Marvel Comics has been one of the most culturally significant pieces of literature in recent times. Not only was it a very important part of popular culture during the second half of the 20th century, but it also led to the most successful franchise to this date, the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Having a huge array of characters of all kinds, and some of the biggest superheroes ever, like Spider-Man, The Avengers, The X-Men, and The Fantastic Four, it is safe to say that this franchise has seen the heights of success.
Despite this, however, recently one of the most well-respected comic artists, Tim Sale, does not like one of the biggest aspects of these comics. He revealed, that he does not like the use of color in Marvel comics from the 60s, for a very specific reason, calling them silly.
Tim Sale Talks About Comic Books And Color
Tim Sale recently gave an interview with The Comic Journal, where he spoke in great detail about his life as a comic artist, having worked several times on the characters, Superman and Batman. While talking about these, he touched on the subject of his color blindness, being asked if this ever affected his capabilities to be a successful comic artist. While speaking on this, he confessed that even though he had been a huge fan of comics growing up, colors were never anything that affected this passion.
“I’ve recently been, because of my website, sharing some of the artists that were an influence on me as I was growing up. And so I was scanning artwork and showing them and talking about them and asking for other people’s opinions, and often color comes up, and the silliness, for instance, of how many of the Marvel comics of the ’60s were colored; and that was my primary and initial introduction to comics and comics influence. And it never occurred to me.”
“It wasn’t until someone else said, “Well, I don’t like it, because of the color,” that I even considered it. And even to this day … For instance, just last week, I’d been sharing some magnificent Jack Kirby artwork. For somebody to look at that stuff and say, “I just can’t get past the color,” is missing the point entirely, it seems to me. And that’s not to defend the color. It just seems irrelevant. Maybe it was easier to seem irrelevant to me because of my color blindness.
He mentioned that thoughts surrounding this topic never even crossed his mind. this was until recently when he started talking to people about his favorite artists and their opinions of them. When he asked the opinions of people on the 60s-colored Marvel comic, the feedback that he got was quite interesting for him. He found out that some people did not like these comics because of the colors. He mentioned that he thought more on this afterward, and believed that people who do not appreciate, because of their colors, are missing the point of them completely.
Tim Sale Does Not Like Marvel’s Use Of Color
Despite having such strong opinions on this, Tim Sale revealed that he feels strongly that comics are not about the use of colors, but about what they’re trying to showcase to the audiences. He then revealed that this was a reason why he did not like Marvel comics or Jack Kirby’s comics from the 60s. He stated that he did not like the use of vibrant and wild colors in these comics, just for the sake of grabbing the attention of readers.
“That may be just too hard for me to say objectively. I know that I feel it strongly that the point of comics is not the color. And when I call the coloring of Marvel comics and the Kirby comics in the ’60s “silly,” I do think it’s silly, but it’s wildly colorful maybe just to grab attention, I guess. And to make it sort of coloring-book-like. But it never really seemed the point to me. I do know what you mean when they talk about “four colors for a dime” and that sort of thing. It was not a concern of my friends either, my friends who were not colorblind.”
He added that though he understood why they were doing what they were doing, He did not think that there was a need for color in comics in the first place. He took an example of himself and his friends growing up, none of them were concerned with the colors of the comics and were more focused on the content.
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