#Tony Mortellaro

[brevoorthistoryofcomics]

BHOC: MARVEL TALES #102

This issue of MARVEL TALES reprinted the story where the series concluded its transition from the Silver Age into the Bronze Age. The book had been there for several months already at this point, with writer Gerry Conway taking over for Stan Lee. But this was the first issue in forever not illustrated by John Romita. Romita had defined the look of Spider-Man over the preceding decade (and he’d…

[eliah]

[chernobog13]

This outfit may look silly (Sean Connery wore an almost identical costume the following year in Zardoz), but it makes perfect sense beca use the original title for the series was Male Strippers From Mars.

Meanwhile, H.G. Wells spins like a centrifuge in his grave...

[dirtyriver]

Amazing Spider-Man #109, June 1972, written by Stan Lee, original art by John Romita and Tony Mortellaro

[acmeoop]

Harry’s In Bad Shape “Amazing Spider-Man” (1973)

Original pencils by Gil Kane and final splash page by Kane, John Romita Sr., Tony Mortellaro, and David Hunt from The Amazing Spider-Man #121, published by Marvel Comics, June 1973.

[tomoleary]

Win Mortimer, Mike Esposito and Tony Mortellaro Spidey Super Stories #19 (1976)

[gameraboy2]

Mister Mystery #16 (1954), cover by Tony Mortellaro

[zotcomics]

Tony Mortellaro - While the Iron Was Hot (Weird Mysteries #3, February 1953).

[weirdlookindog]

Mister Mystery #7 - Aragon, 1952.

Cover art by Tony Mortellaro.

[ewzzy]

BACKGROUND BY MORTELLARO

When John Romita Sr returned to Amazing Spider-Man he was busy as art director for all of Marvel so he hired an artists to fill in backgrounds for him so he could focus on the character figures. It's a common enough practice and these ghost artists tend not to make any waves. Tony Mortellaro? He snuck his name in everywhere.

Look close and you'll see that he'd only write parts of his name so you'd have to piece together multiple instances including some that only say "back" to get the full message.

Never one to hold back, on the first page of Amazing Spider-Man #122, right after Gwen Stacy got knocked off that bridge, there is "Mortellaro" in full right by her head!

If you're doing a 1970s Spider-Man pastiche please to sneak in a "BACK MORT" on a sign in there somewhere. Here's the full story from Jazzy John Romita:

[the-spinner-rack]

BINGO! (by John Romita & Tony Mortellaro from Amazing Spider-Man #112, 1972)

[brevoorthistoryofcomics]

BHOC: MARVEL TALES #79

BHOC: MARVEL TALES #79

When we left things off last week, we were talking about a pair of issues that I got in those plastic-wrapped bundles of coverless comics my local drug store had begun to sell. When this story was originally printed in the pages of AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, the Comics Code Authority of the time wouldn’t approve it, since it had a subplot running through it that dealt with drug use–a plot whose…

[inky-curves]

Mister Mystery #6 (July 1952) Cover by Tony Mortellaro

[dirtyriver]

Amazing Spider-Man #109, June 1972, written by Stan Lee, original art by John Romita and Tony Mortellaro

[hungariancomics]

Peter Parker Pókember #1

[davidmann95]

Can we agree that—regardless of all the other reasons "The Night Gwen Stacy Died" was incredibly influential, for good and for ill—"so do proud men die, crucified not on crosses of gold but on stakes of humble tin" is in fact one of the greatest lines to ever appear in a superhero comic?

I’ve been in love with that line for years, glad someone else was as struck by it.