Todd McFarlane was born on March 16, 1961, in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, [2] [8] to Bob and Sherlee McFarlane. [9] He is the second [10] of three sons, [11] which McFarlane says contributed to his competitive streak. [10] Curtis and Derek. Bob worked in the printing business, which led him to take work where he could find it, and as a result, during McFarlane's childhood, the family lived in thirty different places from Alberta to California. [9] [12] Prototype version of the character Spawn, which McFarlane drew in his teens Todd McFarlane's adjective-less Spider-Man series, released during the summer of 1990, was, for all intents and purposes, the opening bell for the speculator bubble of the 1990s. We all know what happened, we all know why it happened, and we all see aspects of it being repeated by the industry today. Even though McFarlane’s visual style of the character was an interesting departure from the regular Spider-Man storylines, his overall storytelling and writing were pretty inconsistent. The artistic flair he brought to Spidey with the hyper-detailed webbing and attention he paid to the faces and bodies of all the characters created a moodier, more intense atmosphere for Spider-Man than fans might have been accustomed to. It makes sense that his next major character was a horror-inspired antihero with Spawn. The issue with him working on Spider-Man was that attempting to age him up doesn’t have to mean sacrificing the lighter aspects of the character. He can still deal with serious threats without giving up the fundamental fun that defines Spider-Man. The expansion of the Spawn Universe also had its roots in Image’s early days; when the founding members chose to do their own books, McFarlane did Spawn solo but always wanted to connect with the other books. In recent years, McFarlane has illustrated comic books less often, focusing on entrepreneurial efforts, such as McFarlane Toys and Todd McFarlane Entertainment, a film and animation studio.

Now, Spawn is slated to break another record when Spawn #350 releases in early 2024, which will see someone finally take the throne of hell. This collection does contain a series created for and by McFarlane and up to instalment 14 it was being pencilled by Todd and then he left to create his own legendary creature. The art and the stories are quite brilliant and it is sad that the McFarlane period ends in a crossover with X-Force in a story that is poor and makes no sense whatsoever for the reader of this Spiderman series, it pulls the high quality down and the editor in his wisdom decided to add the second part of the story by another artist. With the exception of the crossover the rest of the stories often in more than one part are vintage McFarlane and are quite beautiful and very original drawn.As a filmmaker, he produced the 1997 film adaptation of Spawn starring Michael Jai White. He will make his directorial debut with the reboot film, which will star Jamie Foxx. Gary St. Lawrence (November 19, 1993). "The Peter David-Todd McFarlane Debate: Topic: Has Image Comics/Todd McFarlane been treated fairly by the media?". Comics Buyer's Guide #1044, pp. 92, 98, 102, 108, 113, 116 During Image's early years of operation, the company was subject to much industry criticism over aspects of its business practices, including late-shipped books, [5] and its creators' emphasis of art over writing. One of these critics was McFarlane's former Hulk collaborator, writer Peter David. This came to a head during a public debate they participated in at Philadelphia's Comicfest convention in October 1993, which was moderated by artist George Pérez. McFarlane stated that Image was not being treated fairly by the media, and by David in particular. The three judges, Maggie Thompson, editor of the Comics Buyer's Guide, William Christensen of Wizard Press, and John Danovich of the magazine Hero Illustrated, voted 2–1 in favor of David, with Danovich voting the debate a tie. [39] Haunt, an ongoing series co-created by McFarlane and Robert Kirkman, was announced in 2007 and launched on October 7, 2009. [45] The comic was initially written by Kirkman, penciled by Ryan Ottley, and inked by McFarlane, with Greg Capullo providing layouts. McFarlane contributed pencils to some issues, and co-wrote issue 28, the series finale, with Joe Casey, who took over writing duties from Kirkman. [46]

Boucher, Geoff (May 9, 2013). "FIRST LOOK: Neil Gaiman's avenging Angela will make Marvel history". Entertainment Weekly. Archived from the original on November 22, 2017 . Retrieved May 9, 2013.KORN…IN THEIR WORDS (Close Up With Jonathan)" (Press release). Sony Music. Archived from the original on September 24, 2012 . Retrieved March 20, 2010. Oshry, Dave (March 17, 2012). "McFarlane says 38 Studios' Amalur MMO is coming this year". VG247.com. Retrieved January 17, 2018. A rough read but a pleasure to flip through. I've never been an ardent enjoyer of McFarlane's work and have very limited nostalgia for the '90s, but there were certain McFarlane works that really worked for me. I really liked his time on the early issues of PAD's Incredible Hulk run, and his contribution to Amazing Spider-Man on David Michelinie's run is stellar. Marvel gave McFarlane the reins to his own Spidey book eventually, though it would be an adjectiveless series that ran separate from ASM. The artwork is stunning, but oh boy are the stories meandering and dull. Instead of building anything meaningful around Peter Parker and Spider-Man, the fifteen or so issues he worked on this title was just a smattering of random hero pairings like Ghost Rider and Wolverine as he prolongs conflicts against villains like the Lizard, Hobgoblin (the weird demon version), Morbius and the Wendigo. To add to to just how '90s this was, there was also the issue where the entire story was in landscape format which is still the most yikes thing I've seen attempted by publishers. Just don't. Li C. Kuo (September 8, 2006). "Curt Schilling Founds Green Monster Games". GameSpy. Archived from the original on October 14, 2007 . Retrieved December 31, 2007. These issues were all originally on newsprint. I have a few of them that I bought off the stands and a couple more that I traded for in my earliest days of comics reading.

Miot, Stephanie (June 8, 2012). "Third Strike for 38 Studios, Curt Schilling Leads to Bankruptcy Filing". PC Magazine. Retrieved January 17, 2018.Sergi, Joe (2015). The Law for Comic Book Creators: Essential Concepts and Applications. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company. p.77. ISBN 978-0-7864-7360-1. McFarlane stated in a 1992 interview that he was an atheist. [23] Bibliography [ edit ] Awesome Comics [ edit ]