Jack Kirby

It’s been said that Doctor Doom is not just one of the greatest supervillains of all time but rather that he’s the supervillain, the one that defines them all. Whenever Doom appears, he's always a huge threat. That’s evident from his very first appearance in Fantastic Four #5 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, when he kidnaps Sue Storm and forces the rest of the FF to travel back in time to steal Blackbeard’s treasure to help him conquer the world. He later teamed up with Namor the Sub-Mariner to send the team into space --- by literally magnetizing the Baxter Building and attaching it to a rocket ship. Of course, he double crosses Namor and the FF. But Namor gets the upper hand and gets the FF back to Earth, leaving Doom on an asteroid careening out into space. But do you think that stopped him?

Captain America: Sam Wilson #1, by Nick Spencer and Daniel Acuna, has caused a stir since its release last week. The second launch for former Falcon Sam Wilson in his role as the current thrower of the mighty shield sees him taking on the Sons of the Serpent, who are abducting Mexicans attempting to cross the border into the US. The same issue also sees Cap making a public call for national unity, which gets him branded as a partisan, anti-American, and a socialist. Conservatives on social media are riled up, with some petitioning for writer Nick Spencer's 'resignation'. Political advocacy group The MacIver Insitute was apparently the first to claim the Sons of the Serpent as its ideological peers in a YouTube video objecting to the storyline, while Saturday morning's Fox And Friends TV talk show saw co-host Clayton Henry pine for for the days when Cap was "punching Hitler" and fighting typical Captain America villains, rather than "going up against conservatives."

Welcome to Cast Party, the feature that imagines a world with even more live action comic book adaptations than we currently have, and comes up with arguably the best casting suggestions you’re ever going to find for the movies and shows we wish could exist. This week we're taking on a classic, Jack Kirby's New Gods, the cornerstone of his Fourth World meta-saga from DC Comics.

One of the best things about the online celebrations of Jack Kirby's birthday is Phil Hester's marathon sketch project. Each year, in honor of the King, he draws a sketch for every year since Kirby's birth in exchange for donations to the Hero Initiative. That means that, this year, he's knocked out a solid 98 pieces of art over the course of two days --- an especially ambitious project since last year's attempt to do 97 in a single day was obviously a pretty draining experience. Today, he posted his favorites from this year's project on Twitter, and as you might expect if you're familiar with Kirby and Hester, they're pretty amazing, including characters from Kirby's tenure at Marvel and DC, from Galactus to Granny Goodness.

Marvel is getting monstrous this October with 26 variant covers featuring some of the finest creation of the true King of Monsters, Jack Kirby. Each cover features a brand new rendition of a classic Kirby monster by one of the finest artists in today's industry, and we have the exclusive reveal on four of the best, from Dan Brereton, Phil Noto, Marguerite Sauvage, and James Stokoe.

The week's over! You did it, and did it in sensational style. But while you've been off working and living and doing all those things that humans do, what have you missed in the world of comics? With Weekender, ComicsAlliance is here to give you a heads-up on some of the stories that you might have overlooked, and to showcase some great writing on comics for you to enjoy over pancakes this weekend.

The Atlas Comics monster stories of the late 1950s cemented Stan Lee and Jack Kirby's working relationship, and laid the groundwork for the revolution they would launch with Fantastic Four #1 in 1961. In honor of Jack Kirby's birthday, we've compiled this gallery of some of his finest Atlas-era covers!

Jack Kirby, born on this day in 1917 in New York, is the greatest comic book creator who ever lived. That's not something that I consider to be up for debate. It's something that's self-evident every time that you sit down to read one of his comics — and, more than that, one of anyone's comics on the stands today — and have your mind blown by a driving energy and the limitless possibilities that have always marked superheroes and the medium they defined. The simple fact is that Kirby's work wasn't just great in and of itself, but that superhero comics as we know them quite simply would not exist without him.

For the past four years, August 28 has been more than just Jack Kirby's birthday. It's also the day that comic artists, retailers and fans all over the world celebrate the King's life and legacy with the Kirby 4 Heroes campaign. Originally created by granddaughter Jillian Kirby in 2012, Kirby 4 Heroes is a fundraiser for the Hero Initiative, the charity designed to help comic book creators in need, and this week, they announced the official start of the 2015 campaign. The idea is a simple one: artist draw original pieces on Kirby's birthday and auction them on eBay, with all proceeds going to Kirby 4 Heroes. Fans can also donate directly, or attend in-store events across the country where there will be a variety of ways to donate.

It's never the wrong time to read a Jack Kirby comic, but with the King's birthday coming up in two weeks, now is a better time than most. Of course, the big problem there is trying to narrow it down --- Kirby's career did, after all, span six decades and involve some pretty prolific major work --- but really, when you want to read Kirby comics, you want to go for the big stuff. And there's nothing bigger than Darkseid finally launching his attack on Earth, a battle so titanic that it took the combined forces of the Justice League and their most diabolical villains to repel it. It's the most titanic battle possible, on the grandest, most cosmic scale! Except for the part where, you know, it doesn't actually happen.