Category: Fantasy

Posted on

Princess Knight Part 1


By Osamu Tezuka, translated by Maya Rosewood (Vertical)
ISBN: 978-1934287-27-9

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: a fairytale for all ages and types of romantic… 8/10

Osamu Tezuka utterly revolutionised the Japanese comics industry during the 1950s and 1960s. Being a devoted fan of the films of Walt Disney he also performed similar sterling service in the country’s fledgling animation industry.

Many of his earliest works were aimed at children but right from the start his expansive fairytale stylisations – so perfectly seen in this splendid romp – harboured more mature themes and held hidden treasures for older readers…

Ribon no Kishi or “Knight of the Ribbon” is a series which Tezuka returned to repeatedly during his life and one that is being continued even in the 21st century by his disciples. The simple tale has been turned into TV anime seen all over the world (generally known as some variation of “Choppy and the Princess” in places as far-flung as Canada, France and Brazil) and in 2006 a stage musical was launched.

The serial was first published in Kodansha’s Shoujo Korabu (Shōjo Club), running from January 1954 to January 1956, with a generational sequel appearing in Nakayoshi magazine between January 1958 and June 1959. The original tale was updated and revised in 1963-1966 and forms the basis of the version featured in this magnificent tome, translated from the Tezuka Osamu Manga Zenshu Edition 1977.

In 1967-1968, to tie-in with a television adaptation, Tezuka reconfigured the tale with science fiction overtones and, illustrated by Kitano Hideaki, it ran for a year in Shōjo Friend.

The series is a perennial favourite and classic of the medium and this volume forms part of a two-volume softcover English-language edition, containing the first 16 episodes.

‘Once Upon a Time’ opens in Heaven where junior angels are busy with soon to be born souls, installing either blue boy hearts or pink girl hearts to the ante-natal cherubs in their care. Unfortunately easily distractible Tink (AKA “Choppy” in many foreign iterations) cocks up and one proto-baby gets both…

Tink is dispatched to Earth to retrieve the superfluous metaphysical organ and lands in the feudal kingdom of Silverland, where a most important child is about to be born. The King and Queen desperately desire that their imminent first-born be a boy, for no female can rule the country. Should the child be a princess then vile Duke Duralumin‘s idiot and nastily maladjusted boy Plastic will become heir-apparent.

Thus, due to a concatenation of circumstances, a baby girl with a dual nature spends her formative years pretending to be a prince…

Fifteen years pass before ‘Flowers and Parades’ resumes the saga. Tink has been lax in his mission and Prince Sapphire has become the darling boy of the kingdom. Duralumin and his crafty henchman Sir Nylon have spent the intervening years certain that the gallant boy is actually a useless girl but have been unable to prove it, whilst Sapphire has grown into a dutiful, beautiful – if androgynous – specimen skilled in riding, sports and all arts martial, but passionately yearns to be allowed to openly wear the dresses and make-up which are her family’s most intimate secret. When Tink finally reveals himself and exposes the heir’s hidden nature, Nylon overhears…

‘The Carnival’ sees gorgeous Prince Franz Charming pay a royal visit from neighbouring Goldland and Sapphire, aided by her mother and nurse, dons a blonde wig and party frock and clandestinely give vent to her true nature, turning all heads and captivating her regal guest. When she returns to her public identity all Franz can talk about is the mysterious girl with flaxen hair, blind to the fact that she is sitting beside him…

In ‘The Tournament’ the evil Duke turns a fencing exhibition to his advantage, killing the King and framing Franz for the deed, after which the ‘Prisoner Prince’ is helped to escape by his Flaxen maid. Heir Sapphire accedes to the throne in ‘Coronation’ only to have it all snatched away as the Duke’s latest scheme succeeds beyond all his wildest dreams and Sapphire is publicly exposed as a girl, and her recently widowed mother is accused of betraying the nation by concealing the fact since her birth…

Reviled and shunned, mother and daughter are imprisoned with ghastly hunchback jailer Gammer in ‘Sapphire in Coffin Tower’ wherein the distraught girl befriends the vermin of the keep just as Gammer gets his orders to dispose of his charges. Meanwhile Tink has been searching high and low for Sapphire…

Narrowly escaping being murdered the princess becomes a masculine masked avenger of wrongs in ‘Phantom Knight’s Debut’, punishing the wicked men who have ruined her nation since Plastic was enthroned by his corrupt father Duralumin.

Meanwhile in the Palace the villains look for ways to control the increasingly off-kilter Plastic in ‘The Idiot King’s Bride’. Little do they know that Briar Rose, the fetching companion they’ve acquired, is Sapphire on an infiltration mission…

When she is inevitably caught Sapphire’s life takes an even more dramatic turn in ‘Devil’s Whisper’ when terrifying witch Madame Hell materialises, offering her untold wealth and power if she will sell her female heart and nature. Luckily Tink’s angelic power drives her off, but is unable to prevent the princess being sentenced to a life of penal servitude in ‘Two By the Quarry’.

Here she again meets Franz, who has long believed Sapphire responsible for his frame-up and imprisonment in Silverland’s dungeons. Nevertheless the Prince helps Sapphire escape, almost dying in the effort. Soon after the girl is transported to ‘The Witch’s Lair’ and meet’s Hell’s daughter Hecate, who is violently opposed to her mother’s scheme to marry her off to Franz.

That young worthy however, has meanwhile recovered from his wounds and is still searching for the Flaxen-haired girl, oblivious to her true identity and nature…

Hecate does not want Sapphire’s girlish heart and frees the Princess Knight by turning her into a ‘Grieving Swan’ who is captured by Franz and added to the Royal Flock. The Prince too is being pressured to marry and beget an heir, so when Madame Hell arrives with a huge bribe and a now compliant Hecate the boy’s uncle is keen to cement the nuptial alliance until the ensorcelled swan Sapphire exposes their true natures with Tink’s angelic assistance…

Just as Franz begins to finally notice the similarity of his flaxen dream girl to the freshly restored Sapphire in ‘Two Hearts’ she and Tink are fleeing – right into the clutches of Nylon who is keen to wipe out any loose ends. At the worst possible moment the angel completes his long mission and reclaims the boy-heart, leaving her helpless, but cannot betray his friend and returns it, consequently losing his place in Heaven…

Together again the pair attempt to rescue Sapphire’s mother from Coffin Tower but are too late. The Queen and Gammer have been taken to Sea Snake Island where vengeful Madame Hell’s dark magic has transformed her into a petrified ‘Stone Queen’.

This premier chronicle concludes with Sapphire and Tink adrift on the ocean where they encounter the brilliant, dashing and gloriously charismatic ‘Captain Blood, Pirate’ who instantly penetrates the princess’ manly disguise and sees a woman he wants to marry at all costs…

Princess Knight is a spectacular, riotous, rollicking adventuresome fairytale about desire, destiny and determination which practically invented the Shoujo (“Little Female” or young girl’s manga) genre in Japan and can still deliver a powerful punch and wide eyed wonder on a variety of intellectual levels. Still one of the best and most challenging kid’s comics tales ever, it’s a work that all fans and – especially parents – should know.

