Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from downthetubes!

Have a great holiday, folks!

Yes, we know it's still August, but...

LEGO Monster Fighters: Vampyre Castle: Top toy for Christmas 2012?

-- we all know that if you don't get your Christmas orders in early, some of these "must have" toys -- including the ones for the big kids who mainly read this blog -- will be hard to find.

Here's a breakdown of some of the toys for the whole family that "toy experts" say look set to top the sales charts this coming festive season... Of these, Moshi Monsters of course has its own magazine, which is a darn site cheaper than some of the toys on offer, so maybe it's worth looking at that as a stocking filler.

Good to see Lego still riding high -- we're sure some of you out there will be hinting for the Batcave listed, even though it was released early on this year.

Boys

• LEGO Monster Fighters: Vampyre Castle - £79.99 
• LEGO City: The Mine - £69.99 
• LEGO Ninjago: Epic Dragon Battle - £84.99 
• John Adams Pro Deck Workshop £24.99 
• Spynet Video Watch £49.99 
• Moshi Monsters: App Monster - £22.99 
• Smasha-Ballz - £19.99 
• Gyro-Botz Battle Arena - £19.99 

Tweens

• Lego Games: Life of George £29.99 

Families

• LEGO Games: Creationary £24.99 
• Booms, Bangs, Fizzes - £19.99 
• Radioactive Science - £19.99 
• Telestrations - £24.99 
• Dragon Chase - £17.99 

Big Kids

• LEGO Star Wars: Jabba's Palace £119.99 
• LEGO Technic: 4X4 Crawler £139.99 
• LEGO DC Superheroes: Batcave £69.99 
• Rubik's Cube - £12.99 

Stocking Fillers

• LEGO Minifigures, £1.99 
• LEGO Hero Factory - buildable action figures, £6.99-£14.99 
• Series 4 Collectable Moshlings - £1.99 
• Fuzzy Felt: My Favourite Shapes - £5.99 
• Gyro-Botz Shadow Warriors £9.99 each 

Pre-schoolers

• Britain's Big Farm: John Deere 6190R RC Tractor - £49.99 
• Baby Jake Giggle n Wiggle - £29.99 
• Little Charley Bear: Ready, Teddy Go! £29.99 
• Cloudbabies: Glow Babas £24.99 
• Everything's Rose: Sweet Dreams Rosie & Raggles - £29.99 

Girls

• Tiny Tears (Classic) - £19.99 
• Girls World: Gabriella Styling Doll - £19.99 
• WaggleTagz - £17.99 
• Cabbage Patch Kids - £29.99 
• AniMagic: Tessie Goes Trotting - £22.99 
• Moshi Monsters: Super Moshi HQ - £24.99 
• Crayola Catwalk Creations: House of Fashion - £29.99 
• Flufflings: Jiggle n Dance - £22.99 
• Winx: Deluxe Dolls - £19.99

• The products listed above can be found at the following websites: www.lego.com,  www.johnadams.co.uk, www.vividtoysandgames.co.uk, www.jaaks.com and www.tomy.co.

Merry Christmas - Don't Eat Too Much!

As you sit down to your Christmas dinner, or alternatively are recovering from it, we couldn't resist showing you this illustration of a Christmas meal in Tudor times taken from The Stories Of Our Christmas Customs which was first published by Ladybird in 1964.

If you think the bearded gentlemen serving the boar's head looks a little familiar that is because the artist for this book was Dan Dare creator Frank Hampson and the model he used for the man was his father, Robert 'Pop' Hampson, who was also the basis for Sir Hubert Guest, Controller of Dan Dare's Space Fleet.

I wonder how many Dan Dare fans realised the similarity at the time?

Merry Christmas.

Ladybird Books © Penguin Books Ltd

The Best of the Season to all our Readers!

Unlike the talented comic artists whose work we promote here, I can't draw for toffee, so I hope you don't mind this adaptation of a piece of art by the great pulp magazine artist Virgil Finlay.

Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year - although we'll probably be posting more stories between now and the start of 2012!

