Category: James Bond

 

By Jim Lawrence & Yaroslav Horak (Titan Books)
ISBN: 1-84576-517-6

The turbulent printing history of the James Bond newspaper strip leads to a novel bonus for British fans as two of the stories reprinted here are technically appearing for the first time.

‘When the Wizard Awakes’ ran originally only in the Sunday Express (January 30th – May 22nd 1977) and the next two tales had no UK home. These Bond adventures (which we’ll presumably see in the next book) only appeared in overseas editions. Finally a new British daily newspaper revived his career, and in 1981 the series returned in the Daily Star. We’ll deal with that in due course. This volume, however, features the first two ‘lost’ stories, ‘Sea Dragon’ and ‘Death Wing’.

Sadly, the disruption caused in production seems to have put the supremely talented creative team off their stroke somewhat, as these tales are far below the quality we have come to expect. ‘When the Wizard Awakes’ returns to the theme of the criminal masquerading as the supernatural, when a the body of a Hungarian spy, dead for twenty years walks out of his tomb and begins a reign of terror, that eventually involves S.P.E.C.T.R.E., the Mafia and the KGB. This is a, taut, action packed mystery, but somehow Horak’s usual graphic spark is not working, and the art seems tired and cluttered.

‘Sea Dragon’, produced for European syndication, is maritime adventure with geo-political overtones as crazed billionairess ‘Big Mama Mather’ tries to corner the World Oil market with sex, murder and Sea Serpents. Whilst the art seems to recover some of its verve, this time the script is a little lacklustre, with less tension and much more skin on show for those more cosmopolitan foreign readers.

‘Death Wing’ continues this lamentable gradual decline as Bond is needed to solve the mystery of a new and deadly super-weapon employed by the Mafia for both smuggling and assassination. However, although the story set-up might be below par, the climactic end sequence is superb, as the undercover agent finds himself trapped, a flying human bomb aimed at the heart of New York City. His escape and destruction of the eccentric hit-man ‘Mr. Wing’ is an undoubted series highpoint.

Despite the regrettable diminution of quality, Bond still remains a highly enjoyable strip, and there is still a huge amount to admire and enjoy in this splendid spy spectacular. And besides you do want a COMPLETE set of these great books don’t you?

© 1977, 1978, 1987 Glidrose Productions Ltd/ Express Newspapers Ltd. All Rights Reserved

 

By Ian Fleming, Jim Lawrence & Yaroslav Horak (Titan Books)
ISBN 1-84023-743-0

Octopussy is a classic Ian Fleming tale. Originally a short-story, under the skilful hands of Jim Lawrence and Yaroslav Horak, this smuggling romp in the West Indies blossoms into a complex tale of Nazi Gold, murdered agents and exotic deaths in exotic locales. Bowing to the wave of popularity caused by the films, there are even a few Q Branch gadgets on offer. Horak excels at the extended underwater sequences and the action is frenetic and non-stop.

The sea also plays a large part in the concluding story in this volume. The Hildebrand Rarity tells of a new Royal Navy robot weapon that seemingly fails but has in fact been stolen by flamboyant millionaire and career sadist Milton Krest. Undercover, Bond infiltrates his glamorous circle in a terrific tale full of innovation and intrigue. You won’t believe how many ways there are to kill with fish!

Top tales of adventure and absolutely captivating reading thrills. Get them all!

Strip © Express Newspapers Ltd. 1987. All Rights Reserved.

 

By Ian Fleming, Jim Lawrence & Yaroslav Horak (Titan Books)
ISBN 1-84023-690-6

By the time of the first story reprinted here (1966), the comic strip Bond had been running for some eight years. Lawrence and Horak had been surpassing themselves almost daily and the super agent had become a World phenomenon, so it’s no surprise that this tale of subversion and assassination was a masterpiece of periodical adventure.

After leaving the Heaven on Earth of a peasant’s life on a Japanese island, Bond is drawn back into the Intelligence game. Brainwashed, he attempts to murder “M”, and while being reconditioned he first encounters the power of Francisco Scaramanga, the world’s deadliest assassin and the top target of all the ‘good’ spy organisations on Earth.

Bond’s make or break mission to destroy the Man with the Golden Gun is a classic duel and captivating reading, which bears little resemblance to the lame film adaptation.