This black and white book is printed in the traditional ‘read-from-back-to-front’ manga format.

© 2011 by Tezuka Productions. Translation © 2011 by Mari Morimoto and Vertical, Inc. All rights reserved.

Posted on

The Fires of Pele


By Hollace and Paul Davids & Sergio Aragonés, assisted by Lee Mishkin, with SFX by M.D. Wolf (Paul Davids Productions/Pictorial Legends)
ISBN: 978-0-93903-100-9

Here’s an intriguing and thoroughly fabulous photo-novel oddity from the 1980s – or as it should be known, the days before Photoshopâ„¢ – that still holds the power to enchant and delight even in an era where recordings of fan-favourite shows can be bought, bartered or downloaded at the click of a mouse.

For all you youngsters: photo-novels were paperback adaptations of movies or episodes of popular TV shows which used text and film-stills instead of drawn art to reproduce the story. Inexplicably popular in the late 1970s and early 1980s, they fell from favour with the rise of video, and latterly, laser-discs, DVD and other methods of actually owning the full-sensorium original material.

Cinema releases included Alien, Grease, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, the 1978 Lord of the Rings and many others whilst TV editions included Dr. Who, The Incredible Hulk and an even dozen episodes of the Original Star Trek.

A few photo-novels such as Star Wars and Charlie’s Angels are still produced these days.

At the end of 1986 husband and wife screen writers Hollace and Paul Davids produced this excessively impressive and clever faux-fable blending the mythology of Hawaii and the Sandwich Islands with the peripatetic but well-documented wanderings of reporter-at-large Samuel Langhorne Clemens AKA Mark Twain.

An oversized 247x305mm, glossy 56 page modern fairytale, the illustrations here are original full-colour special effects cinematic plates (no cheap computer graphics packages or Photoshop, remember?) with a cast of actors creating the scenes in the manner of Fumetti/photo picture stories, further enhanced with designs and painted illustrations by Sergio Aragonés and Lee Mishkin – and the pen and ink maestro also provides a wealth of merry monochrome “marginals” of the Great Raconteur himself…

The story is beguilingly simple: whilst reporting on the Sandwich Islands for his employers the Sacramento Union newspaper in 1866, the adventuresome author encountered a race of magical Polynesian pixies known as Melehulas and was drawn into a battle between bold heroes and spiteful gods…

The great Prince Lakekua was to wed the foundling princess Analike, but the comely warrior had caught the eye of dreadful Pele, Goddess of Fire, Lightning, Wind and Volcanoes. After first trying unsuccessfully to seduce and compel the doughty warrior, Pele sent her malign kin, such as The Shark God, Moho the steam god and Earth-giant Kona to imprison the brave girl beyond the reach of man and destroy all who tried to find her.

Luckily for Lakekua, his trusty young friend Kakipoto knew such benevolent spirit creatures as the Menehulas, bestial master craftsman Kakamora and a host of other advantageous allies such as a fast-thinking, smooth talking visiting white traveller from distant shores…

Crammed with exotic scenarios, lush, incredible scenery, mighty battles, true love, talking fish, shape-shifting wizards, Demon Owls, Lizard-Ladies and the unjust wrath of the gods this is a marvellous romp in the grand Ray Harryhausen Bank Holiday movie manner and a splendid yarn long overdue for a modern revisitation.

Until then however, the original large slim tome is still readily available should you desperately need to explore the dark side of Paradise…
© 1986 Hollace & Paul Davids. All right reserved. Menehulas Photos © 1985 The Menehunes Group. All other photos © 1983 Paul Davids and Mark Wolf.

Posted on

Requiem Vampire Knight Tome 5: The City of Pirates and Blood Bath


By Pat Mills & Ledroit (Panini Books UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-496-6

As is so often the case Europe is the last and most beneficial arena for the arts and untrammelled creativity, and none more so than comics and sequential narrative. Mercifully the Continent cherishes the best of the world’s past as well as nurturing the fresh and new, without too much concern for historical bugbears of political correctness, transient social impropriety and contemporary censoriousness – which is why so many established English language strip creators produce their best work there.

Perhaps it’s simply that they revere not revile the popular arts as much as all those hoity-toity classical ones….

Requiem Vampire Knight is an impressive example of self-publishing done right, and happily with commensurate rewards. For years writer Pat Mills wanted to break into the European market and in 2000 he did so by setting up Nickel Editions with publisher Jacques Collin (whose Zenda Editions produced some of the nicest looking albums of the 1980s) and artist Olivier Ledroit who illustrated the first four books of the incredibly popular Chroniques de la Lune Noire (Black Moon Chronicles) for Zenda before the series transferred to Dargaud. Mills and Ledroit were already old comrades having previously worked on the impressive Sha.

Mills is well known to readers of this blog (see for example Marshal Law: Fear and Loathing and his incontestable masterpiece Charley’s War) but perhaps Ledroit is not so familiar. After studying Applied Arts he began his career as an illustrator for games magazines and broke into Bandes Dessinee (that’s comics to us Anglaise) in 1989 with the aforementioned Black Moon Chronicles, written by François Marcela Froideval.

Specialising in fantasy art Ledroit drew Thomas Mosdi’s Xoco (1994) before teaming with Pat Mills on the acerbic, futurist thriller Sha, set in an ultra-religious fascistic USA (1996-1999 and thematically in the real world any minute now).

His lush painterly style was adapted to fairytales in 2003 with L’Univers Féerique d’Olivier Ledroit, and he is credited as one of the founding fathers of the darkly baroque fantasy sub-genre BD Gothique.

From a financially shaky start Requiem Vampire Knight quickly proved that quality will always find an audience and Nickel swiftly expanded whilst continuing the excessively adult adventures of deceased warrior Heinrich Augsburg. The saga is released as annual albums in France and has been serialized in Germany as Requiem Der Vampirritter and in America’s Heavy Metal (beginning in Volume 27 #1, March 2003).

Two years ago Panini UK brought this evocative series to Britain in superb oversized, A4 format, double-editions presenting two albums per volume and the fifth compendium is here just in time to assault the Christmas market. The City of Pirates and Blood Bath continues the hell-bent saga of a conflicted Nazi doomed to unlive his life as a vampire warrior in a macabre inverse world of evil, which began in Requiem Vampire Knight Tome 1: Resurrection and Danse Macabre.

Augsburg was a German officer killed on the Eastern Front in 1944. As he died all he could think of was his guilt over a doomed affair with the Jewess Rebecca whom he chose not to save when the Gestapo came for her…

Resurrection is a brooding, blood-drenched world of eternal strife and warfare: a grim, fantastic, necromantic mirror of Earth with the seas and land-masses reversed, where time runs backwards and denizens grow younger day by day – if they’re not “expired” first by any of a billion-and-one friends, allies, total strangers or archest enemies.

