Mike Carlin, an editor who has been with DC Comics for many of their iconic adventures, has announced his retirement after 37 amazing years. Carlin’s farewell message was announced via his wife Janice Cohen’s Facebook page as he recounted his love for comics and his career adventure.
Comics really are his life, and he started his memories with his earliest one:
My earliest memory is waking up on a Gurney at 2 years old having just had my tonsils out, I was being wheeled into my Mother’s room as she had her tonsils out that day, too.
Part of the memory was that I had a bunch of SUPERMAN Comics on my lap. Mom had arranged that I’d get them when I woke up… because she loved SUPERMAN and WONDER WOMAN Comics when she was a kid.
Carlin worked with many amazing writers and artists over the years, but the first he met was DC Editor Dick Giordano, who’s worked on too many comics to list.
He wrote:
One Saturday famed DC Editor DICK GIORDANO gave a lecture about doing comic book art. He gave out a packet and said that if we did sample pages and they were selected, the “winner” could come up to DC’s offices at 75 Rockefeller Plaza for a private (well with 8 other kids) lesson from Dick… I was selected and invited up to DC’s headquarters
Although his career didn’t start at DC, he already had a lot of experience under his belt before joining the company, in 1986. Since then, he’s been there for some of the most iconic moments, like The Death of Superman and Reign of the Supermen (1990-1993). He helped create the DC Versus Marvel Comics crossover event when he worked as Executive Editor, before becoming a Senior Group Editor and moving to the animation division. At one point, Carlin, alongside Denny O’Neil and Archie Goodwin, was even put into the comics!
In 1993’s The Batman Adventures #10, writer Kelley Puckett and artists Mike Parobeck and Rick Burchett introduced three new criminals to Gotham City based on the three Senior Editors. Mastermind, The Perfesser, and Mr. Nice returned to cause trouble for the Dark Knight in issues #20 and #30, too.
Unfortunately, Goodwin passed away in 1998, and in 1999 Puckett and Burchett came together again, with Terry Beatty, to make a Bat-Tribute in Batman: Gotham Adventures issue #13. In a heartwarming story, the trio got together for one last crime. Fighting against Batman and Nightwing, after having Gotham in the palm of their hands, their adventure ended after Mr. Nice walked into the light with a boy from a leper colony.
We will miss Mike Carlin’s amazing work, but as he said in his farewell:
$@%$!, I swore I’d make mine Shorter than everyone else’s… oh well… I was at DC longer!
The short version: I dreamed of being at DC… my dream came true… now it’s your turn!
Source: Games Radar and CBR.com
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