Category: Environmentalism

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The Treasury of British Comics Annual 2024


By Simon Furman, Tom Tully, Alec Worley, Alf Wallace, Leo Baxendale, Pat Mills, Mike Brown, Kek-W, Walter Thorburn, E. George Cowan, Derek Cribbling, Leo Baxendale, Ken Armstrong, Mike Collins, David Roach, Enric Badia Romero, Dave Gibbons, Garry Leach, Ken Reid, Brian Bolland, Joe Colquhoun, Steve Dillon, DaNi, Cam Kennedy, Brian Lewis, Mike Western, Staz Johnson, Tom Paterson, Carlos Guirado, Juan Arancio, Henry Flint & various (Rebellion Studios)
Digital only eISBN: 978-1-83786-025-8 (Kindle); 978-183786-133-0 (Webshop Exclusive)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: True Brit Comics Class… 8/10

As I’ve repeated ad infinitum, British comics always enjoyed an extended love affair with unconventional (for which feel free to substitute “weird” or “creepy”) heroes. Many stars and notional role models in our strips might have been outrageous or just plain “off”, but we also handled traditional stuff in a more appropriate manner… one less likely to have outraged parents and censorious moral stickybeaks gunning for editors and publishers

Until the 1980s, UK periodicals employed an anthological model, offering a large variety of genre, theme and characters. Humour comics like The Beano were leavened by action-adventures like The Q-Bikes or General Jumbo whilst dramatic fare papers like Lion, Eagle, Hotspur or Valiant always offered palate-cleansing gagsters… and there was no reason to rock that boat in end-of-year bumper annuals

Prior to game-changers Action, Misty and 2000AD, British comics fell into fairly ironclad categories. Back then, you had genial and/or fantastic preschool fantasy; a large selection of licensed entertainment properties; action; adventure; war; school dramas, sports and conventional comedy strands. Closer examination would confirm there was always a subversive merging, mixing undertone, especially in such antihero series as Dennis the Menace or our rather strained interpretation of superheroes. Just check out The Spider, Kelly’s Eye or early Steel Claw stories…

The glory days of Christmas Annuals have ended but thanks to Rebellion and their superb Treasury of British Comics project, a touch of that grand legacy has been delighting old and new readers with modern versions of the good old days for a few years now. A little slice of the future of nostalgia comes with a limited Hardback edition and general-release digital compilations of seasonal comics fun and thrills. Moreover – just like the bonanza hardbacks they celebrate – these Annuals are a blend of all-new material and old classics.

In this first release from November 2023 the recovered, remastered delights stem from Smash! April 2nd – May 14th 1966; Wham! Annual 1966: Wham! November 25th 1967 and January 15th 1968; Lion & Valiant Holiday Extra 1969; Pow! Annual 1971; Buster Book of Scary Stories 1975; Action Summer Special 1976; Valiant Book of Mystery & Magic 1976; Action Annual 1979; Battle Holiday Special 1979; Misty Annual 1980; Starlord Annual 1982; Scream! May 12th 1984 and Monster Fun Halloween Spooktacular 2021 and opens with a modern-day team up clash by Simon Furman, Mike Collins & David Roach, coloured by Gary Caldwell and lettered by Annie Parkhouse.

‘The Spider Vs The Leopard from Lime Street’ pits the wild and wary misunderstood heroes against each other until time-bending true malign manipulators The Infernal Gadgeteer and Dr Mysterioso are exposed and expelled, after which true evil genius Leo Baxendale depicts in full colour how ‘Grimly Feendish’ staged his own Great Train Robbery in Wham! November 25th 1967.

Reproduced from actual artboards as “Original Art Archive Scans – with erasings, white out and all…” and as seen in weekly Smash! from April 2nd – May 14th 1966, ‘Moon Madness’ was written by Alf Wallace and illustrated by Brian Lewis, and revealed how a Russian lunar mission resulted in a bizarre jigsaw monster terrorising Britain…

Another multi-hued Baxendale ‘Grimly Feendish’ (from Wham! January 15th 1968) depicting another banditry bungle segues into a sci fi classic from an unknown author and Garry Leach as seen in Starlord Annual 1982 wherein an all-consuming bio-terror on a cargo freighter demands the expert attention of ‘The Exterminator’, after which an equally anonymous yarn from The Buster Book of Scary Stories 1975 limned by Dave Gibbons sees a keen trainee aviator used by ‘The Ghost Pilot’ to save a person on peril and pay off a debt…

Wham! Annual 1966 provided a wry extended ‘Frankie Stein’ tale by Walter Thorburn & Ken Reid regarding the excesses of the tabloid press before Tom Tully & Brian Bolland detail the terrors and rewards of modern sport sensation ‘Spinball’ as originally covered in Action Annual 1979, prior to another new tale as ‘Black Beth’ faces arcane peril from tarot terrors courtesy of Alec Worley, DaNi & Oz Osbourne. Pat Mills, Derek Cribbling & Joe Colquhoun keep up the mystic menace with a craven cartoonist’s cautionary tale and fate as ‘The Final Victim’ as seen in the Valiant Book of Mystery & Magic 1976 prior to Misty Annual 1980, an unknown author and Carlos Guirado exposing a young heiress to ancient heirloom ‘The Hand of Vengeance!’

Supernatural mystery continues with Furman, Steve Dillon & Jay Cobb’s ‘Beware the Werewolf!’ from Scream! May 12th 1984 before the scene shifts to true horror as Cam Kennedy and the Unknown Scripter deliver a lost episode of ‘Charleys’ War’ first found in Battle Holiday Special 1979, prior to time-travelling ‘Robot Archie’ and pals facing pirates in the Caribbean thanks to E. George Cowan & Mike Western and Lion & Valiant Holiday Extra 1969…

‘Esper Commandos’ was published in Pow! Annual 1971, limned by future Modesty Blaise and Axa illustrator Enric Badia Romero and reappears here as another smudges ‘n’ all “Original Art Archive Scan”. It features a future and fascinating psionic super-squad as they infiltrate and eliminate the Britain’s future enemies, and precedes a full colour origin for one of UK comics’ strangest stars. Thanks to Ken Armstrong & Juan Arancio in Action Summer Special 1976,‘Great White Death’ revealed how Shark superstar Hookjaw got his bloody start…

One last original yarn – by Kek-W, Staz Johnson, Barbara Nosnzo & Simon Bowland – maintains the tone but transfers time and place to Leningrad in 1944 for saucy savage combat fable ‘Gustav of the Bearmacht’ before Monster Fun Halloween Spooktacular 2021 revives ‘Gah! The Gobblin’ Goblin’ and his astounding appetite thanks to Keith Richardson, Tom Paterson & Bowland.

Daft, thrilling, beautifully rendered, devastatingly nostalgic and truly fun, these are all you need to complete your Crimbo celebrations and since we’re all messing about with electrons and what-nots, if you want YOU CAN GET IT IMMEDIATELY THANKS TO DIGITAL RUDOLF THE RED BUTTON REINDEER AND THEM INTERWEB TUBES!!

The same applies to the follow up tome…
© 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969, 1971, 1975, 1976, 1979, 1980, 1982, 1984, 2021 & 2023 Rebellion Publishing IP Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

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The Treasury of British Comics Annual 2025


By Paul Grist, Simon Furman, Leo Baxendale, Ian Rimmer, Donne Avenell, Tom Tully, Alec Worley, Steve Moore, John Smith, Simon Williams, John M. Burns, Mike Collins, Carlos Ezquerra, Mick McMahon, Mike Western, Frank Langford, Massimo Belardinelli, Anna Morozova, Ian Kennedy, Eric Bradbury, David Roach, Emily Roach, Andreas Butzbach & various (Rebellion Studios)
eISBN: 978-1-83786-498-0 (general edition); 978-183786-501-7 (Webshop Exclusive)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: More True Brit Comics Class… 8/10

What you read up above is just as true for this second Annual Endeavour which emerged at the end of 2024. This time around, the new contributions are augmented by material from Tiger February 13th – May 8th 1965; Wham! February 27th 1965; Lion Annual 1972; The Buster Book of Scary Stories 1975; Valiant 21st August -16th October 1976; Valiant Annual 1976; Battle Annual 1979; Dan Dare Annual 1980; Action Annual 1982; Scream! Holiday Special 1985 and 2000 AD Presents Action!

Kicking things off is a full-colour, all new rematch /grudge match as Paul Grist, Simon Willams, colourist Jason Cardy & letterer Leila Jess detail one more mighty mess up in ‘Robot Archie Vs The Sludge’ prior to that uncredited writer and Carlos Ezquerra revealing how battle-savvy rebel ‘Major Easy’ ferrets out traitors in Nazi-occupied Greec as seen in Battle Annual 1979.

Long ago Scream! Holiday Special 1985 pointed out the problems with ‘New Neighbours’ courtesy of Ian Rimmer & Mike Western whilst anonymous & Mick McMahon expose the domestic stresses of ‘3000 AD The Traveller’, as first debated in Dan Dare Annual 1980 (which is apparently still a 2000 AD Production)…

Leo Baxendale’s anarchic spoof ‘Eagle Eye, Junior Spy – Doomsday School’ (Wham! February 27th 1965) segues into dark and dangerous (no really) football strip ‘Stryker’ (by Tom Tully & Ian Kennedy and running in Valiant 21st August to 16th October 1976) as really good player joins a naff team to discover how his brother died following an ugly on-pitch incident…

John Smith & John M. Burns were on fine form in 2000 AD Presents Action! as ‘Doctor Sin: The Strange Case of the Wyndham Demon’ sees the mystic troubleshooter drawn to a dark and deadly case of diabolical incursions after which Simon Furman, Mike Collins & letterer SquakeZz deliver an all-original adventure as ‘Kelly’s Eye Vs The White Eyes’ sees mystic ghost-breaker Cursitor Doom call in the invulnerable hero to end a threat to the entire multiverse caused by environmental mucking about…

There’s more of the same, if a little earlier set, as anonymous & Frank Langford detail how animal experiments turn a lab chimp into a threat to all humanity after taking over ‘Gorilla Island’ as seen in Tiger from February 13th to May 8th 1965 – predating Planet of the Apes by three years! – after which possibly the same scripter (who can tell?) & Ian Kennedy cover how immortal time traveller ‘Adam Eterno’ exposes a slave-taker at Camelot’s Round Table, as seen in Valiant Annual 1976.

Donne Avenell & Massimo Belardinelli tell a tale of feudal Caped Crusader/Dark (green) Knight) ‘Flame O’ the Forest’ wherein the masked Saxon battles Norman injustice and oppression in a short romp from Lion Annual 1972 before final new addition ‘Black Beth: Vultures of Azotir’ sees Alec Worley, Anna Morozova, & Ozwald reaffirm the Warrior Sorceress’ undying battle against evil magic and wicked people, before Steve Moore & Eric Bradbury close the Christmas curtain with The Knight From Nowhere’: one last bout of sword-waving sagas and supernatural vengeance as originally seen The Buster Book of Scary Stories 1975…

And that’s another pretty package of festive future-of-nostalgia fun done. Crucially, all these digital delights could be all yours right now, if not sooner…

Admit it. You’re tempted, right? And don’t YOU deserve some seasonal fun and thrills too?
© 1965, 1972, 1975, 1976, 1979, 1980, 1982, 1985, 1992 & 2024 Rebellion Publishing IP Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Today in 1946 Vittorio Giardino was born. We just did his Max Fridman stuff so no help from here, just go scrolling. In 1947 Dutch wonder boy Joost Swarte was born and in 1959 Jean Roba’s Boule et Bill began in Le Journal de Spirou, and 10 years later Scottish writer Mark Millar was born.

