RIP Joe Kubert

Prolific comic book artist Joe Kubert passed away over the weekend. Among the last of the talent from the comic book industry’s Golden Age (his work stretches from the 1930's to the present), Kubert was well known and admired not just for his work, but for founding the Kubert School of cartooning and graphic design in New Jersey, which has groomed upcoming comic artists since the 1970’s.

Kubert’s art was featured in a wide range of genres. He’s perhaps best known for co-creating the iconic war hero Sgt. Rock and the prehistoric caveman Tor, but served as an artist for many characters, including superheroes (his breakthrough in that genre was drawing Hawkman in the 1940’s) and provided his talents (as both an artist and writer) on an epic run for the pulp hero Tarzan for DC.

Of course, Kubert was active in horror comics as well. For DC comics, he contributed to the often macabre and supernatural anthology series Weird War Tales (serving also as the series editor) and sister title Weird Western Tales. Before Kubert achieved mainstream success, he did freelance work for many pre-code titles (much of them horror), to include Weird Horrors and Strange Terrors*.

Kubert was 85.