Elvis Mitchell is wrong about Jack Kirby and I don't even care
My chief beef is that in order to make a connection to current pop culture, Mitchell oversells Kirby's influence on the recent crop of superhero films. Kirby helped create the X-men, but X1 and X2 owe much of their sensibility to long-time X-book writer Chris Claremont. Only one character co-developed by Kirby (Jean Grey) is featured prominently in X2. The article implies that Kirby had a hand in creating modern X-men like Wolverine. He didn't; Wolverine was created by Len Wein and John Romita Sr., and Wein or Claremont invented most of the other new X-men.
And while it's true that Kirby helped father the Hulk, the big green guy is also one of his least interesting creations. The Hulk's tortured soul storyline is pure Stan Lee, and I bet the colourist came up with the purple pants.
Kirby's legacy lies not so much in the characters he helped create (though it's an impressive list), but in his kinetic, crackling, powerful artwork. An irony that's buried in Mitchell's article is that the movies based on Kirby characters or, as Mitchell suggests, Kirbian themes don't reflect Kirby's unmistakable visual style. The X-men movies are too sleek. The Matrix is all wu xia and anime. Star Wars comes the closest--Darth Vader looks like he might have sprung from Jack Kirby's expansive imagination, and the Death Star has some Kirby machine qualities. But still, I can't think of a single film that truly captures the Silver Age style that Kirby basically invented.
Kirby's influence continues to percolate throughout the comics world. As Michael Chabon says, "I don't think it's any accident that at this point in their history the entire Marvel universe and the entire DC universe are now all pinned or rooted on Kirby's concepts." It appears in video games like Freedom Force. Every once in a while someone affirms his status in the broader pop culture pantheon ("Now everyone who reads comic books knows that the Kirby Silver Surfer is the only TRUE Silver Surfer, now am I right or wrong?", a too-cool-for-you line from Crimson Tide likely inserted by Quentin Tarantino). Overall, though, it's an influence that's felt and not seen.
But whatever the flaws in Mitchell's article, they're forgivable on the grounds that he genuinely likes Kirby and would like to see him get some of his due. I agree entirely. A Fantastic Four movie would be a fitting tribute to Kirby. FF is probably his best body of work, and it's arguable that the book was at its finest under Lee/Kirby (whereas X-men reached its creative peak long after Lee and Kirby had left the series). And it would be great if some of Kirby's style--the impossible machinery, exploding universes, radiating energy--rubbed off on the director.