On the downside, though, in 1986 today was Gardner F. Fox’s last day on Earth-1 and in 1992 Smurf-meister Peyo passed away leaving all far less blue…

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Justice League of America – The Last Survivors of Earth!


By Denny O’Neil, Mike Friedrich, Robert Kanigher, Dick Dillin, Neal Adams, Joe Giella, Murphy Anderson, Curt Swan, Dick Giordano & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-4012-8920-1 (TPB/Digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Action, Imagination and Social Conscience: a True Xmas Tradition… 9/10

After the actual invention of the comic book superhero – for which read the Action Comics debut of Superman in 1938 – the most significant event in the industry’s progress was the combination of individual sales-points into a group. Thus, what seems blindingly obvious to us with the benefit of four-colour hindsight was proven: a number of popular characters could multiply readership by combining forces. Plus, of course, a mob of superheroes is just so much cooler than one… or one-and-a-half if there’s a sidekick involved…

And so, the debut of the Justice Society of America is rightly revered as a true landmark in the development of comic books, and when Julius Schwartz revived the superhero genre in the late 1950s, the turning point came with an inevitable union of his reconfigured mystery men. That moment came with #28 of The Brave and the Bold, a classical adventure title that had recently transformed into a try-out magazine like Showcase. Just before Christmas 1959 the ads began running. …Just Imagine! The mightiest heroes of our time… have banded together as the Justice League of America to stamp out the forces of evil wherever and whenever they appear!…

The rest is history: the JLA captivated the youth of a nation, reinvigorated an industry and even inspired a small family concern into creating the Fantastic Four, thereby transforming the art-form itself. Following a spectacular rise, TV spin-offs brought international awareness which led to catastrophic overexposure: by 1968 the new superhero boom looked to be dying just as its predecessor had at the end of the 1940s.

Sales were down generally in the comics industry and costs were beginning to spiral, and more importantly “free” entertainment, in the form of television, was by now ensconced in even the poorest household. If you were a kid in the sixties, think on just how many brilliant cartoon shows were created in that decade, when artists like Alex Toth and Doug Wildey were working in West Coast animation studios. Moreover, comic book heroes were now appearing on the small screen. Superman, Aquaman, Batman, upstart Marvel’s heroes and even the Justice League of America were there every Saturday in your own living room…

It was also a time of great political and social upheaval. Change was everywhere and unrest even reached the corridors of DC. When a number of creators agitated for increased work benefits the request was not looked upon kindly. Many left the company for other outfits. Some quit the business altogether… and some were pushed out…

This fabulous compendium volume reflects the turmoil of those times as the original writer and penciller who had created every single adventure of the World’s Greatest Superheroes since their inception gave way to a new wave of scripters and a fresh if not young artist.

Richard Allen “Dick” Dillin (17th December 1928 – 1st March 1980) had started in the 1940s at Quality Comics on Blackhawk, Plastic Man and their war anthologies. An utterly reliable prolific draughtsman, he moved to DC when the company bought out Quality and spent over a decade drawing their Blackhawk. When Sekowsky left, he would draw every JLA issue for the next twelve years, as well as many other adventures of DC’s top characters – and even a wealth of horror stories when the company started scaring kids for money again…

Collecting issues #77-95 (cover-dates December 1969 to December 1971) and generously re-presenting the stirring covers of #85 & 93: giant all-reprint editions, this tome captures a culture in transition and visible change in the way DC stories were told, over a period when the market changed forever, and comics stopped being casual disposable mass-entertainment.

By the end of the period covered in this volume the publishers had undertaken the conceptual and commercial transition from a mass-market medium which slavishly followed trends and fashions to become a niche industry producing only what its dedicated fans wanted…

Without preamble the drama commences with the heroes’ confidence and worldview shattered after enigmatic political populist Joe Dough suborns and compromises their beloved teen mascot in ‘Snapper Carr… Super-Traitor!’ as crafted by Denny O’Neil, Dillin & Joe Giella, a coming-of-age yarn that changed the comfy, cosy superhero game forever.

Greater social awareness parading through comics at this time manifested in the next epic 2-parter, which also revives another Golden Age Great (presumably to cash in on the mini-boom in screen Westerns). The Vigilante – a cowboy-themed superhero who battled bandits and badmen in a passel of DC titles from 1941-1954 – here alerts the team to ‘The Coming of the Doomsters!’ just in time to foil alien invaders who use pollution as their secret weapon. The vile plot concludes in ‘Come Slowly Death, Come Slyly!’ as the heroes stop the toxic baddies whilst subtly introducing young readers to potential ecological disasters in the making. This gave us plenty of time to offset greenhouse gases and end our dependence on fossil fuels and has given us the healthy planet we enjoy today…

Another landmark of this still-impressive tale was the introduction of the JLA Satellite, as the team moved from a hole in a mountain to a high-tech orbiting fortress. As they are moving in, ‘Night of the Soul-Stealer!’ sees Thanagarian Lorch Nor collecting heroic spirits in a magic box, but it is only prelude to an even greater threat as JLA #81 reveals his good intentions when the ‘Plague of the Galactic Jest-Master’ threatens to inflict a greater mind-crushing horror upon our entire universe…

Next is another grand collaboration between JLA and the Justice Society of America as ruthless property speculators (is there any other kind?) from outer space seek to raze two separate Earths in ‘Peril of the Paired Planets’. Only the ultimate sacrifice of a true hero averts trans-dimensional disaster in climactic conclusion ‘Where Valor Fails… Will Magic Triumph?’

Justice League of America #84 (November 1970) hosted ‘The Devil in Paradise!’: a guest-script from veteran Robert Kanigher wherein a well-meaning but demented scientist builds his own Eden to escape Earth’s increasing savagery, before going off the deep end and attempting to cleanse the world and start civilisation afresh.

With superheroes on the outs the team was severely truncated too. JLA #86 confronted issues of overpopulation and impending global starvation as Mike Friedrich began a run of excellent eco-thrillers with ‘Earth’s Final Hour!’. Here crooked business entrepreneur (can I say “any other kind” again?) Theo Zappa tries to trade away Earth’s plankton (base of our entire food-chain) to a race of aliens with only Superman, Batman, Flash, Aquaman, Atom & Hawkman on hand to thwart him, whilst #87’s ‘Batman… King of the World!’ brings in occasional guest-star Zatanna and semi-retired Green Lantern Hal Jordan to tackle a deadly alien robot raider. This was a devious and barely veiled attack on Big Business and the Vietnam war, most renowned these days for introducing a group of alien superheroes mischievously based on Marvel’s Mighty Avengers.

The human spirit and enduring humanity are highlighted as ancient refugees from the lost city of Mu return to find us in charge of the planet they had abandoned millennia ago. ‘The Last Survivors of Earth!’ proves that even when superheroes are outmatched by scientifically-instigated global catastrophes, the simple patience, charity and self-confidence of ordinary folks can move mountains and save worlds…

‘The Most Dangerous Dreams of All!’ is one of the oddest tales in the JLA canon, with a thinly disguised Harlan Ellison psychically inserting himself into the consciousness of Superman and Batman to woo Black Canary with near-fatal repercussions, in a rather self-indulgent but intriguing examination of the creative process. Back on – and under – solid ground again for #90, ‘Plague of the Pale People!’ sees Aquaman’s submerged kingdom of Atlantis conquered by a primitive subsea tribe (the Saremites from Flash #109) using nerve gas negligently dumped in the ocean by the US military. In a mordant and powerful parable about lost faith and taking responsibility, the JLA must deal with problems much tougher than whomping monsters, repelling invaders and locking up bad guys…

JLA #91 (August 1971) heralds a hero-heavy first chapter in the annual JLA/JSA team-up with ‘Earth… the Monster-Maker!’ as the Supermen, Flashes, Green Lanterns, Hawkmen, Atoms & Robins of two Realities simultaneously and ineffectually battle an alien boy and his symbiotically-linked dog on two planets a universe apart. The result is meaningless carnage and imminent death until ‘Solomon Grundy… the One and Only!’ gives all concerned a life-saving lesson on togetherness and lateral thinking…

Following the cover of reprint giant #93, Neal Adams steps in to provide additional pencils for tense mystery ‘Where Strikes Demonfang?’ as ghostly guardian Deadman helps Batman, Aquaman & Green Arrow foil a murder mission by previously infallible archer Merlyn and the League of Assassins.

The issue and this tome end on a cliffhanger as Flash, Green Lantern & Hawkman are lost in a teleporter accident, leaving Batman, Black Canary, Green Arrow & Atom to fight ‘The Private War of Johnny Dune!’ wherein a disaffected African American freshly returned from Vietnam discovers the power and temptation of superpowers. Tragically, even the ability to control minds isn’t enough to change an unjust society 200 years in the making…

Augmented by stunning covers from Murphy Anderson, Curt Swan, Dick Giordano & Adams, these thoroughly wonderful thrillers mark an end and a beginning in comic book storytelling as whimsical adventure was replaced by inclusivity, social awareness and tacit acknowledgement that a smack in the mouth can’t solve all problems.

The audience was changing and the industry was forced to change with them. But underneath it all the drive to entertain remained strong and effective. Charm’s loss is drama’s gain and today’s readers might be surprised to discover just how much punch these tales had – and still have.

And for that you must get this book…
© 1969, 1970, 1971, 2019 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved.

Today in 1929, Dick Dillin was born. You can appreciate his lifetime of comics creation drawing everyone from Aquaman to Zatanna in everything from Blackhawk to World’s Finest Comics… and you should. Or you could just scroll up.

In Britain, Strongman’s Daughter Pansy Potter debuted in 1938, courtesy of Hugh McNeill and The Beano. Red Ryder co-creator Stephen Slesinger died today in 1953 and in 2006 ultra prolific comics phenomenon Joe Gill passed away. He co-created Captain Atom and most reprinted Charlton comics you’ve heard of. Why not track down Strange Suspense: The Steve Ditko Archives vol 1 for a taste?

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Not Quite Last-Minute Presents: Goodnight Opus, The Last Basselope & Red Ranger Came Calling

By Berkeley Breathed (Little, Brown & Co.)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: To Be Read Every Christmas Until the Stars Grow Cold… 10/10 Each!

If – like me – you’re actually too busy to enjoy the season, or maybe poor, scared, fed up or otherwise disengaged, here’s a way to get it done and still derive some joy – absolutely astounding comics and cartoon wonder – all in one bunch!

 

Goodnight Opus

ISBN: 978-0-316-10853-9 (HB) 978-0-316-10599-6 (PB)

After a desperately brief and glittering career as a syndicated strip cartoonist and socio-political commentator (so often the very same function) Berkeley Breathed retired his award-winning Bloom County and Outland vehicles and became a writer and illustrator of children’s books. He lost none of his perception, wit or imagination, and actually got better as a narrative artist. He didn’t completely abandon his entrancing cast of characters and – as a happy ever after postscript – eventually revived them all for another go-round of satire and social advocacy. Yay!