The follow-up tale was also poorly served by the movie industry. The Living Daylights is a tense Cold War thriller that is a metaphor for the conflict itself. Bond is dispatched to the Western side of the Berlin Wall to play a waiting game. A Red sniper is picking off valuable escapees as they try to cross the barrier and 007 is the only man capable of settling the matter. This sniper duel across the Wall is enlivened by the usual double-dealing and there is – naturally – a sexy blonde involved.

These espionage tales from masters of their craft deliver as much punch now as they ever did and should rank alongside the classics of British adventure fiction.

Strip © Express Newspapers Ltd. 1987. All Rights Reserved.

 

By Ian Fleming, Jim Lawrence & Yaroslav Horak (Titan Books)
ISBN: 1-84576-261-4 ISBN-13: 9781845762612

Jim Lawrence went from strength to strength as the premier Bond scripter with these tales from 1970-1971. The eponymous lead feature sees the British super-agent risking a deadly double cross as the head of Spectre offers to sell information of a potential disaster that leads Bond on a trail involving psychics and assassins and an attempt to destroy British prestige and end our country’s Nuclear Airship Programme. As usual there are thrills and glamour in abundance in a plot that presages modern summer blockbuster movies.

The Golden Ghost is followed by Fear Face, a tale of robotic assassins that might have been influenced by the “Cybernaut” episodes of that era’s other spy sensation, the TV series The Avengers. 007 is embroiled in a complicated plot when 0013 Briony Thorne, a disgraced agent, comes to him for help in clearing her name after a communist scheme has made her appear a traitor to the Realm. They are soon in contention with not only mad scientists, killer robots and ruthless gangsters but also their own secret service comrades.

Double Jeopardy is an early example of that now commonplace scenario, the replacement of prominent figures by flawless duplicates who steal, blackmail and kill. A deadly variation is the death of each duplicate and the original to close off the trail. Luck as much as skill is necessary to defeat a plot to sabotage a peace conference, by having the delegates murder each other.

The final story, Star Fire, is an enticing change of pace, full of ploy and counter-ploy as the leader of a ‘hippie cult’ unleashes what appears to be a plague of fireballs randomly incinerating anyone who mocks his beliefs. Just how that leads Bond to the death of a government scientist and the loss of secret plans for a top-secret British aircraft is a marvel of fast-paced storytelling, and the eventual resolution is bloody, thrilling, and a tribute to the real world roots of this most fantastical of espionage adventures.

Whilst tapping in to the contemporary fascination with the spiritual and supernatural, Lawrence and Horak never strayed too far from the basic solid grounding of the action-adventure. Sexy women and evil men litter the streets, cafes and bedrooms, evil organisations and enemy powers work their wiles and always the outcome depends on the determination and skill of the right man in the right place. These timeless thrillers are a joy to read and a pleasure to return to again and again.

© 1970, 1971 Glidrose Productions Ltd/ Express Newspapers Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

 

By Kingsley Amis (as Robert Markham), Jim Lawrence & Yaroslav Horak (Titan Books)
ISBN: 1-84576-175-8

James Bond proves he can never die as the first of the prose “continuation novels” is magnificently adapted by the regular strip-team of Lawrence and Horak. Unbelievably, by today’s publishing practises, when Ian Fleming died in 1964, there was only the unfinished Man With the Golden Gun to be eventually released. Bond books languished on hiatus until 1968. The story of how Kingsley Amis came to write Colonel Sun is a fascinating tale, and is fully recounted in this latest graphic collection from Titan Books.

What we all want though, is chills, spills, chicks and thrills and the opening reprint from the Daily Express in 1969 is American strip veteran Lawrence’s second all-original 007 script. And what a cracker it is! In River of Death Bond has to infiltrate the Amazon River stronghold of a maniacal oriental scientist. This madman is supplying trained animals to international criminals for the purposes of robbery, espionage and murder. Horak’s intense illustration is approaching a career peak and easily copes with action, mood, cutting edge science, beautiful women and exotic locales as diverse as the Alps, Rain Forests, London’s underworld and Rio de Janeiro at Carnival time. This is James Bond at his suave and savage best.

Colonel Sun might almost have been an anti-climax after such an auspicious run by two creators on such a visionary roll, but the sheer pace, complexity and action of Amis/Markham’s only Bond novel simply encourages them to up their game.

When “M” is kidnapped and 007 is too obviously lured into a rescue attempt in the Greek Islands it leads to an unlikely alliance with Soviet agents against a mysterious third force. These devils are not beyond using Nazi War criminals to achieve their nefarious ends, and this classic Cold War Spy-romp delivers a punch with every strip.

