Trailblazing writer and editor Louise Simonson was inducted into the Eisner Awards Hall of Fame at this year’s ceremony, held virtually through Comic-Con@Home on Friday, July 24.
Simonson is best known for her work on the best-selling X-Titles of the 1980’s and ’90’s such as X-Factor, New Mutants, Power Pack, and Superman: The Man of Steel, where she played a key roll in “The Death of Superman” event series. Many of the characters she co-created are well-known to comic fandom, such as Cable and Apocalypse for Marvel and Doomsday and Steel for DC.
Simonson started her career at Warren Publishing in 1974, editing a number of the companies horror comic magazines, Creepy, Eerie, and Vampirella. In January 1980, she joined Marvel Comics, as an editor on Uncanny X-Men, The New Mutants, Star Wars, and Indiana Jones. comics.
In 1983, she took a major risk and quit her job as an editor to pursue a full time writing career. The risk paid off, as she returned to Marvel only a year later and created Power Pack and picked up other high profile writing assignments on Marvel Team-Up and Web of Spider-Man. Eventually, Simonson would have her own “Marvel team-up” with husband and artist Walt Simonson on X-Factor from 1988-1989. Simonson continues to write comic stories, and last year contributed two stories to DC Primal Age #1 and also returned to Power Pack with the one-shot Power Pack: Grow Up.
Conskipper would like to congratulate Simonson on her induction into the Eisner Awards Hall of Fame and for being a role model to an entire generation of female comic book writers.