Dan Jurgens


Dan Jurgens is an American comic book writer and artist. He is known for his work on the DC comic book storyline "The Death of Superman" and for creating characters such as Doomsday, Hank Henshaw and Booster Gold. Jurgens had a lengthy run on the Superman comic books including The Adventures of Superman, Superman vol. 2 and Action Comics. At Marvel, Jurgens worked on series such as Captain America, The Sensational Spider-Man and was the writer on Thor for six years.

Career

1980s

After graduating from Minneapolis College of Art and Design in 1981, Jurgens' first professional comic work was for DC Comics on The Warlord #63. He was hired due to a recommendation of Warlord creator Mike Grell who was deeply impressed by Jurgens' work after being shown his private portfolio at a convention. In 1984, Jurgens was the artist for the Sun Devils limited series, with writers Gerry Conway and Roy Thomas. Jurgens would make his debut as a comic book writer with Sun Devils. He began scripting from Conway's plots with #8 and fully took over the writing duties on the title with #10. In 1985, Jurgens created the character Booster Gold, who became a member of the Justice League. Jurgens was one of the contributors to the DC Challenge limited series in 1986. His first work on Superman was as penciller for The Adventures of Superman Annual #1. In 1988, Jurgens provided pencil art for the Deadman short stories which were written by Mike Baron in the short-lived anthology Action Comics Weekly from issues #601–612. He then had a run as artist of Green Arrow with writer Mike Grell from 1988–1990. In 1989, Jurgens began working full-time on the Superman character when he took over the writing/pencilling of the monthly The Adventures of Superman.

1990s

Jurgens was the penciller of the 1991 limited series Armageddon 2001 and co-created the hero Waverider with Archie Goodwin. Jurgens helped writer Louise Simonson and artist Jon Bogdanove launch a new Superman title, ' in July 1991 and assumed the writing/pencilling of the main Superman comic book with issue No. 57. He created a supporting hero named Agent Liberty in issue No. 60 and then worked on the "Panic in the Sky" crossover in 1992. During his run on Superman, Jurgens created two major villains, Doomsday and the Cyborg Superman. Doomsday was the main antagonist in "The Death of Superman" storyline which saw the iconic hero killed in an issue consisting entirely of splash pages. The Cyborg Superman was an existing character which Jurgens reintroduced in The Adventures of Superman #500 for the "Reign of the Supermen" storyline. Jurgens wrote and drew Justice League America and in 1993 pencilled the Metal Men four-issue miniseries, which was a retcon of their origin story. Jurgens wrote and pencilled the crossover series Zero Hour. and the Superman/Doomsday: Hunter/Prey miniseries, both in 1994.
Jurgens scripted and provided layout art for the Superman vs. Aliens miniseries. The story featured a battle between Superman and the aliens created by H. R. Giger, from the titular film series. It was co-published by Dark Horse Comics and DC in 1995. In the same year, he gave up the pencilling duties on Superman. In 1996 Jurgens and Italian artist Claudio Castellini worked on the highly publicized crossover Marvel vs DC. Jurgens was one of the many creators who worked on the ' one-shot in 1996 which featured the title character's marriage to Lois Lane. Jurgens developed the Tangent Comics imprint for DC the following year.
In January 1996, Jurgens was writer and penciller of the new Spider-Man series, The Sensational Spider-Man, at Marvel Comics. The title was initially conceived to be the flagship showcase for the new Ben Reilly Spider-Man. The initial seven issues were written and pencilled by Jurgens. Jurgens pushed strongly for the restoration of Peter Parker as the true Spider-Man and plans were made to enact this soon, but Bob Harras, the new Editor-in-chief, demanded the story be deferred until after the "Onslaught" storyline. Jurgens had by this stage become disillusioned with the immense amount of group planning and constant changes of ideas and directions and took this as the last straw, resigning from the title. In a past interview several years after his Spider-Man run, Jurgens stated that he would like to have another chance on the character, since his run was with the Ben Reilly character during the Spider-Man Clone Saga, and not Peter Parker. Jurgens wrote and pencilled Teen Titans for its entire two-year, 24-issue run. George Pérez, the co-creator of The New Teen Titans served as inker for the series' first 15 issues. After 10 years working on the Superman character, Jurgens ended his run as writer with Superman vol. 2 #150. Also in 1999, Jurgens was writer and layout artist for the tabloid-sized graphic novel Superman/Fantastic Four, with finished art by his former The Adventures of Superman inker Art Thibert. Jurgens worked with Marvel Comics as writer on Thor vol. 2 with pencilling by John Romita Jr. and as writer/artist on Captain America vol. 3. In 1995 he was writer/penciller on Solar #46 from Valiant Comics wherein he worked with inker Dick Giordano and with penciller Tom Grindberg joining in with issues #51–54 after Jurgens relinquished penciller duties with issue #50. Jurgens was the debut writer of the Tomb Raider: The Series comic book series licensed to Top Cow Productions and Image Comics, which in 1999. The debut issue of Tomb Raider was the number one selling comic book of that year. Jurgens was writer of the series until issue #21.