The charnel realm is populated by all the worst sinners of Earth reincarnated as monsters of myth in a damned domain where the dead mortals are reborn in ranks and hierarchies determined by their sins on Earth. Their only purpose is to expiate or exacerbate the sins of their former lives…

Heinrich (now called Requiem) is a Vampire: one of the top predators in this bloody post-existence reality, pinnacle of Hell’s pyramid of puissance and a full knight at the court of Dracula.

Requiem and his blood-draining kin are trapped in a spiral of bloodletting, debauchery and intrigue and his position is far from secure. Not only has he earned the enmity of the treacherous faction of elite Nosferatu led by Lady Claudia Demona, Lord Mortis and Baron Samedi, but it appears that he may be a returned soul…

Long before Augsberg died on a frozen battlefield, killed by a Russian he was trying to rape, the Templar Heinrich Barbarossa had committed such atrocities in the name of Christianity that he was guaranteed a place in Dracula’s inner circle when he inevitably reached Resurrection.

However the remade Barbarossa/Vampire Knight Thurim committed such an unpardonable crime that he and it were excised from the court and Resurrection itself.

But in this volume, Requiem, plagued by memories of a doomed affair with a proscribed Jewess named Rebecca, is in the midst of a cataclysmic all-out war involving every ghastly inhabitant of the blazing inferno they’re pent within…

Amidst the factions of Vampires, Gods, arcane Archaeologists, Lamias, Werewolves, Ghouls and so many others, Rebecca too has reconstituted in Resurrection. Her only chance of eternal rest is to expire the one responsible for her being there…

I’d strongly advise picking up the previous chronicles before this one if back-story means much too you, since Mills & Ledroit don’t waste any time or space on catching up, but storm straight into the unfolding epic with a staggering climax to the all-encompassing war between the unruly desperadoes of Aerophagia, The City of Pirates and Dark Harbour, capital and stronghold of the Vampire Court of Draconia.

Along the breakneck way we discover that the second most important man in post-War America was the earthly identity and hideous soul reconstituted as the deadly Buccaneer Queen Lady Mitra, who has been trading with the living world of Earth for holy weaponry capable of destroying Nosferatu, whilst the conflicted and irresolute warrior Requiem makes an unlikely conquest who will again divert him from his quest for Rebecca.

Also drawing attention is the samurai vampire Dragon, bound to the pirate cause by his ancient – and therefore baby-like – sensei Tengu, but whose own unholy dream is to find and expire the man who caused the atomic death of Hiroshima…

As the conflict escalates to a bloody, burning climax all of Resurrection is embroiled in the constant carnage and even the most exalted monsters begin to falter and finally “die”…

With everything in uproar Dracula begins his final moves in the bloody game as Requiem, torn between desire, duty and despair faces off against his martial and spiritual counterpart Dragon…

Blood Bath combines the incredible end of the war with Mills’ signature blackly mordant bad-taste humour, as a peerless duel between the Vampire Knights devolves into murderous slapstick as demon-infant Tengu battles his own master (Requiem’s teacher and sponsor Cryptos – an even younger baby-thing) whilst a euphoric Lady Mitra invades the Vampire sanctum intent of sealing her victory in the ichor of undead elite Lady Zarkov and Queen Bathory.

Tragically for her, Mitra succeeds and learns a horrifying ultimate truth…

Meanwhile, in a far corner of the realm the race of dragons who once were England’s greatest champions are moving against their once-ally Draconia…

Unrelentingly hard and heavy, this spectacularly decadent, opulent, Machiavellian dalliance with the wildest dreams – and grim, black wit – of a new De Sade, this book ends on yet another cliffhanger as the Vampire Lord prepares to make his endgame move, but that a blood-drenched spectacle for a later day…

For any fan of Mills’ work there nothing truly new here to be shocked by, but the liberating license to explore his favourite themes guided only by his own conscience and creative integrity has resulted in a complex, intensely compelling epic of revenge and regret on the most uncompromising of worlds where there is literally no justice and no good deed ever goes unpunished.

Blending cosmic warfare with sardonic deadpan humour, wrapped in the ludicrously OTT trappings of sadomasochistic fetishism, this is a truly epic saga of Gothic hopelessness perfect for the post-punk, post-revisionary, lavishly anti-reductionist fantasy fan.

But it’s probably best if you don’t show your gran or the vicar and certainly not your – or anybody else’s – kids. They’ve probably got their own copies anyway…

Ledroit’s illustration is utterly astonishing. In places delightfully reminiscent of Druillet’s startlingly visual and deceptively vast panel-scapes from such lost masterpieces as Yragael: Urm as well the paradoxically nihilistic energy of such decadent Michael Moorcock civilisations as Granbretan or Melniboné, he has created a truly unique scenario with his vibrant palette. Never has the horrific outer darkness been so colourfully captured and the sheer scope of the numerous ambulatory nightmares and eye-popping battles is utterly mind-boggling.

A darkly grim and mordantly cynical secularist dream, this is a fabulously realized adult fantasy of blood and thunder both beguiling and addictive.

Dark, dark magic!

© 2009, 2010, 2011 Nickel/Mills/Ledroit.  All rights Reserved.

Posted on

Animal Land book 1


By Makoto Raiku, translated and adapted by Stephen Paul (Kondansha USA)
ISBN: 978-1-935429-13-5

Here’s a sly and rather subtle allegory from relative manga newcomer Makoto Raiuku (Newtown Heroes, Genmai Blade, and the enormously popular Konjiki no Gash!! which hit American TV screens as Zatch Bell!!).

Dōbutsu no Kuni or “Animal Country” began in 2009 and follows the incredible life of a seemingly human baby abandoned and cast adrift on a river only to wash up in the land of animals: a dog-eat-dog, literally bestial world of raw savagery where the weak always die and only the strong are able to survive.

‘Word 1: Hello, Baby’ opens proceedings with little Monoko, an orphan Tanuki (a sort of tiny raccoon dog indigenous to Japan). Since her parents were eaten by wild cats she’s been unable to pull her weight in the hard-pressed Tanuki community; all rushing to store enough for the rapidly approaching winter. It doesn’t look like she’s going to make it…

Her world and existence change forever when she adopts the strange hairless monkey cub which washes up on the river bank one cold day. This is a very strange baby and Monoko insanely decides to become its new mother against all the advice of the village.

In Animal Land all creatures are at odds and cannot understand other species cries, but Monoko decides to risk everything – including being eaten by cats such as the fearsome Kurokagi – to steal some milk for the foundling to drink.

Despite a horrifying but successful mission the baby is cold and dying: it has no will to live and the Tanuki elders brusquely tell her to stop wasting everybody’s time and resources.

