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| SPIDER-MAN: FEVER #1 preview art by Brendan McCarthy |
Brendan McCarthy, long known for his unique and innovative art work on the independent comic book scene, enters the Marvel Universe for the first time with SPIDER-MAN: FEVER #1 on April 7 as he writes and draws one of the Webslinger's most bizarre meetings yet with Doctor Strange.
"I used to read the Marvel Silver Age material when I was a boy, and the 1960's [AMAZING] SPIDER-MAN ANNUAL [#2] which featured both Spider-Man and Doctor Strange was a standout story for me," recalls McCarthy. "I really loved [artist Steve] Ditko's surreal dimensional landscapes peopled with sinister sorcerers and Mindless Ones. There was nothing like it in any other comic."
As for the origins of FEVER, the project came together fairly effortlessly.
"A few years ago, Steve Wacker, the editor of the Spider-Man line, asked me if I'd like to do something new for Marvel, so a kind of loose sequel to that 60's story was pitched by me," McCarthy explains. "And in a short while, it was green lit!"
McCarthy's story reunites Peter Parker and Stephen Strange as Spider-Man finds himself out of his depth in some mystical shenanigans.
"In a nutshell, Spider-Man's soul is abducted by a tribe of spider-demons and taken to a bizarre spider-dimension to be eaten and Doctor Strange attempts to rescue him," summarizes McCarthy.
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| SPIDER-MAN: FEVER #1 preview art by Brendan McCarthy |
"I am very interested in the imaginative creation of different realities by certain artists and writers," he relates. "I think Ditko had a very original vision, influenced by surrealist art such as [Max] Ernst and [Joan] Miro's paintings, and the psychedelic vibe that was in the air at that time in the 60's. I liked that Doctor Strange is a sorcerer and a mystic; the character foreshadowed the interests of a large section of youth in the 1960's, in eastern mysticism and the occult, [with Aleister] Crowley, [Carlos] Castaneda, etc.
"I think Doctor Strange is [Ditko's] great masterpiece, especially the great Eternity storyline. I also like Ditko's villains and the concepts behind his characters. There is often a concern with madness in his work; insanity seems like a constant theme, for some reason."
Beyond Ditko, McCarthy has enjoyed work by a number of Marvel's other signature creators throughout the decades.
"Obviously, Stan Lee, Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko were the foundation of my appreciation of comic book art," he lists. "I liked [Jim] Steranko a lot as well. Later on, Barry Smith's Conan was a big deal for me. Rich Buckler's Deathlok I liked too. Neal Adams' X-Men. More recently, I enjoyed Frank Quitely's NEW X-MEN run, and Mark Millar's ULTIMATES and KICK ASS have been very strong."
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| SPIDER-MAN: FEVER #1 preview art by Brendan McCarthy |
"This is the only long-form comic story I've worked on for almost 15 years," he points out. "I had moved into film, TV and animation and learnt a lot about story structure and writing, especially from George Miller, the 'Mad Max' creator, whom I worked with for a long while. But writing and drawing a comic is as much hard work as a movie, I can assure you!
"Working on my own material is a lot of fun. But I equally enjoyed creating this story, my first for Marvel. It's hopefully of good quality and originality. I definitely wanted to take the reader someplace new and in a style that wasn't totally 'filmic' in the storytelling approach."
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