This one is a story about the magic of storytelling and features universal innocent Opus the Penguin. One night, as she has done two hundred and nine times before, Granny starts to read the svelte yet uncool waterfowl his favourite bedtime book. But this night is different. Tonight, Opus’ mind wanders and he “departs the text”…

And so begins a riotous flight of Technicolor fantasy as sedate monochromatic images give way to a powerful, vibrant and surreal romp extending to the Milky Way and back, by way of animated monuments, the burned out Fairy of Sleep, and stopovers at some of the most exotic corners of the planet.

Less a story than an exuberant travelogue of Imagination, delivered in sharply lyrical rhyme, this is a book to trigger dreams and promote creativity. A perfect primer to explain how to wonder and wander…

Every kid, at any age, should have this.
© 1994 Berkeley Breathed. All Rights Reserved.

 

The Last Basselope – One Ferocious Story

ISBN: 978-0-316-10761-7 (HB) 978-0-590-47542-6 (PB)

Berke Breathed is no one-trick-pony and has never been limited to one specific season or holiday. He can do fun and wonder all year round. Although not a proper Christmas story, this charming, tearfully funny tale is another joyous celebration of childhood realms and regions and how little adventures can become great big ones.

It stars his best-loved characters from Bloom County and Outland: jolly, unfulfilled Opus, Bill the Cat, Milquetoast the Housebug, Ronald-Anne (her mother named her for President Reagan – because he had done so much to advance the cause of Poor Black Women) and Rosebud, the eponymous, enigmatic Basselope of the title.

Opus is a dreamer of great dreams and frustrated explorer. In his unassuming, shy way he lusts for glory and the heady wine of immortality. As everybody knows, that can only be found by Discovering Something.

Anything will do. And in the pages of the latest National Geographic Enquirer he finds his dream waiting…

Organising a safari, our fish-fuelled fool heads for the woods in back of the house in search of the most elusive beast in history; every crypto-zoologist’s Holy Grail.

How he finds The Last Basselope and what he actually learns comprises a magical journey of intense discovery into the uncharted wilds of childhood’s imagination which reveals the strength, power and character of true friendship.

This beautifully illustrated, captivating and multi-layered fable is ideal for the eternally young at heart and all those still looking for a path back to their own wonder years.
© 1994 Berkeley Breathed. All Rights Reserved.

 

Red Ranger Came Calling – A Guaranteed True Christmas Story

ISBN: 978-0-61371-758-8 (HB) 978-0-31610-249-0 (PB)

We sneer at sentimentality these days but in the hands of a master storyteller it can be a weapon of crippling power. This glorious fable is purportedly one told every Christmas Eve to the author by his own father before being generously shared with us in mesmerising prose and captivating illustrations.

In 1939 young Red Breathed was well on the way to becoming a snotty, cynical wiseacre. Sent to spend the Holidays with his Aunt Vy, he mooches about all day with her old dog Amelia, while lusting as only a child can after an Official Buck Tweed Two-Speed Crime-Stopper Star Hopper bicycle.

Tweed, of course, is the famous movie serial star “Red Ranger of Mars” and the only thing capable of brightening the benighted life of the woeful, unfairly exiled child. Times are tough though, and Red knows his chances of getting that bike are nonexistent, but he just can’t stop himself hoping…

On his way home one day he sees an odd, pointy-eared little man heading for the ramshackle house of that reclusive old man Saunders. Since he’s a big kid now, Red knows there’s no Father Christmas and none of that hokey magic stuff is true, but even so finds himself sneaking up to the old house that Christmas Eve night…

This is a gloriously powerful tale fully capturing and emphasising the magic of belief and tragedy of realisation, and yet still ends with a Christmas miracle and a stunning surprise ending. Get this book for the kids, get this book for yourself, but get this book – and on pain of emotional death, don’t peek at the last page until the time is right!
© 1994 Berkeley Breathed. All Rights Reserved.

Today in 1892 artist Alfred Bestall was born. Anything else needful to know can be gleaned by visiting Rupert: A Celebration of Favourite Stories – 100 Years of Rupert Bear 1920-2020. In 1914 the day welcomed troubled genius Jack Cole who was responsible for manic innovation as packed into DC Finest: Plastic Man – The Origin of Plastic Man. It’s also – in 2011- the day we lost comic legend Joe Simon, co-creator of Captain America, Boy Commandos, Newsboy Legion and The Fly as well as inventor of Brother Power The Geek and other wild notions.

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Man-Thing Marvel Masterworks volume 1


By Steve Gerber, Roy Thomas, Len Wein, Gerry Conway, Val Mayerik, Gray Morrow, Rich Buckler, John Buscema, Neal Adams, Howard Chaykin, Jim Starlin, Gil Kane, Dan Adkins, Jim Mooney, Frank Bolle, Chic Stone, Frank McLaughlin, Sal Trapani, Joe Sinnott, Frank Brunner, Mike Ploog & various (MARVEL)
ISBN: 978-1-3029-5547-2 (HB/digital edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times. This book also includes some Discriminatory Content included for dramatic and literary effect.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Timeless, Remorseless, Evergreen Scary Stuff to Make You Think… 9/10

At the end of the 1960s American comic books were in turmoil, much like the youth of the nation they targeted. Superheroes had dominated for much of the decade; peaking globally before explosively falling to ennui and overkill. Older genres such as horror, westerns and science fiction returned, fed by radical trends in movie-making, where the kids who had grown up with Marvel now fulfilled the bulk of their young adult entertainment needs.

Inspiration isn’t everything. In fact as Marvel slowly grew to a position of market dominance in the wake of the losing their two most innovative and inspirational creators, they did so less by experimentation and more by expanding proven concepts and properties. The only real exception to this was the hasty hyper-generation of multiple horror titles in response to the industry down-turn in super-hero sales – a move vastly expedited by a rapid revision in the wordings of the increasingly ineffectual Comics Code Authority rules.

The switch to supernatural stars had many benefits. Crucially it brought a new readership to Marvel comics, one attuned to the global revival in spiritualism, Satanism and all things sinisterly spooky. Almost as important, it gave the reprint-crazy company an opportunity to finally recycle old 1950s horror stories that had been rendered unprintable and useless since the Code’s inception in 1954.

A scant 15 years later the Comics Code prohibition against horror was hastily rewritten – amazing how plunging sales can affect ethics – and scary comics came back in a big way with a new crop of supernatural heroes and monsters popping up on the newsstands to supplement the ghosts, ghoulies and goblins already infiltrating the once science-only scenarios of the surviving mystery men titles. In fact lifting of the Code ban resulted in such an en masse creation of horror titles (both new characters and reprints from the massive boom of the early 1950s) that it probably caused a few more venerable costumed crusaders to (temporarily, at least) bite the dust.

Almost overnight nasty monsters (and narcotics – but that’s another story) became acceptable fare on four-colour pages and whilst a parade of pre-code reprints made sound business sense, the creative aspect of the contemporary buzz for bizarre themes was catered to by adapting popular cultural icons before risking whole new concepts on an untested public. As always in entertainment, the watch-world was fashion: what was hitting big outside comics was to be incorporated into the mix as soon as possible.

The first fan-sensation of the modern era, (now officially enshrined as the Bronze Age of US comic books) Swamp Thing had powerful popular fiction antecedents and in 1972 it was seemingly a concept whose time had come again. Prime evidence was the fact that Marvel were also working on a man-into-mucky, muddy mess character at the very same time. Both Swampy and the Macabre Man-Thing were thematic revisions of Theodore Sturgeon’s classic novella It, and bore notable resemblances to a hugely popular Hillman Comics star dubbed The Heap.

He/it sloshed through the back of Airboy Comics (née Air Fighters Comics) from 1943 until the end of the Golden Age, and my fanboy radar suspects Roy Thomas’ marsh-monster The Glob (Incredible Hulk #121-November 1969 & #129-June 1970) either inspired both DC and Marvel’s creative teams, or was part of that same zeitgeist. It must also be remembered that in the autumn of 1971 Skywald – a very minor player with big aspirations – released a monochrome magazine in their Warren knock-off line entitled The Heap.

For whatever reason, by the end of the 1960s superhero comics were in another steep sales decline, again succumbing to a genre boom led by a horror/mystery resurgence. A swift rewriting of the Comics Code Authority augmented the changeover and at National/DC, veteran EC comics star Joe Orlando became editor of House of Mystery and sister title House of Secrets. These were short story anthologies embracing gothic mystery scenarios, taking their lead from TV triumphs like Twilight Zone and Rod Serling’s Night Gallery, but a horror themed lead meant a focus on character not plot, tragedy and empathy over twist endings and most precious of all, continuity…

No one was expecting satire and social commentary but that came along for the ride too!

Remarkably soon after the Comics Code prohibition against horror being amended, scary comics returned in force and a fresh crop of supernatural superheroes and monsters began appearing on newsstands to supplement the ghosts, ghoulies and goblins already infiltrating the once science-only scenarios of the surviving Fights ‘n’ Tights titles.

In fact, the lifting of the Code ban resulted in such an avalanche of horror titles in response to the industry-wide downturn in superhero sales, that it probably caused a few more venerable costumed crusaders to – albeit temporarily – bite the dust.

When proto-horror Morbius, the Living Vampire debuted in Amazing Spider-Man #101 (cover-dated October 1971) and the sky failed to fall in, Marvel moved ahead with a line of shocking superstars. They began with a traditional werewolf and a vampire before chancing something new: a haunted biker who tapped into both Easy Rider’s freewheeling motorcycling chic and the prevailing supernatural zeitgeist: the all-new Ghost Rider (in Marvel Spotlight #5, August 1972). He had been preceded by western hero Red Wolf in #1 and the aforementioned Werewolf by Night in #2-4. From these beginnings spooky floodgates opened to such an extent there was even room for non-white stars like The Living Mummy and ultimately today’s star turn…

This quirky compendium collects the earliest exploits of Marvel’s muck monster, and not at all coincidentally traces the rise of a unique comics voice. Steve Gerber was a sublimely gifted writer with a ferocious social conscience who combined a deep love of Marvel’s continuity minutiae with dark irrepressible wit, incisive introspection, barbed cultural criticism, a barely reigned-in imagination and boundless bizarre surrealism. His stories were always at the extreme edge of the company’s intellectual canon and never failed to deliver surprise and satisfaction, especially when he couched his sardonic sorties as thinly veiled attacks on burgeoning cultural homogenisation and commercial barbarity. Via material from Savage Tales #1, Astonishing Tales, #12-13, Adventure into Fear #10-19, The Man-Thing #1 & Marvel Two-In-One #1 (communally spanning May 1971 to January 1974) we’ll see how Marvel increasing became the voice of a lost and dissatisfied liberality…

The revolution begins after an erudite Introduction by authorial everyman Steve Orlando (Scarlet Witch, Wonder Woman, Ben 10, Heavy Metal Magazine), before we trudge back to very different times and the beginning of a new kind of comics experience and Marvel’s continued experiments with the monochrome, mature reader marketplace…