Desperate Monoko cuddles it with her body, sharing her warmth in a desperate, lonely struggle to keep it alive one more night. When she awakes she discovers something miraculous and staggering game-changing…

The initial episodes ends with another huge shock: the baby can speak Tanuki…

The mystery increases in the second instalment ‘Word 2: Baby’s Power’ when the infant reveals that he can converse and understand the speech of all animals – even the ultimate predator Kurokagi – thereby discovering the dire marauder’s tragic secret and further reshaping the nature and destiny of the savage domain, whilst the third and final chapter ‘Word 3: Baby Cries Over His Name’ sees Monoko’s first maternal crisis as she finds a keepsake from the baby’s biological mother and fears her joyous new world is crumbling around her until once more the wonder baby comes to her emotional and physical rescue…

Despite what the publishers would have you believe this isn’t just another cute kiddie-book. For starters it’s filled with scatological asides and the audience advisory is 13 and older. Moreover, despite being filled with action, adventure and slapstick/social gaffe humour in the grand manga manner, this is a tale filled with scary moments, brutal situations and heartbreaking poignancy, with a lot to say about family, community, integration, unity and understanding through plain-talking and communication.

Also included in this initial monochrome volume are translator’s notes, a guide to Japanese honorifics, Omake pages (“extra” or “bonus”) of short cartoon strips and a longer piece wherein Makuto Raiku lets us in on the background of and inspiration for the strip: sharing the bittersweet story of his and wife’s best friend Riku – an abandoned wounded puppy…

More Animal Farm than The Gruffalo, this is a brilliant piece and impressive slice of social fantasy for kids, and would make a great gift for older children getting too big for traditional kids stuff.

This volume is printed in the traditional front-to-back, right-to-left reading manner.

© 2010 Makoto Raiku. English translation © 2011 Makoto Raiku. All rights reserved.

Posted on

Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant volume 4: 1943-1944


By Hal Foster (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-455-9

Win’s Christmas Gift Recommendation: Ideal for anybody who ever strived or dreamed or wished… 9/10

Almost certainly the most successful comic strip fantasy ever conceived, the Sunday page Prince Valiant in the Days of King Arthur launched on February 13th 1937, a luscious full-colour weekly window onto a perfect realm of perfect adventure and romance. The strip followed the life and exploits of a refugee boy driven by invaders from his ancestral homeland in Scandinavian Thule who grew up to roam the world and rose to a paramount position amongst the mightiest heroes of fabled Camelot.

Written and drawn by sublime master draftsman Harold “Hal” Foster, the little princeling matured to clean-limbed manhood in a heady sea of wonderment, visiting far-flung lands and siring a dynasty of equally puissant heroes whilst captivating and influencing generations of readers and thousands of creative types in all the arts.

There have been films, animated series and all manner of toys, games and collections based on the strip – one of the few to have lasted from the thunderous 1930s to the present day (over 3800 episodes and counting) – and even in these declining days of the newspaper narrative strip as a viable medium it still claims over 300 American papers as its home. It has even made it into the very ether with an online edition.

Foster produced the strip, one spectacular page a week until 1971, when, after auditioning such notables as Wally Wood and Gray Morrow, Big Ben Bolt artist John Cullen Murphy was selected to draw the feature. Foster carried on as writer and designer until 1980, after which he fully retired and Murphy’s son assumed the writer’s role.

In 2004 the senior Cullen Murphy also retired (he died a month later on July 2nd) and the strip has soldiered on under the extremely talented auspices of artist Gary Gianni and writer Mark Schultz.

This fourth luxurious oversized full-colour hardback volume reprints – spectacularly restored from Foster’s original Printer’s Proofs – the strips from January 3rd 1943 to 31st December 1944 and sees the beginning of his celebrated but rarely seen “Footer strip” The Mediaeval Castle.

As comprehensively explained in Brian M. Kaine’s introductory essay ‘Hal Foster’s The Mediaeval Castle in the Days of President Roosevelt’ wartime paper rationing forced newspapers to dictate format-changes to their syndicated strip purchases and properties like Prince Valiant began to appear with an unrelated (and therefore optional) second feature, which individual client papers could choose to omit according to their local space considerations.

Apparently the three-panel-per week saga starring the 11th century family of Lord and Lady Harwood, their young sons Arn and Guy and teenaged daughter Alice – a feudal pot-boiler so popular that it spawned a couple of book collections – wasn’t dropped by a single paper throughout its 18-month run from April 23, 1944 to the dog-days of 1945, but Foster was happy to return to one epic per full page once the newsprint restrictions were lifted. This volume also includes a candid glimpse of a painting by the artist lost since his death and only recently discovered at auction.

This comic chronicle opens with Valiant leading King Arthur’s forces in a cunning war of attrition against united Scottish Picts and invading Vikings – but only until the wily young paladin starts sowing deadly discord amongst their assembled ranks, breaking the invasion force by turning it upon itself.

After the clash of arms subsides, restless Val is haunted by visions of Queen Aleta of The Misty Isles, whom he believes has bewitched him, utterly unaware that she saved his life not once but twice.

Determined to lose his dolorous mood, he revisits the fenland swamps of his youth and spends a tempestuous time with the wizard Merlin, before moving on to Camelot and a joyous reunion with his dashing and outrageous comrade Gawain. Even in such company Val’s mood is poor and he determines to visit his father King Aguar in distant Thule, stopping only to eradicate two bands of bandits and cut-purses lurking in the great forest, ably assisted by his devoted squire Beric.

Taking passage to Scandia, the heroes stumble into a turbulent shipboard romance and extended drama which ends tragically as the great vessel Poseidon, carrying them all to Uppsala, founders in a mighty storm.

Enemies become comrades and even friends as they all struggle for survival, with Val, Beric and a few others, including Jewish merchant Ahab and a rowdy Saxon yclept Eric, finally continuing their voyage in small skiff, encountering Viking raiders and deep sea monsters before safely beaching in Trondheim.

Eric joins Val and Beric for the final leg of the journey to Thule, but as they near King Aguar’s palace they become fortuitously embroiled in a plot to oust the aged monarch, leading to insidious intrigue and a spectacular confrontation. As the heroes of the day bask in deserved glory, the boastful and flirtatious Eric is easily and permanently tamed by the delightfully capable maid Ingrid, but the idyllic days don’t last long as the other elements of the proposed coup become known.

For a change, Val uses diplomacy to end the crisis but danger still cloaks him like a shroud. When a hunting accident almost kills him, he accidentally plays Cupid for a crippled artist and a Viking’s daughter and, barely recovered, repulses an invasion by barbarian Finns.

After a collapsing glacier nearly ends his life he is captured by rebellious nobles determined to be rid of his sire. Tortured and used as bait, Valiant escapes, turns the tables on his captors and presides over a grim and merciless siege which sees them all destroyed like vermin.

Midway through that action The Mediaeval Castle debuted, beginning with details of daily life for the noble Harwoods before launching into an epic feud between rival lords that lasted until the end of this collection whilst depriving the lead feature of fully a third of its usual story-space each Sunday.

