Jeffrey Morgan - Comics

Comics

In 1966, DC Comics published Morgan's first writing in the comic book letters section of Batman #182.

• Later that decade, Morgan began writing numerous letters to the Marvel Comics Group, many of which were printed during the early 1970s in the letters section of such Marvel comics as Fantastic Four #95, The Amazing Spider-Man #82, Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos #78, The Avengers #73 and Conan the Barbarian #5. More often than not, whenever one of Morgan's letters wasn’t published, he received a compensatory Marvel No-Prize in the mail.

• It was during this second letter writing phase that Morgan’s first known piece of satirical writing was published. In the letters section of Captain America #122, he had two consecutive letters printed: the first under his own name and home address and, directly beneath it, a second separately-sent letter from "Toronto, Ontario" which he’d signed with the name of deceased villain Baron Zemo. In it, "Zemo" implored Marvel writer/editor Stan Lee against resurrecting Cap’s former World War II teen partner Bucky Barnes in favor of himself: "I’m begging you, Stan--keep the kid dead and let me return!" Lee, who had met Morgan eighteen months earlier in Toronto, wrote the following editorial reply: "Sooo! The infamous Baron Zemo is alive and well in Toronto, ehhh? (TORONTO?!?)".

• Over the next few years, Morgan’s style of comic book letter writing would become so distinctive that the iconoclastic American humor magazine National Lampoon parodied his letter writing style in their "Is Nothing Sacred?" issue (January 1972). In the Marvel pastiche Son-O’-God Comics which was written by Canadian associate editor Michel Choquette, the first letter in the fake letters section at the end of the story was attributed to having been written by "Stan Spooner, Toronto, Canada". This parody letter accurately spoofed Morgan’s writing style in tone and spirit, right down to its similar use of a spiritual closing salutation (Morgan: Pacem in Terris; Spooner: Yours in Christ).

• In 1973, Morgan began writing letters to CREEM, which led to his hiring, a year later, by Lester Bangs.

• One of Morgan's first instances as a comic book writer appeared in issue #16 (April 1979) of the alternative press anthology series Star*Reach. His 16-page cover story, Murphy’s Law, was illustrated by Ken Steacy.

• Morgan wrote volume two of Dean Motter's Vortex Comics series Mister X, the first volume of which ran 12 issues cover-dated June 1984 to August 1988. When Motter left the first, color series to work on other projects, he asked Morgan to assume the writing duties for a second, black-and-white volume, which ran 12 issues cover-dated April 1989 to March 1990.

• In 2008, again at Motter's behest, Morgan wrote the introduction to Volume One of Dark Horse Comics' hardcover omnibus Mister X: The Archives.

• In 2011, Dark Horse reprinted Morgan's Mister X stories in a 320 page deluxe hardcover edition titled The Brides of Mister X and Other Stories.

• In 2012, Morgan announced on Twitter that he was writing the introduction to Howard Chaykin's "considerably filthier" graphic novel prequel to Black Kiss, Black Kiss 2, to be published in 2013 by Image Comics.