Changing Shades...

As mentioned before, I'm a huge Ditko fan and his most malleable DC creation outside The Question is easily Shade: The Changing Man.  And while I love Ditko's short original run, Peter Milligan & Chris Bachalo (then Sean Phillips & Richard Case)'s work on the character remains one of my favorite comic book series of all-time and a long out-of-print gem of the founding Vertigo era.  

I tracked down all of the single issues shortly after moving to Seattle in 2005 and created the bound editions pictured below.  They were worth the hunt for the letter columns alone, but the raw dynamism and imagination in early the Bachalo work with Peter Milligan developing into the methodical long form writer I'd come to love for "X-Statix" is quite an artistic feat to watch over the course of the series 5+ years.

All of this is in preparation of my saying that the current DC/Young Animal relaunch by Cecil Castellucci & Marley Zarcone is every bit on the level with everything "Shade" I've known before.  That is to say, it's a once in generation surreal yet emotional journey through madness and mystery.

Check out my comic book, Spinner-Rack #1 (80 Pages / Black & White).  It's available on Etsy, at Arcane Comics, and at the Fantagraphics Store & Gallery (both in Seattle).