It must have hell on the nerves to follow this adventure in short daily doses, and doubly so at the week-ends. If ever comic strips become part of the National Curriculum we can only pray that this is the calibre of material on any reading list.

Strip © Express Newspapers Ltd. 1987. All Rights Reserved.

 

By Ian Fleming, Henry Gammidge & John McLusky (Titan Books)
ISBN 1-84023-908-5

This edition of Titan Books’ 007 newspaper strip collections comes from the period when the workmanlike John McLusky was the artist and features Henry Gammidge’s adaptations of no less than five Ian Fleming tales of the world’s most famous Secret Agent.

The title tale faithfully adapts Fleming’s novel of the world’s most ambitious bullion robbery, so if you’re only familiar with the film version there will be a few things you’ve not seen before. The action fairly pounds along and the tension is high throughout this signature tale.

Following Goldfinger is Risico. Bond is tasked with stopping a heroin smuggling gang whose motive is not profit but social destabilisation. Next is A View to a Kill, a traditional Cold War thriller with 007 on the trail of a gang who have been stealing secrets by ambushing military dispatch riders.

For Your Eyes Only, which was cobbled together with Risico to become the Roger Moore film version, is an adaptation of Fleming’s short story, wherein Bond is given a mission of revenge and assassination. Set in Jamaica with the Nazi war-criminal Von Hammerstein as culprit and target for the man with a licence to kill, it is a solid piece of dramatic fiction that once again bears little similarity to the celluloid adventure.

The volume concludes with the controversial Thunderball adaptation. That particular tale was censored and curtailed at the behest of Lord Beaverbrook, owner of the Daily Express, where the strip was running. Five days of strip were excised and for the full story you’ll need to read the ancillary text feature, but what remains is still pretty engrossing comic fare and at least some effort was made to wrap up the storyline before the strip ended.

James Bond was to return a year later in the adaptation of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service .These stories are a must for not only aficionados of Bond but for all thriller fans, as an example of terse gripping adventure uncluttered by superficial razzamatazz. Get back to basics, and remember that classic style is never out of fashion.

Strip © Express Newspapers Ltd. 1987. All Rights Reserved.

 

By Ian Fleming, Henry Gammidge & John McLusky (Titan Books)
ISBN 1-84576-089-1

The Dr No edition begins with an adaptation of Diamonds are Forever, which pits the Bond against an insidious gang of diamond smuggling criminals, in an explosive all-action romp before directly segueing into the tense, low-key thriller From Russia With Love, both courtesy of Gammidge and McLusky. The artist hits a creative peak with Dr No itself, scripted by Peter O’Donnell – before he created the amazing Modesty Blaise – as Bond returns to Jamaica to investigate the disappearance of two operatives and stumbles upon a plot to sabotage the American rocketry program.

These stories come from an age at once less jaded but more worldly; a place and time where the readers lived daily with the very real threat of instant annihilation. As such, the easy approachability of the material is a credit to the creators.

These volumes are a must for not only aficionados of Bond but for all thriller fans, as an example of terse gripping adventure uncluttered by superficial razzamatazz. Get back to basics, and remember that classic style never goes out of fashion.

Strip © Express Newspapers Ltd. 1987. All Rights Reserved.

 

By Ian Fleming, Anthony Hern, Henry Gammidge & John McLusky (Titan Books)
ISBN 1-84023-843-7

In Casino Royale Bond is ordered to gamble with and bankrupt Le Chiffre, a communist agent who has embezzled his Soviet masters’ operating capital in a moody tale of tension that results in torture and violent death, heady stuff for newspaper readers of 1958, when it first ran. Live and Let Die has 007 and US agent Felix Leiter tackle Mr. Big, another commie agent, who rules the Harlem underworld through Voodoo, and Moonraker concerns the attempt by Hugo Drax, a Nazi officer who has infiltrated the British aristocracy to drop a guided missile on London.

These editions of Titan Books’ 007 newspaper strip collections come from a period when the dependable John McLusky was developing a less formal approach, before going on to produce some of his best work, illustrating adaptations of Fleming’s tales. Casino Royale was the opening strip in a nearly twenty-five year run, and the somewhat muted artwork here shows an artist still not completely comfortable with his task. It was adapted and scripted by Anthony Hern, who had won the author’s approval after writing condensed prose versions of the novels for the Daily Express. Live and Let Die and Moonraker are both adapted by Henry Gammidge.