Ranged amidst the grittier-than-usual adult-oriented material (that meant partial nudity and more explicit violence back then) Savage Tales #1 (cover-dated May 1971) was a mixed bag of sword & sorcery, sci fi, crime and horror stories featuring Conan, Ka-Zar and more. That line-up included a powerfully enthralling horror yarn entitled ‘Man Thing!’ Scripted by Gerry Conway & Roy Thomas, it offered a fairly traditional spooky story elevated to sublime heights by Gray Morrow’s artwork. It related how government biochemist Ted Sallis was hiding out in the swamps whilst finishing a new/recreated iteration of the much-prized Super-soldier formula that had created Captain America…

Sadly, his live-in lover Ellen is an agent for the opposition and when she and her minions made a play for the formula, Ted is wounded and flees into the murky mire. To preserve the only sample of his life’s work, the desperate, possibly dying boffin injects himself with it… and the bog mingles with the mix to spawn something tragic and uncanny…

Barely conscious or sentient, a shambling muck-monster emerges, apparently set on justice or vengeance…

Savage Tales was not a success and who knows how many manic Marvelites actually saw the anthology, but creators are stubborn brutes who can’t let things lie, so some months later the muck monster shambled back via a tenuous mainstream comic book connection…

Cover-dated June 1972, Astonishing Tales #12 sees the Savage Land’s self-appointed Sovereign Ka-Zar – and morphologically unsubstantiated primaeval saber-cat Zabu – abruptly relocating to Florida in pursuit of S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Barbra “Bobbi” Morse only to find that ‘Terror Stalks the Everglades!’ Here Thomas, John Buscema & Dan Adkins deftly recast the Jungle King as a freelance “consultant” for the superspy network, assisting aging biologist Dr. Wilma Calvin – who just happens to be Morse’s mentor – in tracking down a missing scientist named Ted Sallis.

What Ka-Zar doesn’t know is that the project all of them are working on is the recreation of the super-soldier serum that created Captain America and what nobody (technically) alive knows is that Sallis succeeded before he vanished. However, when Advanced Idea Mechanic agents tried to steal it. Sallis had injected himself and the chemicals reacted with the swamp’s magical energies to create a mindless shambling monster.

Readers are clued in thanks to a lovely unused interlude intended for Savage Tales #2, with Wein & Neal Adams providing a chilling recap sequence detailing the macabre Man-Thing’s previous relationship with Calvin, before back in the now, AIM attacks, trapping Ka-Zar with the bog-beast…

In AT #13 (Thomas, J. Buscema, Rich Buckler & Adkins), the mystery grows as the Jungle Lord escapes the ‘Man-Thing!’ to focus on the real monsters, subsequently routing out a traitor and defeating AIM… for now. With the attention-grabbing overlap with mainstream Marvel done for the moment the path was clear if muddy for a new horror hero to forge ahead, but what was needed was the right tone of voice…

Steve Gerber was a uniquely gifted writer who combined a deep love of Marvel’s continuity minutiae with dark irrepressible wit, incisive introspection, barbed socio-cultural criticism, a barely reigned-in imagination and boundless bizarre surrealism. His stories were always at the extreme edge of the company’s intellectual canon and never failed to deliver surprise and satisfaction, especially when he couched his sardonic sorties as thinly veiled attacks on burgeoning cultural homogenisation and commercial barbarity. With Man-Thing he held up a peculiarly scummy mirror to many cordoned-off and taboo subjects and made history – and enemies – over and over again. However before him, Conway & Morrow returned, aided by Howard Chaykin as the bog beast won its own series, beginning in (Adventure into) Fear #10. Cover-dated October 1972, ‘Man Thing!’ (Say it again! Again!) saw the monster defy all odds to return an abandoned baby to a daddy who just did not want him… and would not take no for an answer…

After that conceptual interlude Gerber, Buckler & Jim Mooney opened an extended mystic parable in Fear #11 on the ‘Night of the Nether-Spawn!’ Gerber’s take was that the beast was empathic and all-but-mindless, reacting and responding to those in its vicinity, but having practically no personal volition. Here that relationship draws in teenagers Jennifer Kale and her little brother Andy who are about to get into all sorts of trouble because they stole something from their grandpa. Sadly, when you play with a magical tome belonging to an ancient cult, handed down over eons to the latest in a long line of guardian wizards, sinister stuff is likely to happen…

The upshot is that a demonic force comes looking for little Miss Kale and its evil emanations make it a painful intrusion the maddened muck monster cannot abide. With diabolical Thog the Nether-Spawn thus preoccupied battling the bonkers bog-brute all through small-town Citrusville, Andy & Jennifer are free to try to fix what they broke. All appearances and happy endings to the contrary, it’s too little, too late…

The nation’s racial tensions boiled over into Fear #12 as Gerber, Jim Starlin & Buckler discovered ‘No Choice of Colors!’ after the moss-heap slurped into a far-too-personal vendetta linking racist white sheriff Wallace Corlee and fugitive black murder suspect Mark Jackson. After initially and instinctively saving the wounded runner, Man-Thing is helpless against the literally paralysing hatred of both men: one condemned for loving the wrong shade of woman and the just other happy to have a legal reason to kill another “coloured man”…

Only after one of the enraged obsessives is no more can the swamp beast freely act against the other…

In #13, Val Mayerik begins his fruitful association with the series as – inked by Frank Bolle – ‘Where Worlds Collide!’ finds Gerber in universe-building mode: introducing Jennifer Kale’s Grandpa Joshua as high priest of a cult that has thrived secretly since Atlantis sank beneath the waves. They have safeguarded the world for eons, handing down the sacred Tome of Zhered-Na, but now Jennifer’s meddling as she innocently answered the call of her heritage has opened a portal to infernal terror that begins by taking Jen’s not-boyfriend Jaxon and opening pathways to devil-infested dimensions. When the Man-Thing follows, he finds a place where Ted Sallis is made manifest again and where Thog offers to make it permanent if the human will betray his world…

Ted’s violent refusal coincides with Joshua and the grandkids showing up and, in the flush of frantic battle and escape to consensus reality, the Kales discover Jennifer’s uncanny link to the mindless (again) monster…

Veteran Chic Stone inks #14’s ‘The Demon Plague!’ as, all over America, hate and insanity blossom. Everywhere, humans attack those nearest, dearest or even largely indifferent to them; and the deluge of violence even affects the wildlife in Florida’s swamps with Man-Thing pitilessly assaulted by everything that walks or hops or crawls or swims…

Joshua Kale soon determines that the not properly sealed dimensional portal is permitting demons to pass and possess mortals, and convenes a cult ceremony to close it from within the swamp – which just happens to be the Nexus of All Realities…

Despite best efforts the ritual goes awry and, curiously spying on them, Jennifer and the bog-beast are abducted from existence by a major mage dubbed Dakimh the Enchanter. Forced into gladiatorial actions to retain the sacred tome that only Jennifer knows no longer exists, everybody underestimates the shambling compost heap with flamethrower hands, and the Earthlings are promptly returned without giving away any more arcane secrets…

With Frank McLaughkin as guest inker this time, Gerber & Mayerik probe ‘From Here to Infinity!’ in Fear #15. With chaos gripping the entire planet, the Man-Thing seemingly killed by invading demons and no sacred tome to consult, Joshua Kale visits ancient Atlantis, seeing how mystic Zhered-Na personally dealt with the last such incursion, learning of an eternal war between divine realms – shining Therea and dark Sominus…

As the current cult leader views how his inspiration met her end, elsewhere Dakimh recruits promising potential sorceress Jennifer, revives the bog-beast and takes them both an a trans-dimensional voyage to save reality and stop the sorcerous shooting war…cat least for now and at the cost of the link to the swamp totem…

Abruptly switching tack and tone, Fear #16 ‘Cry of the Native!’ (inked by Sal Trapani) explores themes of Native American rights, ecological barbarism and callous capitalism run amok, when developer F A Schist attempts to drain the swamp and relocate its Indian occupants to facilitate his new airport complex. Complex issues of new jobs versus already broken treaties and promises lead to sabotage, riots and civil unrest, but what concerns the Kales most is how the disruption might affect the shaky barriers holding back the hungry hordes of Sominus…

This time, however, simply human pride, greed, bigotry and love of violence – all agonising felt by mindless, empathic Man-Thing – is enough to spark riot and butchery, and stall the project. In the aftermath (and with Trapani sticking around as inker) #17’s ‘It Came Out of the Sky!’ offers dark, wry parody as the bog-beast curiously opens a long-submerged space capsule buried in the hidden mire. Within is a super-powered baby sent from a world believed by one scientist/loving father to be on the imminent edge of extinction due to environmental collapse…

The capsule had fed and sustained the godlike being within for 22 years, but when Wundarr emerged to immediately imprint on the Man-Thing, nothing could convince the educationally and emotionally challenged – and fully-grown – waif that the unthinking moss-mass was not his mother. The rejection and indifference proved unbearable and the violent tantrums that resulted almost destroy the airport construction site and Citrusville…

The story notionally carries over into debuting superhero team-up book Marvel Two-In-One #1 (cover-dated January 1974) where, after a desert clash with Thanos, Fantastic Four stalwart Ben Grimm accidentally and improbably ends up in Florida for the premier issue of his own title. Crafted by Gerber, Gil Kane & Joe Sinnott, the ‘Vengeance of the Molecule Man!’ sees The Thing learn some horrifying home truths about what constitutes being a monster when battling with and beside ghastly, grotesque anti-hero Man-Thing after the essence of the reality-warping villain starts possessing bodies in the swamps

Back in Fear #18, Gerber, Mayerik & Trapani resume straight terror tropes and real-world controversy in ‘A Question of Survival!’ as a bus load of ordinary people and a drunk driver catastrophically intersect on a highway through the Everglades. Drawn to the emotional turmoil, the mire monster becomes unwilling witness and unintentional guide as the survivors learn about each other (this at a time when women and minorities were still legally second-class citizens, and pacifists & warhawks violently clashed over Vietnam) whilst trekking back to civilisation and medical treatment. Sadly, one of them really needs to be the only survivor and is not averse to more killing…

The series truly hit its innovative stride with its final appearance in (Adventure into) Fear #19 – cover-dated December 1973 – wherein Thog makes his grand move to conquer all realities and destroy the benign over-gods of Therea. That’s when Jennifer Kale officially becomes ‘The Enchanter’s Apprentice!’ (Gerber, Mayerik & Trapani) and joins another trans-planar trek as the formerly regulated realms of existence begin to collide, clash and combine. First task is to gather the heroes needful to the task and her far-from-united party rapidly expands to include tutor Dakimh, the mindless Man-Thing, a burly barbarian (Korrek, Warrior Prince of Katharta!) and a brusquely cynical talking mallard who calls himself Howard…

Hounded by Thog’s forces, their task is to traverse the twisting paths of existence and save the gods with the chase leading directly into The Man-Thing #1 (January 1974) and a world-shattering ‘Battle for the Palace of the Gods!’ Along the way, Howard is an early casualty, lost in a plunge through cascading universes and the chaos even briefly encompasses baffled heroes Daredevil and Black Widow; and all seems lost when the malign Congress of Realities smashes into seemingly undefended Therea. However, there are forces at play that are beyond even demons and devils, and the mysterious Man-Thing is their unknowing yet willing tool; and ultimately realties are rebalanced and life goes on…

With covers by John Buscema, Buckler, Morrow, Adams, Starlin, Kane, John Romita Snr., Alan Weiss, Frank Brunner, Sinnott, Frank Giacoia, Herb Trimpe & Ernie Chan, the extras in this moody tome of terror and extrospection also include – from November 1970 – Thomas’ original plot for the short story in Savage Tales #1; an original grey-toned art page by Morrow; more by Buscema & Adkins, Buckler, Mooney, Weiss, Brunner, Mayerik & McLaughlin. For your perusal, Gerber’s plot for Fear #16 follows, with lettering notes and Brunner’s cover for #17. More original art includes Romita’s cover for #18 plus interior art by Mayerik & Trapani. The cover art for #19 by Kane & Chan opens another gallery before segueing into house ads, Adams’ cover for Monsters Unleashed #3 and a cover gallery for reprint title Book of the Dead #1-3 (1993-1994) by Tennyson Smith & Morrow, and Ariel Olivetti’s cover to the 2012 Man-Thing Omnibus.

