'Invaders From Home' #2.
John Blair Moore was an American comic book artist, writer and cartoonist, who did artwork for magazines, animated TV commercials, books and comics. He produced scripts and art for Disney comics stories, mainly with television and movie characters, such as 'Roger Rabbit' and 'Darkwing Duck'. For DC's Piranha Press imprint, he wrote and drew the short-lived comic book series 'Invaders from Home' (1990), which also spawned a newspaper comic spin-off titled 'Virtual Reality' (1993-1995). Decades later, he also made satirical newspaper and web comics, of which the anti-Donald Trump series 'Live Bait–the Chronicles of Drumf' (2017-2018) was the most notable.
'Invaders From Home' #3.
Early life
John Blair Moore was born in 1948 in Saint Louis, Missouri. Not much is known about his early years. In the forewords of his comic book and on his website, the man joked around about his background, all in his own humorous and idiosyncratic way. Among his graphic influences were Gluyas Williams, Walt Kelly, George Herriman and Harvey Kurtzman.
Invaders From Home
Around 1990, Moore began working in the comic book industry, when he made the six-issue comic book series 'Invaders from Home' for DC's experimental imprint Piranha Press. The books chronicle the mid-life crisis of Bobby Boomer, who is about to become a father again. He loses his grip on reality, plunging the comic into a world of zany and surreal humor, populated by extraterrestrial aliens and a strange group of galactic creatures called Nuerbles. His best friend is an anthropomorphic duck. The main characters of 'Invaders From Home' were subsequently transferred to the newspaper comic strip 'Virtual Reality' (1993-1995), which ran in The Saint Louis Post-Dispatch's Metro Post section.
'Darkwing Duck', from Marvel's The Disney Afternoon #1 (1994). © Disney.
Disney comics
By 1991, Moore began writing Disney comics, initially for Disney's own comic book line. He wrote scripts for 'Goofy Adventures', 'Roger Rabbit's Toontown' and 'Disney Adventures', subsequently drawn by John Costanza, Bill Fugate and members of the Jaime Diaz Studio. Moore both wrote and drew the limited series based on the animated Disney TV show 'Darkwing Duck' (1991-1992), and in 1994 made another story with the character for Marvel's 'The Disney Afternoon'. Between 1993 and 2003, Moore was a sporadic scriptwriter of pocket book stories with 'Donald Duck' and 'Mickey Mouse' for Egmont, the Scandinavian licensee of Disney comics.
'Virtual Reality' (27 July 1993).
Cartoonist for books and newspapers
John Blair Moore additionally illustrated children's books and humor books, and worked as a cartoonist for hire for commercial clients. Moore also developed new strips like 'Bin Laden in Hiding', 'Cosmo's Cafe' and 'Pop Gasket's New Ace Hardware Store', the latter of which ran in St. Louis Home. On 1 February 2017, he started a daily strip called 'Live Bait–the Chronicles of Drumf' (2017-2018) on his Facebook feed, inspired by the controversial new president of the United States, Donald Trump. The final installment was posted on 20 July 2018.
Death
On 20 July 2018, Moore discontinued his comics career because he fell ill. He was hospitalized for twelve days and passed away on 5 August 2018.
'Live Bait–the Chronicles of Drumf', spoofing Donald Trump.