New Eagle Times released

The latest issue of Eagle Times - Volume 24 No 4 - is now available from the Eagle Society.

Contents include:

• From Under the 1950s Christmas Tree, Pepys Card Games - a seasonal look at the numerous Pepys games, which included some based around characters from Eagle ('Dan Dare' and 'Jeff Arnold') and Girl
• The Case of Christmas Presents - PC49 appears in a seasonal short-story
• A Look at 'Luck' - part 2 of a continuing series examining the French Foreign Legion strip by Geoffrey Bond and Martin Aitchison, that ran in Eagle from 1952 - 1961
• Working with David Hunt, part 2 - memories of working on 'Dan Dare' projects for the "New" Eagle editor in the 1980s
• Rivals of Eagle, takes a look at The Boy's Own Paper, the long-running boys' story paper, which lasted 88 years - from 1879 - 1967
• The first part of a series on Visual Memories of Eaglecon 80 - the only London comics convention ever held solely for Eagle enthusiasts
• PC49 and the Case of the Frightened Flower Girl - the conclusion of a new adaptation of one of Alan Stranks' radio plays
• Rivals of Jeff Arnold - the 9th in the series takes a look at 'Happy Daze', a comedy western strip drawn by Bill Holroyd for D.C. Thomson's Topper comic
• 'Dan Dare' Figures (from the 1950s to the present day) - begins by taking a look at those produced in the 1950s by the Crescent Toy Company and Eaglewall Plastics/Kentoys
• Ron by Ron - a lighthearted look at some of Ron Embleton's appearances in some of his own artwork
• L. Ashwell Wood, Cutaway Maestro - an addendum to the article in Eagle Times Vol 24 No 3, covering the Inside Information series, Odhams Books and the reprinting of Eagle cutaways in foreign publications
• Eagle Annuals 1971-1975 looks at the annuals that continued to appear after the original Eagle's demise as a comic
• 'Sammy' in colour - a strip from Eagle's companion paper, Swift, which was translated and reprinted in colour in the Dutch paper Arend - shown for the first time in English and colour
• A short biographical piece on David Motton, the 'Dan Dare' writer of the 1960s, who recently retired
• A report and photographs from the Eagle Society Annual Gathering at Midgham, Berkshire, 6th - 8th September, 2011

Membership of THE EAGLE SOCIETY is via Annual Subscription to EAGLE TIMES magazine, which is published four times annually. The Subscription rate for 2011 is held at the 2010 rate: UK £23, Overseas £34(in £s Sterling, please) Postal applications to: Keith Howard, 25A Station Road, Harrow, Middlesex HA1 2UAUnited Kingdom. If you wish to pay by Paypal (to the eagle-times hotmail address below) we request an additional payment of £1. Enquiries: eagle-times@hotmail.com

In the Spotlight: Ron Embleton

One of our most popular and talented artists, Ron Embleton - whose work is getting major promotion this month over at the Book Palace web site's Illustration Art Gallery - began drawing as a young boy, at 12 winning a national poster competition.

At 17, he earned himself a place in a commercial studio but soon left to work freelance, drawing comic strips for many of the small publishers who sprang up shortly after the war.

He was soon drawing for the major publishers. His most fondly remembered strips include 'Strongbow the Mighty' in Mickey Mouse Weekly, 'Wulf the Briton' in Express Weekly, 'Wrath of the Gods' in Boys’ World, 'Tales of the Trigan Empire' and 'Johnny Frog' in Eagle and 'Stingray' in TV Century 21.

Embleton also provided the illustrations for the title credits for the Captain Scarlet TV series, and dozens of paintings for prints and newspaper strips, including 'Snow White', 'Beauty and the Beast', 'Wicked Wanda' and 'The Magic Apples'.

A meticulous artist, his illustrations appeared in Look and Learn for many years, amongst them the historical series Roger’s Rangers.

