SOMETHING SURE SMELLS FISHY ABOUT THIS...

Printed result

Here's one that didn't get away. I was in my local chip shop one night
and the owner asked me if I'd do a cartoon to advertise his delivery service.
Rather than take the man's money, I asked for a fish supper every week -
for a year. (With an onion and a beetroot for good measure.) Not too bad
for half an hour's work, eh?

Above is the finished article which appeared on his chip shop bags
and leaflets for years; below is the "rough" of the initial idea.

Initial pencil rough

THE BANNER AND BLAKE SHOW...

Here's one of the art samples I presented to 2000 A.D. editor STEVE
MacMANUS at a Glasgow comic mart back in October of 1984. The
lettering was done with a fountain pen and was a far cry from being truly
professional, but it was enough to give Steve an idea of my potential and
eventually resulted in me freelancing for IPC about three months later.

 

The lettering may be far from perfect, but I was always quite proud of
the rather clean pencilling which it adorned, so I thought I'd share it
with you here.

EVOLUTION IN ACTION...

The above picture is a B&W copy of a colour cartoon for a proposed

ad for a local restaurant, which I did some years ago. (It's a shame I no

longer have a colour copy 'cos it was quite nice.) However, rarely does

a cartoon (or any illustration for that matter) spring full-blown from the

hand of its creator; it usually undergoes a process of development until

the finished result is reached. Let me show you what I mean.

The following picture is the original 'rough' suggesting the idea.

This is to show the prospective client what one has in mind. (I say

'prospective client', but in actual fact I was doing a 'favour' for the

owner. You know the old saying "There's no such thing as a free

lunch" ? Well, this is the proof of that saying.)

Below is another rough of the proposed final drawing -

this is essentially what I'm aiming for.

And now the finished line artwork. I added the restaurant's logo to the

tablecloth and then coloured it with acrylic inks. The finished result was

very effective, but unfortunately I gave it to someone, so only the B&W

and grey copy at the top of the page remains in my possession. You'll just

have to imagine it in colour - the guy has a blue suit and the girl has a

red dress, if that's any help. Trust me - it was nice.

And guess what? After all that work, the idea for the ad was abandoned.

Just another day in the life of a frustrated cartoonist, eh?

HEY, BIG FRANKIE...

A while back, I posted an unused cover for HUGH CAMPBELL's
'80s fanzine, FUSION. The illustration was one I'd first drawn back in
about 1981 or '82, and as I previously mentioned, I'd first used it for a
suggested cover for RON BENNETT's fanzine/catalogue, SKYRACK'S
FANTASY TRADER, 'though I never got around to sending it. So, 27
years later, here it finally is...quite effective, if I say so myself.

LOOK - UP IN THE SKY...ER, I MEAN COMING THROUGH THE WALL...

"I've lost my front door key!"

Here's a real collector's item for you to feast your eyes on - the
1964 AURORA model kit of SUPERMAN, as built and painted by
myself. Aurora was once the world's biggest plastic model kit company,
before the high price of oil made life difficult for them and forced them
out of business in 1977. (Oil being one of the ingredients in the
manufacture of plastic.)

Hopefully, MOEBIUS MODELS will get around to rereleasing
this kit in its original form (with original box art) in the near future.
Why not contact them at http://www.moebiusmodels.com/ and
 suggest it? Go on, you know it makes sense.

OLD BALLS, PLEASE...

Here's a strange little story for you concerning the item in the above ad.
I bought my first and only TONIBELL MINIBALL back around 1967 or '68.
(Hard to believe it was over forty years ago.) When I moved house in 1972,
I was sure I had brought it with me to my new home, but - mysteriously - I
couldn't find it. I had kept it behind the water tank up in the attic, and I was
sure I had retrieved it the night before moving, but - search as I might in
our new abode - it was nowhere to be found.

Over the years, I would regularly have dreams in which I found myself
back in my old house, searching for my trusty friend from childhood. Any-
way, to cut a long story short, nineteen years later I decided to determine
its fate once and for all, and managed to gain access to my old house and
its attic - and was overjoyed (if flabbergasted) to find my yellow-coloured
miniball exactly where I had left it so many years before - completely un-
touched. So, not only was I the last person to see it back in 1972, I was
the first person to clap eyes on it again in 1991. Strangely, the nineteen
years that have elapsed since I retrieved it don't seem a fraction of the
time it lay undiscovered and neglected for the same period.

And guess what? I've never had those dreams again since that day I
finally solved the mystery of the disappearing little yellow ball.

OURS IS A DRAMA DECREED BY THE FATES...

