Missing in Action: Off the Frame

One casualty of the delayed publication of Comics International was a special "Off The Frame" cartoon by John Freeman and Paul Harrsion-Davies, the brief to note news of a proposed Weerewolf by Night film project and tie in with issue's Captain America feature.

Something of the moment, it's unlikely it will now feature in the magazine, which is particularly disappointing since Paul, to his credit, turned the art around to a tight deadline, only for the title to fall into a publishing void for some months. Such is life in publishing sometimes...

With that in mind, I'm happy to publish it here for your (hopeful) enjoyment... Comments welcome!

Tube Surfing: 9 February 2009

• The animated feature based on Neil Gaiman's Coraline is now on release int the US and seems to be doing well both critically and at the box office. "A lot more people than anyone expected are going to see it," Neil notes. "...Which is good for Coraline, and good for Laika, and good for the Portland animation world, and good for [director] Henry [Selik], and I'd be lying if I said it wasn't good for me."

• IDW has announced it to publishe a new ongoing Doctor Who title by Tony Lee, which will launch in July from IDW. The first two issues will be set in 1920's Hollywood.

• Fans of US comics will adore the concept behind Covered, a blog where people redraw famous comic covers. The results are mixed but have prompted Paul Harrsion-Davis, one of the artists involved in the upcoming TOXIC Comic Supplement (see news story), to come up with his own interpretation of a Blue Devil cover.

• Graeme Neil Reid is finishing his illustration work for The Dangerous Book of Heroes, a new follow up to The Dangerous Book for Boys that became a massive hit for the authors Conn and Hal Iggulden back in 2006. There will be around 100 of Graeme' s illustrations in the book and Graeme has posted a marketing sampler for the new title on his blog.

• Talking of books, Lee O'Connor has posted his latest book cover commission, Short Stories from a Troubled World, soon to be published by Iconoclast Publishing. The book is a collection of the beautiful thoughts of one Tony Paul "who takes 'a Humorous, yet heard-hitting swipe at some serious issues. Among the book's targets are Ruling Elites, Globalisation, Dumbing Down, Think-Tanks and the unholy alliance between government, Big Business and the media," Lee notes. Check out the cover on his LiveJournal and if you can guess who all the personalities are in the drawing " you get a fictional prize!"

Exclusive: TOXIC Comic Supplement Details

Egmont's TOXIC Comic is to publish a special comic supplement of an upcoming issue, featuring comic characters old and new in a move to, hopefully, bring more strip material to the bestselling British news stand title.

The line up for the 16 page supplement will feature nine comic strips – eight of which are completely brand new and original, whilst one, WereWilf, is a resurrected character from Egmont’s past given a modern day makeover.

The line up is:

Count Von Poo
By Jamie Smart (writer/artist)
Jamie is of course, perhaps best known for his 10-issue comic Bear and My Own Genie in The Dabdy.

Zombie Nation
By Luke Paton (writer) and Laura Howell (artist)
Luke is the creator of the web comic, The Adventures of Kez and Luke, while Laura is of course a firm favourite with TOXIC readers as the artist on Robin Hoodie for the title, and also draws Ratz for The Beano and strips for The DFC.

Spooks In Space
By Paul H Birch (writer) and Steve Harrison (artist)
Paul's the brains behind the Birmingham Mail's Speech Balloons blog, delivering the latest word on comics in the Midlands

Bovver Baby
By John Freeman (writer) and Paul J Palmer (artist)
As well as drawing strips for TOXIC and other comics, Paul also drew The Underversity, a six part story featuring characters from The Really Heavy Greatcoat.

HoaXers
By David Hailwood (writer) and Paul Harrison-Davies (artist)

WereWilf
By Paul H Birch & Shane Oakley (writers) and John Erasmus (artist)
Shane has worked on and off in the comics industry, writing and drawing for some of the big guys, and some of the microscopic. John Erasmus credits include Desperate Dan, Accident Man (for the original Toxic comic), Dervish Ropey in the Amazon, and much, much more.
WereWilf first appeared March 1976, one of three strips introduced to Whoopee! to mark the comic's second birthday. (The others were Smiler and Gook the TV Spook).

Clump
By Lew Stringer (writer/artist)
Lew should need no introduction to any British comics fan -- his credits include Combat Colin, Brickman and more.

Bad Robots
By John Freeman (writer) and Paul Harrison-Davies (artist)

Simon Spectacular
By Luke Paton (writer) and Stuart Arrowsmith (artist)
Stuart is a full-time Designer and Illustrator, producing work ranging from panel cartoons to natural history pieces for commercial use.

