Wonder Woman #199, DC Comics, April 1972. Artist: Jeff Jones.
Jeff Jones’ cover to Wonder Woman #199 is scary good, I know Jones likes to channel Frazetta but he owns this classic.
Carmine Infantino’s Superman #199 is a worthy winner as well but I couldn’t possibly vote against the Jeff Jones cover. Yesterday’s winner, a worthy one at that, was my way of saying I’m sorry to Superman #199.
Carl Barks’ classic Four Color #199 featuring a bad ass Donald Duck rounds out a very very impressive trio for Day 199.
The cover to Famous Funnies #199 reminds me of a few north end Hamilton bars I used to drop into. Erik Larsen keeps pumping out fantastic Kirbyesque covers on Savage Dragon #199.
Tomorrow is day 200!
A great comic book cover matching each day of the year, 1 through 365. Please chime in with your favourite corresponding cover, from any era.
I completely agree. I have looked at this comic as an homage to Johnny Craig’s Vault of Horror 39 cover. As you say, Jeff Jones “owns this classic”. Great choice.
Batman 200 is a nice one to consider.
Was hoping you were going with this beautiful cover! Thank god Jones didn’t use that terrible WW costume on the upper left. Good artistic decision!
I love almost all the covers of DC’s 52 page twentyfive cent Giants. What a period to collect. I actually give thanks to Marvel for starting the ball rolling in a successful ploy to out distribute / sell DC for the first time in history. This is a beautiful Wonder Woman cover Walt…and the rest are great too.
How about four color #200 for tomorrow….
as I like super sleuthing.
Or Superman 200….. Kal-El had better hope those Tomahawks don’t have kryptonite 🙂
http://d1466nnw0ex81e.cloudfront.net/n_iv/600/747823.jpg
The problem is Wonder Woman would never have that look on her face. This would have been great on Eerie but totally incongruous for Wonder Woman. To me this is like a piece of Rococo furniture – I can appreciate the skill of the artisan and that they achieved their objective, but I don’t want it in my house.
#200 tomorrow and this remains one of the best classes that I’ve ever taken. It’s like a seminar class with practitioners and experts who stop in as well. If there is any downside I think it might be the impact on my investment performance. It seems like the market likes to chase the hot books (FF #48 etc.) while this exercise has me lusting for books like House of Secrets #134 and Tomahawk #136. Every time I think of how many pristine romance comics I could get for my FF #4, I am discomfited.
I was thinking about picking both an anniversary and non-anniversary cover, but I don’t think there is any non-anniversary cover that can really compete. So I am going with the Spawn Liefeld/McFarlane variant. Yes a poster but that’s basically the case with all of the anniversary covers. But what a poster. And no guts hanging out of some victim, many thanks.
I also love the Jim Lee variant but the lack of distinction between foreground and background colors causes problems. The Finch variant is utterly magnificent but just a tad visually confusing. Of course Batman #200 is the classic anniversary cover but it also is a poster and mostly reprint images. Avengers is also worthy but marred by the advertising.
For non-anniversary covers there’s Byrne’s Daredevil, and the second Wonder Woman damsel cover. Another Eerie cover that doesn’t belong, but is otherwise magnificent. I didn’t see the Four Color at first but it’s a good one. I would not hold up Action (not Superman) as an objective candidate but I am a big big big fan of Actions from this period because of their period panache and their extreme scarcity.
Adventure’s Superboy and the apes tried to swing off with the JOWA, but they have been stopped by Blackhawk’s Queen Killer Shark and her jet-powered water skis. Spoiler alert! After her unsuccessful assault on the Blackhawks, she retired to the mainland and focused on tutoring brilliant but criminally-minded youth, with her star student being Robert Farrell.
A perfect choice for today. I have no problem with the expression on Diana Prince’s face since she was no longer a super powered wonder woman (and its been a long time since I’ve read this issue so I’ll assume it is Diana and not someone else in the story? I’ll solve that question tonight). But I do take a bit of issue with your putting Jeff Jones into a Frazetta wanna be camp. Yes there are some similarities in their “rubenesque” approach to women and I know that there are earlier examples of Mr. Jones’s work that are very similar, but I would argue that this cover is all Jones and the better for it. Yes, he owns this. Nothing over the top. Just mood and accuracy as opposed to Mr. Frazetta who had to take everything to an extreme at least in his covers and paperback covers. I love them both.
Whew! I thought there was a lot to like on Day 199.
But I fully agree with Walt’s choice – Wonder Woman #199 is an outstanding cover that somehow escapes the mold of prior “bondage” covers, and has a much greater impact. I really like the covers dark feel, but I am encouraged because it is not asking for a hero to save the day like most versions of a “bondage” covers – it is up to our heroine to either save or suffer.
Several years ago I put together a collection of the Superman/Flash race covers, and Superman #199 is my favorite among the set. So I expected it to be the choice today, and share the spotlight with yesterday’s selection. Although I also like World’s Finest #199, the full screen cover versions on World’s Finest #198 and Superman #199 always rated higher for me.
But I am fan of several of today’s covers including:
• HULK #199 – A packed Hulk vs. Doc Samson cover.
• Conan #199 – The Devourer of Souls is one of my favorite Conan villains and I really like this cover where a small girl is the intended victim of evil that Conan must save, rather than usual beautiful woman.
• Fantastic Four #199 – Every comic is made better with a Dr. Doom appearance – so what can be better than a strong Dr. Doom battle cover as a lead in to FF #200.
• Thor #199 – Once again, Thor delivers a cover contender.
• Our Army at War #199 – Liked the effect of the “ghost wolf” cover.
• Batman #199 – If love comic books, this is fun cover.
• House of Mystery #199 – Scooby & Shaggy meet the Snow Beast by Neal Adams – Outstanding!
Great pick! I always loved Jones less is more take and also don’t see the Frazetta connect! I disagree with Chris on the Spawn cover… those definitely look like Liefeld knees and that makes it a no go for me! Do like the Sheriff Donald!
Liefeld knees > Miss Grundy knees
Gee fellas, looks like this pick was the bee’s knees for most of you.