
The character of Overkill/Overtkill was originally drawn in collaboration with Rob Liefield on a comic creator VHS series that Stan Lee hosted (I forget the name now but you can find them in RUclips). I imagine the change from Overkill to Overtkill was to fend off any ownership claims by Lee or whoever produced the videos. I thought that as a pretty neat bit of comic history when I first saw it.
Nolan Callender same here! i just saw that exact vhs tape here on yt, and it was kinda amusing how Lee pointed out Liefelds tropes :D
The episode was on RUclips a couple of years ago. It was a show where Stan Lee interviewed various comic creators. I think the OvertKill episode featured McFarlane and Liefeld showed up or maybe it focused on both of them! Check them out!
BTW McFarlane has acknowledged Byrne, Michael Golden, Keith Giffen and Gil Kane among his primary influences! I think he also said he was influenced by "bad" artists who still got work which might have helped him become such a powerful storyteller! He's still one of my favorites but I admit to enjoying cartoonists more that slick illustrators!
The episode is here: ruclips.net/video/WaJhpqAWjuE/видео.html
There's also one with McFarlane and Leifeld where Todd trolls Rob for his bad drawing habits.
yeah, stan completely owns these fools for creating such a stupid character.
Much respect for making it to issue 100 of Spawn, Chris. Despite having the series up to issue 140 or 150, my credulity has only ever lasted until about issue 50. After that, I'm gone. It just became sillier and sillier. Anyway, I'm really enjoying your videos, mate. You really know your stuff!
you ever noticed that the marvel characters on his wall are images of characters, but the DC characters are the symbols of the characters.
I think it's an allusion to the archetypal nature of many of DC's heroes
says the guy with a Batman symbol as an avatar
Good eye! Now that I think about it, I feel like marvels icons aren’t as universal for whatever reason. A superman or Batman symbol is ubiquitous, one with the character. But a spider-man symbol? Not nearly as much. The most iconic marvel symbol is probably the avengers logo or cap’s shield (and that’s basically a flag)
None of the Marvel characters have or need a logo or insignia, as many of them aren't the secret identity type of superhero save Spider-Man.
Loved the comic and HBO animated series. I actually met the real Al Simmons during the tour of McGuire's baseballs. Really nice guy and I still have some autographed action figures.
You got one heck of an enjoyable TV show format, man, and enough trivia chops to make it authoritative.
Big league geeky subject matter approached with intelligence. Rare, and good, thanks.
Todd MacFarlane, Rob Liefeld, and Stan Lee did a home video back in the 90s where they invented a character called Overkill. Todd creatively borrowed it.
Plots twist, the cyborg's name is Robertkill
What is funny as you listed those tropes was my realisation of how much todd influenced my artwork.
I really appreciate how goofy a lot of your jokes and bits are. They're silly, they're ridiculous, and you don't take yourself too seriously. I love how you commit to the bit, I'd be too embarrassed to look silly and probably half-ass it lmao. This channel is excellent with analysis of technical skill, themes, a critical eye towards stylistic choices, and above all it's just good fun. Keep it up man, I love the channel and I'm glad to see someone make such great and insightful content about something that obviously brings them joy.
This brings back memories of other 90s comic characters, like Bone, Savage Dragon, Lady Death, Wildcats, Gen-13, and Hell Boy. I think alot of iconic characters came out of the 90s from the majors, like Gambit, Cable, Doomsday, Deadpool, Jesse Custer, Bane, and Squirrel Girls. I was just a little kid, but I know I would occasionally hear older readers say the industry would be dead by the mid to late 2000s.
Early 90’s comics were insane! Still my favorite era
This is the third video of yours I've watched suggested by RUclips. You bring such intellect and depth to comic books.
The hobo circle singing the Flintstones theme song now has me thinking about copyright and how much you can get away with
Todd actually did roughly 20 or so issues of SPAWN! I think GREG CAPULLO took over the pencils around Spawn 25 or 26
I actually enjoy the contrast of "realistic" backgrounds combined with a cartoony style--WILL EISNER (whom you mentioned), JACK KIRBY, ERIK LARSEN and others were masters at this while Manga creators made it their definitive style! You also mentioned JOHN BYRNE but the problem with Byrne is that he seemed to go out of his way to eliminate the "cartoony" approach and make his work more "realistic"--of course, the more he did that, the less I liked it!
i always felt like the cartoony designs made the story feel even darker. like you could see how innocent or twisted a person might be by their look. for example, Twitch looked so fragile that i'd feel worried that something might happen to him lol
Say what you will about Todd’s writing, but the artwork still, to this day, holds up great imo. Looks better than the art in most modern books.
I Am The Maxx...I Am Prominent..I Am Homeless..I AM THE MAXX!
Todd McFarlane is a beast as an artist. He really is cartoony but it's some amazing shit he did.
Amazing shit is a good description.
I love how much fun you have in these.
My favorites pencillers are: George Perez and John Byrne.Old School but classics.
My absolute faves too.
john byrne , jim lee and arthur adams for me . I loathed McFarlane from day one . liefeld too.
