The Beano annual 1972

I've rather unfairly been ignoring the Beano, focussing more on true boys comics rather than titles that appealed to both boys and girls. But, with the new annuals in the shops now, i thought i'd have a return to when i was 10 with this edition. When talking Beano, there was always a bunch of strips that i read, but didn't really enjoy: Minnie The Minx, Dennis The Menace, Roger The Dodger, Lord Snooty, Biffo The Bear. Then there were strips i enjoyed, but instantly forgot: Pup Parade, Little Plum, Bash St Kids. And then there were those that i adored and read over and over again: The Three Bears. Total and utter genius in just a few pages and it didn't matter that the scheme was always the same - it was like Tom & Jerry cartoons, you know how its going to pan out but the joy was going along for the ride to get there. Here we have the usual extravagance of the time, devoting two whole pages of the annual just to have the Three Bears welcoming the readers:

There's two tales of the Bears here, with exactly the same plot,them trying to break into Hank's store while he's away. The second tale has a happy Crimbo ending and, was it just me, but didn't a slap-up feast in comics always look SO much better than any amount of food served up in our real world?

The other tale i adored was Billy The Cat. Here i had weekly superhero adventures, so much different to the American reprints i was ingesting - characters, locations and set-ups that i could relate to much more than the likes of Marvel and DC were giving me. I could actually BE Billy - just needed a crash helmet, black togs, rucksack and be good at sports. I thought. Billys two tales here are a bit of an oddity. After another unnecessary, but brilliant opening page:

We start with Billy talking directly to us readers from the comfort of his deck chair, letting us know about his latest exploit of stopping a burglar and sorting out "five toughs". When he's done with that, he lets us know he'll have another tale for us after the next two pages - which are given over to a Billy The Cat drawing guide:

He's back to let us know how he'd mistaken a Fire Brigade house fire simulation and rescued a dummy. Two real light tales, with very light art - there's an awful lot of blank, white spaces in those panels, but it works a treat with the stories. Great Stuff. "AIEEEE!" WATCH: Not suprisingly, none.

POW! annual 1971 - #7 - The Phantom

About time i returned to this countdown and i think this takes the Number Seeven slot not for the hero, but the bad guy of the tale - a wall climbing, dart-firing villain called The Bat, sporting a cape Batman would be proud of and in the habit of leaving folk his calling card - a picture of a bat with "The Bat" over the top of it - in case folk didn't realise who'd robbed them. Anyway, our story centres on Jim Maguire, crime reporter, who - stand by for yet another bizzarro plot/device/set-up that makes these stories so special - needs to stake out a chemical factory where he thinks the Bat will appear, but has to attend a fancy dress ball, sneaks off while still in his natty outfit, gets to the factory, is chased by the Bat's men, falls into "electronic equipment", survives that, tumbles into a "huge drum containing a chemical powder" and emerges super-strong, glowing in the dark, and is mistaken for The Bat.

Anyway, he captures The Bat in a real humdrum tale and sets off on his new life as a crimefighter. Humdrum just about sums it up - The Bat is the only reason then and now for reading it as visually he's really neat. But now, as an adult, i can see the European artist was completly lifting from European superhero villain, Diabolik:

Valiant - 28th Feb 1970

Well, that sure was a surprise - popped into one of the local charity shops today and there was this copy sat all by itself on a pile of cookery books:

Had to have it, so lets see what's inside shall we? As usual, i'll skip "Captain Hurricane" as its a strip i never cared for back then and have do desire to revisit now. After that its "The Nuts", a comedy strip i didn't bother with as, back in '70, i was firmly into Leo Baxendale's work in other titles and they don't exactly compare do they? Next, "Kelly's Eye", a strip i've passed over before, and will do here, as he's quite a drip. But may do a feature when the premise of a tale is worth noting. "Raven Of The Wing". Hmmmm... One of those "football strips with an angle to stop it being Roy Of the Rovers" that seemed to be in every title back then. The angle here is that the lead character is "a gipsy boy" - as if that should make a difference. I haven't bothered with it, but did notice it as it has some excellent Lopez art - especially this last panel:

An excellent example of the artists character work and darn menacing to boot - would anyone dare put imagery like this into kids comics today? Next up, "College Cowboy". Pass. "World In Peril". Pass. "The Steel Claw" follows, and what a treat this is - in just two pages (!) Crandall's all-too visible steel hand is trapped by a pitchfork, he escapes and follows new villain "The Wraith", a bad guy who also turns invisible, except for his"... spectacles... The only thing that didn't vanish". Seeing a pair of glasses going "C-curse it..!" as he realises he's been rumbled is a treat. More so The Wraith ducking into an opticians to blend in. Anyway, Crandall gives up, goes to a telephone box (remember them?) to report in and then we get another one of those "no WAY would you show kids that these days" moments as the Wraith positions a live electrical cable in front of the door for when our hero emerges.