With the launch of The Phoenix in January, 2000AD's 35th Birthday in February and the continuing strength of the UK indie press, it's not all doom and gloom out there, no matter what the mainstream media would have us believe.

Our thanks to everyone who sent us stories - publishers, individual creators and others - and the very best of luck in your comic endeavours next year.

• More eCards sent to the DTT team here on my virtual fireplace on Flickr

Austerity Reviews of the Year

It is that time of the year when bloggers think of their favourite books, comics and magazines of the year. However since there can be a lot of overlap in what various people consider to be worth mentioning, and you don't really want to have to read several long reviews of the same title, we have decided to do something a little different.

In the spirit of austerity Britain, with everyone having to tighten their belts, we have decided to tighten the word count of these reviews until their pips squeak. These reviews are cheap, cheerful and quick to read as their word count is the grand total of 1.

Now that might sound easy but one word to sum up a favourite British book, comic or magazine of the last year or so is more of a challenge that you might think, especially as we have decided that no one can use the same word twice.

So in the spirit of the time of year the team here at downthetubes, John Freeman, Jeremy Briggs, Richard Sheaf and Ian Wheeler, wish you all a Merry Christmas and in the spirit of the recession we present you with, in alphabetical order, our Austerity Reviews Of The Year.

ALAN MOORE: STORYTELLER

Written by Gary Spencer Milliage
Published by Ilex Books
Website: www.ilex-press.com/books/alan-moore-storyteller/

Richard: Moore-ish

THE ASTONISHING SPIDERMAN

Bi-weekly comic
Published by Panini UK
Website: www.paninicomics.co.uk

Ian: Efficacious


BAGGAGE
By writer Robin Etherington and artist Lorenzo Etherington
Published by David Fickling Books
Website: www.davidficklingbooks.co.uk

Jeremy: Manic


THE BEANO
Weekly comic
Published by DC Thomson
Website: www.beano.com

Ian: Legendary


THE BROONS AND OOR WULLIE 75 ANNIVERSARY GIFT BOOK

Published by DC Thomson
Website: www.dcthomsonshop.co.uk/Group-View_All_Broons_and_Oor_Wullie_Gifts.aspx

Jeremy: Nice


COMMANDO - 50 YEARS A HOME FOR HEROES

Written by George Low
Published by Carlton
Website: www.carltonbooks.co.uk

Jeremy: Wow
Richard: Essential


COMMANDO

Four issues every two weeks comic
Published by DC Thomson
Website: www.commandocomics.com

Ian: Celebratory
Jeremy: Historic
John: Relentless


THE DANDY

Weekly comic
Published by DC Thomson
Website: www.dandy.com

Ian: Resilient
Jeremy: Cliff-hanging


DOCTOR WHO MAGAZINE

Four weekly magazine
Published by Panini UK
Website: www.paninicomics.co.uk

Ian: Expensive
John: Brilliant


DRACULA

Adapted by Jason Cobley with art by Staz Johnson
Published by Classical Comics
Website: www.classicalcomics.com/books/dracula.html

John: Astonishing


EAGLE TIMES

Quarterly magazine
Published by The Eagle Society
Website: www.eagle-times.blogspot.com

Richard: Enduring


HURRICANE AND CHAMPION INDEX

Written by Steve Holland
Published by Bear Alley Books
Website: www.bearalleybooks.blogspot.com/2011/02/hurricane-and-champion-index.html

John: Fascinating
Richard: Necessary


JEFF HAWKE'S COSMOS

Four monthly magazine
Published by the Jeff Hawke Club
Website: www.jeffhawkeclub.com

Richard: Bargain


JOHNNY RED - FALCON'S FIRST FLIGHT

Written by Tom Tully and illustrated by Joe Colquhoun
Published by Titan Books
Website: www.titanbooks.com/johnny-red-falcons-first-flight-3951

Jeremy: Finally
John: Pleased


LONG JOHN SILVER

Written by Xavier Dorison and illustrated by Mathieu Lauffray
Published by Cinebook
Website: www.cinebook.co.uk

Jeremy: Lovely
Richard: (Cinebook in general) Prodigious


MIRABILIS

Written by Dave Morris and illustrated by Leo Hartas
Currently published by Print Media Productions
Website: www.mirabilis-yearofwonders.com

John: Marvellous


MULTIVERSE

Comics news magazine
Published by Hell Freezes Over
Website: www.multiverse-magazine.com/about.html

Richard: Occasional


THE PHOENIX

Weekly comic beginning on 7 January 2012
Published by David Fickling Comics Ltd
Website: www.thephoenixcomic.co.uk

Jeremy: Anticipation
Richard: Newsstand!


