The first part of my interview with Dane McCart went into detail about how he managed to keep some original art from Silverwolf Comics, and how his employment eventually came to an end. While discussing these things, I ask what kind of work he is doing nowadays.
“For the first time in my life I am working color, for the last couple of years. All my life I’ve always worked for reproduction…” he tells me as we look through a portfolio of some older work.
He describes his main influence, Frank Brunner, and how influences will show up in an artists work no matter how much an artist tries to not let it show.
This leads our discussion back to…
Dane’s Thoughts on Getting Hired by Silverwolf, Turning Down Grips, and The Boom and Bust of the Late ’80s…
“Money was coming in pretty good, there were print runs of 50,000 copies, the glut was just beginning and Silver hit the wave right as it was going up…a print run of 50,000 was just unheard of for a small black and white.”
I point out that Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles had an initial print run of only 3,000 copies .
“Right, and today it would probably be less than that.. but these books, the price guide carried them for the first year they were out and then (they said) no, they were not going to do that anymore because none of them had any value. There were huge print runs on all of them, so they were not rare, they were not scarce, so even if it was a good artist on them…for the most part they were what they were…vanity. ‘Hey I can just pay to publish my own work even though I’m not good enough to be hired by anybody.”
“We did not realize we were in a glut while were were doing this, that was something that we could only see in retrospect or (be seen) by people in distribution.” Dane goes on to describe being a part of the boom and bust as several little events…this, then this, then that…and it only took shape as ‘one event’ after the fact…after it crashed. “But at the time it was happening Silver had every reason to fail…this guy was a dreamer from the minute I walked in…he was talking about big things.”
So, Dane was hired…to draw Grips. “He wanted to give me Grips when I first started.” The problem for Dane was simple: Grips had not even had a first issue out yet. The character had only appeared in Silver’s comic shop fanzine, The Silverwolf Bulletin, in a 4 page preview with art by Ron Lim. “So I’m thinking I’m going to go with the book that gets published…”
Moby: “You turned down Grips?”
“Yeah, I didn’t want it. That is why it was still available when Vigil got hired. Tim was perfect for Grips, if I did it it would be sad, Grips would be nothing…could you imagine Vigil doing The Eradicators?”
“I went home that first day, I believe it was in May or April of ’86, went home and drew Grips…and as I was doing it, I said to myself ‘This book has (only) seen a little fanzine, the (Eradicators) already has an issue out. I figured this guy is gonna implode, there’s no reason to believe not, there’s just no talent here…”
Getting Issue #4 Done, and The Return to Alexander’s Comics…or “and when we got there (Silver) opened the port-hole.“
“My second issue was inked by Tiffany Ragasa…and strangely enough I finished my pencils on time.” Unfortunately, the inking was not close to being done as the deadline approached, leading to a classic inking party at the studio the night before the issue was due. “She shows up and she’s got like five friends in tow, not one of them an artist, and I thought ‘OH NO!“.
“So I’m inking as fast as I can to get as many (pages) as I can done and Tiffany is inking away, and all her friends want to ink the figures. ‘No figures, just the black spaces!’
Dane is laughing a bit as he tells this, remembering his fear when he realized his art was about to be inked by what I would refer to as random stranger.
‘These people wanted to ink a figure so badly, but we got it done on time and I remember riding on the back of Tim’s motorcycle at 8AM, with the pages, down to Alexander’s Comics. On the freeway, on the back of Tim’s Honda 150 or something, holding the pages and when we got there (Silver) opened the port-hole.”
“It was the first time I had seen him since the firing. He’d had a real disintegration, it was pretty dramatic for me because I had not seen him in a long time. All around was plywood, on all of the windows.”
Moby: Plywood and a port-hole? Inside of a mall?
“This was the second story of an indoor mall, you’d be walking along, shop, shop, shop…and then plywood. You’d come to the door and there was a little opening in the door, some port-hole. He had a list at the door of people that were allowed in and I was not on the list. But I was a guest, an unusual visitor, so I was allowed into the inner sanctum.”
