Pilgrims Everywhere Are Curious

Those of you who read Marvel Feature #1 (and/or the scintillating PPC post reviewing it) which presented the debut of the dynamic Defenders  may have been wondering about the very strange inking work of artist Bill Everett on that story. Letter-writer Charles Meyerson bottom-lines it for us:

"The interior artwork was nice, but I wish that Bill Everett would revert to his crisp, clear style of inking. That scritchy-scratchy style is not at all suited to Ross Andru's pencils."

Whatever description of the work I was going for couldn't hold a candle to "scritchy-scratchy," so we'll go with that. As for the response, Marvel's designated response typist for "Defenders Dialogue" that month addressed every other point that Mr. Meyerson raised, but deftly sidestepped the scritchy-scratchy issue (it just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?) thusly:

"Finally, Roy and Ross have moved on to a new Marvel surprise, so how does Steve and Sal's work grab you? We'll be interested to hear, pilgrim."

Which we can probably take to mean, "That's on a need-to-know basis, pilgrim."

To add a little clarity to the situation, Vol. 1 of the Defenders Masterworks contains this quote from Thomas on the subject:

As noted, Everett skipped MF #2, but was present and accounted for in issue #3--and that went double for his inking, which returned to the quality that long-time Bill Everett fans remember well. So enjoy a quick peek at select scenes from that story, amply demonstrating that both Everett and Andru earned their pay for the week on this one.

What do you want to bet that druggist helped himself to a few samples from his prescription-only inventory following that encounter?