Next, "The House Of Dollman", another strip i've been over-looking. And i don't know why - the strip is very similar to "General Jumbo", in which our hero has a whole bunch of animated toys/mechanical folk at his command. Where this strip has the edge over Jumbo though is the bizarre and really quite distburbing notion that Dollman's artificial friends can't actually talk - its Dollman doing it as he "often amused himself by throwing his voice into the mouths of his puppets". Yes, really. They bicker and banter, often without Dollman being anywhere near. Strange. This episdoe has the puppet Hovero, handless and therefore useless, accidently being sold at a jumble sale, only to save the day when the days takings are stolen.

Its all very Toy Story in feel, with great Eric Bradbury art and the favourite strip this time round with my Sprogs, who i've let read. The rest of the issue is pretty forgettable, but it ends on a high with this back cover Sugar Smacks ad:

I remember this cereal for its TV tie-ins, mainly Captain Scarlet and UFO, and partially Star Trek, but don't remember these gifts at all. "AIEEEE!" Watch: Nowt.

Major Eazy - Heart Of Iron

Was given this for my birthday by my good friend Ian and, boy, was i pleased. So, SO nice to start seeing other classic boys characters of the seventies given the same decent amount of care and respect and presentation as Charleys War has had for so many years now. Well done Titan Books and thank you very much. Its strange reading it though, in large chunks of this hero, with no intervening strips of other characters. First thing of note is just how much Daly is a support act - almost like Ernie Wise to Eazy's Morecombe - and what a likeable charcater he is. Sure, he doesn't exactly develop over time, but his loyalty to Eazy is without question. Second up is what a surprise to not have that many tales that i remember Eazy for - him being discovered doing something unconventional, then told to do something, then does something unconventional that gets the end result, but his own way and usually better than if he'd just done what he'd been told. Usually in an amusing way. There's a bunch of them here to be sure, but we soon get a seriousness creeping in to the tales and, before long, we're almost in Charleys War or Darkies Mob territory: assisting suicides, shooting a woman in the back:

a massacre in a church of women and children:

and a fair bit of racism to boot. Also of note is how Carlos' art changes for a while, guessing he was having an experiment with different techniques:

In all, a great read. I like the serious tales but must say i prefer the more lighter one's as that's how i remember the fella. And glad to see his opposite number being in here, Major Leicht. The explanation of what his name means is a bit clumsy, but guess was neccesary.

Expect looks into some of the tales soon.

Modesty Blaise in Manchester

While in Manchester last month, we went to the brilliant Solita - great food, great atmos and a whole wall of Modesty Blaise. Smashing.

New art for you

Happy to say, i've just a new "Someone Old, Someone New" pairing to reveal. Address is below, or follow the link on the right of this page http://someoneoldsomeonenew.blogspot.co.uk/

Charley's War at the Tank Museum

Back from holidays, which was all great fun. A very unexpected and delightful surprise when at the Tank museum at Bovington in Dorset was to stumble across a cabinet of Charley's War art. It was there to illustrate just how accurate Joe was with his art, with actual items from WW1 alongside his depictions. A lovely treat to be nose to glass with his stunning art.

BYEEEE!!!!!!

Off now for two weeks of adventures - see you soon.

A spin-off project

You may be aware of my "Someone Old, Someone New" project. Actually, i had another idea before that one, which was to do with this Bat-cover. Its my Number 1 image from my childhood Bat-reading, an image that's stayed with me all these years and, even now, looking at it i get a deep down, emotional reaction to it. So, i thought it'd be nice to ask artists to have a go at their own version of it. As long as the three characters were there and were doing what they're doing, how they went about it and what it'd look like is totally up to them. Very pleased to say that i've my first two now. If you care to pop over to my Bat-Blog, you'll see them in all their glory: http://outofthebatcave.blogspot.co.uk/

Battle - 15th May 1976

With an awful lot of comics from the 70's, i've got a vague memory of the covers. Not so with this one that i've just rebought. Great innit? Inside we get the usual "how they heck did they manage to get all that in 3 pages?" way of telling a self-contained story. In the case of Major Eazy, he has a fight over a card game, almost shoots dead soime MP's, gets orders to get an expert to Toragli, finds its one of the cheating card players and goes up against a German tank an d truck before getting there. Great stuff and, again, more examples of just how mature these tales for children were. Look at this MP just about to give a soldier a beating for brawling in the street:

Other things of note here is just how bad Belardinelli's art is when coloured:

