D.C. Thomson launched a new weekly comic 35 years ago, when Spike No.1 arrived in newsagents on Friday 14th January 1983. Although Thomsons had attempted a few tougher styled boys' comics with Warlord, Bullet and Crunch a few years earlier, this new comic was playing it comparatively safe and was more of a mixture of traditional comics like Victor and Buddy. That said, Spike did have its own style and felt more casual than its companion comics, helped considerably by the comic's mascot, Spike himself.
Under a nicely designed logo, the cover of issue 1 featured two proven methods to hook the reader; an exciting announcement that the comic contained a free gift, and the opening panels of the lead strip, Iron Barr (art by Mike White). The perceived wisdom at the time was that if a reader picked up a comic to read the cover strip, you were almost guaranteed a sale. Whether this worked in practice was debatable, as Spike only lasted for 67 weeks before merging into Champ.
Inside, the comic contained a nice variety of adventure strips, including sci-fi hero Starhawk (who had previously starred in Crunch) fighting the Powerbeast. (Art by Terry Patrick.)
A D.C. Thomson boys' comic wouldn't be complete without a war story, and Spike gave us The Ghost in the Cockpit (art by Gordon Livingstone)...
The main draw of Spike started in the centre pages. The Man in Black told the story of a mysterious, seemingly ageless athlete with extraordinary strength and stamina. The clues to the man's identity were revealed over the weeks that followed, eventually identifying him as William Wilson, the Wonder Athlete who had appeared in Thomson story paper The Wizard many years earlier, and in The Hornet in the 1960s. His revival in Spike acted as a sequel to those earlier stories but was also a retelling, using updated scripts as I recall. The artist of the strip was a Wilson too; Neville Wilson...
The Bleak Street Bunch was a traditional school strip, but with a contemporary setting. Art by Peter Foster...
Ticker Tait, the Man with a Time Bomb in his Heart, was also drawn by the very-busy Neville Wilson, and was the spy thriller of the comic's line up...
Spike also featured a few articles, a text story, plus a strip featuring Spike himself, drawn by Brian Walker...
On the back page of the 36 page first issue was an ad for future issues and the free gifts to come!
...and if you wondered what the Ghostly Glow Badge in issue 4 looked like, here it is...
...and yes, it did glow in the dark!
Spike was a very enjoyable, well produced comic but sadly it arrived at a time when traditional adventure comics were on their way out. Had it been launched in the 1960s it might have stood a better chance, but not in 1983 when it faced so much rivalry from comics based on toys and tv shows. The comics industry was changing and publishers soon found they had to adapt to survive.
All of the images in this post are my own scans and photographs, but I'm indebted to Jeremy Briggs at Down the Tubes for his excellent article on Spike which you'll find here: http://downthetubes.net/?page_id=25672 which enabled me to identify the artists.
By 1984, Buster was still printed on increasingly flimsy newsprint but it contained some good stuff. This festive cover by veteran artist Reg Parlett is simple but effective. I wonder how many Christmas strips Reg drew in his long career that stretched to about 60 years?
Inside, The Leopard from Lime Street continued to be one of the most popular British superheroes around. I think the art was by Mike White by this time...
School Fun had merged into Buster months before, and appeared as a separate pull-out section, akin to Chips in Whizzer. The School Fun Section only had 12 pages though, (leaving Buster with 20) so it wasn't an equal 50/50 split like Whizzer and Chips. Artwork on School Team was usually by Vic Neill but this is a fill-in by Doug Jensen. (Thanks to Andy Boal for his observations.)
School Belle was another strip that had joined the comic from School Fun. Art by Tom Paterson...
A festive Faceache page by Ken Reid, even scrunging at Christmas.
Good Guy that issue had a smashing festive decorative border. Terry Bave going the extra mile there...
On the back page, Buster's Diary, with Reg Parlett again on the artwork, and the story ending with the traditional slap-up feed!
Another Christmas comic tomorrow. Or maybe even two! Stay tuned!
Here's the second in this year's selection of vintage Christmas comics, and it's 2000AD and Tornado Prog 145 from 1979. A great cover by Carlos Ezquerra, and the art department has even added traditional snow to the logo.
Inside, the comic isn't actually that festive, as IPC tended to leave the Christmas hi-jinks to the humour comics, but it's such a great line-up of strips that I thought you'd like to see a taste of them. The issue got off to a strong start with Judge Dredd by John Wagner and Mick McMahon...
Future war story The V.C.s by Ian Rogan and Garry Leach...
The Mind of Wolfie Smith had transferred over from Tornado comic. This episode was by Tom Tully and Mike White...
The centre-spread at this time featured The Stainless Steel Rat, adapting Harry Harrison's novel in comics form by Kelvin Gosnell and Carlos Ezquerra...
2000AD featured a single-page humour strip back then, with Captain Klep drawn by Robin Smith. (Ken O'Neill had been the original artist.)
Black Hawk was written by Alan Grant and illustrated by Massimo Bellardinelli...
