Russ Manning

Russell Manning (born 1929, California, United States; died 1981) was an American comic book artist who created the series "Magnus, Robot Fighter" and illustrated such newspaper comic strips as "Tarzan" and "Star Wars". He was inducted into the Comic Book Hall of Fame in 2006.

Manning studied at the Los Angeles Art Institute, and later, during his Army service in Japan, drew cartoons for the newspaper at his military base.

In 1953, he went to work for Western Publishing and illustrated stories for the wide variety of comics published by Western for Dell Comics, and later for Western's own Gold Key Comics line. His first notable work was on "Brothers of the Spear", a backup feature, created by Gaylord Du Bois in the "Tarzan" comic book. He also drew a few Tarzan stories. He created Gold Key's "Magnus Robot Fighter" in 1963 and drew the first 21 issues, through 1968.

From 1965 to 1972, Manning drew Gold Key's "Tarzan" series. During this time, he drew the first 11 Tarzan novels written by Edgar Rice Burroughs, from scripts (written by Gaylord Du Bois) adapting them. The first 8 of these have been reprinted by Dark Horse Comics as "Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan of the Apes" ("Tarzan of the Apes", "Return", "Beasts", and "Son of Tarzan"), "Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan - The Jewels of Opar" ("Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar" and "Jungle Tales of Tarzan"), and "Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan The Untamed" ("Tarzan the Untamed" and "Tarzan the Terrible"). He also drew the Korak stories in the first 11 issues of Gold Key's "Korak" comic (also written by Du Bois).

From 1969 to 1972 he did the "Tarzan" daily newspaper strip, and stayed on the Sunday page until 1979. He also created 4 original Tarzan graphic novels for European publication. Two of them have recently been reprinted by Dark Horse Comics in a single trade paperback collection ("Tarzan in The Land That Time Forgot" and "The Pool of Time") (ISBN 1-56971-151-8). During that period he used assistants, among them William Stout, Mike Royer and Dave Stevens.

"Magnus", his and Gold Key's best-known heroic-adventure series, was set in the year 4000, which Manning depicted as clean, airy cityscapes populated by shiny robots, handsome men and beautiful women. In an era when many science fiction illustrations showed interstellar spaceships with antique-looking fins reminiscent of V-2 rockets of World War II, Manning offered more exotic craft. His Magnus work is being reprinted in hardcover 'archive' editions by Dark Horse Comics with a different color palette.

His final major work was writing and drawing the Star Wars newspaper strip in 1979-80. This work has been collected by Dark Horse Comics as "Classic Star Wars: The Early Adventures" (ISBN 1-56971-178-X), which omitted the fact that Manning only drew some of the episodes that were written by Steve Gerber and Archie Goodwin (the latter used the pseudonym "R.S. Helm" on the original strips).

The Russ Manning Award is named for him.

External links

* [http://www.erbzine.com/mag8/0830.html ERBzine's Manning Tribute]
* [http://www.lambiek.net/artists/m/manning_r.htm Lambiek's page on Manning]