Undeterred Foster then launched his longest yarn to date: a twenty-month extravaganza which saw Prince Valiant set out for the Misty Isles to free himself of the “spell” of grey-eyed siren Aleta. Returning to Camelot the tormented Prince enlists the aid of Gawain and they promptly set off across the kingdoms of Europe. In Germany they are attacked by barbaric Goths, before taking ship in Rome and being shipwrecked. Beric and the now amnesiac Val are marooned whilst Gawain, who is held hostage by an ambitious Sicilian noble, takes the spotlight for a few weeks.

The sheer bravura of Foster’s storytelling ability comes to the fore now: in modern times an author of a periodical tale would blanch at the spending of a great and well-established character, but as Valiant finally recovers and lands on the extremely hostile Misty Isles one of the most loved players dies nobly to save the Prince’s life…

Aleta, the spellbinder of Val’s nightmares, has been ill-used by fate and is not the monster the bold voyager believes. She is however, in dire straits with a flock of suitors and her own courtiers pressing her to marry immediately and produce an heir. So it’s with mixed emotions that she sees the boy she once rescued burst in, snatch her up and flee the Isles with her as his uncomplaining prisoner.

As for the exhausted but exultant Val, he now has the cause of all his woes chained and at his mercy…

To Be Continued…

Rendered in a simply stunning panorama of glowing visual passion and precision, Prince Valiant is a non-stop rollercoaster of stirring action, exotic adventure and grand romance; blending human-scaled fantasy with dry wit and broad humour with shatteringly dark violence. Beautiful, captivating and utterly awe-inspiring the strip is a World Classic of fiction and something no fan can afford to miss. If you have never experienced the intoxicating grandeur of Foster’s magnum opus these magnificent, lavishly substantial deluxe editions are the best way possible to do so and will be your gateway to an eye-opening world of wonder and imagination…

Prince Valiant © 2011 King Features Syndicate. All other content and properties © 2011 their respective creators or holders. All rights reserved.

Posted on

The Giant Holiday Fantasy Comic Album


By various, edited by Mike Higgs (Hawk Books)
ISBN 0-948248-06-8

Being almost universally anthology weeklies, British comics over the decades have generated a simply incomprehensible number of strips and characters in a variety of genres ranging from the astounding to the appalling. Every so often dedicated souls have attempted to celebrate this cartoon cornucopia by reprinting intriguing selections and in 1990 the splendid Hawk Books released this delightfully cheap and cheerful compendium that is still readily available for connoisseurs of the wild and wonderful British oeuvre…

As is so often the case creator credits are nonexistent and although I’ll hazard the odd guess now and then, a lot of these marvellous concoctions will have to remain annoyingly anonymous until someone more knowledgeable than me pipes up…

With little ado the monochrome madness began with a magically whacky superhero tale featuring supernatural warrior Thunderbolt Jaxon who promptly mopped up a gang of saboteurs in ‘The Flying Wreckers’.

Plucky lad Jack Jaxon could transform into the invincible mini-skirted muscleman because he wore the magic belt of Thor, and as comprehensively revealed in Steve Holland’s superb Bear Alley articles, the character was originally designed in 1949 by Britain’s publishing powerhouse Amalgamated Press as an export feature for Australian publisher Kenneth G. Murray after WWII. The strips were commissioned by Editor Edward Holmes and realised by writers TCH Pendower, Leonard Matthews, plus Holmes, with prolific artist Hugh McNeill the original illustrator. The export-only hero soon began appearing in UK comics Comet and Knockout with later stories limned by Geoff Campion, Robert Roger & Ian Kennedy.

Next here is a charming tale of ‘The Space Family Rollinson’ by Graham Coton: a series which ran in Knockout from 1953-1958 and was successfully syndicated in France. Your average Mum, Dad and four kids on a trek across the universe, here stopping to save the natives of Skandok from a hideous space spider and its interplanetary jelly-webs, after which a moodily engrossing adventure of outlandish Victorian escapologist Janus Stark finds the man with rubber bones thwarting a gang of kidnappers in a stirring extravaganza by Tom Tully & Francisco Solano López .

A stunning strip The Jungle Robot debuted in the first issue of Lion in 1952, created by E. George Cowan & Alan Philpott, before vanishing until 1957. On his return he became one of the most popular heroes of the British scene. Reprinted here from the early days after his comeback is ‘Robot Archie and the Mole Men’ illustrated, I suspect, by Ted Kearnon, pitting the amazing automaton and his hapless handlers Ted Ritchie and Ken Dale against a bunch of subterranean bandits plundering Paris in an incredible burrowing machine – a complete 14 week adventure delivered two pages at a time.

Next up is ‘The Men from the Stars’ a complete 60 page sci fi epic originally presented in AP’s digest Super Detective Library #14. In this grand old invasion romp, test pilot and “Special Agent in Space” Rod Collins endured the World’s first contact with a marauding and incomprehensible race of flying saucer people before spearheading Earth’s inevitable resistance and narrow victory, after which paranormal detective ‘Maxwell Hawke’ and plucky girl Friday Jill Adair investigated ‘The Ghost of Gallows Hill Manor’ – a creepy, condensed shocker probably drawn by a young Eric Bradbury.

Knocker White and Jinx Jenkins were ‘The Trouble-Seekers’; two-fisted construction workers who had to add giant monsters to the list of obstacles threatening to delay the completion of South American super city Futuria, after which action-man cover star of Smash! Simon Test narrowly survived ‘The Island of Peril’ in another moody masterpiece of all-ages action-adventure illustrated by Bradbury.

One of the most fondly remembered British strips of all time is the strikingly beautiful Steel Claw. From 1962 to 1973 Jesús Blasco and his small family studio thrilled the nation’s children, illustrating the breakneck adventures of scientist, adventurer, spy and even costumed superhero Louis Crandell. Created by novelist Ken Bulmer, the majority of the character’s exploits were scripted by Tom Tully.

Crandell was a bitter man, missing his right hand, which was replaced with a gadget-packed prosthetic. Moreover, whenever he received an electric shock he became invisible.

After going on a deranged rampage Crandell’s personality shifted and by the time of ‘The Return of the Claw’ (which first saw print in Valiant from 5th June 1971-22nd April 1972) the super-agent was a tired and broken emotional burn-out dragged out of retirement to foil an alien invasion wherein disembodied invaders the Lektrons possessed the bodies of children, turning them into demonic, energy-blasting monsters.

More than any other strip the Steel Claw was a barometer for British comics reading fashions. Starting out as a Quatermass style sci-fi cautionary tale the series mimicked the trends of the outer world, becoming in turn a Bond-like super-spy saga complete with outrageous gadgets, a masked mystery-man romp when Bat-mania gripped the nation, and eventually a Doomwatch era adventure drama combating eerie menaces and vicious criminals.

The thrills of the writing are engrossing enough, but the real star of this feature is the artwork. Blasco’s classicist drawing, his moody staging and the sheer beauty of his subjects make this an absolute pleasure to look at.

