that’s when I really started to get into it. CBA: Do you appreciate Art Adams’ work as much as Golden’s? Chris: Not as much as Golden. I like Art Adams a great deal as a person, but because I was at that age when I first encountered Golden, I’m still more into Golden’s work. I did like Art’s stuff, and as a matter of fact, probably pieces people don’t expect, like that X-Factor issue inked by Bob Wiacek. But yeah, I’ve got a ton of Art’s stuff, I just never was into him as much as those ’70s guys. I hope he’s not offended by that, but the ’70s was when I first fell in love with the art of guys like Chaykin, Mike Nasser, and the rest. They’re not necessarily all artists who worked at Continuity. But those artists who all had unique styles back then (at least unique to me). Now I know a little bit more about where they were coming from. Golden was really into Steranko, but at the time I’d never seen Steranko’s work. CBA: After you finished with high school, did you go into art school? Chris: I wanted to draw comics, but my parents talked me into going to a “real” school. “Why don’t you go to school and get a decent education in case this comic thing doesn’t work out.” So I went to a small college called James Madison University. It turned out that’s where Matt Wagner went for a while. My final portfolio didn’t have any real comic work, just a lot of painting and drawing. I went to become a graphic design major, but became disenchanted because all my design classes seemed to be grooming me for a career where I wouldn’t actually get to draw, which is all I wanted to do. CBA: When did you graduate from college? Chris: ’88. CBA: What was your first comic? Chris: Hammerlocke #1. That was 1989. It was a mini-series for DC. CBA: Did you have a hard time finding a job in comics? Chris: No, actually, it was very simple. I mailed in samples after seeing ads saying that DC needed artists. I mailed in four pages of continuity, a Mister Miracle action sequence. Two weeks later, I got a call back from DC, and they said they would send me work. Another two weeks went by and then I was actually working on my first job with them. I’ve since found out that the submission editor’s desk had just been cleaned off, and I was lucky enough to be the first person to send in samples that week. They had a hundred the week before, then mine came in first thing on Monday. I was very, very lucky. CBA: You were at DC a long time. Did you enjoy the books you did over there? Chris: I loved Legionnaires. That was a fun book for me. I left after #12 because I was really unhappy with my art. Basically I wanted to spend more time working on it but just couldn’t find the time. It felt like they were really, really strict with the deadlines back then, and the books had to be in a lot earlier than they do now. There was a lot less tolerance for late artists. I can’t remember the details specifically, but it just seemed like I started on the book and suddenly they moved up the shipping date. I think originally it was going to ship in six months or something (which I really needed, because even then I wasn’t very fast), and they pushed it up to three months from when I started, and I lost a lot of lead time. It just went downhill from there. I was late from then on, and the stress just got to be too much. I wanted a break. I think I was holding up other people, including the writers, Tom and Mary Bierbaum. They were doing it Marvel style, sending a plot and they wouldn’t get paid until after I was finished with my part. I was keeping everybody from making money, so the pressure was grinding me down. I needed a break.
CBA: What do you think the appeal is to the Legion books for the comics fan? Chris: I think it’s because it’s about family. Actually, it’s not quite like the FF, where they’re a real family, but this group of kids get together in their clubhouse as friends and all kinds of strange and unusual people coexisting. Beyond that, I think there’s just some real fun stuff that’s goofy and appealing. For others, like me, it was the sciencefiction aspect. At the time I got into the Legion as a fan (the first Giffen run), they had toned-down costumes and had aliens running around, and spaceships—all that stuff. That appealed to me. I have to imagine that appealed to lots of other people, as well. June 2003
Above: Chris Sprose’s black-&white line art for the cover of the second Tom Strong collection, courtesy of the artist. ©2003 America’s Best Comics, Inc.
Inset left: Certainly there’s at least a creative lineage from Alan Moore’s Supremes to the Strongs, if only in the superb delineations of artist Chris Sprouse, who first teamed with the superstar scribe in the Awesome title in 1997. This previously unpublished picture of Supreme, girl sidekick Suprema, and Krypt… I mean, Radar, the Hound Supreme! (What, you think the Dalmatian spots would fool us?). Art ©2003 Chris Sprouse. Characters ©2003 Awesome Entertainment.
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