THE MISSING MAN
Without question, the oddest Ditko creation may be THE MISSING MAN. Debuting
in the Pacific Comics' Kirby book Captain Victory #6 (Sep 1982), the character was only
comprised of hair, ears, eye-glasses, arms and legs. You couldn't stab him because,
to quote Mr. Khill, ''He's here, yet he's not here. I don't know where to stab!''
(courtesy of that issue's dialogue by Marky Mark Evanier). Working with the help of ''Ma's
Detective Detective Agency'' - and all of Ma's cronies - the hero, real identity - Syd Mane
would tackle whatever case was doled out to them. Some of this artwork has to be seen to be
believed. The page presented here is from PACIFIC PRESENTS #1; eighteen pages of The Missing
Man meeting the Queen Bee (no kidding). Importantly, Robin K. Snyder, a very significant
person in Ditko history, wrote the dialogue for PACIFIC PRESENTS #2 ''...Meets The
Payne Family'', one of the first examples of I can find of the Snyder/Ditko connection.
PACIFIC PRESENTS #3, whose Ditko layouts are quite superb, features the last appearance by
The Missing Man. The inside front cover also mentions Robin Snyder doing an ''assist'' on the
dialogue for this issue (whose paper stock is heavy and the colors much gaudier). It also asks
the reader to look out for ''new Ditko art and story in THE DITKO WORLD coming this summer
from Fantagraphics Books. We should be seeing THE ART OF STEVE DITKO from Eclipse around that
time.'' This, of course, was Cat Yronwode's infamous, never-published book on Ditko. As
for THE DITKO WORLD, it is very possible that they are refering to the 1986 comic bearing
roughly the same title that appeared for Robin Snyder and the company RENEGADE in 1986,
since no original Ditko work was published by Fantagraphics until 1997's Strange Avenging
Tales.
If you have any stories or articles concerning
Ditko's creation The Missing Man, please E-MAIL me.
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