The first of Marvel's super hero titles was the Fantastic Four #1 introduced in 1961. One of the most beloved of the characters of that group has been the Thing.
The Thing along with his Fantastic Four has had many different looks over the years. Marvel has seen fit to give him a new look in the incarnation of the their super team.
In this new incarnation of the Thing by cover artist Daniel Acuna, he maintains his orange skin but it is less "rocky" and softer looking than usual. It's slightly closer to his original look as seen in a pin-up from FF #2.
Kirby immediately started to evolve the Thing's look from the very beginning.
John Byrne described the Thing's orange skin as - "dinosaur hide"…"That description came into common parlance after Jack Kirby appeared on a panel at a San Diego Con, where, during Q&A, he was asked what he had in mind when he designed the look of the Thing. Taking the question literally, Kirby said "dinosaur hide", which described how the character had looked for the first few years of the FF. According to Roger Stern, who was present and reported this exchange, there was much confusion in the audience, as the "rocky" version of the Thing, which is what the questioner was asking about, bore no resemblance to anybody's idea of "dinosaur hide".
"Just for funsies, here again is that "Evolution of the Thing" montage I (Byrne) put together a while back…"
In recent years Ben has been interpreted by different artist in interesting ways.
Here Byrne's thing with an explanation of how to draw him -
McNiven has given him a great new look -
The Fantastic Four movie wasn't great but I have to say that the Thing make-up as well as Chiklis performance are some of my favorite movie interpretations of comic material ever!
The Thing along with his Fantastic Four has had many different looks over the years. Marvel has seen fit to give him a new look in the incarnation of the their super team.
In this new incarnation of the Thing by cover artist Daniel Acuna, he maintains his orange skin but it is less "rocky" and softer looking than usual. It's slightly closer to his original look as seen in a pin-up from FF #2.
Kirby immediately started to evolve the Thing's look from the very beginning.
In the 5th issue of Foom, Friends of ol Marvel, They featured an illustration showing the Thing's ever changing look.
John Byrne described the Thing's orange skin as - "dinosaur hide"…"That description came into common parlance after Jack Kirby appeared on a panel at a San Diego Con, where, during Q&A, he was asked what he had in mind when he designed the look of the Thing. Taking the question literally, Kirby said "dinosaur hide", which described how the character had looked for the first few years of the FF. According to Roger Stern, who was present and reported this exchange, there was much confusion in the audience, as the "rocky" version of the Thing, which is what the questioner was asking about, bore no resemblance to anybody's idea of "dinosaur hide".
"Just for funsies, here again is that "Evolution of the Thing" montage I (Byrne) put together a while back…"
Here Byrne's thing with an explanation of how to draw him -
The Fantastic Four movie wasn't great but I have to say that the Thing make-up as well as Chiklis performance are some of my favorite movie interpretations of comic material ever!
One of my favorite portrayals is Jae Lee's in the Hulk/Thing Hard Knocks mini series!
He looks so much realer than usual, as if he is a guy with a serious case of mange.
In fact I think Jae Lee does a pretty mean Hulk as well!
The amazing thing is that I can recognize specific panels from that 45 image collage and recognize that they must be taken one from each of the first 45 issues! Am I right? I think he starts getting recognizable in #25.
ReplyDeleteHard Knocks is fantastic
ReplyDeleteJae Lee's Thing in Hard Knocks is my favorite interpretation
ReplyDelete