Remembering Darwyn Cooke

Darwyn Cooke, the award-winning comic book creator, passed away recently on May 14th. He was 53. There were never any reports of him going through health complications as I recall, but suddenly his wife Marsha Cooke announced he was receiving palliative care following a bout with aggressive cancer.

As an artist, Darwyn Cooke's style was reminiscent of a bygone era yet somehow still appeared very modern, something that you wouldn't expect to see in a generation overrun by ridiculously muscular characters, and detailed, almost Hollywood-ish influence. No, his art had this feeling of cartoonish sense of innocence, in a way that reminds us of our sweet childhood memories watching our favorite Saturday morning cartoons.

I was first introduced to his work, and most likely others as well, through 2004's critically acclaimed limited series DC: The New Frontier. As the sole creator of the series, he wrote and illustrated all 6 issues which starred numerous iconic DC superheroes. The series won multiple Eisner and Harvey awards and was adapted into an animated movie in 2008.

DC: The New Frontier is most probably Cooke's most recognized work. As mentioned earlier, I learned about him through this series and it's always a recommended reading whenever people talk about Cooke.

And as I looked up more on Cooke's work I learned that he worked on 2002's Catwoman with another one of my favorite comic book writers Ed Brubaker. While his stint on the series may be brief (he only illustrated the first four issues), he gave Catwoman a stylish redesign for a modern audience, a look that defined a new era for the character.

Those two works are some of the best stories in superhero comics. But I'd only truly appreciated Cooke's work when I read his adaptations of Richard Stark's Parker crime-noir novels. I'm a sucker for crime fiction so when I heard of the Parker comics, I jumped in on that in a heartbeat.

Now you'd think his simplistic and cartoonish style would be lost in a crime noir setting, however it only elevated his art to a new level. The Parker graphic novels are a demonstration of his versatility. Mixing the grit with the pure, the black and white, the monochromatic tone he chose to go with perfectly captures the essence of the novels. After all, author Richard Stark (real name Donald E. Westlake) gave him permission to actually use the name Parker for the adaptations, when many times before it was always changed to something else that just rhymed.

To be honest I have not seen the majority of his work. The ones mentioned here are only the few I was able to read, so one might say I don't satisfy the criteria of being a "true fan." Be that as it may, the Parker graphic novels are masterpieces in the world of crime comics, and it's influenced my reading in a big way.

On another note, Cooke announced a new psychological thriller ongoing series called Revengeance more than a year ago. Sadly, it never saw the light of day, but I'm still hopeful.

It's truly unfortunate that we won't be able to see a legend at work any more in the future. So in closing I'd like to thank you, Mr. Cooke. The comic book industry surely lost a great one.