‘Innocence and Seduction: The Art of Dan DeCarlo: Expanded Edition’ (review)

Art by Dan DeCarlo 
Edited by Bill Morrison
Published by Fantagraphics

Innocence and Seduction: The Art of Dan DeCarlo is not a brand-new book but rather an expanded reissue of one from more than a decade ago. I actually have that original version on my shelf. The author is Bill Morrison, an estimable writer/artist/editor in his own right (Bongo Comics, Mad, Yellow Submarine).

Morrison’s subject here is certainly worthy of revisiting as, even after the book came out initially, Dan DeCarlo just never seems to really get the respect he deserves. Archie Comics fans know his name, as his style became the template for all other Archie artists for decades. But that was only one DeCarlo. There were three distinct phases of the man’s career.

The first was that he was one of the smoothest illustrators of the “girlie” cartoon panels that were all the rage from the 1940s through then 1970s.

The second was his longtime collaboration with Stan Lee in the 1950s on everything from Millie the Model to newspaper comic strips. By the time he got to Archie, everyone there was drawing in Bob Montana’s style. DeCarlo’s was similar but, again, with a smoothness that had been missing.

In time, everyone at Archie was drawing in a Dan DeCarlo style. In fact, throughout the 1970s, even DeCarlo’s two ill-fated sons were drawing Archie stories in their father’s style.

The book at hand is an art book, offering more than 270 beautifully laid out pages showcasing all the different eras and aspects of its subject’s artwork going back to teenage doodles. Interspersed throughout the pages is a very readable but almost surprisingly detailed ongoing biography and career profile.

Much of the artwork shown consists of full-color published pages, panels, covers, and strips, all reproduced from the printed versions, but there’s also a generous helping of original art. The artwork is well-chosen to present as wide a range as possible of DeCarlo’s output.

Along with Archie, Betty, Veronica, and the Riverdale gang, we’re treated to looks at the artist’s comic book work on Batman (with Harley Quinn), Elvira, The Simpsons, Kool-Aid Man, Vampirella, Radioactive Man, and more. Dan’s creation of Josie (as in “and the Pussycats”), based on and named after his wife, is dealt with as well.

The extra pages for this expanded edition round out the book with lots more vintage original art pages, including two entire unpublished stories from the 1950s, originally intended for a never released final issue of a comic called The Brain for Magazine Enterprises. One stars the Brain himself, and the other Russel the Muscle. They’re cute and well-drawn.

The highlights of Innocence and Seduction: The Art of Dan DeCarlo, though, are clearly DeCarlo’s women. Betty and Veronica may well be, as the late Victor Gorelick once said, perpetually 16 and a half, but that doesn’t mean that Dan’s clearly older and more developed women didn’t sometimes look just like them…even before he started working for Archie. No matter how naughty they got, though, they were never really “dirty.”

With a handful of photo pages supplementing that art and the bio, Bill Morrison has presented just a beautiful tribute to one of the most important—and prolific—comic book artists of them all. The book points out that prices on DeCarlo’s originals have gone up in recent years so maybe his work really is finally being “discovered” by the fans that mainly worship at the superhero altars.

These days Archie Comics are presented in various styles, including hip, modern, semi-realistic work, but the Archie digests are still out there, and they still feature new stories drawn in Dan’s classic style, as well as plenty of Dan DeCarlo reprints. Check them out yourself, but be sure to supplement with Innocence and Seduction:The Art of Dan DeCarlo.

Booksteve recommends.