So, this morning's comic industry news has been filled to the brim with D(etective)C(omics) Comics playing musical chairs with their artists. (oh, and the Smallville Season 11 digital comic)
Take a deep breath and here's the rundown: 90's Animal Man artist, Steve Pugh, is taking over art on Animal Man; Animal Man's Travel Foreman is moving to Birds of Prey; Birds of Prey's Jesus Saiz is moving to Resurrection Man; Resurrection Man's Ferndando Dagino is moving to Suicide Squad; and whoever was drawing Suicide Squad is... not.
After reading all of this (and lord help us, let that be the last of these announcements, today) I find myself consumed with the question: "WHY?"
Pugh was already sharing art chores with Foreman on Animal Man, so that didn't come as too much of a surprise, but Jesus Saiz is PERFECTION on Birds of Prey. Absolute PERFECTION. Especially with the addition of colorist, June Chung. He draws strong, realistic women and that's SUPER important on a book like BoP. (and something it hasn't often seen, with artists like Ed Benes and Ardian Syaf)
So, why the shuffle? I know fan reaction to Travel Foreman on Animal Man has appeared to be split right down the middle. (I fall on the "Love Him" side) Potentially, bringing Steve Pugh to the book would appease everyone. Foreman has previously worked with writer, Duane Swierczynski, on Iron Fist, so that makes sense... but do they think that moving Saiz to a lower-selling book will improve sales? Did he simply want to try something completely different, having been a part of the last two volumes of Birds of Prey? Suicide Squad has already seen quite a shuffle of artists since it launched so one more makes little difference.
It just... seems strange and pretty needless, all the shifting about of artists.
But mostly I'm just upset about losing Saiz. I dig Foreman quite a lot and I'm sure he'll do fine on Birds of Prey... and he's definitely not in the "Image-style" school that Benes and Syaf travel in, but... and I can't emphasize this enough... Jesus Saiz is just SO perfect on Birds of Prey and it's become such a great female-focused action/caper comic, I'd hate to see anything shake the series.