I'm glad to report that
MARVEL have done them-
selves proud with the release
of the softcover THOR
MASTERWORKS volume.
Quite simply, these tales,
from JOURNEY INTO
MYSTERY #83-100, have
never been presented better
anywhere. For the first time
since its original printing
back in 1962, Thor's origin
is reproduced - in colour -
from pristine proofs, with
no evidence of clumsy,
so-called "restoration" or
"reconstruction" as was the
case in most earlier reprints.

For example, when the
story was reprinted in MARVEL TALES #1, a badly lettered blurb on the
splash page declared it was originally printed in JIM #38 (instead of 83) -
and the final page was cropped to allow a wrap-up panel to the issue. When the
tale was reprinted in the GOLDEN BOOK & RECORD SET, the splash page
was printed in black and white, and the "Editor's Note" panel on the last page was
eliminated, with the last two pics being resized to fill the space. In ORIGINS OF
MARVEL COMICS, the corner page numbers were removed and some clumsy
touch-up work was noticable in places. For the first printing of the hardback
edition of Masterworks (and subsequent editions up until now), the splash page
was reconstructed from the reprint in Thor #158, and the final panel was badly
re-lettered from the changes made in the aforementioned issue to its original
wording. (Although the misspelling of "THORR" was corrected.)

Rather than bore you
here with the details of
every single printing of this
classic tale, see my previous
post on the subject. However,
before you do that, run out
and buy this beautiful edition
before it's sold out. (It's just a
shame that they inadvertently
missed out a paragraph in
STAN LEE's introduction,
originally written for the
1991 printing.)

ISBN# 978-0-7851-4568-4.

Start saving now for
the giant-sized OMNIBUS volume coming out at the end of the year.

KIRBY HAS LEFT THE BUILDING...

Following on from my post
about FANTASTIC FOUR:
THE LOST ADVENTURE,
I'd like to look at another of
the fantasies surrounding
the original printing of this
story in FF #108. I've
already addressed JON B.
COOKE's idle speculation
that STAN LEE may
possibly have delayed
printing JACK KIRBY's
version out of spite, so I'd
now like to examine the
suggestion that it was
printed the same month
as the first issue of DC
COMICS' (then National
Periodical Publications,
Inc.) NEW GODS title in
a malicious attempt to sabotage its launch.

Sound plausible? Let's examine the facts. Kirby's first comic to be
released by DC was SUPERMAN'S PAL JIMMY OLSEN. When New
Gods hit the stands (six months after Kirby had left MARVEL) no special
attention or promotion was given to FF #108 - Kirby wasn't mentioned
on the JOHN BUSCEMA cover - the Kirby content was bookended by a
Buscema splash page and end page, with quite a few redrawn panels
inside the book - rendering Kirby's involvement practically invisible 'til
the reader got the mag home and sat down to read it. Hardly the way
to create an impact and steal New Gods' thunder, I'd suggest.

Marvel were attempting to establish Big John Buscema as the FF's

new regular, superstar artist (after four issues by JOHN ROMITA), so that

would surely count against them harping on about the past glory that was

Kirby. Also, sales on "The World's Greatest Comic Magazine!" actually

increased after Kirby left the book (as they did with SPIDER-MAN after

STEVE DITKO departedt) so - Stan Lee's personal sadness aside - Marvel

wouldn't have been too concerned over the King's departure. The most

likely explanation seems to be that the story was printed simply because

it had been paid for - and once Stan had worked out the problems with

it and incorporated it into a longer, more cosmic story arc, there was

no good reason not to print it.

When one examines the evidence, the fact that FF #108 featured
Kirby material and came out the same month as New Gods #1 seems to
be nothing more than coincidence, otherwise Marvel surely would have
hyped it to the rafters. They didn't - which puts paid to that little notion as
far as I'm concerned. That's the trouble with most "conspiracy theories" -
they seldom withstand scrutiny when measured against the plain and
simple facts of the matter.

******

For previous post on this topic, click here.

WELCOME TO THE 21st CENTURY...

Here's another fine example of RON EMBLETON artwork - the cover
to the very first TV CENTURY 21 ANNUAL from 1965 (for 1966). When
the weekly comic first debuted, STINGRAY was the current GERRY
ANDERSON show on TV, essentially making it the "starring" picture-strip
of the publication. (Although, with the LADY PENELOPE strip, the comic
was already preparing the grounds for THUNDERBIRDS as the upcoming
main feature.)

When one thinks about it, artists like RON EMBLETON, FRANK
HAMPSON, DON LAWRENCE, and FRANK BELLAMY were very
much the ALEX ROSSes of their day. Don'tcha think?

To see the 1967 Annual, click here.