DC'S OLD BLACK MAGIC CREEPY COVER GALLERY...

Images copyright DC COMICS

Back in the early to mid-'70s, DC COMICS published a 9 issue run of a comic called BLACK MAGIC, which reprinted strips from the 1950s PRIZE COMICS mag of the same name.  Some of the art was revised in places to look less dated (and also to meet then-current Comics Code requirements) and, overall, the reproduction wasn't quite as good as it could (and should) have been.  However, it was a noble attempt to present older tales to a then-modern readership, so here are the covers to all 9 issues of this short-lived but interesting revival of a SIMON & KIRBY classic.

Looking at these covers takes me right back in time.  I still remember the shop from which I bought the first issue, though it's so long since I've been there that I'm unsure whether it still exists or not.  I suspect the latter.  Also, I don't think I had every issue at the time, just the first three or four perhaps.  However, I've got 'em all now, even if it did take me 40 years to own the complete set.  Did you buy this mag back in the day, and if so, what are your memories of it?  

(Interestingly, the fourth issue featured a version of a hitherto unused cover originally intended for the first issue of the title's initial 1950s run.)

The RETURN Of The KILLER ROBOT - PART FIVE Of An AMAZING JOHNNY FUTURE ADVENTURE...

Copyright REBELLION

  

It's time once again to turn back the clock to the 1960s, when comics still topped the list of what any self respecting boy would spend his pocket-money on in those pre-decimal days of 'free love' and black and white TV.  In fact, here's an interesting experiment for all those who lived through the '60s and are approximately the same age as me.  Cast your mind back to watching BATMAN as a kid and I bet'cha you think you saw it in colour.  Am I right?  My parents didn't get a colour telly until the early or mid-'70s, yet so familiar am I with those colour episodes from later repeats, that when I think back to 1966, my memories of watching the programme seem to be in vivid TECHNICOLOUR!

 

Talking of Batman (which we were), has anyone else noticed how similar JOHNNY FUTURE's costume and cape are to those of the DAYLIGHT (as he was on telly) DETECTIVE ?  It's almost as if artist LUIS BERMEJO was using ADAM WEST's outfit as a template for JOHN FOSTER's own little superhero number.

 

Anyway, that's more than enough obligatory preamble from me.  Time to turn you loose on the pretty pictures.  Go to it, Tiger!

 

("Tiger" ?  I can't believe I just typed that.)

The ASTOUNDING ORIGIN Of JANUS STARK...

Copyright REBELLION

Long after the weekly SMASH! had shuffled off this mortal coil, JANUS STARK continued to thrill and amaze readers in the pages of VALIANT & SMASH!, as well as a few more annuals of his original comic's title.  He was extremely popular abroad, and zee Frenchies had a licence to produce their own adventures of the character - some of which were re-lettered into English and published over here in the mid-'80s.

However, here is how he first began, way back in March 1969.  As far as I know, this strip has only been reprinted once before - in a book called ALBION ORIGINS back in 2007.  The pages which follow are scanned from my own first issue of the 'new' Smash!, and are presented here for your very own delight and delectation.  (Which are essentially the same thing, but you know how I love alliteration.)

The awesome art is by the prolific SOLANO LOPEZ.

AND DOOM COMES CALLING! KALAK The DWARF - PART ONE...

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Way back in the 1960s, so legend (and GIL PAGE) has it, there was going to be a new FLEETWAY/IPC weekly comic called BLACKJACK.  However, management decided not to proceed, and consequently the material produced for it was eventually used elsewhere.

CURSITOR DOOM and (eventually) The PILLATER PERIL were two strips that ended up being published in a new incarnation of SMASH!, relaunched in 1969.  I don't know at this point what other strips intended for Blackjack turned up in Smash!, but the unpublished comic's loss was the revamped weekly's gain.

For those of you who were avid Smash! readers, here's the first episode of Cursitor Doom, drawn in the mean, moody and menacing style of the incredible ERIC BRADBURY.  Want to see further instalments?  Then let me know in the comments section.

******

American readers may find the strip seems a little familiar to them.  That's because it was published under the name of AMADEUS WOLF in a U.S. sized colour comicbook called SPELLBINDERS (produced circa the mid-80s in the U.K. by DEZ SKINN's QUALITY COMICS).  As far as I know, it was available in both Britain and the States.

The very 1st issue of the 'new' Smash!

CALLING 'FANTASY INK' BLOG...

Every time I click on the FANTASY INK site, my computer freezes and I get a message saying 'Blogspot not responding'.  Any ideas as to how I can resolve the matter?  This is the only site this happens with, so is the problem at my end or the other?  Great site, but I can't see it.  And does anyone else have the same difficulty with access?

