Claw the Unconquered No. 3 Unpublished Cover by Chan & Dutton

This was an interesting find. An unpublished version of Ernie Chan’s – then credited at DC Comics as Ernie Chua – cover for Claw the Unconquered No. 3 from the summer of 1975.

I think Chan’s body of work – especially the stuff he did for Marvel – was dynamic and exciting. But all too often at DC his cover figures were small, stiff, static and nowhere near showing the energy we remember him for.

Comparing the published version to the unpublished one here, this may help explain why. If the pencilled version was done first, that’s the Chan we know and love. Lots of life in Claw here. The published version is stiff and stylised. I’m guessing the layout was done by Carmine Infantino who – for whatever reason – rejected the pencilled version. Infantino was a superb designer and knew how to use geometric underpinning well in his own work. It didn’t mesh well with Chan’s more fluidic style though, and this is what we got.

So let’s see what the unpublished version might have looked like.

Inks, colours and updated trade dress by me. No AI was used.

As published. I suspect this version was done after a layout supplied by Carmine Infantino.

Original art scan of Chan’s pencils from somewhere on the web.

Inks by me.

Colour version.

Updated trade dress added.