TwoMorrows Publishing
Encyclopedia
TwoMorrows Publishing is a publisher of magazine
Magazine
Magazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles. They are generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...

s about comic books, founded in 1994 by John and Pam Morrow out of their small advertising agency in Raleigh
Raleigh, North Carolina
Raleigh is the capital and the second largest city in the state of North Carolina as well as the seat of Wake County. Raleigh is known as the "City of Oaks" for its many oak trees. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the city's 2010 population was 403,892, over an area of , making Raleigh...

, North Carolina
North Carolina
North Carolina is a state located in the southeastern United States. The state borders South Carolina and Georgia to the south, Tennessee to the west and Virginia to the north. North Carolina contains 100 counties. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte...

. Its products also include books and DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....

s.

Jack Kirby Collector

After the death of comics creator Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby , born Jacob Kurtzberg, was an American comic book artist, writer and editor regarded by historians and fans as one of the major innovators and most influential creators in the comic book medium....

, lifelong Kirby fan John Morrow and his wife Pam contacted Roz Kirby, the artist's widow, about an ongoing magazine devoted to her husband's work and legacy. She gave it her authorization.

Jack Kirby Collector was first published in limited quantities as a small, black-and-white magazine focusing on Kirby artwork and articles by Morrow and a few fellow collectors and fans. As each issue grew in size, it began to include rare or previously unpublished Kirby art, as well as uninked
Inker
The inker is one of the two line artists in a traditional comic book or graphic novel. After a pencilled drawing is given to the inker, the inker uses black ink to produce refined outlines over the pencil lines...

 pencil versions of published art. Soon the magazine was being published on better paper, with glossy color covers. New and veteran comics artists were given the chance to ink reproductions of Kirby's original pencil work. Each issue carried the notation "Fully Authorized by the Kirby Estate". The magazine went on to be nominated for several awards.

The Morrows as well have launched fundraiser projects to fund the preservation of the thermostatic
Thermostatic
Thermostatic are a Swedish electronic band, formed in Gothenburg in 2003. Their music can be said to fall within the genre categories of bitpop and synthpop, with the band inspired by the "video games and computer era of the eighties."...

 copies of Kirby's uninked pencils by scanning over 5,000 pages and cleaning them for future researchers and readers.

Other magazines

Jack Kirby Collector contributor Jon B. Cooke approached the two Morrows about launching another magazine that would cover the comics of the 1960s and '70s. This magazine, Comic Book Artist
Comic Book Artist
Comic Book Artist was an American magazine founded by Jon B. Cooke devoted to anecdotal histories of American comic books, with emphasis on comics published since the 1960s...

, launched under the TwoMorrows imprint in 1998 and would go on to win several Eisner Awards. TwoMorrows also picked up Comicology, a magazine devoted to current comics, and which lasted four issues.

TwoMorrows expanded again with a revival of former Marvel editor-in-chief Roy Thomas
Roy Thomas
Roy William Thomas, Jr. is an American comic book writer and editor, and Stan Lee's first successor as editor-in-chief of Marvel Comics. He is possibly best known for introducing the pulp magazine hero Conan the Barbarian to American comics, with a series that added to the storyline of Robert E...

 1960s fanzine, Alter Ego
Alter Ego (fanzine)
Alter Ego is an American magazine devoted to comic books and comic-book creators of the 1930s to late-1960s periods comprising what fans and historians call the Golden Age and Silver Age of Comic Books....

— initially as a flip book
Flip book
A flip book or flick book is a book with a series of pictures that vary gradually from one page to the next, so that when the pages are turned rapidly, the pictures appear to animate by simulating motion or some other change. Flip books are often illustrated books for children, but may also be...

 with Comic Book Artist, then in 1999 as a standalone publication.

In 2001, TwoMorrows launched Draw! a magazine edited by animation and comics artist Mike Manley that centered on how-to and related articles for cartoonists and animators. At the same time, comics author and editor Danny Fingeroth
Danny Fingeroth
Daniel "Danny" Fingeroth is an American comic book writer and editor, better known for a long stint as group editor of the Spider-Man books at Marvel Comics.-Career:...

 started Write Now, a magazine of how to write comics and animation. In 2003, Jon B. Cooke left TwoMorrows to take Comic Book Artist to another publisher, Top Shelf Productions
Top Shelf Productions
Top Shelf Productions is an American publishing company founded in 1997, owned and operated by Chris Staros and Brett Warnock and a small staff. The company is based in Marietta, Georgia, Portland, Oregon, and New York City, New York....

. The Morrows hired former comics writer and editor Michael Eury, author of the book Captain Action
Captain Action
Captain Action was an action figure, from 1966, equipped with a wardrobe of costumes allowing him to become Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, Captain America, Aquaman, the Phantom, The Lone Ranger , Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, Sgt. Fury, Steve Canyon, and the Green Hornet. Captain Action was the Ideal...