Finally, at the back of the comic, a Christmas strip! Tying in with the front cover, it's Tharg's Christmas Tale, drawn by Carlos Ezquerra...
Don't forget that this year's Christmas 2000AD will be out on Wednesday with 100 pages! Here's a preview:
https://lewstringer.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/the-christmas-issue-of-2000ad-is-zarjaz.html
There'll be pages from another old festive title tomorrow. Which year will we arrive in? Wait and see!
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| Cover by Mike White. |
There's a new book coming out on October 3rd that details the history of the Roy of the Rovers strip. Real Roy of the Rovers Stuff is written by ex-Fleetway editor Barrie Tomlinson and gives the behind-the-scenes story of the famous character.
It promises to reveal how Roy went from "comic book hero to national institution". I would hope that it'll also include lots of info about the many uncredited artists who drew the strip over the years.
You can pre-order the book now from Amazon:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Real-Roy-Rovers-Stuff-Story/dp/178531212X
I noticed this book listed on Amazon yesterday: Uncensored Action (The Best of Action). Or just The Best of Action according to the cover. From the brief description it looks like this 288 page paperback from Titan Books will reprint some classic material from the pages of IPC's Action, the boy's comic that shocked a nation in 1976 with its portrayals of violence. The powers-that-be back in the day hated the comic and it was withdrawn several months after its launch, to return in a much toned down form weeks later.
According to the book cover shown above (which of course may be different when it's eventually published in August 2014) the contents will include the controversial Kids Rule O.K. This strip survived Action's relaunch but suffered the consequence of having panels censored and an ending that went against the grain of its original concept.
Here's a page from an issue of Action (25th Sept. 1976) before the ban. Art by Mike White...
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| Copyright © Egmont |
No doubt The Best of Action will also feature background details on the rise and fall of the comic. However, this isn't the first time that Titan Books have covered this fascinating saga. Back in 1990 they published Action: The Story of a Violent Comic by the social and media historian Martin Barker. This compelling book reprinted many of Action's strips - including the ones that never made it to the shelves, comparing the published versions with the original uncensored pages, accompanied by text and research by Professor Barker. Perhaps Titan's new book will be similar, but if you don't have a copy of Martin Barker's edition it's well worth tracking down on eBay or wherever to read about this interesting part of British comics history.
Sad news just in. Mike White, artist of numerous British adventure strips passed away at the weekend after a long illness.
Mike's first regular strip was Jackaroo Joe for Valiant about a swagman from the Australian outback brought to the UK, preceding a similar plot in the film Crocodile Dundee by 21 years. Here's the first episode from issue dated 30th October 1965...
Mike White also drew many other series for Fleetway/IPC including Cannonball Craig for Score 'n' Roar and The Team Terry Kept in a Box for Lion. Here's the final episode of that strip from the last issue of Lion in 1974...
Mike also illustrated various strips for DC Thomson (usually one-off stories). His solid, professional style made him ideal for the boys' adventure comics. In 1976 the artist developed a grittier edge to his usually clean inkline when he illustrated Hell's Highway for the tough new IPC weekly Action.
Mike also used that darker, more detailed style of artwork when he became the artist of Action's most controversial series, Kids Rule OK. From the outset (shown below) this was one of the most brutally violent strips IPC had published and it (and other strips) led to the public outcry against the comic which saw Action suspend publication for several weeks to return in a diluted form.
Many comic fans will be most familiar with Mike White's work on 2000AD, particularly his collaboration with writer Alan Moore on the Time Twisters story The Reversible Man. This memorable complete story told of a man literally living his life in reverse. The story appeared in 2000AD Prog 308 in 1983.
Mike also had a popular run on Roy of the Rovers for six years, bringing a new dynamic energy to the strip. He also illustrated various stories for Commando, with his most recent work appearing last year.
Able to master both black and white and colour work Mike White's powerful images were perfect for British adventure comics. I'm sure that comic scholars with broader knowledge of Mike's work than I will soon be paying their tributes to the artist elsewhere with more details of his long and impressive career.
Yesterday on his own blog, artist Mike Perkins wrote: "I've had the honour to go drinking with Mike a few times and had always found him to be a lovely bloke - with a curmudgeonly streak - accompanied by a plethora of tales. He arrived in London during " The Swinging Sixties" and, by his accounts, he made the most of it - regaling me with tales of drinking Oliver Reed under the table and another, unmentionable tale, involving Felicity Kendal! It's my belief that he was in love with the theatre and felt compelled to pursue this as a career. I have no idea why he didn't but am glad that he chose the path he did - enriching so many lives with his artwork even if he himself believed he left no lasting impression unlike those talented "kids" Bolland and Gibbons. I like to think that, in our times drinking in the Lord Salisbury pub, I had persuaded him, just a tiny bit, that his work was, indeed, influential on, at least, my life."
My sincere condolences to Mr White's family and friends for their loss.
More information on Mike's work is on this page written by Steve Holland:
http://illustrationartgallery.blogspot.com/2011/06/mike-white.html