We – me especially – apply the terms milestone, landmark and groundbreaking as guarantors of quality that change the way comics are perceived and even created. It has never been more true or accurate than with these game-changing, socially aware horror yarns. These are stories you must not miss…
© 2024 MARVEL.

Today in 1894 the magnificent Elzie Segar was born. Go read some Popeye or even Thimble Theatre if you can find it.

In 1980 Berke Breathed chose the day to begin his almost-as-magnificent Bloom County strip, as we last saw in Bloom County: Real, Classy, & Compleat 1980-1989. Some of that last factoid is made up by me, but it could have happened…

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Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan: The Jesse Marsh Years Volume Nine


By Gaylord DuBois & Jesse Marsh (Dark Horse Books)
ISBN: 978-1-59582-649-7 (HB)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Primal fantasy Adventure… 8/10

I don’t know an awful lot about Jesse Marsh, other than that he was born on 27th July 1907 and died far too young: on April 28th 1966 from diabetic complications at the height of a TV Tarzan revival he was in large part responsible for. What I do know, however, is that to my unformed, pre-fanboy, kid’s mentality, his drawings were somehow better than most of the other artists and that every other kid who read comics in my school disagreed with me.

There’s a phrase we used at 2000 AD that summed it up: “Artist’s artist”, which usually meant someone whose fan-mail divided equally into fanatical raves and bile-filled hate-mail. It seems there are some makers of comic strips that many readers simply don’t get.

It isn’t about the basic principles or artistic quality or even anything tangible – although you’ll hear some cracking justifications: “I don’t like his feet” (presumably the way he draws them) and “it just creeps me out” being my two favourites. Never forget in the 1980s DC were told by the Comics Code Authority that Kevin O’Neill’s entire style and manner of Drawing was unacceptable to American readers!

I got Jesse Marsh. He was another Disney animator (beginning in 1939) who moved sideways – in 1945 – to become a full-time narrative illustrator for the studio’s comic book licensee Whitman Publishing. Marsh never looked back and became the go-to guy for other ERB adaptations such as John Carter of Mars.

Situated on the West Coast, Western’s Dell/Gold Key imprints rivalled DC and Marvel at the height of their powers, and the licensee famously never capitulated to the wave of anti-comics hysteria that resulted in the crippling self-censorship of the 1950s. No Dell Comics ever displayed a Comics Code Authority symbol on the cover – they never needed to…

Marsh jobbed around adapted movie properties – mostly westerns like Gene Autry – until 1948 when Dell introduced the first all-new Tarzan comic book. The newspaper strip had run since 1929 and all previous funnybook releases had featured expurgated and modified reprints of those adventures. That all changed with Dell Four Color Comic #134 (February 1947) which featured a lengthy, captivating tale of the Ape-Man scripted by Robert P. Thompson, who also wrote both the Tarzan radio show and the aforementioned syndicated strip (as you can see in Tarzan and the Adventurers).

The comic was very much in the Burroughs tradition: John Clayton, Lord Greystoke and his friend Paul D’Arnot aid a young woman in rescuing her lost father from a hidden tribe ruled over by a monster. The engrossing yarn was made magical by the simple, underplayed magic of a heavy brush line and absolutely unmatched design sense. Marsh was unique in the way he positioned characters in space, using primitivist forms and hidden shapes to augment his backgrounds, and as the man was a fanatical researcher, his trees, rocks, and constructions were 100% accurate. His animals and natives, especially children and women, were all distinct and recognisable; not the blacked-up stock figures in grass skirts even the greatest artists so often resorted to.

He also knew when to draw big and draw small: the internal dynamism of his work is spellbinding. His Africa became mine, and of course the try-out comic book was an instant hit. Marsh and Thompson’s Tarzan returned with two tales in Dell Four Color Comic #161, cover-dated August 1947. This was a remarkable feat: Four Colour was a catch-all title showcasing in rotation literally hundreds of different licensed properties, often as many as ten separate issues per month. So rapid a return engagement meant pretty solid sales figures…

Bolstered by a healthy and extremely popular film franchise and those comics strips, within six months, bimonthly Tarzan #1 was released (January/February 1948). It was a swansong for Thompson, but another unforgettable classic for Marsh – and the first of an unbroken run that would last until 1965: over 150 consecutive issues. Moreover there were also spin-offs featuring other ERB character adaptations and gigantic specials like the Annual that opens this collected volume.

Prior to that, the collection – reprinting material from 1953 from Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan #44-46 and monumental bonus book Tarzan’s Jungle Annual #2 – opens with Foreword ‘Looking for Jesse Marsh’: a heartfelt appreciation and appraisal of the secretive genius by publisher Dan Nadel, packed with information about the enigmatic master. Then, cover-dated August 1953 and on sale from 16th July, that colossal bonus book delivers a painted cover by Morris Gollub (not featuring then current big screen Tarzan Lex Barker) in advance of a beguiling trip to an Africa that never was…

A monochrome Jungle World frontispiece revels in an idyllic quiet moment for the Ape-Man and faithful pachyderm pal Tantor, before main event ‘Tarzan in the Valley of Towers’ transports the Jungle Lord and pilot/scientist Professor Alexander MacWhirtle to a distant unexplored region in aid of a girl who sent a plea for help in a tiny parachute woven from spider-webs…

As always this yarn (and everything else including puzzles) was written by Gaylord DuBois. Editor and prolific scripter (Lone Ranger, Lost in Space, Turok, Son of Stone, Brothers of the Spear and many more) he was Marsh’s creative collaborator for nearly 20 years.

Flying into the great desert, Tarzan and “Professor Mac” soon find Heather Day laid out as a sacrifice on a towering limestone altar, left for giant carnivorous bats by debased humans who have turned themselves into flying/gliding predators in their image. The battle to overthrow the petty tyrants of the sky takes them from the highest peaks to deepest subterranean depths, but inevitably Tarzan triumphs and returns Hearther to the outer world.

Back then, entertainment was full on and informative, so this Annual was packed with fact and activity features. First up, and still all Marsh in vision, is potted travelogue ‘Jungle Trails’ augmented by a simple method for ‘Making Maps’ and a clever rebus message from Tarzan to his ‘Jungle Village’. Then it’s back to action as ‘Tarzan and the Cannibals of Kando-Mor’ finds the Ape-Man and his Waziri friend Chief Muviro traversing the fearsome Great Swamp when the party is captured by man-eating men. Their escape brings the wanders fully into Burroughs’ rich fantasy-scape as they discover another isolated and embattled outpost of lost land Pal-Ul-Don (introduced in 8th novel Tarzan the Terrible) and befriend the buffalo-worshipping Gallugos. The event is quite timely as the ever-encroaching cannibals have almost completed their extended scheme to eliminate the cow-lovers…

Almost…

Illustrated sheet music provides long-distance lessons for ‘Dancing Feet’ to cavort at a ‘Moonlight Marriage’ ceremony, whilst ‘Happy Warrior’ shares the secrets of kite-making before ‘Boy Stands by a Friend’ offers another intimate peek at the formative years of Greystoke’s African family when Boy – later called Korak – and ape pal Zorok stow away on a riverboat and nearly end up as zoo exhibits. ‘Letters from Boy’ to the readers feature next, as ‘Jungle Hunt’ details how to make an inner tube popgun and water canteens, prior to an adventure with elephants as ‘The Troubles of Tantor’ seen the herd patriarch go to extraordinary lengths to rescue wayward calves captured by angry farmers.

Picture essays detail the secrets of MacWhirtle’s plane and the domain of dinosaurs in ‘Boys Air Adventure to the Valley of Monsters’ after which a touch of old-fashioned racial profiling describes native characteristics in ‘Jungle Tribes’ and ‘Jungle Woman’ before embracing romance as final story ‘Tarzan Trails the Brothers of the Barracuda’ sees the Ape-Man reunite shipwrecked and separated young lovers by hunting down the slave traders who have seized and sought to sell her…

Wrapping up with a load of lexicons, ‘Jungle Language: Swahili-English’ and ‘Jungle Language: Ape-English’ provides illustrated dictionaries that come in handy for the puzzle pages and crossword, before monochrome endpiece ‘Jungle World’ explores the violent existence of bugs and minibeasts.

Cover-dated May 1953, Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan #44 sees the Jungle Lord enjoying a quiet ride over vast hidden Pal-Ul-Don on his giant eagle Argus when he saves a tiny shepherd from a vulture as big as the mighty raptor Tarzan rides. In ‘Tarzan and the Little Spearmen’ this good deed soon sours. Coro of Saparta is grateful and desperate and happy in turn as the benevolent giant and his equally immense pal Muviro hunt down the ferocious carrion feeders who find living little people more tasty than corpses. Sadly, the interaction sparks civil war between the farming fraternity and now-unemployed spearman clan who used to defend them, especially after Tarzan teaches them the high-tech marvel of archery…

Pathos and nostalgia hit hard in second saga ‘Tarzan and the Strange Balu’ as a she-ape finds a human baby and replaces her own dead newborn with him. Poor, grieving Kalahari will not surrender the infant, leaving the Ape-Man in a double bind: finding the child’s real family and saving the mother surrogate from heartbreak…

The task is made even harder but more gratifying when Tarzan discovers vile slavers have been transporting a white woman to market…

The issue ends with a stunning pinup of Argus and a GIANT-giant vulture and contemporary house ad before ERBT #45 (June 1953) opens with ‘Tarzan and the Haunted Plantations’ wherein the Ape-Man visits old friend Chief Buto and learns his warrior comrade is plagued by devils and ghosts. A little careful investigation then reveals the fields where his people hire out as croppers are coveted by a bandit with knowledge of unexploited resources beneath that fruitful dirt, and Razan devises a sneaky scheme…

‘Boy and the Shamba Raider’ again focuses on the exploits of Korak-to-come as the kid and his pal Dombie take executive action to trap rogue water buffalo raiding crops and attacking workers. They wouldn’t have had to if the adult warriors had listened to them in the first place…

Epic fantasy follows in ‘Tarzan Returns to Cathne’ when the Jungle Man and Waziri’s Pal-Ul-Don explorations bring them into conflict with sabretooth tigers attacking the war-lions of Queen Elaine of Cathne. The staunch friend and ally is a fugitive now as her husband King Jathon is gone and usurper Timon rules. The madman is unstoppable and seeks to conquer sister city Athne, but Tarzan has other ideas and the wits to implement them…

The issues closes with another house ad and ‘Tarzan’s World’ pinup of the Dangina (Cape Hunting Dog) before we segue into final entry Tarzan #46 .