Everything's just lost - that top image of the ship would've been fantastic in black and white. When you turn the page and do get the B&W, biggest thrill, and note really in the same league, is Turk going up against a sumo wrestler in a Japanese training camp. Yes really:

Nasty bit of violence if Eagle Flies East. '76 is the time of Action, but its often overlooked that Battle was coming out with equally strong stuff at the same time:

"AIEEEE!" WATCH: A short "AIEEE!" from a tumbling German in D-Day Dawson. And a 100% perfect "AIEEEE!" from his mate a bit later. A "AAIEE!" from the torturor in EAgle Flies East

Back, with a huge dose of Thrill Power

Again, sorry i've been away. To get back in to things, what i've done is put my hand in the 2000AD box at the cut-off date of June 1978, and picked a Prog at random. And this is what came out - 27 May 1978 and a classic McMahon cover of Dredd. He and his tales have been given tons and miles of print, so lets look elsewhere as to what Tharg was offering this time shall we? First up, Dan Dare and yet again, and again, and again, and again, PLEASE can we see these reprinted? A fantastic tale of Dare and crew coming across a massive life-form buried on an ice planet. Who's quite happy to chat with his visitors, but can't escape as he's saving the last of his energy for his "DEATH-NOVA!". And won't let Dan and co go as he doesn't want to die alone. But, Dare being Dare, he finds a way and off the fella goes in to the stars.

Lovely art by Dave Gibbons but, yet again, we come across the crass and very silly idea of "have a character with a name associated with what he does". By now we've already met Hitman, who's a borderline pstcho and could easily be a - guess what? Here we have crewmate Wise, who not only looks like Ernie, is - wouldn't you know it - a "self-styled comedian. A horrible concept which, of course, is resurrected years later with Bagman and Gunnar in Rogue Trooper. Next we've got "Death Planet". Pretty duff stuff, despite lovely art from Lopez, notable only really for its use of alternative, futuristic swear words, that seemed to be the norm in the early days of the Prog. Dredd got his "Drokk!" and "Stomm!" and here the survivors get a "Strack!" and the bit better "Strack me!". Wonder what it could be a substitute for?

Mike Dorey does some lovely, moody art on "Mach Zero" and Mike McMahon's art on Dredd is, of course, superlative, but it falls to Belardinelli on "Inferno" to take top honours this time. Every page has a stand-out "whoah" moment, but these are my two favourites this time - the stunning, terrific, bizarre Caveman whacking the ball away, abd this terrific shot of Artie Gruber catching the ball. Genius stuff.

"AIEEEE!" WATCH: Zilch. But would like to highlight probably the best ever exclamation, as Artie crashes into a window - "FNUURRRGGLE!"

Demoncon 3

Yeah, i know, i know - there will be a new post soon, promise. But things are SO busy right now, i've no time for reading except for last thing at night before kip, and i'm too knackered then to remember anything to write down next day. In the meantime, yet another stop-gap, this time footage from the really rather excellent Demoncon convention in Maidstone a while back. I'm in it, but only very briefly so don't let that put you off. And, if you can, i heartily recommend the next Demoncon in September.

My General Blackblood build

Sorry for lack of updates here, but i've been real busy trying to make deadlines on some of my modelling projects. Which has eaten up all my spare time, so time for reading anything. Come to the end of that now, so expect more waffle soon. In the mean time, thought you might like to see where i am today with one of my projects, building Blackblood from 2000AD's ABC Warriors:

Flesh episode

I've just finished the latest of the "Flesh" GN's and its been a real blast.
Each episode is packed full of Thrill Power, no more so than the first bunch and, reading them, i'm that 15-year old again, loving that his trusty Airfix T Rex
can be put up against all his Tamiya tanks and troops.

Episode 3 is one that was a huge favourite back then, with its horribly gnarly Pteradon's with the Letratone seemignly giving them more mass than would be possible to fly

The first apperance of the soon to be one-eyed One Eye, and the terrifically daft "natter away while facing the jaws of death" staple of early 2000AD's

And this classic, classic, iconic moment


Thrill Power indeed.
"AIEEEE" WATCH:
A squashed down "AIEEE" from a squashed down Cowboy, being trodden on by Old One Eye.

My Biog

Long term readers of this here Blog will know how my favourite strip in 2000AD for the first coupla years was "Dan Dare", partly for Dave Gibbons' work during the whole Space Fortess saga, but mainly for Belardinelli's creepily effective work right from the off - and especially his depictions of the Biogs, bio-mechanical aliens out there amongst the public long before H.R. Giger did the same in "Alien":

I've just been asked to send a sample of JPEG's of my original work to someone and i included my take on the foot soldiers of that alien race and i thought you might like to see it?
Making it was a bit of a nightmare - what Massimo made look simple really wasn't - tons of compound curves and far, far too much detail.
Gawd, he was brilliant.