SPACESHIP AWAY

Four-monthly magazine
Website: www.spaceshipaway.org.uk/

Richard: Futuristic
Jeremy: Glossy
John: Wonderful


STRIP MAGAZINE

Monthly comic magazine
Website: www.printmediaproductions.com

(As John and Jeremy both work on Strip we will now point out that "other A4 comic magazines are available" and that Ian and Richard were not threatened with being fed to Hook Jaw if they didn't choose their words carefully!)

John: Exhausting :)
Jeremy: Hurrah!
Ian: Promising
Richard: Retro


2000AD

Weekly comic
Published by Rebellion
Website: www.2000adonline.com

John: Ace


TOMORROW REVISITED - THE COMPLETE FRANK HAMPSON STORY

Written by Alastair Crompton
Published by PS Publishing
Website: www.frankhampson-tomorrowrevisited.co.uk

Jeremy: Gorgeous


WULF THE BRITON

Illustrated by Ron Embleton
Published by Book Palace Books
Website: www.bookpalacebooks.com/index.html

Jeremy: Weighty

Crazy comic-related Christmas presents: the Spider-Man Guitar

You know Christmas is on the way when we start getting PR for perhaps the stranger kinds of comics tie-in merchandise at downthetubes.

Case in point? New guitars from Nevada Music featuring favourite Marvel Super Heroes including Wolverine, X-Men, Spiderman, Iron Man, Captain America, Thor and the Incredible Hulk.

The guitars come with colourful Marvel super hero graphics and detailed artwork that adorn each guitar, strap and pick, set against a black background.

Acoustic Guitars come in half sizes suitable for younger players whilst the electric versions are available in ¾ and full size guitars.

Nevada are proud of their product and tell us both music and Comic fans will find a lot of fun and inspiration in these new instruments from Peavey featuring their favourite Marvel  Heroes. Acoustics are priced from £49.99 and Electric Guitars from £99.

• For more info visit: www.nevadamusic.co.uk or telephone 023 92 205100

Wishing you all the best of the season!

The cover of Rainbow, 15th December 1917.

The downthetubes team would like to wish all our readers the very best of the season. If you're travelling, take care out there and enjoy some down time with family and friends.

Normal service will be resumed here in the New Year... although we may just sneak a couple of posts up before then!

-- John Freeman, Editor

Merry Christmas

Well hopefully Santa arrived at your house last night and didn't look too much like this.

New Eagle's most popular character was of course Dan Dare but its most popular new character was Doomlord.
The alien Doomlord Vek from the planet Nox created and written by Alan Grant was originally an evil character out to destroy the Earth but eventually became its protector. It this issue he takes on the disguise of Santa to hide from the Deathlords of Nox who are on Earth to kill him.


The issue also included Dan Dare fighting for his life on the planet Belendotor, cop One Eyed Jack fighting for his life on the streets of New York and heavyweight boxer Danny Pike fighting in a European Championship eliminator in Madrid.

Christmas was also a theme in the issue's Amstor Computer story. The Amstor Computer stories were one off stories based on suggestions sent in by readers and "A Modern Christmas..." was suggested by Daniel Stockman of Middlesex. Artist Ron Turner shows that even Father Christmas needs a little help from modern technology.


And so we leave our Christmas covers for yet another year and but not before we take the time to wish all our readers a Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas: 1 Day To Go

Our run of Christmas covers continue as we countdown to Christmas Day.

Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without a good Look and Learn Santa cover and this one comes from issue 728 in 1975.

