Journey #21 pg.3 by William Messner-Loebs (1985)

No way!  Next thing you'll tell me is the other guy is named Deadpool.

Amazing stand alone page, Loebs beautifully in the Eisner tradition

Sleeping in when he should be out chicken hunting.

A guy named Wolverine should definitely be on the list!

"The Dark Man Loves You" image in the top panel is creepy AF! it's awesome! I wonder if OA collectors keep lists like this for when they meet other collectors about what they collect, or if they leave you comments on CAF instead of just hitting the Like button.

Very lively pencilling. Messner-Loebs' style is reminiscent of the Jack Davis school of cartooning. By the way, Rick, did you see and/or bid on the back cover to Journey #1 on ComicLink 2 days ago? I don't know what's going on, but it was hand-colored, when it previously wasn't. So either there's two of them, or someone stupidly had it colored very recently.

No, I didn't buy it. Funny, I actually sold that back cover back when I purchased the front cover. After now seeing it colored, wish I hadn't split them up. 

Yeah, I don't understand what would make someone think, "Yeah, a full hand coloring is what this cover needs!". I'm curious though, given that you have the back cover for issue #2, why did you feel okay selling off the one from the first issue?

I actually had quite a bit of Journey art at that time, several interior pages and a couple other covers. I had decided to keep only my best examples and sold everything but the #1 front cover and the page 1 splash to issue #2. Since then I've rekindled my nostalgia for the series and added the rest of what you see in the collection, including the front and back covers to issue #2. In hindsight, I should have kept the back cover to #1 but now it's no longer desirable, at least to me ;)

Ah, I see. Yeah, losing interest and parting with art and then rekindling interest is something that happens to us at times, so I understand. What a shame that whoever bought it from you (I assume it was them) got it colored and didn't even bother to have the colorist make any notation so we know who did the work, just for the provenance, regardless of the fact that we' don't like the fact that it was done to begin with.

Hi, guys, I wonder if this helps – back in 2020 I bought the full colour back cover of Journey 5 off eBay from someone in Germany (I have not posted it on CAF yet). I am pretty sure it is the original used for the back cover as the colour application matches and there is bleed-through on the reverse of the page. A couple of years later someone else on eBay posted the black and white line art for the back cover of Journey 5, and it is still on the site as of this writing. It looks identical but the signature on that drawing does not match the signature on the printed back cover. I do not think that is a forgery, but it is possible that mine is a photocopy of the original which has had colour added to it (can’t distinguish if the black on mine is toner or India ink). So it may be that both versions were unsigned until the end, and my colour version was used to print the back cover from but it is not the original line art. So there are two “originals”. It might be the same with the back cover(s) of issue 1 of Journey, as well as other covers on that title. I think Tim Bradstreet had a similar method because Mark, TB’s rep, would sometimes have two versions of Hellblazer covers on his Splashpageart.com site at the same time; one of the black and white line art and one of the colour version. The way to get a definitive answer would be to ask Bill Messner-Loebs himself who I think can be contacted via his website – bloebs.com – and also Clifford Meth who is organising Bill’s GoFundMe campaign has a link to Bill’s facebook page in the write-up to Bill’s second campaign (a second campaign was started because a bug in the first one was preventing people from donating). On a separate note: I did think that there was one thing missing from your superlative Journey gallery, Rick, and that was a page which features both MacAlistaire and Craft. You have completed the puzzle with a missing piece. Thank for sharing that; it is always nice to see a page featuring the mismatched pair.

I think you are 100% correct Simon. After comparing the published book colors to the recent offering, they match perfectly. It must have been a colored print of the original line art. That clears things up but now leaves me with wanting to find the color art for my #1 cover ;) 

I also see that the color art was listed as 8-1/2" x 11". The original b&w art was 11" x 17".  

Thank you, Rick, for your message because that clears up for certain what I have as it too is 8.5 inches by 11 inches. I have the original hand-colouring of a print of the original art for the back cover of Journey 5. As it has been five years since I got it I have missed my opportunity to take this up with eBay or the seller even if I had his eBay id (and I don’t) and it could be said it was the original art for the back cover anyway. Another big clue I should have seen was that it was relatively cheap at €170. If it too good to be true then it is. I won’t be chasing down the original line art version. As for your version of the cover for Journey 1 – I think if you were to ask any CAF member which they would prefer between a page of Frank Miller’s OA for Dark Knight Returns or a page of Lynn Varley’s colour art (“not a colour guide”) for the same page then the answer would be unanimously the former, but I can see why you would like to reunite the two (assuming the colour version exists) so all I can add is, as the saying goes, “I hope you find what you’re looking for”.

Great page!  Loved this series

It's so cool to be introduced to stuff I never read, thanks Rick!

Excellent page bravo !!