James O'Barr is an American comics artist, writer and graphic artist, best known as the creator of the comic book series The Crow. O'Barr, an orphan, was raised in the foster care system. In 1978, O'Barr enlisted in the Marines. While stationed in Germany, he illustrated combat manuals for the military. Before entering the Marines, O'Barr's fiancée, Beverly, had been killed by a drunk driver. While living in Berlin in 1981, O'Barr began work on his comic The Crow as a means of dealing with his personal tragedy. O'Barr was further inspired by a Detroit newspaper account of the murder of a young couple over a $20 engagement ring. In The Crow, a man and his fiancée are murdered by a gang of criminals. The man then returns from the dead, guided by a supernatural crow, to hunt their killers. After his discharge from the Marines, O'Barr continued his painting and illustration as well as doing various odd jobs, including working for a Detroit body shop. The Crow sat on a shelf for seven years, but at last he found a publisher with Gary Reed of Caliber Press. The first mini-series was published in 1989. The Crow has since sold more than 750,000 copies worldwide. O'Barr's own hope that his project would result in a personal catharsis went unfulfilled, he told an interviewer in 1994, saying, "[A]s I drew each page, it made me more self-destructive, if anything... There is pure anger on each page"

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