With Santa speeding over the snow on a snowmobile it is advertising the Speed and Power article "Skimming Over The Snow When It's Forty Below" which highlights snowmobiles, Sno-Cat tractors, the unpowered Sno-Bob as well as of course husky powered sleighs. The rest of the issue pretty much ignores Christmas with articles on General Montgomery's double, Clifton James, how a telephone works and the mud left behind when the Nile floods. The comic strips were the B&W Oliver Twist and of course More Adventures Of The Trigan Empire in full Don Laurence colour.

The following year, for issue 780, it was less 20th Century Santa and more a case of 21st Century Santa as Gerry Wood painted this amusing image of Santa on the surface of Mars. For someone able to visit every child on Earth in one night a quick detour to Mars doesn't hold many problems such as breathing the thin Martian air without a helmet on or, even more importantly, how he gets that beard into the helmet in the first place.

This advertised the second of a Speed and Power series entitled "Exploring Space" which included an illustration of the same Martian lander with rather more realistic astronauts surrounding it. Trigan Empire had moved into the hands of Oliver Frey by this issue and the B&W strip was Great Expectations.

Let's hope when Santa visits your house tonight his bag is as full as it is shown in these covers. Our final Christmas cover will appear tomorrow.

Merry Christmas: 2 Days To Go

Our run of Christmas covers continue as we countdown to Christmas Day.

There wasn't much Christmas cheer on display on the Christmas cover for Bunty in 1987. Indeed it seemed to be all doom and gloom - a miserable Christmas for The Kids Of Hunger House, a cold Christmas in School's Out and tears at Christmas in The Four Mary's.

After Ian Kennedy's full colour IPC Fleetway cover of Super Naturals 1987 Christmas issue yesterday, he returns to DC Thomson's limited colour newsprint for this compilation cover for Bunty in the same year.

The tears are not from one of the four Mary's - Field, Cotter, Simpson and Radleigh, but rather for one of their friends, Denise Fowlds, who is feeling sorry for herself since her divorced mother is in hospital and she has fallen out with her sister who has sided with their father.

Set in the past, Hunger House is Conwyn Castle stately home where the bereaved master of the house is such a miser that he doesn't feed his children properly. But all is not lost as finding and reading his late wife's diary brings him to his senses in time for Christmas dinner.

School's Out has four pupils of Wansdale School - Carol, Dawn, Marie and Ellie, queuing in the snow for the New Year Sales. So really they only have themselves to blame if they have a cold Christmas.

More Christmas covers tomorrow.

Tube Surfing: Wallace and Gromit, Insomnia on PSP, Free Digital Comics and Christmas Covers

• Titan Publishing's Wallace & Gromit digital comic has taken the iPhone by storm with over half a million downloads of its first free app - and the company is surely hoping to repeat the success with its release on the new PSP comics service. More on this story on the downthetubes Mobile Comics Blog

• Talking of digital comics, Insomnia Publications is one of a handful of UK comic publishers featuring on the launch offering for the PlayStation Network's Digital Comics service, which enables you to download the comics directly to your PSP over Wi-Fi or you use your PC to transfer the files. Although there's bound to be more coverage of both Marvel and Disney's offerings on the platform, this is a major coup for the independent publisher: titles on offer include Cancertown Burke and Hare, Cages and more. (Click here for a full list of titles on offer on the Insomnia blog).
The service is also being supported by IDW Publishing and iVerse Media, among others and over 550 comics were made available at launch with more to be added as the service develops.

• Forbidden Planet International reports that audio recordings from the Women in Comics conference, which took place a few weeks ago in Cambridge, are now available on the New Hall Art Collection site, including Sarah McIntyre, Asia Alfasi, Nicola Streeten and others, with more audio to follow in due course.

• Matthew Badham has re-posted an interview with comic creators Adam Cadwell (left, as visualised by cartoonist Marc Ellerby) and Jim Medway that disappeared into the ether when his previous blog bit the dust. Matthew sasy both Adam and Jim say a lot of interesting things about comics and art, and make some good observations about the Brit' small press scene, as well as offering their insight into the failure of The DFC and much more. Jim, it seems, by the way, has a phobia about comic shops, arguing many are "awful" (with some notable exceptions, such as Nottingham's Page 45. "You can’t expect anyone else to go into a shop with goblins on the window," he feels.