The supplement will come with issue 137 of TOXIC, on sale 1 April for three weeks. Readers will be asked to vote online for their favourite comic strip and the winner will potentially get a full-time slot in the magazine.

British Zombies Boom!

A few months ago, up and coming British comics artist Paul Harrison-Davies promised a sneak peak of a comic he was working on before finding out sneak peaks were not allowed.

"Well, I'm told the comic's out so I guess I can talk about it," he announces on his blog. "The story is called 'Etc' and it's in Boom Studio's Zombie Tales #7. I've not had a copy yet, but you might be able to find it in your local comic shop.

"The script was written by Shane Oakley and I was happy to find Shane's scripts have the same dark over the top humour as his awesome artwork.

I'm not going to give anything away more than this first page shows, if you like it, track down a copy of Zombie tales to find out how it ends."

Shane, who has had his comp copies, also provided an alternate cover for the issue, which he's featured on his blog and also reveals of his script: "I scribbled it down in response to my increasing disenchantment with the ever-uninspiring glut of zombie movies/comics. The genre ran outta ideas a long time back, and really, the majority haven't moved past Romero's Dawn of the Dead. Same story, same idea, same stock characters. Stories that seem to take an age just to lead you nowhere, and stories that deliver nothing but a dreary sense of deja vu...

"i wanted to have some fun with the undead, play around, try to add a little invention to the genre, and do it quick (only six pages)!"

Tube Surfing: 21 November 2008

• King Features Syndicate, the world’s premier distributor of comics (including Hagar the Horrible, Popeye and more), columns, editorial cartoons, puzzles and games to newspapers worldwide, is launching Comics Kingdom, a first-of-its-kind digital platform it says provides a revenue-driving business service to help local news web site publishers foster user engagement and attract marketers.

• Meanwhile, rival US didgital comics distributor UClick Digital Entertainment, considered America’s top provider of comics on mobile phones recently launched Jeff Smith's Bone, the first of many graphic novels planned for release on the iPhone. Uclick say they have tailored series like Bone and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles specifically for the iPhone, taking full advantage of the full-color LCD screen and Multi-touch display. Fans can move back and forth through stories with a simple swipe of their finger. To learn more Bone and other iPhone releases from Uclick, visit their store on iTunes

• Not all is good in the world of digital comics. Website Fleen notes the news from Comic Book Resources that Platinum Studios, owmers of the Druk Duck webcomics site, have entered into a deal to produce a Hero By Night TV show. If you you haven't heard of Hero By Night, it's a very successful web comic on the Drunk Duck service created by a guy named DJ Coffman... who, as of this writing, hasn’t actually been contacted by Platinum regarding said deal. Needless to say, it's made Coffman even nore upset about Platinum's antics than before, and that must have been really hard...

• Comics artist Rufus Dayglo has posted a report and pictures from the Opening Night of the Mutate Britain exhibition we plugged earlier this month. "You've got to go and check it out, he urges, enthusing about the exhibtion which is spread over four floors."It's on for a month, and is incredible." Mutate Button: Behind the Shutters takes place at Cordy House 87-95 Curtain Rd London EC2A 3BS More information about the Mutate Britain Exhibition on MySpace

• WallaceAndGromit.com Gets Baking! To celebrate the impending release of A Matter of Loaf and Death this Christmas, the official Wallace & Gromit website has had a design "bake-over". Packed with information about the new film, brand new downloads and cracking recipes, make sure you visit the site at: www.wallaceandgromit.com

• Warren Ellis has taken time out of comics writing to deny, utterly and completely, rumours that he has been asked to write for the Heroes TV series. "I don’t know where this has sprung from, but for the last week I’ve been fielding emails and MySpace messages asking me if it’s true that I’ve been asked to work on the American tv series Heroes as a writer," he says. "Even stranger to me is that when I dismiss it with 'I don’t even watch the show' or similar, that’s somehow taken (three times now) as cryptic assent.
"So listen. No, I haven’t been approached to write an episode of Heroes. In no way shape or form has there been any kind of contact from the Heroes production. I doubt anyone working there has even heard of me..."

• The next UK Comic Expo Bristol will be 9th - 10th May 2009. With the credit crunch biting and potential sponsorship on the wane, organiser Mike Allwood has announced the event will only take place in the Ramada Hotel.
The time it takes to organise the event is also causing probelms. "My spare time in the foreseeable future is going to limited owing to my real job," Mike told Terry Hooper, "and the Expo takes forever to put together. Rather than the show being less than the sum of its parts owing to my commitments we are taking a step back for 2009 and are co-producing with Fantasy Events for this one." For more information visit www.fantasyevents.org