Moby: So at that point was it even a comic book store anymore?
“No, no. He had shut the shop down. This was now Silverwolf Publishing…”
Is it just me, or does this actually sound like a fun place? Sort of like an evil-lair or something…I’ve always wanted a lair.
A Good Word for Kris, ‘The Ed Wood of Comic Books’
As our discussion comes to a close, we talk a bit more about Silverwolf founder and publisher, Kris Silver. I tell Dane about how on this blog, I have made a point to not write much about Kris because, well…most of what I have read about him online is a bit unkind. So I decided early on to say nothing about Kris myself, as I don’t know the guy and have only exchanged emails with him one time. And for the record he was polite and not at all abrasive.
Dane decides that it would be unfair to Kris to not say something nice about him as well.
“One thing he did for me that was cool..I was up on the roof of the high school with some friends, and I had to go back to the studio to finish several pages to turn in a batch the next morning. They were due…so I jumped off the roof. I just wanted to get down, and because it was dark it looked closer than it was. So, I landed on my feet, I didn’t roll or anything, I just landed on ’em and sprained the arches or something in my feet…and I knew it was going to be bad.” Turns out he had to be driven to the studio because he could not even push the clutch in.
“When I got there Tim was working ’cause his pages were also due the next day, this was after midnight, and my feet are getting worse…now they are swelling. Tim and I are trying to figure out what to do ’cause I have to draw all night. We both come to the conclusion to do the worst thing we could do, and Tim gets a big tub of hot water. So I’m sitting there at the drawing board, soaking my feet in hot water all night, and of course they are just swelling even bigger, and Tim keeps filling it with more water as the water cools off.”
“By the time we go into Silver’s in the morning I can’t even walk, I’ve gotta go to the doctor…and he gave me the cash to cover my co-payment; I had not finished the issue yet but he fronted me the money so I could go see the doctor. So to be fair, he did that.”
It was nice of Dane to add that last part. Having talked to a few former artists, my personal favorite is still hearing him referred to as ‘The Ed Wood of Comic Books’. It’s a fitting title frankly; whatever else might be said, it seems Kris had a dream and he lived it. He had a good run at making (bad) comics. Twice.
That may seem like a bit of a backhanded compliment, but let’s face it; I am writing this, and you are reading it, because of Kris. It’s a bit like when Jack Sparrow is told “You are, without doubt, the worst pirate I’ve ever heard of.” He proudly responds, “But you have heard of me.” Yeah, sort of like that.
A huge thank you to Dane McCart for his time and insights. Be sure to check out these related posts for more great interview insights and artwork from Dane McCart:
Cool interview – I wish I had friends in comics when I was younger, sounds like you guys made the most of it.
I’d be interested in reading more about Kris Silver, you said you emailed him but did you interview him too?
Unfortunately no, that email exchange with Kris was about buying back issues; and like I said above, he was polite and all. But since, he has not answered back.
He is very welcome to add his two cents, should he choose to contact me. Moby’s email is still mobyshsx@gmail.com. I would love to interview him.
I dimly remember the plywood. That was late in the game, probably the last time I saw the store. My wife & I had the same reaction to his closing of the comic book shop…”He did what???” It was a guaranteed monthly income, and he shut it down.
The plywood everywhere made the place feel like the set of an Eli Roth movie. It felt like someone was going to get snuffed, and you wanted to get out before it was you.
An ee-vil lair, I knew it! Okay so not a fun place but…I still want one…
The ‘Ed Wood of Comics’ thing is my fault. I caught all Hell for saying this at the Silverwolfcomics.com forums (of Keieth Paquette) as there were guys like John Gilbert there who were big fans of Kris and thought I was being unfair. In the 1980s and early ’90’s my friends and I would read aloud Kris’ books and riff on them MST3k style (this was largely before there was MST 3000 though) and that was when I first referred to Kris as the ‘Ed Wood of Comics’. Seemed pretty accurate to me and so I made this observation very often when the internet had evolved to the point of being able to find and read about things like Silverwolf and similar niche interests.