Quiro, Great choices! George Perez's amazing work on the New Teen Titans, helped form my youth and I'm a, Byrne victim, to the core!
Spider- man + Batmans cape / shadowy persona+ Ghost Riders chains /attitude towards the devil = Spawn
This is my favorite video by you, thank you very much!
I just laughed out loud so hard at that last one. I really love Comic Tropes!
At the same time Sam Keith's "The Maxx" featured a homeless superhero.
love the channel man you do a great job explaining these works in enough detail that i can stay paying attention lol
The 90's were huge for comics. Especially for me and my friends. Good times for sure.
My favorite all time character. He’s basically Todd’s venom, spider man, and Batman mixed with ghostrider. Awesome!
I will forever hate hate hate the real Tony Twist for the frivolous lawsuit. Tony lied saying that naming him after a Mafia character affected his income (merchandise, etc.)
Yea he ran out of power when he cured Terry's cancer. This was the 1st time spawn was dragged to hell after this is when i think they got rid of the counter.
Wasn't the whole point of the power counter that Spawn would have to go to hell again if his necroplasm ran out?It's an interesting tension, disincentivizing Spawn from using his greatest powers.
I see I'm not the first one to add this, but The Maxx was also a homeless superhero. He also debuted around the same time as Spawn, and was part of the original first wave of Image comics series. The Maxx was a much more adult comic though, it dealt with psychological themes and existentialism. One of my all time favorite books, for Sam Kieth's unique art style, and his hallucinogenic mystery driven story. The Maxx wasn't successful enough to be remembered, but for those who were fans, it will never be forgotten.
I remember those times.
Spawn was the shit back then!
Spawn (especially back then) was something new, something different, something exhilarating, very well executed and Todd Macfarlane created the character and all that was so new, different and exhilarating about it all by himself. This in a day and age where it wasn't so evident to come up with something so new, different and exhilarating that on top of it all would stick around for so long. Spawn and the mythos surrounding the character was- and to me still is Awesome. I hope the next silver screen adaption will be equally new, different, exhilarating and well executed this time around. There's the potential and the means for it.
Came back to watch this episode since Spawn is hitting the 300th issue milestone this August 🤟
It would be so cool to see an episode about the Maxx. This episode was amazing, so much nostalgia!
That Devil summoning part made me laugh harder than it probably should have.🤣
That was an amazing three stooges bit was hilarious. I cant believe you got the devil to play himself
spawn had so much trouble dealing with one demon here on comic tropes this literally took on and KO’d the devil
Homless Superheros. Cloak and dagger.
The skit at the end........well done, I laughed way too much!
Overkill vs overtkill is based on Stan Lee comics with the greats.. this should be known
I like the show BUT you really are one of the most critical individuals on this planet! :)
I know man.....i mean its a comic book right? What do u really expect from a comic book.
Also I will note that when you took the blade and turned it around to hit the devil on the head... *chef's kiss* Pure comedy.
Spawn the comic book and the TV series raised me.
I couldn't believe it when I found out that Todd didn't create the Prowler.
The text that introduces Overt-Kill, with the line “Some people call him Overkill”, is an obvious reference to Stan Lee and Liefeld creating the character, while he did the masthead in the video of the 3 of them. McFarlane was basically saying “SOME people call the character Overkill(the other 2 who helped create him) but this is my version”. Seems like a jab/nod to character being Co-created.
I'm currently on a quest to collect all 41 issues of Spawn in Finnish, since they're cheap and it's all 90s super grimdark edginess.
POWER COUNTER: Like you I read and loved Spawn as a kid. My memory is vague on this, but I'm 99% it was resolved. (In a kinda anticlimactic way).
Basically, I think McFarlane wanted to drop the counter idea. So Spawn started getting low. There were a couple issues in which this was starting to be a problem--but then Coglistro taught him how to use and harness the power of the symbiote (costume). Draw his power from the symbiote instead of from Hell (the counter). From that point on his powers were basically limitless and they stopped talking about both the counter and that he draws his power from the symbiote.
Part of me wants to say this happened around the time Spawn's costume changed (early 30s). But part of me remembers there still being this problem going into ish-50 or so.
Anima (from DC) was also homeless, and a personal favorite of mine. Great video! :)
That three stooges bit at the end cracked me up XD
Great video as always Chris
I remember reading this as a kid! Totally forgot Overtkill Kool-Aiding through the wall. 10/10
Spawn #6 and #258 were my first comics I brought when I was 12 love them
What happened in #258
I like the text, gave a lot more lore and details to the story. I never liked being able to go through a comic in five minutes
Please do a The Maxx video!!!
So much better than spawn!
Sam Keith was awesome... who else would give wolverines a beer belly?
I love the original comic trops into and all your videos
McFarlane has always been a business genius, and as an artist he's always pushed to improve his strong points rather than spending years fixing his weaknesses. That takes courage and an incredibly clear vision.
The man has guts, that much is clear.
Spawn was/is such a Great series. Big part of my childhood comic days... Had a awesome animated show as well.