Over 90 pages long ‘The Return of the Claw’ alone is worth the price of admission – even with the terribly poor quality printing of this volume. Just imagine the impact when somebody finally completes the deluxe reprinting of this classic series begun in The Steel Claw: the Vanishing Man…

After the main course there’s a few short dessert items to end this feast of nostalgic fun, beginning with an engaging vintage alien invasion chiller ‘The Marching Trees’ after which the light-hearted ‘Toby’s Timepiece’ propels errant schoolboy Toby Todd into a mediaeval nightmare and an epic adventure with an extraterrestrial chrononaut before ‘Thunderbolt Jackson and the Golden Princess’ closes the memorable montage of comics wonderment in a simply splendid tale of Amazonian lost cities and rampaging dinosaurs.

This is a glorious lost treasure-trove for fans of British comics and lovers of all-ages fantasy, filled with danger, drama and delight illustrated by some of the most talented artists in the history of the medium. Track it down, buy it for the kids and then read it too. Most of all pray that somebody somewhere is actively working to preserve and collect these sparkling and resplendent slices of our fabulous graphic tradition in more robust and worthy editions.

Maybe we need a Project Gutenberg for comics…
© 1989 Fleetway Publications. All Rights Reserved.

Posted on

Conan: The Ravagers Out of Time

– a Marvel Graphic Novel


By Roy Thomas, Mike Docherty & Alfredo Alcala (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-87135-911-7

During the 1970′s the American comic book industry opened up after more than fifteen years of cautious and calcified publishing practices which had come about as a reaction to the scrupulously-censorious oversight of the self-inflicted Comics Code Authority. The body was created by the publishers themselves to self-police their product and keep it palatable and wholesome after the industry had narrowly survived a McCarthy-style Witch-hunt during the mid-1950s.

One of the first genres to be revisited was Horror/Mystery comics and from that opening up came the pulp masterpiece Conan the Cimmerian.

Pulp-style Sword & Sorcery stories had been undergoing a prose revival in the paperback marketplace since the release of soft-cover editions of Lord of the Rings (first published in 1954) and by the 1960s the revival of the two-fisted fantasies of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Otis Adelbert Kline, Fritz Lieber and others were being supplemented by modern writers such as Michael Moorcock and Lin Carter who kick-started their careers with contemporary versions of man against mage. Undoubtedly the grand master of the genre was Robert E. Howard.

Marvel Comics tested the waters in early 1970 with ‘The Sword and the Sorcerers’ (from horror anthology Chamber of Darkness #4) whose hero Starr the Slayer bore no small resemblance to the Barbarian. It was written by Roy Thomas and drawn by Barry Smith, who was just breaking out of the company’s Kirby house-style.

Despite some early teething problems, including being cancelled and reinstated in the same month, the comic-strip adventures of Robert E. Howard were as big a success as the prose yarns that led the global boom in fantasy and, latterly, the supernatural.

Conan became a huge hit; a giant brand that saw new prose tales, movies, a TV series and cartoon show, a newspaper strip and all the other paraphernalia of success… and it all stemmed from the vast range of quality comics initiated by Thomas and Smith.

In Conan’s all-conquering wake Marvel developed comicbook interpretations of other Howard creations such as Bran Mak Morn, Solomon Kane and others. Undoubtedly the Silver and Bronze medals went to the fairly straight adaptation of King Kull of Atlantis and a rather more broadly reinterpreted Red Sonya of Rogatine.

Roy Thomas was a huge fan of the prose source material and took great pains to adapt the novels and short stories into the graphic canon, but he was also one of the top writers in his field and much of the franchise’s success devolves from his visceral grasp of the characters, which makes this particular graphic novel of particular interest.

All comics fans adore a team-up – especially if the antagonists fight each other as well as whatever menace brought them together – and this dream-ticket event, superbly illustrated by Mike Docherty & Alfredo Alcala, with painted colour from Tom Vincent, combines the big three in a stupendous battle to save the entire Hyborian Age from supernatural Armageddon.

When Conan leads a raid against a Turanian treasure caravan he once more meets friendly foe Red Sonja and an uncomfortably familiar ancient Pict shaman named Gonar who warns them of an old eldritch enemy recently risen from the dead for a third time and destined to become a threat to all who ever lived. After some heated debate the heroes determine to seek out the horror and Conan’s rag-tag bandit army accompany them – less concerned with saving the world than liberating the vast gold mine where Rotath the All-Conquering currently resides…

The sorcerer’s latest form is a hideous confused monster but it still recalls its most recent slayer Conan (see Chronicles of Conan volume 6). The re-resurrected, bewildered and utterly deranged mage wants a human body and when he fails to secure the Cimmerian’s, the gilded nightmare rips open the veil of time and drags Conan and Sonja back eight centuries, where they meet the only other hero ever to have killed Rotath – King Kull.

Determined to wreak final revenge upon all who have ever thwarted him, Rotath employs a legion of intelligent primates dubbed the Ape Lords to attack Kull’s empire of Valusia and blackmails Conan into abducting the King so that the monster can possess his form.

Of course after every mandatory battle of heroes they always unite in common cause and the greatest warriors of two ages are soon making the undying golden wizard rue the day he was reborn…

With brawny battles, warring wizards and enough suspense to choke a mastodon, this action-packed yarn is rip-roaring fantasy fare, brimming with supernatural horrors, wild women, wickedly worldly cynicism and spectacular titanic clashes, cannily recounted by immensely talented creators at the top of their form.

Still readily available, The Ravagers Out of Time is a another magnificently oversized tale produced in the European Album format with large, glossy white pages (285 x 220mm rather than the standard US proportions of 258 x 168mm) which provides another heady swig of untrammelled joy for lovers of the genre and fans of the greatest hero(es) ever to swing a sword or plunder a tomb…
© 1992 Conan Properties, Inc. Conan the Barbarian is a Registered Trademark of Conan Properties Inc. All rights reserved. Kull © 1992 Kull Productions, Inc. Kull and the distinctive likeness thereof is a Trademark of Kull Productions, Inc. All rights reserved. Red Sonja © 1992 Red Sonja Corporation. Red Sonja and the distinctive likeness thereof is a Trademark of Red Sonja Corporation. All rights reserved.

Posted on

Xenozoic


By Mark Shultz (Flesk)
ISBN: 978-1-933865-31-7

Some things just are cool.

Perfect unto themselves and intrinsically, inexplicably, indefinably just right in any milieu and venue. Thus in 1986 when Mark Shultz wrote and drew the EC comics inspired pastiche/homage ‘Xenozoic!’ for Kitchen Sink’s fantasy anthology Death Rattle, his solid blend of pulp fiction, fifties automobile chic and honking great saurians hit an instantly addictive chord with the comics buying public.

