Michael Netzer - Early Life

Early Life

Michael Nasser (later Netzer) was born in Detroit, Michigan, to parents of Lebanese origin. He contracted polio at the age of eight months which partially paralyzed his left hip and leg. After two years of medical treatment, he was sent with his mother and siblings to his father's Druze hometown, Dayr Qūbil, Lebanon. In 1967, at the age of 11, he returned to Detroit. In school, he became interested in comic book illustration and storytelling, and began developing skills as an artist. He used his art for a campaign that won him election of vice-president of his senior class in Redford High School, where he also gained the rank of lieutenant colonel in the JROTC program.

During high school, Netzer met Greg Theakston, who introduced him to the world of professional comics art. He worked as a sign painter and graphic designer while attending Wayne State University in Michigan for two years. Theakston later introduced him to Neal Adams at the Detroit Triple Fan Fair comics convention in 1975. Adams took interest in Netzer's art and invited him to join Continuity Studios.