I wish Marvel had let McFarland have a go at Ghost Rider. Just fanboy fantacising but it would have been mind blowing, I bet.
When spawn was pretty new I was a kid and just getting into comics. I started with spiderman 2099 of all things because I wanted something I could collect from the first issue.
i like how you have the symbols of the popular characters on your wall
Todd also tried taking credit for Neil Gaiman's work, Neil apparently came up with Angela (who would later be sold to Marvel and I believe Medieval Spawn was a Gaiman thing. Gaiman definitely added a deeper layer to Spawn where I just felt Todd's stories were typically more shallow.
Spawn ran out of his power in issue 50 when he used every drop of it to save Terry fritzgerald life and was sent back to hell. There he confronted Malebogia and was subsequently sent back with his powers restored. The counter acts as a literal clock for spawns to recharge.
This guy is literally in love with comics
Fun fact: I had a #0 Spawn with both McFarlane and Al Simmons' authographs. Unfortunately, I had to sell it to a friend because I really needed the money.
Ultimaetor I still have my autographed issues #1-3, autographed at the 1992 Philly Comic-Con. They’re in the shed with the rest of my collection, which I’ve not touched in twenty years and are probably all ruined by now. Whoops.
I was just watching a video where todd and rob were being roasted by stan lee. Rob was drawing Overkill or overtkill .
My favourite comic book back in early teens, the three stoges fight with the devil was hilarious btw
Glad you finally did Spawn
It was fun looking back at the super stylized 90s.
skunkape spawn #6 and #258 were my first spawn comics at the age of 12 btw the comic is a 2 part series continuing with h spawn #7
"Can't think of a homeless superhero" Picture of the Hulk right behind you. ;)
I hope we can get a decent Spawn movie in my lifetime. I really love the "spiritual warfare" aspect the Spawn comics offer......
Really fun Stooges bit. Reminded me a lot of Ash v Evil Ash. Good stuff.
I find funny that there's probably-influenced-McFarlane-Michael-Golden (wackier, loose anatomy and more random crosshatching) and also probably-influenced-Jim-Lee-Michael-Golden (somewhat more academic anatomy, more rigid but not stiff, and more highly disciplined, cleaner crosshatching, including the use of long parallel lines for secondary lights within shadows). These are the "extreme ends" of style on early Image comics, and somehow they must have spawned (no pun intended) from a common influence, even though at different phases.
That bit at the end had me LMAO. And on the topic of those poorly drawn guns, i saw a solicitation for a rob liefeld book coming out in April 2019, and his guns look worse then EVER!!
I always how appreciated how Todd McFarlane drew Spider-Man like he didn't have any bones.
I invented a homeless superhero. I know it doesn't really count because I'm not a published artist or anything, but I'm still somewhat pleased.
Ragman from DC. Waaay before Spawn. Was homeless
This is the 4th time iv'e seen this video. I dont know why i love this video so much😅
Sometime I play your videos as I’m going to sleep. I woke up to you freaking out at 22:53, which was a bit unnerving.
Are you going to do chuck austen on comic tropes?
ssasuke125 Hadn't considered it but sure. I'll put it on my list.
Overkill was a name developed by Stan lee, Todd and Rob Liefeld drew him on COMIC BOOK GREATS
It is beyond insane that I saw that video by RENTING it in my small Alabama hometown. That video, somehow, was a money maker in the early 1990s.
I don't know if I'd consider hanging out with the homeless a "trope" as much as a plot point and I'd say tropes are deliberate so a lawsuit probably wouldn't qualify. But don't get me wrong, love the show.
I believe he actually only runs out of his power when he's dealing with the man of Miracles and he's just about to kill the last of the man of Miracles Guardians when he told to stop and apparently that was the right decision this was around like spawn 175 or so
I never liked spawn, it seemed to me a mixture between spider-man venom and batman. The eyes are and black color from venom, the cape and mistery from batman. It never got me engaged. Thouhg the art is atractive. The Greg Capullo Spawn looked great.
When you look closely at Spawn and Venom you realize just how goofy Todd McFarlane is and how fun his comics are. That's really why he's been so enduring over the years.
I would like there to be an episode about Mike Golden. I remember him as having a great sense of form, like Arthur Adams but rounder. BTW, I've really enjoyed binging on your channel for the last hour or so.
I'm probably 195 comments too late but look for the video where Stan Lee gives MacFarland & Liefeld the task of creating an "original" character named Overkill. It's so full of Liefeld tropes, you'd probably have to explore remote areas of SE Asia to find peppers hotter than ghost pepper, and even Stan seems to get on the trope-spotting train during the drawing process. Anyway, I heard somewhere else, that one or the other added the character to their repertoire since they created his *ahem* image, but called him OverTkill because Stan had come up with the name.
Oh pooh, you're gonna fix it in post. Why is when I'm moved to type, it's for nought>? BTW, baseball Al Simmons didn't sue?
Sicilian military? That'd be the Italian Military.
You made it to issue 100, I read the first 8 or so and realized I had no idea what was going on.
Maybe The Maxx could be considered by some as a homeless super hero. Cheers mate!