| Dennis O'Neil | |
|---|---|
O'Neil at the 2009 Brooklyn Book Festival. |
|
| Born | Dennis J. O'Neil[1] May 3, 1939 St. Louis, Missouri |
| Nationality | American |
| Area(s) | Writer, Editor |
| Pseudonym(s) | Sergius O'Shaughnessy[2] Jim Dennis[3] |
| Notable works | Batman, Green Lantern/Green Arrow, The Question |
| Awards | Shazam Award, 1970, 1971 |
Dennis J. "Denny" O'Neil (born May 3, 1939,[4] in St. Louis, Missouri) is an American comic book writer and editor, principally for Marvel Comics and DC Comics in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, and Group Editor for the Batman family of books until his retirement.
His best-known works include Green Lantern/Green Arrow and Batman with Neal Adams, The Shadow with Mike Kaluta and The Question with Denys Cowan, all of which were hailed for their sophisticated stories that expanded the artistic potential of the mainstream portion of the medium. As an editor, he is principally known for editing the various Batman titles. Today, he sits on the board of directors of the charity The Hero Initiative.
Contents |
O'Neil was born into a Catholic household in St. Louis, Missouri. He still recalls from his youth the Sunday afternoon ritual where he would accompany his father or his grandfather to the store for some light groceries and an occasional comic book.[5]
O'Neil graduated from St. Louis University around the turn of the 1960s with a degree centered on English literature, creative writing, and philosophy. From there he joined the U.S. Navy just in time to participate in the blockade of Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis.[5]
After leaving the Navy, O'Neil moved on to a job with a newspaper in Cape Girardeau, Missouri. O'Neil wrote occasional columns on the subject for the newspaper, which attracted the attention of Roy Thomas, who would eventually himself become one of the great names in the history of the medium.[5]
When Roy Thomas left DC Comics to work for Stan Lee at Marvel Comics he suggested that O'Neil take the Marvel writer's test, which involved adding dialogue to a wordless four-page excerpt of a Fantastic Four comic; and O'Neil's entry impressed Lee enough to offer him a job.[5]
When Marvel's expansion made it impossible for Lee to continue writing the company's entire line of books, Lee passed as much on to Roy Thomas as he could, but still needed writers, so O'Neil took the reins for a short-term run of Doctor Strange stories in Strange Tales, penning six issues. He also wrote dialog for such titles as Rawhide Kid and Millie the Model, as well as scripting an issue of Daredevil over a plot by Lee when Lee went on holiday.
The available jobs writing for Marvel petered out fairly quickly, and O'Neil took a job with Charlton Comics under the pseudonym of Sergius O’Shaugnessy.[2] There he received regular work for a year and a half from Charlton's editor Dick Giordano.[5]
In 1968 Dick Giordano was offered an editorial position at DC Comics and took a number of Charlton freelancers with him, including O'Neil. Charlton talent arrived at DC from a different culture of comics. At DC, the office seemed like a snapshot from 1950, with a crowd of short-haired men in white shirts and ties. The jeans-wearing, hippy trended Charlton crowd visibly represented a different generation.
O'Neil's first assignments involved two strategies for bolstering DC's sales. One approach centered on the creation of new characters, and O'Neil scripted several issues of Beware the Creeper, a series starring a new hero, The Creeper, created by artist Steve Ditko. From there, DC moved O'Neil to Wonder Woman and Justice League of America. With artist Mike Sekowsky, he took away Wonder Woman's powers,[6] exiled her from the Amazon community, and set her off, uncostumed, into international intrigues with her blind mentor, the dubiously-named I Ching. These changes did not sit well with Wonder Woman's older fans, such as Gloria Steinem, and O'Neil later considered that de-powering DC's most well-known superheroine might have alienated readers. In Justice League, he had more success, introducing into that title the first socially and politically themed stories, setting the stage for later work on Green Lantern/Green Arrow.[5] He and artist Dick Dillin made several changes to the membership of the JLA by removing founding members the Martian Manhunter and Wonder Woman.[7]
Following the lead set by Bob Haney and Neal Adams in a Brave and the Bold story that visually redefined Green Arrow into the version that appeared in comics between 1969 and 1986, O'Neil stripped him of his wealth and playboy status, making him an urban hero. This redefinition would culminate in the character that appeared in Green Lantern/Green Arrow, (with many stories also drawn by Adams) a socially conscious, left-wing creation that effectively took over Green Lantern's book to use him as a foil and straw man in sounding out the political concepts that would define that work.[5] O'Neil went on to write Green Lantern for the balance of the 1970s, leaving the title in 1980 to return to Marvel Comics.
O'Neil's 1970s run on the Batman titles is perhaps his best-known endeavor, getting back to the character's darker roots after a period dominated by the campiness of the 1960s TV series,[8] emphasizing Batman's detective skills, and introducing new villains such as his own creation Ra's al Ghul. During this period, O'Neil frequently teamed up with his regular collaborator Adams (with Giordano often assisting on inks) on a number of memorable issues of both Batman and Detective Comics.