Dated July 1953 it begins with ‘Tarzan Defends a City’ as the Ape-Man and not-dead Jathon (surprise!) trek back to Cathne with super-colossal war lion Goliath, only to find the citadel under siege by crocodile-riding Terribs from the Great Swamp. Things look bleak until the Gallugos – freshly fled from the cannibal Kando-Mors – arrive and turn the muddy tide. All they want in return is land to build their new city…

Back in regular Africa, ‘Boy Faces the Fangs of the Mamba’ after Matusi witchdoctor Ungali – having failed to kill Tarzan – frames his annoying spawn Boy for theft and orchestrates a lethal trial by snake. Sadly for the villain, Ape-Man arrives just in time…

This titanic tome terminates with whimsical mystery ‘Tarzan and the Treasure of the Apes’ as brutal unscrupulous white hunters discover the great apes dubbed “mangani” are all bedecked in priceless jewels. Ruthlessly stalking the vain bedazzled beasts the safari killers even manage to wound Tarzan, before he convinces the apes to surrender their “pretty stones” in favour of something better: something edible.

The Jungle King then delivers a unique judgement that might not look like justice but truly is nothing but…

Although these are tales from a far-off, simpler time they have lost none of their passion, inclusivity and charm, whilst the artistic virtuosity of Jesse Marsh looks better than ever. Perhaps this time a few more people will “get” him…
Edgar Rice Burroughs® Tarzan®: The Jesse Marsh Years volume 9 © 1953, 2011, Edgar Rice Burroughs Inc. Tarzan ® Edgar Rice Burroughs Inc. All rights reserved.

In 1952 Jack of all comics trades Keith Giffen was born. We haven’t reviewed Ambush Bug, Legion of Super-Heroes or his Doom Patrol yet, so why not recall gleeful glory days with Justice League International volume 1?

In 1978 screen writer and comics luminary Robert Kirkman was born. You probably know him best for Walking Dead volume 1: Days Gone Bye.

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The Most Amazing Saturday Morning Rubbish Club


By Bill Tuckey & Francisco de la Mora (SelfMadeHero)
ISBN: 978-1-914224-36-2 (TPB)

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Family entertainment… 8/10

Are you old enough to remember, books, films and comics aimed at kids who would see players their own age finding a problem and sorting it out themselves? That’s what this fabulous yarn is, only here those plucky protagonists are all kids with conditions the world says renders them even more useless and in fact unable to act or think for themselves at all…

Writer (broadcaster, radio DJ, journalist, editor) Bill Tuckey & artist Francisco de la Mora (Frida Kahlo – Her Life, Her Work, Her Home please link to March 13th 2023) are both parents of children with special needs. Tuckey’s boys have ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) and de la Mora’s lad has PVL (Periventricular leukomalacia) and both creators have brought those experiences into a grand adventure that is also a signpost for how you should all behave around those of us that need a little forethought, patience and consideration…

In a city district near a park, 11-year-olds Arthur Ballentine and Finn Gregory are already pals when they first encounter tireless fireball Uma Blanco. She’s 8 and has PVL. It leaves her with speech difficulties and cognitive deficits, but she always knows what she wants and runs rings around Arthur, who has ASD, and Finn, stuck in his wheelchair due to cerebral palsy.

They instantly unite over the way the insensitive folk (“the white people”) around them act and find purpose in the way their favourite space is becoming one huge litter trap. It’s just one aspect of the ongoing neglect slowly ruining the treasured urban green space. It’s getting less fun all the time now, as they learn from embattled park warden “the General”, lumbered with explaining why the latest council cuts mean the disabled toilets are closed from now on…

By June the kids are firm friends and resolved to do something. It begins with just picking up other people’s rubbish every Saturday, but builds before going into extreme overdrive once they discover a quiet, damaged man is living under the trees with a fox called Winchester. He’s buried himself in an underground hideout constructed secretly from other people’s cast offs…

And thus begins a quirky tale of renewal and unlikely friendships which charmingly lead to victory for the idealistic nippers, salvation for sad, strange wild engineer Richard (once the police stop being involved) and even a glorious storybook ending of sorts…

This is not polemic masquerading as entertainment. There’s a clever plot, compelling drama and a profound resolution in the offing. Of course there are plenty of incidents underlining how crap we are as society in taking care of our fellows, but it’s velvet-gloved in a welter of witty incidents and glorious characters studies of the kids and all the adults they impact and gradually convert to a better way of thinking and acting…

I don’t get to use the terms inspirational or heartwarming much when reviewing modern books and comics but when The Most Amazing Saturday Morning Rubbish Club inevitably becomes the next big British indie movie hit (like The Lady in the Van but closer to the kerb and bushes), I’ll be back to say I told you so and to plug the book all over again…
© 2025 Francisco de la Mora/Bill Tuckey. All rights reserved.

Today in 1911 Disney comics artist Paul Murray was born. We last saw his mastery in Walt Disney’s Donald Duck Volume 2: The Diabolical Duck Avenger. In 1950 Chris Claremont was born, and the magnificent Bob Haney died today in 2004. You don’t need me to tell you what they did and where to find their works.

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Yoko Tsuno volume 7 – The Curious Trio


By Roger Leloup (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-84918-127-3 (PB Album)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Rollercoaster, Role Model Wonderment for All… 8/10

Today in 1933 master craftsman and raconteur Roger Leloup was born. Bon anniversaire and many more, mate…

On September 24th 1970, “electronics engineer” Yoko Tsuno began her troubleshooting career as an indomitable intellectual adventurer. Her debut in Le Journal de Spirou came in “Marcinelle style” 8 page short ‘Hold-up en hi-fi’, and although she is still delighting readers and making new fans today, for a while it looked as if she wasn’t going anywhere soon. Thankfully, her astonishing, astoundingly accessible exploits were revised as she quickly evolved into a paragon of peril: helming pseudo-realistic fantasies numbering amongst the most intoxicating, absorbing and broad-ranging comics thrillers ever created. Her globe-girdling mystery cases and space-&-time-spanning epics are the brainchild of Belgian maestro Roger Leloup. He launched his own solo career in 1953 whilst working as studio assistant and technical artist on Hergé’s Adventures of Tintin.

Compellingly told, sublimely imaginative and – no matter how implausible the premise of any individual yarn – always firmly grounded in hyper-authentic settings underpinned by solidly constructed, unshakably believable technology and unswerving scientific principles, Leloup’s illustrated escapades were at the vanguard of a wave of strips revolutionising European comics. Early in the journey, he switched from loose cartooning to mesmerising, nigh-photo realistic illustration that has become a series signature. The long-overdue sea-change in gender roles and stereotyping he led heralded a torrent of clever, competent, brave, formidable women taking their rightful places as heroic protagonists, not romantic lures. That consequently elevated Continental comics in the process. Such endeavours are as engaging and empowering now as they ever were, none more so than the travails of masterful Miss Tsuno.

Her first outings (oft-aforementioned, STILL unavailable Hold-up en hi-fi, and co-sequels La belle et la bête and Cap 351) were mere introductory vignettes prior to epic authenticity taking a grip in 1971 when the unflappable problem solver met valiant but lesser (male) pals Pol and Vic. Instantly hitting her stride in premier full-length saga Le trio de l’étrange (LJdS’s May 13th edition), from then on, Yoko’s efforts encompassed explosive exploits in exotic corners of our world, spy and crime capers, time-travelling jaunts and sinister deep-space sagas such as this one. There are 31 bande dessinée albums to date, with 21 translated into English thus far, albeit – and ironically – none available as digital books…

The series has a complex history in English. Comcat previously released a few adventures – sadly, poorly translated and adapted – before British-based Cinebook acquired the franchise and opened a comprehensive and entrancing sequence in 2007 with 1976’s (seventh) saga On the Edge of Life.

Translated as The Curious Trio, Le trio de l’étrange was actually the 7th chronicle released by Cinebook and opens in a busy TV studio at midnight (back when actual humans pushed, pulled and focussed the clunky paraphernalia). Young Director Vic Van Steen loses his rag with best pal Pol Paris for falling asleep on his camera. Later, still smarting from another fractious tiff, the pair walk home past a deserted construction site and witness what looks like an elegantly brilliant burglary…

The quietly flamboyant break-in is, in fact, a pre-arranged test by sleekly capable freelance Japanese electrical engineer Yoko Tsuno. She’s been hired by a major company to test their new security. After apologising for nearly ruining her trial with well-intentioned interference, the lads invite the enigmatic tech-bod to join their film crew as sound engineer on a proposed outside shoot.

The gig is to explore flooded caves for a documentary and before the week ends the new friends are hauling equipment to a spectacular cavern, keen to work out the technical details. No sooner do they begin, however, than something goes terribly wrong and the trio are dragged deep underground by irresistible, swirling waters…

From here the achingly realistic, rationalist strip takes a huge leap into the uncanny as their subterranean submersion dumps them into a huge metal-shod vault where they are seized by blue-skinned humanoids. The colossal complex is of incredible size, and the captives are bundled into a fantastic vessel which runs on rails via magnetic levitation. Driven even deeper underground, a handy translation helmet enables the only friendly-seeming stranger to explain. She is Khany and her race, the Vineans, have been sleeping deep beneath the Earth for almost half a million years.

However, since recently awakening, internecine strife has disrupted the colonists’ lives. Ambitious militaristic martinet Karpan constantly manoeuvres to seize power from vast electronic complex The Centre, which regulates the lives of the awakened colonists. The humans’ first meeting with the blustering bully does not go well. When he attempts to beat Khany, martial artist Yoko delivers a humiliating and well-deserved thrashing…

Infuriated, Karpan tries to disintegrate them but is pulled away by security forces. As the newcomers resume their voyage to The Centre, he secretly follows their magneto-carrier, resolved to destroy them. With the maglev ship hurtling to unimaginable depths, Khany introduces the humans to a stowaway – her young daughter Poky – while relating the astounding tale of the Vinean escape from planetary doom and two-million-light-year trip to Earth. Accustomed to subterranean living, on arrival the Vineans hollowed out a mountain and dug down even further.

