Early life Steve Gerber was born to a
Jewish family in
St. Louis,
Missouri, the son of Bernice Gerber, and one of four children, with siblings Jon, Michael, and Lisa.
Career Gerber began work as a
copywriter for a St. Louis
advertising agency. In early 1972, Gerber asked Thomas, by this time Marvel editor-in-chief, about writing comics; Thomas sent him a writer's test – six pages of a
Daredevil car-chase scene drawn by
Gene Colan – which Gerber passed. He accepted a position as an associate editor and writer at Marvel Comics. Thomas said in 2007, Gerber's comics writing career at Marvel began with three comic books
cover-dated December 1972:
Adventure into Fear #11,
The Incredible Hulk #158, and a collaboration with writer
Carole Seuling on
Shanna the She-Devil. Gerber initially penned superhero stories for titles such as
Daredevil (20 issues),
Iron Man (three issues) and
Sub-Mariner (11 issues). Gerber penned adaptations of
Lin Carter's barbarian sword-and-sorcery hero
Thongor for
Creatures on the Loose; short horror stories for
Monsters Unleashed,
Chamber of Chills and
Journey into Mystery and humor pieces for
Crazy Magazine, becoming editor of that satirical magazine for issues #11–14. On page 11 of that issue, he created the series' narrative tagline, used in captions: "Whatever knows fear burns at the Man-Thing's touch!" After issue #19 (Dec. 1973), Man-Thing received a solo title, which ran 22 issues (Jan. 1974 – Oct. 1975), of which issue #1 was originally intended for
Adventure into Fear #20. Gerber and Mayerik introduced the original
Foolkiller in issue #3 (March 1974). In the final issue, Gerber appeared as a character in the story, claiming he had not been inventing the Man-Thing's adventures but simply reporting on them and that he had decided to move on. With
penciler Val Mayerik, Gerber created
Howard the Duck as a secondary character in a
Man-Thing story in
Adventure into Fear #19 and
Man-Thing #1 (Dec. 1973 - Jan. 1974). Howard graduated to his own backup feature in
Giant-Size Man-Thing #4-5, confronting such bizarre horror-parody characters as Garko the Man-Frog and Bessie the Hellcow, before acquiring his own comic-book title with
Howard the Duck #1 (Jan. 1976). Gerber wrote 27 issues of the series, penciled initially by
Frank Brunner and for most of its run by
Gene Colan. The series developed a substantial
cult following, which Marvel helped to promote by Howard's satiric entry into the
1976 U.S. presidential campaign under the auspices of the All-Night Party. Marvel attempted a spin-off with a short-lived
Howard the Duck syndicated comic strip from 1977 to 1978, initially scripted by Gerber, and drawn by Colan then Mayerik and finally
Alan Kupperberg. Gerber was replaced on the strip in mid-1978, by another comic book writer,
Marv Wolfman, creating acrimony. Marvel's then editor-in-chief,
Jim Shooter, blamed Gerber's chronic tardiness, saying the creative team was "producing strips within six days of their publication dates," which he said caused several newspapers to drop the strip. which explored the strange link between a cosmic superhero and a boy, and wrote the first issue of
Marvel Comics Super Special featuring the rock band
Kiss. He created the characters
Starhawk,
Aleta Ogord, and (with Skrenes)
Nikki for the Guardians of the Galaxy series. He scripted the adventures of
Daimon Hellstrom,
Morbius, and
Lilith. He reintroduced the 1969 one-time feature
Guardians of the Galaxy, first as guest stars in
Marvel Two-in-One and
The Defenders, then as a feature in
Marvel Presents. Toward the end of his work at Marvel, he wrote
Hanna-Barbera stories for
Mark Evanier under the
anagrammatic
pseudonym Reg Everbest. Only two of these, featuring
Magilla Gorilla and the
Clue Club, were published in English.
Battle for Howard the Duck In the first half of 1978, Gerber was fired from first the newspaper strip and then the comic book series purportedly for failure to meet deadlines. On August 29, 1980, after learning of Marvel's efforts to license Howard for use in film and broadcast media, Gerber filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Marvel corporate parent Cadence Industries and other parties, alleging that he was the sole
owner of the character.
