While browsing the RPG posters thread (yes, it's still going on), I suddenly learned that
Steve Gerber has died (of pulmonary fibrosis)
according to his blog.
Steve Gerber was one of the new crop of comic book writers who came of (professional) age in the 1970s. He is most famous for creating Howard the Duck, and if all you know about Howard is that obscenity of a farce of a creative rape of a movie Lucas produced, you know nothing of Howard The Duck. He also took over the Defenders, and turned them into the first really outre superhero team, pairing assorted second-string characters like Valkyrie and Nighthawk with a bean-loving Hulk and an oddly bemused Doctor Strange, and placed them against villains like Tapping Tommy and the Headmen (a collection of oddities from Marvel's pre-Fantastic-Four monster comics). In many ways, his offbeat creations, still working within the very strict, very controlled editorial guidelines of the 1970s corporate machine, paved the way for the 80s revolution by folks like Alan Moore. He also led the charge for creators rights in comics, championing Jack Kirby's efforts to get recognition and his own art back to support himself in his final years.
At 60, he didn't exactly die young -- but it's not old, either. He's likely the first of the generation that wrote and drew the comics I grew up on to pass away, but he's not going to be the last.
Life sucks.
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