The history lesson is interrupted by Karpan’s murderous attack, which is thwarted by Yoko’s quick thinking and her companions’ near-insane bravery…

Eventually, after another, far subtler murder attempt, the damaged magneto-carrier reaches its destination and the astonished visitors are brought before a stupendous computer to plead their case and expose Karpan’s indiscretions. The vast calculator controls every aspect of the colony’s life and will deliver judgement on the human invaders’ ultimate fate. After mind-scanning Yoko The Centre’s pronouncement is dire: the strangers must be placed in eternal hibernation…

When Pol plays his long-hidden trump card and threatens to destroy the machine with a stolen disintegrator, diplomatic Khany proposes a solution; suggesting simply waiting until they can all confront still-absent Karpan. Yoko is still deeply suspicious and not convinced Karpan is responsible for every attempt on their lives. That “night”, while Yoko rests, Poky sneaks into her habitation chamber and takes her on an illicit tour of the underside and innards of the impossibly huge complex. The jaunt verifies the engineer’s suspicions with a ghastly revelation. What they expose is a horrific threat not just to the Vineans – Karpan included – but to every human on the surface of Earth…

The eerie mystery then explodes into spectacular action and a third act finale worthy of any  Bond blockbuster as Tsuno’s dramatic duel with an incredible malign menace settles the fate of two species…

Absorbing, rocket-paced and captivatingly combining tense suspense with bombastic thrills, spills & chills, this is a terrific introduction to a world of rationalist mystery and humanist imagination with one of the most unsung female action heroes of all… and one you’ve waited far too long to meet…
Original edition © Dupuis, 1979 by Roger Leloup. All rights reserved. English translation 2012 © Cinebook Ltd.

Today in 1916 DC Golden/Silver age and newspaper strip scripter Alvin Schwartz was born, followed 11 years later by Belgian author Maurice Rosy, whose art direction made Spirou what it is.

In 1928 Don Lawrence was born. You can go look back at his Trigan Empire stuff, but why not also enjoy Maroc the Mighty like we just did…

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Moomin volume Ten – The Complete Lars Jansson Comic Strip


By Lasse Lars Jansson (Drawn & Quarterly)
ISBN: 978-1-77046-202-1 (HB) eISBN: 978-1-77046-557-2

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: the Personification of Good Will at Every Season… 9/10

Tove Jansson was one of the greatest literary innovators and narrative pioneers of the 20th century: equally adept at shaping words and images to create worlds of wonder. She was especially expressive with basic components like pen & ink, manipulating economical lines and patterns into sublime realms of fascination, whilst her dexterity made simple forms into incredibly expressive and potent symbols. So was her brother…

Tove Marika Jansson was born into an artistic, intellectual and rather bohemian Swedish family in Helsinki, Finland on August 9th 1914. Patriarch Viktor was a sculptor and mother Signe Hammarsten-Jansson a successful illustrator, graphic designer and commercial artist. Tove’s brothers Lars AKA “Lasse” and Per Olov became – respectively – an author and cartoonist, and an art photographer. The family and its close intellectual, eccentric circle of friends seems to have been cast rather than born, with a witty play or challenging sitcom as the piece they were all destined to inhabit. After extensive and intensive study (from 1930-1938 at the University College of Arts, Crafts and Design, Stockholm, Graphic School of the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts and L’Ecole d’Adrien Holy and L’Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris), she became a successful exhibiting artist through the troubled years of WWII.

Brilliantly creative across many fields, she published her first Moomins fable in 1945. Småtrollen och den stora översvämningen (The Little Trolls and the Great Flood – latterly and more euphoniously The Moomins and the Great Flood) was a whimsical epic of gentle, inclusive, accepting, understanding, bohemian misfit trolls and their strange friends…

The term “Moomin” came from maternal uncle Einar Hammarsten who tried to stop Tove pilfering food when she visited by warning that a Moomintroll guarded the kitchen, creeping up on trespassers and breathing cold air down their necks… you can check out our other reviews such as Christmas Comes to Moominvalley for how the critter made a mega franchise and proto-mythology. Here and now, let’s discuss how Lars got involved…

Exponentially more popular with each successive book, global fame loomed. In 1952 Finn Family Moomintroll/The Happy Moomins was translated into English to great acclaim, prompting British publishing giant Associated Press to commission a daily newspaper strip starring the seductively sweet & sensibly surreal creations. Jansson had no misgivings or prejudices about strip cartoons as she had already adapted Comet in Moominland for Swedish/Finnish paper Ny Tid.

Mumintrollet och jordens undergäng/Moomintrolls and the End of the World was hugely popular and she welcomed the chance to extend her eclectic family’s range. In 1953, The London Evening News began the first of 21 Moomin strip sagas which captivated readers of all ages. Tove Jansson’s involvement in the cartoon ended in 1959, a casualty of its own success and the punishing publication schedule. So great was the strain that she had already recruited brother Lars to help. He quietly took over, continuing the feature until its close in 1975. His tenure as sole creator officially began with the sixth collection in this series and reaches its penultimate volume here…

Liberated from cartooning pressures, Tove returned to painting, writing and other pursuits: generating plays, murals, public art, stage designs, costumes for dramas and ballets, a Moomin opera and 9 more Moomin-related picture-books and novels, as well as 13 books and short-story collections strictly for grown-ups. She died on June 27th 2001, with awards too numerous to mention, and her face on the national currency…

Lars Fredrik Jansson (October 8th 1926 – July 31st 2000) was almost as amazing as his sister. Born into that astounding overachieving clan 12 years after Tove, at 16 he started writing – and selling – his own novels (nine in all). He also taught himself English as there weren’t enough Swedish-language translations of books available for his voracious reading appetite. In 1956 at his sister’s request he began co-scripting the Moomin strip: injecting his own witty whimsicality to ‘Moomin Goes Wild West’. He had been Tove’s English language translator and sense-reader from the start, seamlessly converting her Swedish into text and balloons even the British could grasp. In 1959, when her contract with The London Evening News expired, Lars officially took over, having spent the interim period learning to draw and perfectly mimic his sister’s art style. He had done so in secret, assisted and tutored by their mother Signe Hammarsten-Jansson. From 1961 to strip’s end in 1974, Lars was sole steersman of trollish tabloid tails (I fear that could be much misconstrued these days…).

“Lasse” was a man of many parts. Other careers included aerial photographer, professional gold miner, writer and translator. He was basis and model for ultimate cool kid Snufkin and his Moomins exploits were subtly sharper than his sister’s version: far more closely in tune with the quirky British sense of humour. Nevertheless, his whimsically wry sense of wonder was every bit as compelling. In 1990, long after the original series, Lasse began a new career, working with Dennis Livson (designer of Finland’s acclaimed Moomin World theme park) as producers of anime series The Moomins and, with daughter Sophia Jansson in 1993, on new Moomin strips…

Moomintrolls are easy-going free spirits: polite modern bohemians untroubled by hidebound domestic mores but under Lars, increasingly diverted and distracted by societal pressures. Moominmama is warm, kindly tolerant and capable, if perhaps overly concerned with propriety and appearances, whilst her devoted spouse Moominpappa spends most of his time trying to rekindle his adventurous youth or dreaming of fantastic journeys. Doting, darling son Moomintroll is a meek, dreamy boy with a big imagination and confusing ambitions who adores – and so moons over – permanent houseguest the Snorkmaiden. That impressionable, flighty gamin prefers to play things slowly whilst awaiting somebody potentially better…

A wonderfully whimsy driven affair, this 10th and final monochrome moon melange delivers serial strip sagas #38 to 41, and commences with Lars still totally in charge as panic grips the sheltered valley-dwelling community. This is thanks to something supernally sinister and quite unknown pops by for the mass mess deemed ‘Moomin and the Vampire’…

The parable on uncontrolled hysteria sees the dozy denizens driven mad by an assumed monster in their midst and begins following a normal day of big game hunting in the small Scandinavian valley. When rumour of an undead horror haunting the fir forests and charming cottages, the usual miscommunications and madnesses leave everyone in a tizzy, tracking or hiding from the unseen doom. All poor placid Moominmama sees is a tiny fuzzy flying creature in need of a feed and a place to rest, but it probably best not to share the secret of her new guest with all her excitable neighbours…

Up next and a swingeing assault on popular cultures comes ‘Moomin and the TV’, as the reclusive Moomins go shopping for anew sideboard and are pressured into purchasing a top of the line television set…

Despite initial resistance and treating the box as a giant wooded chest, eventually the family succumb to the shows and ads perpetually erupting from it, but that’s as nothing to the chaos caused as the friendly visits from everyone else in Moominvalley – even passing strangers! -threaten to overwhelm even Moominpapa’s legendary hospitality and deplete the mythic capacity of ‘Mama’s larder and pantry…

And my gosh, the rubbish they all watch!

A delicious poke at town planning, social crusaders, local politics and property developers follows as ‘The Underdeveloped Moomins’ finds the big white darlings helping a dedicated but unemployed and under-appreciated Assessor of Under-Developed Areas feel fulfilled. She knows her gifts, specialisms and training can readily bring these primitive, happy valley-folk into the top echelon of progressive go-getting modern citizens, and the Moomins are happy to help, no matter how miserable all these new-fangled ideas, gadgets and schemes make everyone…

The wonderment comes to a close with a whiff of prognostication and prophecy as winter draws on in ‘Moomin and Aunt Jane’. When glamourous but generally useless Romantic poet Wispy moves in next door, he accidentally and then intentionally beguiles flirtatious dreamer Snorkmaiden, just as a little old lady haunts the chilly community. Perpetually predicting frozen doom and deadly privation, she starts to snaffle any potentially useful kit – other people’s blankets, firewood, food, skis, stores. As young Moomin and the maiden again perform their standard jealousy dance, ‘Pappa finally listens to the busy biddy and is convinced the extremely cold end of days is coming. As he begins his own excessive doomsday-prepper precautions, Wispy and Snorkmaiden elope with Moomin in cold pursuit, and the crisis goes into overdrive as prim, officious Moomin Aunt Jane invites herself to stay. Not even faking deadly illness can deter this dowager do-gooding know-it-all and she has no time for silly biddies, puling poets, vacuous romance or any sort of nonsense..

Finishing the fabulous Finnish saga in a cloud of confusion with a domestic dramedy in the best Ealing Comedy traditions of anything with Dame Magaret Rutheford in it, this is the ideal end to a cartoon era…

This compilation again closes with a closer look at the creator in ‘Lars Jansson: Roll Up Your Sleeves and Get to Work’ courtesy of family biographer Juhani Tolvanen, extolling his many worthy attributes…

These are utterly, adorably barbed tales for the young, laced with that devastating observation and razor-sharp wit which enhances and elevates only the greatest kids’ stories into classics of literature. These tomes – both Tove & Lars’ – are an international treasure trove no fan of the medium – or carbon-based lifeform with even a hint of heart and soul – can afford to be without.
© 2015 Solo/Bulls, except “Lars Jansson: Roll Up Your Sleeves and Get to Work” © 2011/2015 Juhani Tolvanen. All rights reserved.

Today in 1921, Heart of Juliet Jones & Blondie artist Stan Drake was born. Why not treat yourself to a rarer delight such as Kelly Green volume 1: The Go-Between? In 1951, Bill Mantlo was born, and in 1964, Brant Parker & Johnny Hart’s Wizard of Id strip debuted. Three years later in France, Jean-Claude Mézières & Pierre Christin’s Valérian and Laureline began utterly revolutionising sci fi. In 1993 star penciller/ editor Ross Andru died. All of the above make multiple appears in Now Read This! so just go wild in that search box…

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Adam Eterno book 2: Grunn the Grim


By E. George Cowan, Chris Lowder, Tom Tully, Francisco Solano López, John Catchpole, Eric Bradbury, with Jack Le Grand, Geoff Kemp, Tom Kerr & various (Rebellion)
ISBN: 978-1-83786-470-6 (TPB/Digital edition) 978-1-83786-480-5 (Exclusive edition)

This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times.

