Fire & Water #225 – Aquaman and Firestorm Cover To Cover

Shag and Rob have the difficult task of identifying just ten of their favorite Firestorm and Aquaman covers! So many gorgeous pieces of art over the decades to choose from, but only ten covers for each hero may be selected! Featuring work by some of the greatest comic book artists of all time!

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Opening theme, “That Time is Now,” by Michael Kohler. Closing music by The Bad Mamma Jammas.

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15 responses to “Fire & Water #225 – Aquaman and Firestorm Cover To Cover

  1. Great episode boys! Count me in for wanting more cover-based episodes. Maybe look at covers from specific eras from DC or other companies’ history. I’d have to go with that Darwyn Cooke Aquaman/Mera cover as my current favorite. His entire run from that series was 1st rate.

    Now, if Shag is Veronica & Rob is Bett – who’s Archie (the cute guy who’s coming between you)?

  2. Cardy’s the top Aquaman cover artist, but my favorite (at the moment) goes to David M. DeVries. Known mostly as a writer and sometime cover artist, his multimedia painting for Aquaman #1 (’89 mini from Giffen/Fleming/Swan/Vey) was strange but striking… definitely memorable.

    First time I saw Firestorm was on the cover of DC Comics Presents #17 as drawn by JLGL PBHN, so that’s my go-to favorite. Runner up? Fury of Firestorm #56. I’ve got issues with BRO, but you can’t deny that cover design. It stood out even in those tiny “Legends” house ads.

    1. No denying the power of Nick Cardy. So good! And that AQUAMAN #1 (89) multimedia painting was amazing!! I remember when I was taking a photography class for school, one of my favorite black & white photos I took was of that cover. Yes, I took pictures of Aquaman comics for a school assignment. 🙂

      And FURY OF FIRESTORM #56 came VERY close to making my list. The cover design is outstanding. The only reason it didn’t make the list was the Hawk drawing (and callout arrow), and something was lacking on Professor Stein and Ronnie.

      Great suggestions!!

  3. Great show guys! More please!

    I’m surprised Aquaman (Vol.1) #45 didn’t make Rob’s list, since he used it to shame BP and got some social media buzz out of it. It’s a great cover to boot!

    Aquaman45

    I’m also a fan of the cover of issue #50
    Aquaman50

    If I were going to pick a Ramona Fradon Aqua-centric Super Friends issue, I’d go with #27. Great cover, and my intro to Mera and Aqualad!
    SF27

    The cover to Fury of Firestorm #34 is obviously a big Ditko Spider-Man homage, but I really like it!
    Fury34

    But I really enjoyed hearing (and seeing) your picks. I like every single one of ’em. You guys have good taste! That much is obvious, look who you choose to hang out with. 😉

    Chris

  4. Fun podcast, count my vote for Aquaman#42 as an all-time classic cover, also seeing Black Manta and Ocean Master together on the cover of #35 is awesome. Aquaman #18 should get a nod as well if only because seeing most of the JLA wearing air breathing helmuts is funny. For Firestorm, #1(78) is a nice classic image cover, also I picked that one off the spinner rack!

  5. Oh, I loved this show! It really puts the lie to Rob’s recent grumpy comment online about the silliness of doing a show focused on art. As I said, you have the gallery posts, and here you use them well.

    Shag, you intrigued me, what was that about changing the title from ‘Fury of Firestorm’ to ‘Firestorm’ being a bit of a kerfuffle?

    It must be harder to pick the best Aquaman covers as he has had so many by Aparo (not a favourite artist in general but a favourite Aquaman artist) and Cardy.

    Rob is spot on, that Firestorm #50 cover loses marks for the boring logo and melodramatic cover copy – Denny O’Neil kept doing this on books he took over as editor, eg Captain Atom and Iron Man.

    I hate the elemental Firestorm costume so much – he looks like someone set the Creeper on fire (not in itself a bad thing) that no cover with him has a cat in hell’s chance with me. Similarly, the New 52 version, with his armoured look. I did put some Firestorm faves on the Facebook post for this show, I won’t repeat them all here but I will give a shout out to the unusual and attractive JJ Birch (did Joe Brozowski use a different name because he was trying to swipe less, find his own style?) and Sam De La Rosa image for Firestorm #72. The figure being sucked into a cosmic eddy (sounds like an Archie superhero), the tumbling clocks, the interaction of the logo with the art, the colours… just beautiful.

    As for an Aquaman cover, as I said, what a massive selection of great options. Let’s plump for Aquaman #53, ‘Is California sinking?’ (which elicits two response – ‘Who cares?’ and ‘Did this perhaps inspire the seminal Sub Diego sequence?) As well as nostalgia – I think it was the first Aquaman cover I ever saw, via house ad – the image is so striking, with Arthur’s desperate struggle to save so many people, amid the novelty of two levels of ‘set’, something you might expect to see more often in a series about a chap of two worlds. The composition is compelling, the copy dramatic, the colouring as striking as it is intelligent – winner winner chicken dinner!

    That David DeVries Aquaman multimedia cover Michel mentions looks to have inspired Dave McKean for Sandman #I.

    1. Thanks for the feedback! We’ll cover the kerfuffle about changing the title in future episodes covering FIRESTORM comics. 🙂

  6. Both of you guys are obviously much bigger Aquaman fans than I am, but I thought Rob did a great job of picking covers through Aquaman’s entire career. The main thing I hated about DC’s Cover to Cover Batman and Superman books was that almost have the covers featured in both were five years old or newer.

    Plus, if I were picking my 10 favorite Aquaman covers, I would have nine that were a mix of Cardy and Aparo and one Jose Luis Garcia Lopez. My favorite Aquaman cover was the Black Manta one that Shag picked.

    I didn’t want to leave you out Shag, but I haven’t seen many Firestorm covers.

  7. Loved this episode. I don’t think of an art-centric episode being that much of stretch, since the comics themselves are so visual, especially since having a website to complement the show works so well. Please feel free to do more like this.

    I had that Super Friends poster on my wall as a kid, and like Shagg, the Craig Hamilton mini-series was the first Aquaman comic I ever bought. Just glorious.

    Funny thing about Firestorm #7 with Plastique. I remember borrowing it from a friend. At school. During class. And with how Firestorm saves the day, um, kinda awkward! I really don’t know how a teacher didn’t bust me for reading it. Anyway, totally agree that cover is stunning.

  8. This was a great show concept. I was able to listen on my phone with the gallery open on my browser, so no issues there. Rob! If you ever want to do an episode covering all of Joshua Middleton’s covers together, I’d LOVE to join you! In fact… if you don’t want to talk to me, you could collaborate with Stella from the Batgirl To Oracle podcast and cover Middleton’s incredible Batgirl covers as well. Pairing this list down must have been TOUGH. Especially for Aquaman who’s had a longer history and some amazing cover artists over the years. Covers that I would have added: Aquaman 01 from the Giffen series with the painterly shadow box, Nick Cardy’s Cover featuring Aquaman and Mera’s Wedding. The cover for When The Sea Dies. And all of them. As for Firestorm, I really like the compositions of issues 23 and 56 of Fury of Firestorm. Those are fantastic. Great show, guys! I always like these kinds of episodes. Tam Ponarese. Nice one, Shag.

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