SPACE PATROL In TV COMIC...

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Simply because I like to spoil you all with awesome acts of unselfish generosity, I now present some scans of a pair of comic strips from the TV COMIC Annual for 1966 (which means it came out at the end of '65).

SPACE PATROL was a show made in '62 (broadcast in '63) which had obvious similarities to GERRY ANDERSON's FIREBALL XL5.  ROBERTA LEIGH wrote and also produced the programme, and ARTHUR PROVIS was responsible for the cinematography.  Both of them had previously worked with Anderson, Leigh on TORCHY The BATTERY BOY (her creation) and Provis as his business partner in AP FILMS.

As you can see from the endpapers, the uniform colours weren't replicated in the strips, the artist probably being supplied only with black and white photos for reference.  In fact, the colours are more like the outfits of the Fireball XL5 crew, and perhaps the artist mistook one space strip for the other.  Who knows?!

Anyway, enjoy a trip back in time to the '60s as we go on patrol in outer space.

(Incidentally, to avoid confusion in the U.S. with a show of the same name, the programme was renamed PLANET PATROL for American consumption.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TV COMIC ANNUAL - FIREBALL XL5...

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Due to the generosity for which I'm justly renowned, I herewith present a classic FIREBALL XL5 strip from the 1964 TV COMIC Annual.  Drawn by NEVILLE MAIN, it's obviously aimed at a younger readership than the classic MIKE NOBLE illustrated adventures in TV CENTURY 21, but it's still worth seeing nonetheless.  I love that cover, and it's great to see good ol' MIGHTY MOTH, who has always been one of my favourite comic characters.

PART FOUR Of FANTASTIC JOHNNY FUTURE THRILL-FEST...

Copyright REBELLION

   

I really do think that I should get some kind of award - a BLUE PETER badge at least.  "What for?" you may ask.  I'll tell you.

 

Do you realize just how difficult it is to write the intros to these JOHNNY FUTURE episodes and not repeat myself?  I'm not talking about the basic info that JF appeared in a comic called FANTASTIC back in the '60s, or that it was published by ODHAMS PRESS and drawn by the amazing LUIS BERMEJO.  No, that's the easy part.

 

The hard part is in 'dressing up' it up so that you rollickin' readers don't feel you're simply being subjected to the exact same introduction each and every strip.  I couldn't bear to think of any of you getting the idea that I'm a lazy loafer who merely regurgitates the same ol' copy you read last time.  Or the time before that, and the time before... well, I'm sure you get the picture.

 

And talking of pictures, here are the ones you've just waded through pant-loads of piffle to get to - so I won't hold you back any longer.

 

 

 

YIPPEE! PART TEN Of The MIGHTY MARVEL COVER GALLERY...

Images copyright MARVEL COMICS

As we emerge from our very own Time-travelling cosmic craft, we are met by yet more magnificent MIGHTY WORLD Of MARVEL cover images and pin-ups from 40 years ago.  By this time, the comic had only four full-colour pages, and that would be reduced to a mere two (front and back cover) before very long.  The early issues of MWOM had something special about them which later ones sorely lacked, but I persevered with the comic for the duration of its run - and what a run it was!

If you were there back in the heady, halcyon and hallowed days of Marvel at its best, then you're sure to appreciate seeing these pages again and reliving your long-vanished youth.  If not, don't fret, as the pictorial treasures presented upon this post are just as capable of transfixing the 'newbies' amongst us as those who are renewing the acquaintance.

So - let's enjoy them together, shall we?

   

MY CUP RUNNETH UNDER...

Funny the memories that spring, unbidden, into one's mind upon a sudden glimpse of a half-forgotten object that, over time, has merged chameleon-like with its surroundings and become practically invisible.  Until, that is, it metaphorically leaps from its accustomed place in an attempt to remind one of its existence, and draw an acknowledgement that its importance is yet secure after all this time.  Such a thing happened to me earlier, so let me now relate a shamelessly sentimental tale.

In my kitchen is a cup that isn't a cup, which I've had for around 16 years.  I'm so used to seeing it that I don't even see it anymore.  That's to say, it no longer registers on my conscious mind.  It is, quite literally, half a cup, as if it's been set upon by a laser and vertically spliced down the middle. (Except it has a 'back' to its imaginary splice and isn't quite so bereft in the dimensional stakes as I might make it sound.)