The genius of Belardinelli - 67/34,876

Just been reading an issue of Battle Picture Weekly from 1975 and, typical of the title from this period, it can either have genius stuff in it - or be pretty dull.
This one is a dull one, with even the usual entertaining tales of "Rat Pack" , "D-Day Dawson" and the further adventures of Mike Nelson being plodding affairs.
But, if a strips got Belardinelli on it, you're guaranteed at least one stand-out instance showing his genius.
And this is his this time on "Rat Pack" - two panels shwoing the ships colliding and just look at that detail.
Amazing stuff - dunno if my favourite is the tiny, tiny soldiers falling into the sea in the second panel (just how big did he draw this???) or the German soldier on the left in the top panel. How much character????
"AIEEEE!" WATCH:
YES! A spot-on 100% "AIEEEE!" from a mown down German in "The Password Is Courage"

Defoe original art

Leigh Gallagher's begun to sell some of his artwork from 2000AD's "Defoe" - see link to his Blog in the sidebar to the right - and, though i can't really afford it, i just had to have one.
As i've said numerous times here, Leigh's work - and Defoe especially - is carrying on the tradition of British boys comic strips from the 60's and 70's, with his incredibly moody and evocative black and white art depecting fantastically imaginative characters and situations.
So its a real thrill to have a page in the "flesh" and its sitting proudly next to my "Janus Stark" page, a truly suitable place for it to be.
I've chosen this page as we get a bunch of characters from the strip along with a dose of ultra-violence.
What's not to like?
Top Bloke that Leigh is, he also included this, an original prelim for Defoe from back in 2006.
Cheers Leigh!

Strip Magazine No.3

Better late than never, but at least i have it now.
Another corker of a read and i'm liking the mix of strips and articles - the more this title goes on the more it reminds me of "Warrior" and that ain't no bad thing is it?
Shame to see my favourite new strip, "Recovery Inc", taking a rest for a while but at least it'll be back and "The Devils Heritage" is off to an intriguing start.
Of course, the old school thrills are still the best for me and its nice to see "Starlord" having one of its infrequent peeps out from behind The Mighty Tharg's shadow.
And so nice to have the Man himself shown here in this classic piece by Ian Gibson. I loved Ian's work around this time and Starlords face is very reminiscent of the work he was doing on "Captain Kronos" shortly before over in "Hammer House Of Horror".
Top Thrill is of course Hookjaw and there's two things of note for me this time.
First up, this very, VERY odd image of the fella from the original strip:

Its odd and frankly quite rubbish. And quite clearly not done by Sola. The only reasons i can think of for having such a bizarre depiction is (A) Hookjaw was never in the panel originally and someone in Editorial decided he should be, (B) He was in it but maybe too small to look threatening?
Anyway, in the new version, the colouring does a great job in breaking up that flat white:

And not making it too noticible. And, comparing the two, again something that wouldn't be noticed any other time pops up - the difference between "at the rig -" and "at the rig..."
I LOVE the other comparision:
the original "AAGH!":

changed over to a much, much better "AAAAIEEE!":

Okay, there's three more "A"'s and one less "E" to be 100%, but that's close enough for me and i'm chuffed to bits - Jim, you did a great job.

Valiant 17th May 1975

Just bought this issue so lets have a peek at what's of note, yes?
Sergeant Strong:

A strip i don't remember at all. He's "Simon Strong", a soldier who's had "an accident in space" which has resulted in him having the strength of 10 men and, for some odd reason, the weight of ten men too...
Odd. And this tale is odd too - its full two pages given over to him climbing up a pipe then being blown up. Twice.
The gimmick (apart from the weight thing) is very similar to Adam Eterno, which id curious as he's in the issue too.
With Adam only being vulnerable to gold, i guess it would only be a matter of time before he came across Jason going after the Golden Fleece.
Which he does here - except, for some bizarre reason, all the names have been changed. Instead of Jason we get "Janex", the "Elgo" replaces Jason's Argos ship and the Golden Fleece is now a "Golden Web.
Curious.
Great tale though, highlight of which is Adam putting himself between the rocks and the prow of the ship to stop it being crushed:

And lastly we've got The Boy Who Went To War, a very "Charley's War" tale set in WW2 though but still featuring a rather simple lad who lies about his age to join up, has a simpler buddy side-kick, a kindly sergeant and lots of tension in the trenches.



"AIEEEE" WATCH:
No. Whta we do have though is an oft-used expletive across the strips: "NEE-AAAGH!"