, to launch a successor publication. The new title, Back Issue Magazine
Back Issue Magazine
Back Issue is an American magazine published by TwoMorrows Publishing, based in Raleigh, North Carolina. Founded in 2003 and published eight times yearly, it features articles and art about comic books of the 1970s to the 1990s....

, debuted in 2003. Rough Stuff magazine, a spin-off of Back Issue Magazine, focusing on previously unpublished penciled pages, preliminary sketches, detailed layouts and unused inked artwork debuted in July 2006.

Books and DVDs

TwoMorrows has also published several books devoted to comics and comic history. The first was the Eisner Award-winning trade paperback Streetwise
Streetwise
Streetwise may refer to:*Rover Streetwise, a small hatchback made by the MG Rover Group*Possessing knowledge of youth culture, also called "street"...

, a collection of autobiographical stories by such creators as Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby
Jack Kirby , born Jacob Kurtzberg, was an American comic book artist, writer and editor regarded by historians and fans as one of the major innovators and most influential creators in the comic book medium....

, Sergio Aragones
Sergio Aragonés
Sergio Aragonés Domenech is a cartoonist and writer best known for his contributions to Mad Magazine and creator of the comic book Groo the Wanderer....

, Sam Glanzman
Sam Glanzman
Sam J. Glanzman is an American comic-book artist, best known for his Charlton Comics series Hercules, about the mythological Greek demigod; his biographical war stories about his service aboard the U.S.S...

, Murphy Anderson
Murphy Anderson
Murphy Anderson is an American comic book artist, known as one of the premier inkers of his era, who has worked for companies such as DC Comics for over fifty years, starting in the 1930s-'40s Golden Age of Comic Books...

, and Nick Cardy
Nick Cardy
Nick Cardy , a.k.a. Nick Cardi, is an American comic book artist best known for his DC Comics work on Aquaman, the Teen Titans and other major characters....

. Others include The Warren
Warren Publishing
Warren Publishing was an American magazine company founded by James Warren, who published his first magazines in 1957 and continued in the business for decades...

 Companion
and The Fawcett
Fawcett Comics
Fawcett Comics, a division of Fawcett Publications, was one of several successful comic book publishers during the Golden Age of Comic Books in the 1940s...

 Companion
, chronicling the histories of the defunct publishers; Kimota! The Miracleman
Miracleman
Marvelman, also known as Miracleman for trademark reasons in his American reprints and story continuation, is a fictional comic book superhero created in 1954 by writer-artist Mick Anglo for publisher L. Miller & Son. Originally intended as a United Kingdom home-grown substitute for the American...

 Companion
, about the British comic book
History of the British comic
A British comic is a periodical published in the United Kingdom that contains comic strips. It is generally referred to as a comic or a comic magazine, and historically as a comic paper....

 character; G-Force
G-force
The g-force associated with an object is its acceleration relative to free-fall. This acceleration experienced by an object is due to the vector sum of non-gravitational forces acting on an object free to move. The accelerations that are not produced by gravity are termed proper accelerations, and...

 Animated: The Official Battle of the Planets book
, detailing the animated TV series; and three The All Star Companions by Roy Thomas, The Legion Companion, and The Justice League Companion, and several other books devoted to Golden Age
Golden Age
The term Golden Age comes from Greek mythology and legend and refers to the first in a sequence of four or five Ages of Man, in which the Golden Age is first, followed in sequence, by the Silver, Bronze, and Iron Ages, and then the present, a period of decline...

 and Silver Age of comic books
Silver Age of Comic Books
The Silver Age of Comic Books was a period of artistic advancement and commercial success in mainstream American comic books, predominantly those in the superhero genre. Following the Golden Age of Comic Books and an interregnum in the early to mid-1950s, the Silver Age is considered to cover the...

 titles and heroes.

Along with books devoted to such artists as Murphy Anderson
Murphy Anderson
Murphy Anderson is an American comic book artist, known as one of the premier inkers of his era, who has worked for companies such as DC Comics for over fifty years, starting in the 1930s-'40s Golden Age of Comic Books...

, Dick Giordano
Dick Giordano
Richard Joseph "Dick" Giordano was an American comic book artist and editor best known for introducing Charlton Comics' "Action Heroes" stable of superheroes, and serving as executive editor of then–industry leader DC Comics...

, George Tuska
George Tuska
George Tuska , who early in his career used a variety of pen names including Carl Larson, was an American comic book and newspaper comic strip artist best known for his 1940s work on various Captain Marvel titles and the crime fiction series Crime Does Not Pay, for and his 1960s work illustrating...

, Gene Colan
Gene Colan
Eugene Jules "Gene" Colan was an American comic book artist best known for his work for Marvel Comics, where his signature titles include the superhero series, Daredevil, the cult-hit satiric series Howard the Duck, and The Tomb of Dracula, considered one of comics' classic horror series...