It bears the legend "You asked for half a cup of tea" and functions as an actual cup for when one wants to elicit a smile from a visitor.  Not that I've ever used it for such an effect, but it has actually been used for that purpose on me.  It must be over 20 years ago now, that I was visiting an old schoolmate and neighbour, GEORGE COOPER, who lived in an area in which I once stayed over four decades ago.

I was in the habit of taking a stroll in my old environs on a Saturday morning, and would occasionally drop in to visit George and his father, who could always be relied upon to provide a cup of tea and sometimes even a sausage sandwich.  On this particular day, I replied to George's enquiry as to whether I would like a cuppa by saying:  "I wouldn't say no to half a cup, thanks very much."

He'd probably been waiting years for someone to say that.  In due course, in he trotted with a plate of biccies and proffered a cup into my outstretched hand.  Yup, you guessed it, 'twas the half cup I've just been wittering on about in my customary long-winded fashion.  Cue my obligatory and poorly-feigned 'enthusiastic' chuckle at the jest.

A handful or so years later, Mr. Cooper Senior sadly passed away, necessitating in George having to eventually vacate the premises as one of his brothers owned the house and wanted to sell it.  On one of my last visits after his dad's demise, George gave me the cup as a memento of my Saturday morning drop-ins, which, alas, were now drawing to a close due to him having to move from his childhood home.

And so the cup that isn't a cup (but is half a cup) sits on a shelf in my kitchen, bringing with it memories of another house and another time, when I'd revisit one of the neighbourhoods of my youth and reminisce with George and his father about events from so very long ago.  And now that time of reminiscing has itself become a memory, having passed into history and is now a period which I fondly recollect today.

I still sometimes go for a stroll in that old neighbourhood and have other friends living there who I can drop in on if I want to, and, indeed, sometimes I do.  However, whenever I'm back there, I always walk past George's house (which, to me, will always be George's house regardless of whoever lives there) and recall with fond affection the day I asked for half a cup of tea and was given precisely that.

And I'm surprised to find my chuckle at the event is now somehow a genuine one.

ROAD WORKS AHEAD...

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As you can see, I've been 'Spring cleaning' my Blog - changing the look of it to something that's hopefully easier on the eye.  However, an unexpected side-effect has arisen from changing the typeface, resulting in some older posts having odd layouts and sentence breaks - not to mention pictures which don't enlarge for some strange reason.

I'm currently working my way through trying to put things right, so any posts you visit that look out of kilter, please be patient as I try to restore them to some semblance of order.  Ta muchly. 

SO - CARDS ON THE TABLE...

When I was a lad we had a card table, which usually sat at the front of our living-room.  In our 4th house (in the town we'd moved to in 1960), my parents summarily dispensed with its services without so much as a 'thank you' for its 20-odd years of loyal fealty.  It was sold to a dealer in 1981 or '82 and bravely went off to meet its fate.

A couple of years later we moved to yet another new house, and my folks acquired another table of the exact same type as its predecessor, in every respect save one; namely, it was lighter toned than the dark-hued original and therefore more suitably complemented the assortment of other furniture amongst whose company it sat.

As I said, the table was of a variety known as a card table; the hinged top unfolded and swung round to present a green-baized surface upon which, in a different era, various card games could be played after dinner by way of rounding off a pleasant evening.  (Neither one of our tables had ever been employed for that purpose as far as I recall, rendering them somewhat redundant in that area.)

Anyway, to try and cut to the chase - as regular readers know, we returned to our former house just over four years after first vacating its premises, and the 'new' table came with us.  What's more, it took up residence in the very spot on which its precursor had once stood at the front of the room.  And why not?  It was the most obvious place.

Which brings us to the photograph which graces this post.  The photo was taken around July of 1972, a few weeks after we had first moved to this house.  In the background can be seen the original table of which I've just been so interestingly (cough) telling you about.  The framed photograph now sits atop the replacement table, creating (in my mind) all sorts of strange and curious ponderings.

We've now owned the 2nd table for quite a number of years longer than we had the first, though I still tend to think of it as a recent acquisition.  An interloper, in fact, who brazenly occupies the space more rightly belonging to its ousted antecessor.  It'd surely be more fitting to have that picture sitting on the very table seen in the actual photo itself, rather than atop a base pretender, a stand-in for the one so cruelly cast out more than 30 years ago.

H'mm, 30 years, eh?

On the other hand, maybe it's time I accepted it as one of the family.  After all, it's been around for over half my life.  And at least the original can be seen through that framed window into the past, ensuring that it yet resides, in a sense, in its accustomed spot.

So - anyone for a game of cards?

******

(Interestingly, most of the ornaments on the table in the photograph now sit on the replacement today.  How's that for continuity?!)