Mark Schultz

Mark Schultz (; born June 7, 1955) is an American writer and illustrator of books and comics. His most widely recognized work is the creator-owned comic book series Xenozoic Tales, which describes a post-apocalyptic world where dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures coexist with humans. In 1993, Xenozoic Tales was adapted into an animated series titled Cadillacs and Dinosaurs and a video game of the same name. Schultz's other notable works include various Aliens comic book mini-series published by Dark Horse and a four-year run on the DC Comics series Superman: The Man of Steel. In 2004, Schultz took over the scripting duties of the Prince Valiant comic strip. Early life Schultz was born just outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, but raised near Pittsburgh. At the age of six, he discovered both comics and classic adventure films, with early favorites being Tarzan and King Kong. As a teenager he was further inspired by such fantasy authors as Edgar Rice Burroughs and Robert E. Howard and the artists who had illustrated their work, including Frank Frazetta, Roy Krenkel, Al Williamson, Wally Wood, Howard Pyle and Joseph Clement Coll. In 1973, Schultz enrolled in Kutztown University of Pennsylvania. Four years later, after graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in painting, he embarked upon a career in advertising illustration, bolstered by such odd jobs as working as a security guard, which he ultimately found unsatisfying. In the early 1980s, Schultz became interested in the burgeoning underground comics scene, which allowed creators to publish stories outside the traditional assembly-line approach of the mainstream comics industry. He also became attracted to the art of the classic stories published by EC Comics in the 1950s. At one point, he took the few boxes of 1960s and early 1970s Marvel and DC comic books he owned to a local comic book store and traded them for a large collection of EC Comics. From then on, Schultz began to hone his illustration style to emulate that of classic EC artists. Career Schultz's first published comics work was on a story called "The Sea King", featuring Robert E. Howard's character King Kull, which appeared in Savage Sword of Conan #132, published by Marvel Comics. Schultz inked over pencils by Val Semeiks. Schultz did not actively pursue further work from Marvel, as he was more interested in developing and publishing comics based on his own concepts.