Fasten your seat belts, True Believers! We’re about to tell the tantalizing tale of one of Marvel’s most colorful comic characters! No, it’s not Iron Man, Spider-Man, Thor, or the ever-lovin’, blue-eyed Thing. It’s the fastest comic book inker in the cosmos, “Valiant” Vince Colletta! 

Vince was no ordinary Marvel artist, some bespectacled craftsman hunched over a drawing table. Comics historian Reed Tucker describes Colletta as “a Godfather-type straight out of central casting, with a salesman’s charm and a Hollywood demeanor. His prematurely graying hair was immaculately styled at all times, and he dressed flashily, often with multiple gold chains. He once turned up at a convention wearing a white suit, white shoes, and black shirt, unbuttoned nearly to his navel.”

In other words, he was an older version of John Travolta’s Tony Manero with ink stains on his hands instead of paint from his dad’s store. The look alone made Colletta stand out among his comic book peers. But the look was only the beginning. 

“He Liked To Let Everybody Know He Was Connected With The Mob Or Something”

To comics colleagues like Joe Staton, Colletta often hinted that he ‘knew guys who knew guys.’ And the idea wasn’t hard to believe. He was born in the Italian village of Casteldaccia to a father who actually did have Mafia ties, according to Colletta’s son, Franklin. Vince’s dad was a “tough guy, a pretty high-level mafioso,” Franklin says. “We were a mafia family in Sicily.” When Colletta’s old man got in trouble with the law, the family hightailed it to Brooklyn, New York. There, young Vincent found he had an eye for art, especially for drawing beautiful young women. 

Love Romances 69 Art

Vince Colletta

And the hand tendons of men. 

That talent landed him in the romance comics business, where he’d eventually meet and befriend Marvel’s Stan Lee. Though Colletta likely wasn’t in the Mafia, it was still thrilling for Stan to know someone who was, shall we say, mob-adjacent. 

Jim Shooter, who would himself become Marvel’s editor-in-chief, recalls the story of Colletta introducing Stan to legendary mobster Frank Costello. Back in the 1960s, Vince and Stan were eating at a local restaurant when Vince spotted Frank Costello entering with his entourage. Costello was the “retired” head of the Luciano crime family. If you lived in New York around this time and pictured a mob guy, you were likely imagining Costello’s scowling mug. 

Frank Costello, American mobster, testifying before the Kefauver Committee investigating organized crime

Al Aumuller

Also if you lived outside New York, or if you live today.

Vince went over to say hello to Costello (as noted, Colletta knew guys) and Stan was beside himself with excitement. The legendary comics chief asked for an introduction, but Vince was wary. You don’t just go ask guys like Frank Costello for an autograph. But Stan was persistent and when he promised to be on his best behavior, Colletta agreed to a quick hello.

“So, Vince and Stan went over to Costello’s table,” says Shooter. “Vince introduced Stan. “Mr. Costello, my friend would like to meet you. This is Stan Lee—” Whereupon Stan stuck his hands up in the air and said, “Pleased to meet you! Don’t shoot!” (Goddammit, Stan.) 

Colletta Was No Stranger To The Shadier Side Of The Art World

In addition to having infamous friends, Colletta worked on what some might consider the fringes of the publication biz. During the 1950s, when comics were on a decline, he found work with Charlton Comics. But he had side hustles too, working for Charlton’s parent company, Monarch Publications and its line of lurid girly magazines and books. Vince was their go-to photographer for “revealing photographs of cheating spouses and scantily-clad women.” 

I Am A Nympho

Monarch

Throw in some veiny man’s hands, and you’ve got yourself a comic.