2000s

In 2000, Jurgens was the writer and provided layouts for the four issue prestige miniseries Titans/Legion of Super-Heroes: Universe Ablaze, with finishes provided by Phil Jimenez. Jurgens wrote Aquaman vol. 3 from issue #63 until its cancellation with issue #75. In November 2002, he wrote and pencilled the four-issue weekly miniseries Superman: Day of Doom, which marked the 10 year anniversary of "The Death of Superman" storyline from 1992. After a hiatus from comics, he returned to DC Comics, providing layouts for the lead story in the Infinite Crisis Secret Files 2006 special and provided art for the weekly series 52 and to the six-issue limited series Crisis Aftermath: The Battle For Blüdhaven written by Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Grey. Jurgens collaborated with writer/creator Marv Wolfman on the Nightwing series for issues #125–128. On Metamorpho: Year One, Jurgens was writer and penciller for the first two issues with Mike Norton drawing issues #3–6. Jurgens was writer and artist of the "History of the Multiverse" back-up stories in the weekly 'Countdown' which appeared in issues #49–38. At the Los Angeles Comic Con in March 2007, DC announced a new, ongoing Booster Gold series written by Geoff Johns, pencilled by Jurgens, and inked by Norm Rapmund to begin shortly after the end of 52. He was the writer of Tangent: Superman's Reign limited series in 2008, revisiting the Tangent Comics characters and wrote and illustrated an issue of The Brave and the Bold vol. 2 No. 23, which featured Booster Gold and Magog.

2010s

Jurgens was amongst the creative talent of DC Comics' The New 52 relaunch in 2011, becoming the writer of the new Justice League International series with artist Aaron Lopresti and the artist of the new Green Arrow series with writer J. T. Krul and inker George Pérez. He became co-writer of Green Arrow with Keith Giffen on issues #3–6. DC announced in October 2011 that Jurgens would return to Superman, co-writing and drawing, the self-titled Superman series with Giffen. Their first issue was #7. During 2012–2013, Jurgens was writer and artist of Fury of the Firestorms: The Nuclear Men from issues #13–20, where the series was canceled. In 2014, he and Giffen together with Jeff Lemire and Brian Azzarello co-wrote '. In 2015, Jurgens became the writer for Batman Beyond, starting with issue #1 in June 2015. He was writer of the two-issue miniseries Convergence: Superman in 2015, and was the writer for ' from 2015 to 2016. As part of the DC Rebirth relaunch of 2016, Jurgens wrote Action Comics, with the series returning to the previous numbering, beginning with issue #957. He contributed to Action Comics #1000 and then became the writer of the Green Lanterns series.

Personal life

Jurgens is married with two children, Quinn Jurgens and Seth Jurgens.

Awards

Jurgens was awarded the 1994 National Cartoonists Society Award for Best Comic Book.

Dark Horse Comics