Silverwolf Comics

Silverwolf Comics was a California-based American comic book publisher founded by Kris Silver in the mid-’80s with titles and characters created entirely by him. Among the titles it published during its run were Dark Assassin, Guillotine, Legion X-1, Port, and Victim.

The company is probably best known for giving the first popular exposure to the work of the artist Tim Vigil in his work on another Silverwolf title, Grips. Grips is one of a handful of titles that survived beyond the first few issues. Another notable distinction of Grips was that its main character’s alter-ego was a comic book illustrator whose own creation, dubbed Fat Ninja, was also put out as a title by Silverwolf　- in actuality written by Kris Silver). Fat Ninja was probably Silverwolf’s second most popular title after Grips. Tim Vigil also drew the first two issues of Nightmaster (only the first issue was published by Silverwolf. The second issue was published as a serial within the Greater Mercury Comics anthology GMC Action.) as well as the first and only two issues of Dragon Quest.

The company also published some of the first work by the artist Ron Lim. Lim drew the first four page Grips story in the pages of Silverwolf Bulletin #2 and reportedly also drew the first issue of Grips before Tim Vigil was hired and he re-drew the book. After Tim Vigil, Juan Muro was the artist for Grips. He did the artwork for two issues . Juan was never paid the agreed amount, instead he received a box of copies of the two issues from Mr Silver. Lim’s first published work (of a full comic book) came in the first issue of another title, Eradicators. Silverwolf was the first company to hire artist Rob Liefeld, though he never actually had any work published (he was hired to draw the first issue of Stech but he dropped out after finding other work and was replaced by Lorenzo Lizanna (later of Artline Studios).