This is an illuminating thread. Suddenly, even an ESSENTIALS series seems within some sort of feasibility again. I started picking up ROM back issues because I miss Sal Buscema. (SPIDERGIRL is okay, but not something I buy.) ROM back issues tend to be cheap and easy to find. All that primo Aiken and Garvey work over Sal still makes my eyes water. It's an enticing treatment. Also, I dig Ditko. So it's just win/win. Plus my favourite inker is Craig Russell. His work over Ditko, even during the time of that bloody awful flexographic printing, was really something. (Sinnott is my second favourite inker and he inked a few issues with Sal. I think Aitken, Garvey, or the the both of them were Joe's assistants, inking backgrounds and such. Hence, how they emerged on ROM.)

I'd love to see Michael Golden "back" on covers.

Who would folks like to see take the torch for Bill Mantlo, the not-to-be-overlooked once-writer?

Corn

Reading: Assorted LITTLE AUDREY and BABY HUEY from Harvey and LOIS LANE and JIMMY OLSEN from DC, AFTER 1984, a poetry chronicle by Judith McNeal and KAVALIER AND CLAY by Michael Chabon.
Listening:I'm Bored and The Passenger by Iggy Pop, God's Away on Business by Tom Waits, Black Betty ("Woah, Black Betty bam-ba-lam Woah...") by Ram Tam, 96 Tears by Question Mark and the Mysterions, Who's That Lady? by The Isley Brothers, Temptation by Heaven 17, and Beat the Clock and No 1 in Heaven by Sparks
Watching: THE THIN BLUE LINE and WHO'S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOLF?
RIP: BO DIDDLEY