• Marvel Digital Comics Unlimited is to give away 1,000 free one-year subscriptions of its digital comics to enlisted US military personnel from Monday through 7th January. Air Force Times reports the offer is on a first come, first served basis. A year’s online subscription would normally cost $59.88, she said. Enlisted personnel who want to sign up for the free subscription can send an e-mail to marveldigitalpromo@sunbeltfs.com to receive a promotion code.

• And finally... as you've noticed, Jeremy Briggs is once again plunging us back into British comics history with various Christmas covers here on downthetubes - expect one post a day in the run up to the Big Day - and Lew Stringer is also offering his annual Christmas comics posting, which started with a Valiant and TV21 cover and will focus on just four comics in depth this year. It's a real treat to see Leo Baxendale’s ‘The Swots And The Blots’ once again. View all Lew's posts over on Blimey! It’s Another Blog About Comics.

Merry Christmas: 3 Days To Go

Our run of Christmas covers continue as we countdown to Christmas Day.

"Merry Christmas, Mortals!" Does anyone actually remember this short run, toy tie-in title from Christmas 1987?

Ian Kennedy does his typically superlative full colour cover for the fifth Super Naturals comic based on the range of action figures that were produced, not by Palitoy or Mattel, but by Tonka - which rather explains why they were riding around in what looks like a Big Foot-style pickup truck called the Ghost Finder.

The toys included holograms which changed with the viewing angle and featured broadly drawn characters. The three standing up at the back of the truck are the knight Lionheart, the American Indian Eagle Eye and the Viking Thunder Bolt.

There are more details of the Super Naturals toys on the Action Figure Archive.

More Christmas covers tomorrow.

Merry Christmas: 4 Days To Go

Our run of Christmas covers continue as we countdown to Christmas Day.

By far the oldest of our Christmas covers for this year, the girl's comic School Friend wished their readers "A Very Happy Christmas" in December 1962 with this compilation cover.

School Friend began in May 1950 and ran for almost fifteen years until January 1965 when it was amalgamated into June. While the comic's best remembered strip was The Silent Three it does not feature in this issue. However this issue does have strips such as Sunny - The Girl With The Smiling Eyes, My School Friend Sara and the historical The Sign Of The Fish as well as a text story The Mystery Of Flint House by Jean Theydon. The Christmas issue continues beyond the front cover as most of the strips have a Christmas or winter theme to them.

Included in the text story is this Christmas message from the editor which shows the age of the title as included in the illustration of Santa reading a copy of the comic is a Golliwog toy.

The other interesting thing about this illustration is the message is from "The Editor and his staff" when the letters page in this girl's comic is run by Sally Brooks of whom there are photographs. I wonder if that caused any confusion amongst the comics readers back then?

More Christmas covers tomorrow.

Merry Christmas: 5 Days To Go

Our run of Christmas covers continue as we countdown to Christmas Day.

DC Thomson's humour comics can always be relied on to do Christmas issues. Christmas 1984 brought these offerings from the digest sized Beano Comic Library.

Pup Parade are the Bash Street Kids' dogs, each with the appropriate attributes of their owners, and in issue 66, Snow Joke, they were out to perform their own winter Olympics with sledging, skiing and ice skating. Indeed the story shows its age by including a reference to Torvil and Dean's Bolero ice skating routine.

Meanwhile issue 65 had the Bash Street Kids themselves staring in Panto Time. After much initial to-do in which it only takes seven panels before Teacher's cane is produced, they choose to put on Cinderella, not that you can really tell from the front cover, and the expected chaos ensues.

More Christmas covers tomorrow.

Merry Christmas: 6 Days To Go

As the 25th of December rapidly bears down on us, each day for the next week downthetubes will be taking a look at a selection of comics and magazines from past Christmases.