, Wally Wood
Wally Wood
Wallace Allan Wood was an American comic book writer, artist and independent publisher, best known for his work in EC Comics and Mad. He was one of Mads founding cartoonists in 1952. Although much of his early professional artwork is signed Wallace Wood, he became known as Wally Wood, a name he...

, and Kurt Schaffenberger
Kurt Schaffenberger
Kurt Schaffenberger was an American comic book artist. Schaffenberger was best known for his work on Captain Marvel and the Marvel Family , as well as his work on the title Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane during the 1950s and 1960s.-Early career:Schaffenberger was born on a farm in the...

, as well as to writer Alan Moore
Alan Moore
Alan Oswald Moore is an English writer primarily known for his work in comic books, a medium where he has produced a number of critically acclaimed and popular series, including Watchmen, V for Vendetta, and From Hell...

, TwoMorrows has published books about how comics are created, such as Panel Discussions, Comics Above Ground, and Acting with a Pencil. Additionally, the company has published three collections of columns on comics by writer Mark Evanier
Mark Evanier
Mark Stephen Evanier is an American comic book and television writer, particularly known for his humor work. He is also known for his columns and blogs, and for his work as a historian and biographer of the comics industry, in particular his award-winning Jack Kirby biography, Kirby: King of...

; checklists of the works of Kirby and Wood; and the "Modern Masters" series by writer-editor Eric Nolan-Weathington.

In 2006, TwoMorrows expanded into DVDs by producing an art-instruction video, and a DVD version of the company's George Pérez
George Pérez
George Pérez is a Puerto Rican-American writer and illustrator of comic books, known for his work on various titles, including Avengers, Teen Titans and Wonder Woman.-Biography:...

 Modern Masters
book.

Books published (selected)

  • Kimota! The Miracleman
    Miracleman
    Marvelman, also known as Miracleman for trademark reasons in his American reprints and story continuation, is a fictional comic book superhero created in 1954 by writer-artist Mick Anglo for publisher L. Miller & Son. Originally intended as a United Kingdom home-grown substitute for the American...

     Companion
    (by George Khoury
    George Khoury (author)
    George Khoury is a writer and interviewer in the field of comic books. Khoury's most notable works focus on UK comic book writer Alan Moore. Khoury is based in New Jersey.-Biography:...

    , 148 pages, 2001, ISBN 978-1893905115)
  • Panel Discussions
    Panel Discussions
    Panel Discussions: Design in Sequential Art Storytelling is a book by Durwin Talon. It was originally published in 2002 and was reprinted in July 2007.-Overview:...

    : Design in Sequential Art Storytelling
    (by Durwin Talon
    Durwin Talon
    Durwin Talon is a comics artist, illustrator, author and professor of new media.- Education & Employment :Talon developed an interest in art at an early age. He received his Bachelors degree in Fine Arts from the Savannah College of Art and Design , then received his ISDP Master’s Degree from...

    , 2002, reprinted July 2007, ISBN 1-893905-14-4)
  • The Extraordinary Works of Alan Moore
    The Extraordinary Works of Alan Moore
    The Extraordinary Works of Alan Moore is a book written by George Khoury, published by TwoMorrows Publishing in 2003. An updated "Indispensable Edition" was released in 2009.-Contents:...

    (by George Khoury
    George Khoury (author)
    George Khoury is a writer and interviewer in the field of comic books. Khoury's most notable works focus on UK comic book writer Alan Moore. Khoury is based in New Jersey.-Biography:...

    , 224 pages, 2003, ISBN 978-1893905245)
  • Comics Above Ground: How Sequential Art Affects Mainstream Media (by Durwin Talon
    Durwin Talon
    Durwin Talon is a comics artist, illustrator, author and professor of new media.- Education & Employment :Talon developed an interest in art at an early age. He received his Bachelors degree in Fine Arts from the Savannah College of Art and Design , then received his ISDP Master’s Degree from...

    , 2004, ISBN 1-893905-31-4)
  • True Brit: Celebrating the Comic Book Artists of England (by George Khoury
    George Khoury (author)
    George Khoury is a writer and interviewer in the field of comic books. Khoury's most notable works focus on UK comic book writer Alan Moore. Khoury is based in New Jersey.-Biography:...

    , 204 pages, 2004, ISBN 978-1893905337)
  • The Dark Age: Grim, Great & Gimmicky Post-Modern Comics (by Mark Voger, 168 pages, 2006, ISBN 1893905535)
  • Image Comics
    Image Comics
    Image Comics is a United States comic book publisher. It was founded in 1992 by high-profile illustrators as a venue where creators could publish their material without giving up the copyrights to the characters they created, as creator-owned properties. It was immediately successful, and remains...

    : The Road To Independence
    (by George Khoury
    George Khoury (author)
    George Khoury is a writer and interviewer in the field of comic books. Khoury's most notable works focus on UK comic book writer Alan Moore. Khoury is based in New Jersey.-Biography:...

    , 280 pages, June 2007, ISBN 1-893905-71-3)
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