Marvel Masterworks: Werewolf By Night Vol. 2

An award-winning writer since 1973, Marv Wolfman succeeded mentor Roy Thomas as Marvel’s editor in chief. Well-remembered for his Tomb of Dracula scripts, he also enjoyed runs on Dr. Strange, Fantastic Four and Nova, among other titles. New Teen Titans, his 1980s collaboration with George Pérez, became DC Comics’ biggest hit in years. Wolfman and Pérez literally rewrote DC history with Crisis on Infinite Earths. He subsequently penned episodes for such animated TV series as G.I. Joe, Transformers and others.

After a Justice League of America stint at DC, Mike Friedrich moved to Marvel and to Iron Man, where, with Jim Starlin, he brought Thanos and Drax the Destroyer into the Marvel Universe. He and Starlin continued Thanos' cosmic saga in Captain Marvel. Friedrich also wrote Captain America and various features for Marvel's anthology titles. Back at DC, he wrote regularly for Batman, Green Lantern, Flash, and others. 

In addition to runs on Fantastic Four and Thor, original Moon Knight scribe Doug Moench specialized in writing features outside the Marvel mainstream — including Adventure into Fear’s Morbius, Frankenstein, Inhumans, Ka-Zar: Lord of the Hidden Jungle, Master of Kung Fu, Werewolf by Night and Astonishing Tales’ Deathlok. Proving his eclectic abilities, he also wrote the full run of Godzilla, most of Shogun Warriors and stories for virtually every Marvel black-and-white magazine of the 1970s. He expanded on his Star-Lord and Weirdworld sagas in multiple anthology titles. At DC, he wrote memorable runs on Batman, Detective Comics and Legends of the Dark Knight — along with numerous Batman one-shots, cross-company crossovers and Elseworlds sagas. He further contributed such short-lived but unique series as Electric Warrior, Lords of the Ultra-Realm, Slash Maraud, Wanderers and Xenobrood.

His drawing style sometimes characterized as “cute-but-creepy,” Mike Ploog — former apprentice of industry legend Will Eisner — was a prominent force in Marvel’s 1970s horror titles, penciling Monster of Frankenstein, Ghost Rider, Man-Thing and Werewolf by Night. His art also appeared in licensed properties Kull the Destroyer and Planet of the Apes. He worked as layout artist on the 1978 version of Lord of the Rings and later became production illustrator and/or storyboard artist on Superman III, The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Titan A.E. and X-Men, among other films. Ploog collaborated with J.M. DeMatteis on the children’s book series Abadazad.

A creative stalwart that put his all into his work on long-running series like Ghost Rider and Defenders, Don Perlin plied his talents in virtually every discipline in the comic-book field — penciling, inking, creating new characters and sometimes editing and writing. A student of Burne Hogarth’s, Perlin launched his career in 1951, drawing horror comics for various publishers and also penciling Will Eisner’s The Spirit. After serving in the Army, Perlin returned to comics with Harvey in the late ’50s as well as Charlton in the ’60s. In 1973, he began his long association with Marvel, finishing John Buscema’s art on Thor and inking several titles. He took over Werewolf by Night from Mike Ploog, penciling and inking the book for much of the next two years. He also penciled and inked the supernatural adventures of Johnny Blaze in Ghost Rider, his name becoming very closely identified with Marvel’s monster biker. In the ’80s, he drew Defenders for a long run before turning his attention to Marvel’s adaptation of Hasbro’s Transformers. His early ’90s work on Valiant’s Solar, Man of the Atom and Bloodshot was extremely popular, after which Perlin went into semiretirement.

The career of the late Gil Kane began in comicdom's Golden Age. Following his role in ushering in the Silver Age of Comics via the re-creations of Green Lantern, the Atom and others, he became Marvel's star cover artist and the regular penciler on Amazing Spider-Man. Kane also helped develop Iron Fist, Morbius the Living Vampire and other Marvel mainstays. In 1971, he published the sword-and-sorcery/science-fiction hybrid Blackmark, often called the first American graphic novel. He was a multiple winner of the National Cartoonist Society Award; in 1997, he was inducted into both the Eisner Award Hall of Fame and the Harvey Award Jack Kirby Hall of Fame.