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Blogging is time consuming. Even an intended quick review of a comic can take an hour or more from scanning, writing the first draft to publishing online. A more detailed blog can take up to half a day or a full evening. Or maybe that's just me.
Anyway, in order to catch up with some work I've fallen behind on through various setbacks (illness, being my Mum's carer etc) I'm putting this blog on hold for a few weeks. Don't worry, it won't be in mothballs for long, and I'll be back soon with some items of free gifts of the past, Christmas strips, and long-overdue reviews of some great small press comics that have been kindly sent to me.
So it really is a case of "back to the drawing board" for now. In the meantime, if you haven't checked out the blogs of friends and acquaintances on the list at the left of this page now is the time to do so. Lots of good stuff there to keep you occupied for ages!
Check back here again in a few weeks and hopefully I'll have a few new items posted by then!
(Photo above shows the pencil stage of a Super School page I did for The Beano. The completed artwork was published a few weeks ago.)
Issue No.12 of Crikey! the magazine of British comics should be in shops across the UK this Friday (October 29th). Once again it contains a strong variety of content, including interviews with Pat Mills (talking at length about his time at IPC plus other things), Leah Moore and John Reppion (on Albion), and veteran comic artist Frank McDiarmid (Cheeky weekly).
Also included is Lee O'Connor discussing his new project with Pat Mills (Stars: The Ayatollah's Son) and the first part of a two parter on Doctor Who comic strips over the years.
Issues of Crikey! can be bought from branches of Borders and various newsagents across the country, priced £4.99, or you can subscribe via their website here:
http://www.crikeyuk.co.uk/sub.html
Crikey! is the only magazine devoted to British comics, and let's face it, there have been very few precedents, so I hope all readers of this blog will support it so that it can continue to thrive. Remember, Crikey! doesn't have the backing of a major publisher behind it so it's up to us to keep such independent publications alive.
The 30th Anniversary issue of Viz, Britain's swearingest comic, is out today (cover shown above). Originally conceived in 1979 as a 12 page comic sold in local Newcastle pubs, Viz became a massive hit with the public, with its sales gradually rising from just 200 to over a million an issue by the 1990s.
(Above: Viz No.1 from 1979)
The latest issue reflects the original format a little by featuring more half-page strips in order to accommodate more characters within its pages. Classic characters such as Tommy 'Banana' Johnson are back in new stories, along with Hector the Collector and His Metal Detector and Johnny Fartpants, and regular favourites such as Roger Mellie and The Fat Slags are also included. (I contribute a half-page Pathetic Sharks strip on page 33.)
To celebrate the rare occasion of a British comic actually lasting for 30 years, The Cartoon Museum in London will be holding an exhibition of original Viz artwork from November 4th 2009 to January 24th 2010 (35 Little Russell Street, London WC1A 2HH). For more details visit their website at:
http://www.cartoonmuseum.org/
Viz No.190, the 30th Anniversary issue, is in the shops now priced £3.00
http://www.viz.co.uk/
At the 1979 British comic convention in Birmingham's Metropole Hotel there was a buzz going around that Marvel UK were about to launch a brand new comic exclusively for the British market. Expectations were high, and on a panel that weekend Dez Skinn, then editor at Marvel UK, announced that the title was to feature... Doctor Who.
Personally my initial reaction was disappointment. As a (then) 20 year old I was going through my "Doctor Who is for kids" phase, - although I was still buying about 25 Marvel comics every month which kind of deflated that air of maturity. However, the news was that Dave Gibbons would be drawing the strip and I liked his work from 2000AD so when Doctor Who Weekly No.1 hit the stands on October 11th 1979 I gave it a go...
...and thought it was brilliant. From the outset Dave's artwork on part one of The Iron Legion was powerful and fantastically drawn, and the fact it was written by Pat Mills and John Wagner, my two favourite 2000AD scriptwriters, was equally pleasing. Doctor Who had previously suffered a roller coaster life in comics. Between the strips in TV Comic (mostly so-so, some dire) to Countdown/TV Action (all excellent) and back to TV Comic again (nosediving to comic strip hell) Marvel UK needed to raise the bar, which they certainly achieved. Thirty years on I still think the splash page is one of the most dynamic openings I've seen for a first issue of a British comic...
The lead strip only took up five pages in the 32 page weekly but the pace was fast and, it has to be said, more dramatically satisfying than the tv show was at the time.
The first issue had a fairly modest free gift; a small assortment of rub-down transfers that could be applied to the full-colour "panoramas" on the inside covers. (Interior colour! This was Marvel UK pushing the boat out, - but just for this launch issue.) The artwork on the transfers and the panoramas was also by Dave Gibbons...
The weekly included two other comic strips. One was the start of a reprint of a War of the Worlds adaptation from Marvel Classic Comics No.14. For the weekly, the Fourth Doctor's head was pasted onto page one as a narrator and the heading Tales from the Tardis added.
The final strip in the comic was another all-new British production; The Return of The Daleks, a four pager written by Steve Moore and drawn by David Lloyd...
The rest of the comic was taken up with short articles on the tv show. Mainly introductory for this first issue, the features explained the background story of The Doctor and the Daleks. There was also the first of a "Photo-File" series of pages with data on the actors from the show. William Hartnell was this issue's subject, and the first issue was dedicated to his memory.