Speed and Power was Look and Learn's sibling, using much the same format but leaning more towards the technological than its older brother. It lasted for 87 issues from March 1974 to November 1975 before being amalgamated into Look and Learn, initially as a separate pull out section.

The end of 1974 saw this unusual 48 page magazine format Christmas Special which they tried their best to give a Christmas cover to. Indeed each of the three subjects that artist Wilf Hardy illustrates are included in the contents - from the (sort of Christmassy) snowmobile racing to the RAF's then new Hawk trainer aircraft to the Soviet rocket launching a Mars probe.

The Christmas Special was as close as Speed and Power got to an annual during its lifetime although three Look and Learn Books of Speed and Power appeared after the two titles were amalgamated.

As for the weekly magazine the Christmas issue was hardly that Christmassy with a half hearted attempt at putting some holly and a "Happy Christmas!" on the front cover which featured a less than wintry dune buggy racer and a Royal Marines Commando Dory rigid raider.

More Christmas covers tomorrow.

Merry Christmas

The final Christmas cover and a cover that just screams Seventies at you.

Since the cover date was 25 December 1977 Look and Learn Plus Speed and Power went all out with this gem from artist Ron Embleton. Having presumably finished his rounds, Santa enjoys a trip on what many young children must have also been playing on that Christmas, a skateboard. Not, of course, one of the long wooden and heavily illustrated boards of today but one of those small garishly coloured plastic boards with their brightly coloured wheels that we all spent more time falling off than staying on that Christmas.

Merry Christmas for 2008.

Merry Christmas: 1 Day To Go

After the less than peaceful image of yesterday our Christmas covers look to their feminine side.

Ian Kennedy is the artist once again but from DC Thomson's long running "For Girls" title Bunty and a far cry it is from Kennedy's more traditional DCT duty providing war covers for Commando.

By Christmas 1990 Bunty had moved away from DCT's tradition newsprint onto higher quality paper which allowed for full colour rather than four colour covers. Here we have Bunty favourites The Four Mary's caroling in front of their St Elmo's school.

From all the team here at downthetubes, "We wish you a Merry Christmas".

Merry Christmas: 2 Days To Go

Two days to go to Christmas and a slight cheat on our Christmas cover today in that it is the cover of an annual rather than a weekly title. That said Christmas covers on war comics are few and far between and it is an Ian Kennedy painting on the Warlord annual for Christmas 1984.

It is set forty years before in Christmas 1944 and Royal Marine Union Jack Jackson is fighting the Germans in post D-Day Europe. By this point in the stories he was still attached to the US Marine Corps but by his own choice rather than by circumstance.

The idea of Santa charging with a fixed bayonet is certainly one of the more unusual Christmas covers.

Merry Christmas: 3 Days To Go

Just when you though that there couldn't possibly be any Christmas covers that Lew hadn't used in his mammoth, and excellent, coverage of Christmas comics over on Blimey, let us bring you just a few more in this countdown to Christmas (and Doctor Who and Wallace and Gromit).

With three days to go, a big step back in time to Christmas 1936. The Gem was one of the story papers published by Amalgamated Press that pre-date the more modern style of picture strip comics that we are more used to. While its cover image does not appear to tie-in to Christmas, its logo has the inevitable snow and it even goes as far as adding holly into the top corners.

The Hidden Hand was a 19 page text story of Tom Merry and the schoolboys of St Jim's which did take place during the school's Christmas holidays - "Thrill follows thrill throughout this gripping Xmas yarn of Tom Merry & Co on holiday".

The most interesting advert inside is for the batch of AP annuals with 1937 cover dates complete with its schoolboy in double breasted jacket, tie and slicked down hair. "Packed with stories of thrilling adventures, this Annual is splendid value. Its hundred and ninety pages of specially selected fiction provide many hours of wholesome entertainment for the healthy boy of today."

Well it was a different millennium.

Simon Mackie's Christmas Credit Crunch!

Tis the season for Christmas e-cards, and this one from cartoonist and illustrator Simon Mackie, creator of the Flick and Jube web comic, is one of my favourites so far... not only funny but summing up the mood of the season at present! (Presents?)