In 1973, O'Neil wrote revivals of two characters for which DC had recently acquired the publishing rights. A new series featuring the original Captain Marvel was launched with a February cover date and featured art by the character's original artist C. C. Beck.[9] Later that same year, O'Neil and artist Michael Kaluta produced an "atmospheric interpretation" of the 1930s pulp hero in The Shadow series.[10] A revival of the Green Lantern title in 1976 was launched by O'Neil and artist Mike Grell.[11] Reuniting with Adams, O'Neil co-wrote the oversize Superman vs. Muhammad Ali (1978) which Adams has called a personal favorite of their collaborations.[12]
Upon O'Neil's return to Marvel Comics in 1980, he took on the scripting chores for The Amazing Spider-Man, which he did for two years. He was the regular scripter for Iron Man from 1982–1986, and Daredevil, from 1983–1985. O'Neil's run on Daredevil ostensibly bridged the gap between when Frank Miller left the title and then returned for a memorable short run with David Mazzucchelli as artist.
O'Neil has written several novels, comics, short stories, reviews and teleplays, including the novelizations of the films Batman Begins[13] and The Dark Knight. [14] Under the pseudonym Jim Dennis,[3] O'Neil scripted a series of novels about a kung fu character named Richard Dragon, and later adapted those novels to comic book form for DC.[3]
O'Neil wrote a weekly column for ComicMix until October 2008.[15]
Joining Marvel's editorial staff in 1980, O'Neil edited Daredevil during Frank Miller's run as writer/artist, which is one of the most memorable takes on the character.[5] In the early-to-mid 1980s, O'Neil edited such Marvel titles as Alpha Flight, Power Man and Iron Fist, G.I. Joe, and Moon Knight.[16]
According to Bob Budiansky, O'Neil came up with the name for the Transformer Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots.[17]
In 1986, O'Neil moved over to DC as an editor, becoming group editor for the company's Batman titles. Speaking about his role in the death of character Jason Todd, O'Neil remarked:
O'Neil spent several years in the late nineties teaching a Writing for the Comics course at Manhattan's School of Visual Arts, sometimes sharing duties with fellow comic book writer John Ostrander.
O'Neil is the father of writer/director/producer Lawrence O'Neil, best known for the 1997 David Schwimmer vehicle, Breast Men.[19] O'Neil was previously married and later, after a divorce, married his high school sweetheart Marifran who is a retired teacher. He also had a bout with alcoholism sometime in the late 1970s or early 1980s. He has stated that his favorite people in the comic book field were Julius Schwartz and Jim Aparo.
O'Neil's work has won him a great deal of recognition in the comics industry, including the Shazam Awards for Best Continuing Feature Green Lantern/Green Arrow, Best Individual Story for "No Evil Shall Escape My Sight" in Green Lantern #76 (with Neal Adams), for Best Writer (Dramatic Division) in 1970 for Green Lantern, Batman, Superman, and other titles, and Best Individual Story for "Snowbirds Don't Fly" in Green Lantern #85 (with Neal Adams) in 1971. In 1985, DC Comics named O'Neil as one of the honorees in the company's 50th anniversary publication Fifty Who Made DC Great.[20]
In The Batman Adventures — the first DC Comics spinoff of Batman: The Animated Series — O'Neil appears as The Perfesser, one of a screwball trio of incompetent super-villains that also includes The Mastermind (a caricature of Mike Carlin) and Mr. Nice (a caricature of Archie Goodwin). The Perfesser is depicted as a tall, pipe-smoking genius who often gets lost in his own thoughts, and who regularly forgets to give his criminal friends crucial information in planning their heists. (For example, after carefully planning a hotel robbery, the trio arrives at the hotel's location to find a vacant lot. The Perfesser then remembers that the hotel was torn down several years ago.) He is also shown to perhaps be smarter than Batman, as he manages to figure out the Riddler's riddle in the third part of The Last Riddler Story, when Batman himself didn't.
| Preceded by Gardner Fox |
Justice League of America writer 1968–1970 |
Succeeded by Robert Kanigher |
| Preceded by Frank Robbins |
Detective Comics writer 1970–1972 |
Succeeded by Frank Robbins |
| Preceded by Frank Robbins |
Batman writer 1970–1975 |
Succeeded by David V. Reed |
| Preceded by Mike Friedrich |
Green Lantern writer 1970–1972 and 1976–1980 |
Succeeded by Bob Rozakis |
| Preceded by Len Wein |
Justice League of America writer 1975 |
Succeeded by Cary Bates |
| Preceded by Len Wein |
Detective Comics writer 1978–1980 |
Succeeded by Cary Burkett |
| Preceded by Marv Wolfman |
The Amazing Spider-Man writer 1980–1981 |
Succeeded by Roger Stern |
| Preceded by David Michelinie |
Iron Man writer 1982–1986 |
Succeeded by Danny Fingeroth |
| Preceded by Frank Miller |
Daredevil writer 1983–1985 |
Succeeded by Frank Miller |
| Preceded by Len Wein |
Batman Group Editor 1986–2000 |
Succeeded by Bob Schreck |