DC work During the mid-1970s and early 1980s, Gerber worked for
DC Comics, including an issue of
Metal Men, the last three issues of
Mister Miracle,
The Phantom Zone limited series, and a run of "
Doctor Fate" backup stories in
The Flash co-written with
Martin Pasko. Gerber had planned to write for DC's
Time Warp science fiction anthology series, but objected to the submission guidelines for that series. Gerber also wrote for independent comic companies. One of Gerber's first major works away from Marvel was the original
graphic novel Stewart the Rat for
Eclipse Comics, with art by
Gene Colan and
Tom Palmer. For
Eclipse Magazine, Gerber and Mayerik created the anti-censorship horror story, "Role Model/Caring, Sharing, and Helping Others".
Resolution of the court case In 1981 he teamed with
Jack Kirby at Eclipse to create
Destroyer Duck, a satirical comic created to raise funds for his court case against Marvel. The lawsuit was settled on September 24, 1982. Gerber acknowledged that his work on the character had been done as
work-for-hire and that Marvel parent Cadence Industries owned "all right, title and interest" to Howard the Duck and related material. On November 5, 1982, Judge
David Kenyon approved the motion and dismissed the case. The proposal was not accepted. Gerber was slated to write a new
Spectre series in 1986, but he missed the deadline for the first issue so that he could watch the last day of shooting on the
Howard the Duck film and DC assigned another writer to the series in response. After Marvel had cancelled his contract in May 1978, Gerber scripted assorted free-lance projects for Marvel, including the controversial creator-owned book
Void Indigo (1984) for
Epic Comics, a serialized, eight-page Man-Thing feature in the anthology series
Marvel Comics Presents (Sept. 1988–Feb. 1989),
The Legion of Night and the 1991
Suburban Jersey Ninja She-Devils one-shot issue. For DC, his works include
A. Bizarro. and sharing a 1998
Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Special Class – Animated Program, for the
WB program
The New Batman/Superman Adventures.
Ultraverse He was one of the founders of the
Malibu Comics superhero setting the
Ultraverse and co-created
Sludge and
Exiles. For
Image Comics, he co-created
The Cybernary with
Nick Manabat and disbanded
Codename: Strykeforce, in addition to guest-writing
Pitt.
2000s work In 2002, he wrote a new
Howard the Duck miniseries for Marvel's
MAX line. For DC, he created
Nevada for the
Vertigo imprint in 1998 with artist
Phil Winslade and
Hard Time with long-time collaborator Mary Skrenes, which outlasted the short-lived imprint
DC Focus, but slow sales led
Hard Time: Season Two to be cancelled after only seven issues. Later, Gerber wrote the
Helmet of Fate: Zauriel one-shot and continued writing the Doctor Fate serial in the
Countdown to Mystery limited series for DC Comics up to the time of his death, working on stories in the hospital. Gerber died before being able to write the concluding chapter of the serial; in his honor, four separate writers (
Adam Beechen,
Mark Evanier,
Gail Simone, and
Mark Waid) provided their own conclusions to the story. In 2010,
Comics Bulletin ranked Gerber's run on
The Defenders first on its list of the "Top 10 1970s Marvels", while
Omega the Unknown was 10th on the same list. Gerber's posthumous Man-Thing story "The Screenplay of the Living Dead Man", with art by
Kevin Nowlan, originally planned as a 1980s graphic novel before being left uncompleted by the artist, was revived in the 2010s and appeared as a three-issue miniseries cover-titled
The Infernal Man-Thing (early Sept.-Oct. 2012). The story was a sequel to Gerber's "Song-Cry of the Living Dead Man" from
Man-Thing #12 (Dec. 1974). His final comics work was writing
Countdown to Mystery: Doctor Fate for
DC Comics, having briefly worked with a version of the character in 1982. At the time of his death, Gerber was separated from his wife, Margo Macleod. He had a daughter, Samantha Gerber. ==In fiction==