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: History in the Unmaking… 9/10

British comics had a strange and extended love affair with what can only be described as “unconventional” (for which feel free to substitute “creepy”) heroes. So many of the stars and potential role models of our serials and strips were just plain “off”: self-righteous, moody voyeurs-turned vigilantes like Jason Hyde, sinister masterminds like The Dwarf, deranged geniuses like Eric Dolmann, so many reformed criminals like The Spider or just outright racist supermen like Captain Hurricane…

… And don’t get me started on our legion of lethally anarchic comedy icons or that our most successful symbol of justice is the Eagle-bedecked jack-booted poster boy for a fascist state. Perhaps that explains why these days we can’t even imagine or envision what a proper leader looks like and keep on electing clowns, crooks and oblivious privileged simpletons…

All joking aside, British comics are unlike any other kind and simply have to be seen to be believed and enjoyed. One of the most revered stars of the medium has finally begun to be collected in archival editions, and perfectly encapsulates our odd relationship with heroism, villainy and particularly the murky grey area bridging them…

Until the 1980s, comics in the UK were based on an anthological model, offering variety of genre, theme and character on a weekly – or sometimes fortnightly – basis. Humorous periodicals like The Beano were leavened by thrillers like Billy the Cat or General Jumbo and adventure papers like Lion or Valiant always included gag strips such as The Nutts, Grimly Feendish, Mowser and a wealth of similar quick laugh treats. Thunder and Jet were amongst the last of this fading model. Fleetway particularly was shifting to themed anthologies like Shoot, Action and Battle, whilst venerable veterans like Lion, Valiant and Buster hung on and stayed fresh by absorbing failing titles.

Thunder ran for 22 weeks before being absorbed by a stronger title to become Lion & Thunder. The merger/acquisition brought Black Max, The Steel Commando, The Spooks of Saint Luke’s and Adam Eterno to the new combined roster. With Steel Commando, time travelling tramp Adam would survive and thrive, as the periodical later merged into Valiant & Lion (June 1974) until the ultimate end in 1976. He also appeared in numerous Annuals and Specials thereafter.

Eterno was initially devised by Thunder assistant editor Chris Lowder – AKA “Jack Adrian” – and editor Jack Le Grand, with top flight artist Tom Kerr (Monty Carstairs, Rip Kerrigan, Kelly’s Eye, Charlie Peace, Captain Hurricane, Steel Claw, Kraken, Mary-Jo, Tara King/The Avengers, Billy’s Boots) initially designing and visualising the frankly spooky antihero. He also drew the scene-setting first episode. The feature was scripted by equally adept and astoundingly prolific old hand Tom Tully (Roy of the Rovers, Heros the Spartan, Janus Stark, The Wild Wonders, Dan Dare, Johnny Red, The Leopard from Lime Street), who only finally left it in 1976. Kerr, Donne Avenell, Scott Goddall &Ted Cowan would also write subsequent adventures. In fact, Tully might have scripted some of the material in this collection including the first instalment here: a handy recap/catchup limned by Francisco Solano López (and his family studio) that swiftly shifts to a gripping tale of “Conquistadore” atrocity…

Thanks to spotty record keeping, like so much in life and comics, it’s all a big mystery…

Gathering episodes from weekly Lion & Thunder spanning March 20th through August 28th 1971, plus pertinent material from Lion & Thunder Holiday Special 1971 & 1972, the chronal calamities and dark doings resume following Chris Lowder’s informative flashback essay ‘A Writer’s Trip Through Time’.

What you need to know: Delivered in stark, moody monochrome, the saga tales of tragic immortal chronal castaway Adam Eterno began life in the 16th century. He was an ambitious apprentice and less than sterling moral character, indentured to alchemist Erasmus Hemlock. When Adam’s master perfected an immortality serum, the headstrong, impatient acolyte sampled the potion against the sage’s express command. This precipitated the ancient’s death and a fiery conflagration that gutted the house. Hemlock’s last act was to curse his faithless student to live forever and “wander the world through the labyrinths of time”. Surcease would come from a mortal blow struck by a weapon of gold…

The curse was truly effective and as centuries passed, Adam became a recluse: his never-changing appearance driving him away from superstitious mortals and perpetually denying him simple contact with humanity. He fought in all of Britain’s wars, but hard-earned combat comradeships always ended whenever a seemingly fatal blow or wound left him unharmed…

Everything changed and the second part of the alchemist’s curse came true in 1970 when the traumatised, barely sane 421-year-old tramp staggered into a bullion robbery. He was shot by the thieves who rapidly realised that their victim was invulnerable, and attempted to use him in a raid on the Bank of England. When that went sideways too, Adam was struck by a fully-gold-plated limousine of a speeding millionaire…

The impact would be fatal for any other being, but for Adam Eterno it was the beginning of redemption as the shock hurled him into the timestream to land over and again in different eras…

The drama continues in that opening recap as Adam drops out of the timestream and is immediately cut down and hurled into quicksand by rapacious Spaniard Don Morto and his pitiless mercenarios, seeking the Incas fabled City of Gold. Dragging himself out of the mire, soon Adam is sought out by an Inca shaman and undergoes outrageous trials (many involving bonds and weapons of gold!) to become their champion in defeating the merciless invaders and liberating hostage king Tazuma Capa…

The resistance is long and bloody but ultimately triumphal after Eterno introduces and mass-produces a weapon from the future that turns the tables on the armour, powder and shot of the invaders…

The bittersweet victory – after all, the traveller already knows more invaders will follow and ultimately succeed – sees Adam returned to chronal limbo only to rematerialise for the first time in the far future: a totalitarian dictatorship policed by brutes and thugs in armour of gold led by a monstrous tyrant: Grunn the Grim. The extended war to liberate tomorrow ends successfully but with the wanderer again returned to falling through eras, with the first hints that the penitent troubleshooter is not randomly drawn to rising manifestations of evil and crossroad moments of menace…

The latest stopover is Dark Ages Eastern Europe where a struggle for the throne sees an evil yet trusted relative seeking to usurp Duke Ctharmis of Carathia, after abducting the prince and true heir. Now as a local wild-child terrorises the populace, and packs of (were?)wolves congregate everywhere, a tatty stranger arrives and starts making trouble. Nobody knows Adam has been recruited by local wizard Mageis to set destiny aright and end the schemes of wicked Baron Draxa, before being deposited in far more familiar territory: England during the Civil War…

Obsessive anti-royalist Captain Raker ravages the locality searching for Lord Benham and the funds he holds in the King’s name. His brutal acts draw the immortal man into the pointless conflict, despite persistent, prophetic visions of doom hampering the antihero… until a final face-to-face duel ends matters and catapults Adam into the New World and a new kind of wickedness. In 1920s New York City, money not power motivates mobster Rikki Delgano, but his tactics are just as cruel and just as ineffectual against an enemy who will not die…

The crook’s hash soon settled, Eterno next appears in the skies over London amidst a storm of ack-ack fire and Luftwaffe planes. Furious and fighting mad, the traveller captures a Nazi bomber and follows the raiders back to their base, delivering a deadly dose of “how do you like it?” before ghosting on to land in the wild west and exonerate unjustly accused drifter the Durango Kid when both are charged with stagecoach robbery. Dodging gunplay and lynchings, Apache tortures and worse, Adam deftly exposes the real bandit before moving on to save all of humanity…

Lost in the early years of the stone age over 35,000 years before his own birth, Eterno roams amidst mammoths, neanderthals and dawn men, but must battle beast men armed with ray guns to foil a plan by alien colonisers. They seek to eradicate emerging humankind and take the world for their own, but Adam is greatly aided by prescient sage Kathon-the-Wise, who seems to see all his past and future secrets… and bears a remarkable resemblance to so many other wizards and mages the nomad of the ages has met…

After a cataclysmic pitched battle, humanity is saved and the spacers defeated, but there’s no rest for the (gradually redeeming) wicked and Eterno lands in shark-filled waters just in time to become the latest target of pirate lord Blackbeard. On foiling that felon, the winds of time waft him to a Viking raid in Anglo-Saxon England where pitiless reiver Geflin One-Eye seems set on taking the kingdom, unless some brave soul can retrieve the fabled Gold Sword of Wulfric from the abbey where it lies and lead the counterattack. Obviously, Adam is not keen on getting that close to his metal nemesis but if the situation demands it…

Bombastic, blood-soaked, inspirational and creepier than you’d imagine possible or permissible in a kids’ comic. the exploits of Adam Eterno are dark delights impossible to put down, so it’s fortunate that there are two more longer complete yarns still to come here.

Taken from Lion & Thunder Holiday Special 1971, the first sadly uncredited yarn (as regards the writer at least) was illuminated by veteran comics illustrator John Catchpole. He was the first to draw Kelly’s Eye – in 1962 for Knock-Out – and limned The Shadow of the Snake & sequel serial Master of Menace between 1972-1974 in Lion where he was part of a rotating team crafting Adam Eterno. As well as Annuals material like Black Bedlam (1975) he inked Jack (Charlie Peace) Pamby on The Potters from Poole Street in Valiant (1976) and was also a book illustrator.

Here all that skill and aplomb is used to detail a moody Victorian mystery as the immortal nomad helps the last of the Calcott line locate a lost family fortune and avoid murder by a monster…

Wrapping up proceedings on a true high (and also lacking a writer credit) the 1972 Adam Eterno special tale was illustrated by the magnificent and prolific Eric Bradbury (1921-2001) began in 1949 in Knockout.

Frequently working with studio mate Mike Western, Bradbury drew strips like Our Ernie, Blossom, Lucky Logan, Buffalo Bill, No Hiding Place, The Black Crow and Biggles. He was an “in-demand” illustrator well into the 1990s, on landmark strips such as The Avenger, Cursitor Doom, Phantom Force 5, Maxwell Hawke, Joe Two Beans, Mytek the Mighty, Death Squad, Doomlord, Darkie’s Mob, Crazy Keller, Hook Jaw, The Sarge, Invasion 1984, Invasion (the unrelated 2000 AD strip), Mean Arena, The Fists of Jimmy Chang, The Dracula Files, Rogue Trooper, Future Shocks, Tharg the Mighty and much more…

All that imagination and experience are seen here, when Adam appears in ancient Atlantis: a dinosaur-infested paragon of human ingenuity and political depravity where a tyrannical queen and audacious space shot lead to the destruction of Earth’s first human civilisation…

Closing with biographies on the creators featured herein and ads for other British lost wonders Adam Eterno – Grunn the Grim is enthralling astonishment awaiting your gaze: a riotously rewarding rollercoaster ride to delight readers who like their protagonists dark and conflicted and their history in bite-sized bursts.
© 1971, 1972, & 2025 Rebellion Publishing IP Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

Today in 1952 the last weekly instalment of Will Eisner’s Spirit Comics Section was published, whilst in 1974 the final Shiver and Shake entertained diehard UK readers.

In 1994, comics and animation giant Doug Wildey went to the final roundup. Remembered for Tarzan, The Saint newspaper strip and Jonny Quest, he’d prefer you read his elegiac westerns like Doug Wildey’s Rio: The Complete Saga.