Xenozoic Tales the series debuted early in 1987 and ran until 1989: 14 sporadic, magical issues which spawned an animated television series, assorted arcade, video and role-playing games, trading cards, action figures, candy bars and a succession of reprints (comics and graphic novel collections) from Kitchen Sink, Marvel and Dark Horse – although mostly under its alternative title Cadillacs and Dinosaurs.

Flesk Publications specialises in art books and the lavish tomes they produce are dedicated to the greats of our industry, with volumes on sequential narrative and fantasy illustration starring Steve Rude, Al Williamson, James Bama, Gary Gianni, Franklin Booth, William Stout and Joseph Clement Coll.

This oversized (279 x 216mm) 352-page softcover monochrome collection re-presents all the stories (excluding a few side-bar stories by sometimes inker and collaborator Steve Stiles) in one luxuriously exuberant and staggeringly compelling compilation and even finds a little room for some extra sketches and unused drawings.

A thousand years from now Earth is slowly recovering from a shattering disaster which devastated the planet and sent mankind scuttling into deep subterranean shelters for centuries. Now humans are reduced to isolated pockets of tribal civilisation eking out a precarious existence in enclaves cobbled together from equal parts recovered remnant technology, renewable natural resources and sheer ingenuity.

In the thousand years since the fall, beasts from many disparate eras – from dragonflies to dinosaurs, trilobites to sabretooth tigers – have all re-established themselves in the tenuous yet expansive ecology. Historian/engineer/shamans called the Old Blood have, for centuries, advocated a doctrine of natural balance; helping mankind progress and thrive in harmony with the environment, but now the species’ old habits of greed, waste and ruthless exploitation are becoming dominant again in too many ambitious tribal leaders…

Following a foreword from creator Mark Schultz and an effusive introduction from animator Craig Elliot there’s a lovely descriptive character epigram of ‘Jack and Hannah’ to contemplate, after which the much-recycled but always excellent adventures commence with ‘An Archipelago of Stone’ as, in sparkling tribute to the work of Wally Wood, Joe Orlando and Jack Davis, the once magnificent pre-Cataclysm metropolis now known as the City in the Sea gets word of an ambassador from the far off tribe of Wassoon.

The formidable Hannah Dundee has sailed north to cement friendly relations with the Sea City dwellers, exchange knowledge and ask the governors to rein in Jack “Cadillac” Tenrec: Old Blood nature shaman, brilliant engineer, miraculous mechanic, ancient auto aficionado and the tribe’s top hunter. The problem is that Tenrec hunts poachers and he’s so good at it that the criminals are steadily drifting into Wassoon territory to escape his lethal attentions…

In this packed 12-page tale all this information is cleverly imparted as some of those poachers try to murder the Ambassador before she can even present her credentials, but the formidable Cadillac Jack is, as usual one step ahead of everybody…

‘The Opportunists’ gives Hannah a chance to display her own capabilities as she promptly solves a long-standing problem of her host’s fishing fleet with the help of keen observation, a weedy scholar named Remfro and a brace of scavenging Zekes (pteranodons), after which ‘Law of the Land’ returns focus to Tenrec as the wrench-jockey and big-game hunter leads a relief column to an outlying mine project and discovers an incorrigible poacher in his team.

Slaughtering dinos for spurious yet valuable medical “cures” is phenomenally profitable, so Jack’s lethal treatments are always carried out with a long-term view of deterring other greedy potential criminals too…

On reaching the mine, ‘Rogue’ (inked by Steve Stiles) concentrates on a crazed man-eating Shivat, which Jack and the ever-present, too-inquisitive Ambassador are forced to put down. Of course there’s a reason why the T-Rex is bothering with human prey, and once more Tenrec gets to teach a poacher a salutary final lesson. Next that debut tale from Death Rattle is marginally remodelled and neatly slotted in as ‘Xenozoic!’ follows Tenrec’s troop into a deep swamp in search of a missing scientific expedition. The hideous fate of Dr. Fessenden and his team gives the first clue to the impossible ecology of the post-Cataclysm world…

Initially unwelcome Hannah Dundee was growing on Jack, which explains why – against his better judgement – the hunter complies with her insane attempt to domesticate a mastodon in ‘Mammoth Pitfall!’ – a task made even harder by a poacher seeking to murder them and steal his “overlander” (a rebuilt, customised, guano-powered Cadillac).

‘The Rules of the Game’ (Stiles inks) finds Jack and Hannah still waiting for the mammoth to get bored (like elephants, they’re easily riled and never forget), affording us a glimpse as the engineer’s adored horde of retrieved, restored automobiles, but when he shows off his driving skills they are caught in a flash-flood and treated to another example of the mysterious forces which bind the new world together…

Shultz’s art had been constantly evolving and by the time of ‘Benefactor’ – the first full-length adventure – the more subtle, humanistic influences of Al Williamson, Angelo Torres and Frank Frazetta were informing every page. This was particularly effective in this tale of political intrigue wherein the increasingly trusted Hannah is introduced to the clandestine ancient race that has helped Old Blood shamans steer humanity away from their self-destructive course, but regrettably those urges aren’t extinguished yet and one of the City Governors follows, intent on assassinating the man who is increasing stalling human “Progress”…

The true reason for Dundee’s mission is disclosed in ‘History Lesson’ when Jack takes her to The Library; a vast, partially flooded subterranean vault filled not only with lost books but also pre-Cataclysm technology. However, trouble is brewing and Scharnhorst, leader of the “moles” who excavate and guard the finds, has discovered a deadly ancient weapon and is planning to make a play for supreme power…

Thinking the crisis over Jack and Hannah go on a fishing ‘Excursion’ but after learning the history of the Wassoon tribe Jack stumbles into a far deadlier catch than he anticipated. In ‘Foundling’ Hannah solves the mystery of a baby missing for a decade and discovers more about the mysterious Grith who secretly shepherd the planet whilst ‘Green Air’ sees aviation addict Remfro attempt the first manned flight in a millennium after which ‘The Growing Pool’ gives more clues to the nature of the Xenozoic Age when an ancient, artificial gene soup is discovered, only to escape into a lake and trigger a fantastic explosion of raw evolutionary insanity…

As guardian of the eco-system Jack had tried to destroy the burgeoning life-lab but was betrayed and knocked out by those closest to him. ‘In the Dreamtime…’ finds him recovering from his wounds, when city Governor Dahlgren turns up with a warning and a mission. Heading out to a road-building project that’s gone quiet Tenrec and Hannah stumble into a macabre and deadly extinction event which almost ends their lives too, before ‘Last Link In the Chain’ sees Scharnhorst make her grab for power; attempting to assassinate Jack whilst taking control of the City Governors.

Tenrec’s precious balance of nature is keeping man down and she intends to restore humanity’s rightful place as ‘Lords of the Earth’. Wounded, discredited and on the run Jack leaves the City in the Sea as civil war is about to erupt and is forced to journey with Hannah to Wassoon, where he will swiftly discover that her people might be even worse.

Is it simply impossible for humanity to live in harmony with everything else on the planet…?