All in all, a very solid publication and a great start to the comic. One thing that stands out today is that although these early issues were aimed at children, Doctor Who Weekly didn't dumb down to its readers. That's something that unfortunately can't be said for its modern-day equivalent Doctor Who Adventures. One cannot argue against DWA's success (regularly outselling other comics) but surely it would still sell on its name even if it wasn't quite so "young"? Or has the age of literacy declined so much between generations that short blurbs on photographs are now preferable to articles, and cut-out masks are more popular than fact-files?
Doctor Who Weekly has survived the years of course, maturing with its readership. It became Doctor Who Monthly less than a year into its run and still thrives today as the 68 page all-colour Doctor Who Magazine. (Issue 414 of which was published yesterday.) Today it's a sophisticated magazine with in-depth features and interviews and its comic strip is now ten pages in length, but in essence it's still the same mag that Dez Skinn edited 30 years ago. I may have been skeptical about it when I heard the news in 1979 but Marvel's decision to publish was right, - three decades later it's still with us and, along with 2000AD and Viz, is the only other comic launched in the 1970s to have survived the years!
Just a quick blog today as deadlines loom but here's a link to a website that should keep you fascinated for hours, if not days. Maybe even weeks. Mike's Amazing World of DC Comics is a fantastic index of DC Comics over the decades which provides background information on the characters and all kinds of other info. The best feature being an exhaustive cover gallery. Click on the Time Machine section, choose a year, select your month, and you'll see all the DC comics that had that cover date (or at least as many as Mike Voiles has scanned in so far, which is a lot).
Mike's now also opened up his Amazing World of Marvel Comics, which does the same for Marvel from 1939 to 1999. Again it's not complete yet but there are still hundreds of covers to see when you step onto the Time Platform. Behold the comics we'll never afford! Gasp at the way the cover art used to actually represent the content! It's a must-see website that's taken Mike ages to produce and is an ongoing project. Well worth a visit and definitely worth bookmarking!
Not exactly comics-related but as some visitors to this blog are fans of Doctor Who I thought this might be of interest. The Doctor Who Exhibition which has held a prominent position on Blackpool's Golden Mile for five years is to close next month on November 8th.
Some of the items from the museum will be transferred to other Doctor Who Exhibitions around the UK. The museum features a range of props, monsters and costumes from the history of the 45 year old tv series.
I visited the exhibition last summer and I have to say I was somewhat disappointed that only props from the "classic" pre-Christopher Eccleston series seemed to be featured, and the items seemed somewhat shabby. However, the props and costumes were designed for the tv screen of course and never intended to be convincing up close. It was still interesting to view such items, including the TARDIS console and a Mechanoid from the 1965 serial The Chase which actually looked better constructed than some of the 1980s props.
Fronting the museum is a shop selling a good range of modern Doctor Who merchandise along with numerous back issues of Doctor Who Magazine and recent issues of Doctor Who Adventures. (There you go; there is a comics connection to this blog entry. ;-))
The exhibition (which is on Blackpool seafront, practically opposite the Central Pier) will be open every day from 10.30am to 8.00pm until November 8th, when it closes its doors for the last time.
This isn't the first Doctor Who Exhibition that has appeared (and disappeared) in Blackpool. A similar one, not far from the current venue, opened in 1974 and ran for 11 years. The current one will certainly leave a void. Blaring the various Doctor Who themes out from its key position on the promenade it presumably attracted lots of passing trade from Blackpool's millions of tourists, but according to this report the decision was made by the BBC:
http://www.blackpoolgazette.co.uk/blackpoolnews/Closure-for-popular-Prom-attraction.5762660.jp
Click on the photographs to see them full size.
The good news for Whovians is that the exhibitions in Cardiff, Glasgow, Lands End, and Coventry will continue. For more information on the Doctor Who Exhibitions around the UK visit this website:
http://www.doctorwhoexhibitions.com/
Titan Books have recently published Nemi 3, another hardback collection of Norwegian cartoonist Lise Myhre's daily comic strip. The 144 page full colour volume includes a great selection of strips featuring the sharp-witted free-thinking Goth, translated into English by Deborah Dawkin and Erik Skuggevik.
Alongside the daily strips, longer Nemi stories are also included from the Norwegian Nemi monthly comic. The 11 page Monstrifer tale is particularly interesting, a story of Nemi's childhood and of learning to be proud of her individuality. Under lesser hands this could have been sickeningly cute, but Lise can be relied on to retain the right balance of pathos and biting humour, with an hilarious final panel for those who have been paying attention.
There are also a selection of full page illustrations spread throughout the book, which originally appeared as covers for the Nemi monthly. Nicely composed designs that would look great on a wall, and in fact in Norway they appear as pages in the Nemi Calendars.
The cover to the book itself is taken from a Norwegian Nemi Christmas album from 2002. For some reason the colour scheme has been changed from the original, and I have to say I prefer the more festive red and green of the Norwegian version (below).
With this third British volume, Nemi seems to be an established part of our Christmas books line up as much as she is in her native country. This doesn't surprise me, as I always felt the themes in the strip were universal enough to work anywhere. If you're a follower of Nemi from the UK Metro newspaper you'll enjoy this book, and if you're new to the strip, give it a go. Without wishing to sound pompous, it's a modern strip for modern times. When this celebrity-obsessed, brand-brainwashed, go-with-the-flow society of ours gets too oppressive, Nemi cuts through it like a knife. Best of all, it's funny.
Forbidden Planet currently have copies signed by Lise Myhre for sale from their online store HERE for just £7.99.
Below: Lise looking very glamourous at the launch party for last year's Nemi book at the Norwegian Embassy. Read about it here.
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