As the strip settles in for the long haul, McLusky warms to the potentialities of the job with cracking tales of Cold-War intrigue and fast, dangerous living set in a multitude of exotic locales. This is a welcome return to public gaze of some of the most influential – and exciting – comic strips in British history.

Strip © Express Newspapers Ltd. 1987. All Rights Reserved

 

By Ian Fleming and Various (Titan Books)
ISBN 1-84023-674-4

There are sadly very few British newspaper strips that can rival the influence and impact of the classic daily and Sunday “funnies” from America, especially in the field of adventure fiction. The 1930’s and 1940’s were particularly rich in popular, not to say iconic, creations. You would be hard-pressed to come up with household names to rival Popeye, Dick Tracy, Buck Rogers, The Phantom, Mandrake the Magician, Flash Gordon or Steve Canyon, let alone Terry and the Pirates or the likes of Little Lulu, Blondie, Li’l Abner, Little Orphan Annie or Popeye and yes, I know I said him twice, but Elzie Segars’s Thimble Theatre was funny as well as thrilling, constantly innovative, and really, really good.

What can you recall for simple popularity let alone longevity or quality in Britain? Rupert Bear? Absolutely. Giles? Technically, yes. Nipper? Jane? Garth? I hope so, but I doubt it. The Empire didn’t quite get it until it wasn’t an empire any more. There were certainly many wonderful strips being produced: well-written, beautifully drawn, but that stubborn British reserve just didn’t seem to be in the business of creating household names. Until the 1950’s.

Something happened in the ‘fifties in Britain – and I’m not going to waste any space here discussing it. It just did. Now we’re moving on. In a new spirit that seemed to crave excitement and accept the previously disregarded, comics got carried along on the wave. Eagle, the regenerated Beano, girls’ comics in general, all shifted into high gear, and so did newspapers. And that means that I can go on about a graphic collection with proven crossover appeal for a change.

The first 007 novel – Casino Royale -was published in 1953 and was serialised in the Daily Express from 1958, beginning a run of book adaptations (by Anthony Hern, Henry Gammidge, Peter O’Donnell and Kingsley Amis) before Jim Lawrence, a jobbing writer who had scripted the aforementioned Buck Rogers, came aboard with The Man With The Golden Gun to complete the transfer of the Fleming canon to strip format, thereafter being invited to create all new adventures, which he did until the strip’s demise in 1983.

The art on the strip was always of the highest standard. John McLusky provided the illustration until 1966 and the conclusion of You Only Live Twice. Although perhaps lacking in verve, the workmanlike clarity of his drawing easily handled the immense variety of locales, technical set-ups and sheer immensity of cast members, whilst accomplishing the then novel conceit of advancing a plot and ending each episode on a cliff-hanging “hook” every day. He was succeeded by Yaroslav Horak, who also debuted on Golden Gun with a looser, edgier style, at once more cinematic and with a closer attention to camera angle and frenzied action that seemed to typify the high-octane 1960’s.

What’s in this volume? Possibly the two best novels adapted back to back. After a falling out with the Express‘ owner, the Bond strip was missing from the paper’s pages from February 1962 until June 1964. The gap was explained as Bond’s year long search for arch villain Blofeld. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service has the agent finally discover his enemy and his perfect woman in a high-octane action extravaganza in the Swiss Alps. Closely adhering to Fleming’s script – as did the George Lazenby film version – the adventure ends with the wedding day murder of Bond’s bride, an atypically downbeat conclusion that directly leads into You Only Live Twice.

Eight months after the death of his wife, a broken Bond is called back from compassionate leave for a routine mission to Japan. Both he and ‘M’ know that this will be a make-or-break job for the demoralised super-agent. Initially indifferent, Bond warms not only to the culture but the characters of Japan, and when circumstances alter the mission into one of ultimate revenge, Bond is back with a vengeance!

Titan Books is re-releasing collected editions of these classic strips after an abortive first attempt in the 1980s. The utterly minor niggle that they’re not coming out in chronological order (I’m a fanboy too, so sue me) is easily countered by the informative checklist in each volume; and these are superb examples of the best of British – even if Lawrence is a damn Yankee and Horak an Ozzie by way of Manchuria. Get them all and sort it all out in a big leather chair over a Vodka Martini. You know the way it should be served… and by the time you read this it won’t matter anyway, so just remember your instructions. Buy them all!

Strip © Express Newspapers Ltd. 1987. All Rights Reserved.