As they flee south Jack and Hannah wash up on a deadly island paradise where bugs and seagoing invertebrates have evolved to fill every ecological niche – including top-predator – in ‘Primeval’. On reaching Wassoon ‘Two Cities’ introduces Tenrec to truly Byzantine and Machiavellian politicking as various factions seek to exploit his knowledge and worth, just as Scharnhorst’s Sea Wolves arrive, demanding his arrest and return. They leave with a corpse, but it isn’t Jack’s…

He isn’t without friends however. Hannah’s old Nanny is high in the Old Blood hierarchy and in direct contact with the Grith, enabling Jack to turn the tables and make a few new allies in ‘Dangerous Grounds’ before this unfinished symphony of pulp wonderment concludes (hopefully temporarily) in ‘Another Swarm’ as an unlikely alliance is formed when the Grith reveal the true powers who run the Earth and dinosaur shaman Jack Tenrec prepared to return to the city that disavowed him…

Blockbusting in scope, magnificently fanciful and beautifully rendered, Xenozoic is the ideal everyman graphic novel: a perfect example of exciting, engaging classical comics storytelling that should be on everyone’s “must read” list.

© 2011 Mark Schultz. All Rights Reserved.

Posted on

The Odd Comic World of Richard Corben


By Richard Corben & various (Warren Adult Fantasy)
ISBN: 84-85138-21-X

Richard Corben flowered in the independent counterculture commix of the 1960s and 1970s to become a globally revered, multi-award winning creator. He is most renowned for his mastery of the airbrush and his delight in sardonic, darkly comedic horror, fantasy and science fiction tales.

Although never a regular contributor to the comicbook mainstream, the animator, illustrator, publisher and cartoonist is one of America’s greatest proponents of sequential narrative: an astoundingly accomplished artist with an unmistakable style and vision.

Violent, cathartically graphic and often blackly hilarious, his infamous signature-stylisation always includes oodles of nudity, ultra-extreme explicit violence and impossibly proportioned male and female physiques – and nobody should be disappointed as there’s plenty of all that in here.

From a time when graphic novels and book-bound comics collections were almost unheard of, this quirky, racy collection opens after an effusive introduction by Will Eisner with ‘The Dweller in the Dark’ (co-written with Herb Arnold) – an early exploration of the artist’s fascination with and facility for depicting lost civilisations. Rain-forest dwellers Bo Glan and Nipta break tribal taboo to explore a dead city, and learn pain and sorrow when they fall foul of rapacious, invading white men and ancient things far worse…

‘Razar the Unhero’ (written in 1970 by Arnold as “Starr Armitage”) is a dark and sexily violent spoof with a deprecating edge, deliciously lampooning the Sword and Sorcery epics dominating paperback bookshelves of the day whilst the silly, saucy ‘Mangle, Robot Mangler’ does the same to classic comicbook hero Magnus with a sexy, seditious rabbit-punch parody.

‘How Howie Made it in the Real World’ jumps wholeheartedly into adult science fiction territory with a sinister gore-fest for unwary space-tourists whilst ‘For the Love of a Daemon’ – opening the full-colour section of this volume and showing the first hints of the artist’s later airbrush expertise – returns to traditional fantasy themes for a boisterous black comedy of Barbarians and mega-hot naked babes in distress.

The1973 collaboration with Doug Moench ‘Damsel in Dragon Dress’ is a gleeful witches’ brew of fantasy, fairytale foible and a curious cautionary tale about the unexpected dangers of drug abuse, whilst worlds-within-worlds alien romance ‘Cidopey’ conceals a tragic twist as well as the artist’s softer and more contemplative side.

The final tales in this collection are both from 1972. ‘Space Jacked’ blends Corben’s mordant sense of humour with a darkly cynical streak in the twisty-turny tale of an outer space Bonnie and Clyde who think they might be Adam and Eve, and ‘Going Home’ closes the show in a contemplative, poignant manner as the last man of Earth bequeaths the universe far better caretakers…

Mad, moody and magnificent, these early exotic episodes are too-long overdue for a proper re-evaluation but until some publisher finally wises up, at least there’s a still a goodly number of older editions just waiting to be found and treasured…
© 1971-1977 Richard Corben/Warren Publishing Co. All Rights Reserved.

Posted on

Congress of the Animals


By Jim Woodring (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-437-5

As with every true art form, some practitioners in the world of comics simply defy easy categorisation and their works are beyond most reviewers and critics’ skills (mine certainly). Some are just so pedestrian or so mind-numbingly bad that one simply can’t face writing about them. Others are so emphatically wonderful that no collection of praise and analysis can do them justice.

At the pinnacle of the funnybook pyramid is Jim Woodring, in a position he has maintained for years and clearly appears capable of holding for years to come. Woodring’s work is challenging, spiritual, philosophical, funny, beautiful and extremely scary. Moreover, even after reading that sentence you will have absolutely no idea of what awaits you the first time you read any of it, or indeed – even if you’re a long term devotee – when opening a new silent masterpiece novel such as Congress of the Animals. Cartoonist, Fine Artist, toy-maker and artistic Renaissance Man Jim Woodring’s eccentric career has delighted far too small an audience since his first mini-comics in 1980. No matter that you may have avidly adored his groundbreaking Fantagraphics magazine series Jim (1986); its nominal spin-off Frank (of which the latest volume Weathercraft won The Stranger 2010 Genius Award for Literature), Tantalizing Stories, Seeing Things or the more mainstream features such as his Star Wars and Aliens tales for Dark Horse, you will still have no idea how you will respond to his next work.

Woodring grows rather than constructs surreal, abstract, wild, rational, primal cartooning: a clean-lined, solidly ethereal, mannered blend of woodblock prints, Robert Crumb, Dreamscapes, religious art and monstrous phantasmagoria. His stories are a logical, progressional narrative – usually a non-stop chase from one invention to the next – clouded with multiple layers of meaning but totally devoid of speech or words, supremely dependent on the intense involvement of the reader as fully active participant.

Congress of the Animals is another vertiginous vehicle following dog-faced Frank and his regular crew of irregular types in a manic fable of dangerous arrogance, casual self-deceit and painful reparations, insane exploration of dire and dreadful alternate dimensions and even the first inklings of what might one day be True Love and always without a single word of dialogue or description. Here, the drawn image is always king…

Clearly Woodring’s work is not to everyone’s taste or sensibilities – otherwise why would you need me to plug his work – and as always, his drawings have the perilous propensity of repeating like cucumber and making one jump long after you’ve put the book down, but he is an undisputed master of graphic narrative and an innovator always making new art to challenge us and himself. And, of course, he makes us love it and leaves us hungry for more…

All art-forms need such creators and this glorious hardback monochrome tome could well change your reading habits for life.

Go on, aren’t you tempted, tantalized or terrified yet? What about curious, then…?

© 2011 Jim Woodring. This edition © 2011 Fantagraphics Books. All rights reserved.