- Check out the gallery of his work on sale at the Illustration Gallery

Bellamy, Beano and Buster comic art up for grabs in latest ComPal auction

The Autumn 2010 auction at British comics auction site Compalcomics has just opened, with 315 lots in the catalogue including a magnificent Beano front cover artwork drawn by Dudley Watkins and some rare Thunderbirds artwork from TV Century 21 by Frank Bellamy.

The signed Bellamy art - which appeared in Issue 220 of the classic 1960s comic and is expected to sell for over £700 - shows Thunderbird 2 landing near Project City where the Mole tunnelling vehicle is deployed to bore through the concrete walls with Virgil and Brains at the controls.

But the walls are live - and they’re being electrocuted...

The Beano cover - Issue 1406, cover dated 28th June 1969 - features longtime cover character Biffo highlighting the publication of that year's Beano Summer Special which is also enclosed with the lot.

ComPal say they have auctioned only three Beano cover artworks in the last twelve years and the art is expected to sell for over £200.

Another rarity on offer is at lot 10 where six of Mrs Hippo's Annuals reside, including the first from 1926. Starring the female versions of Tiger Tim and The Bruin Boys, Mrs Hippo, Tiger Tilly and the girls never made it in to comic form, just these annuals published between 1927 and 1935, which are in nice condition.

Tiger Tim is also represented with his own Bruin Boys' Bagatelle Game, a rare survivor from the 1920s and in full playable order at lot 42. Beano, Dandy and Magic early issues published by DC Thomson are in evidence from 1938 and 1939 - including The Dandy's first April Fool (Issue 18) and Christmas numbers.

The 1960s are represented by a near complete run of Hurricane in five lots (one containing a flyer for No 1 of The Big One), Commando, Battle Picture Library and various lots of Lady Penelope - including Issue 1.

In addition to the Bellamy art, there's also more comic work on offer including Look and Learn pages by Ron Embleton, Battlestar Galactica art from Look-In by Martin Asbury, a page of Frankie Stein by Ken Reid (and some of his great World Wide Weirdness pages from Whoopee), s1977 Bionic Woman art by John M. Burns for Look-In, Buster original front cover artworks from the 1980s by Reg Parlett, plus pages of The Broons and Oor Wullie by Dudley Watkins - the latter a regular staple of these fantastic ComPal auctions.


The auction's US section profiles The Batman #12 (1942), Fantastic Four #1 with CGC late 50s issues of Detective, Lois Lane and Batman and along with our usual runs of 1960s Marvel and DC titles, there's some high grade horror from the 1970s and four original artwork pages drawn and signed by Sal Buscema.

• Bids will be accepted until Tuesday 7th September at 8 PM UK time. To go directly to the main page for the catalogue, click here

Classic British strip Wulf The Briton to be collected

There's some great news for fans of cracking British comics artist Ron Embleton with the announcement of an impending collection of his superb comicstrip, Wulf the Briton, from Book Palace Books - fronted by an introduction from Dave Gibbons.

Longtime fan of the strip Peter Richardson is the brains behind this exciting project, a collection of strips first published in Express Weekly.

Set largely in Roman Britain, the comic ran for three years before Express (latterly TV Express) Weekly and is considered one of the UK's finest 'classic' comic strips.

Embleton took over the strip in 1959, and the workload he was shouldered with on Wulf was formidable. In comparison to Frank Hampson, who had a studio and assistants to help meet the weekly Dan Dare deadlines, Embleton just had himself to draw, letter and paint the feature.

Embleton was, however, unfazed by such considerations and within a few months he was also writing the strip and steering it in a much more historically credible direction as well as adding an extra page to the strip.

"As a result of my weekly blog postings [about Wulf] earlier in the year I had an approach from Geoff West CEO of Book Palace Books to enquire whether I would be interested in editing a collection of all Ron Embleton's Wulf the Briton stories," Peter reveals on the Cloud 109 blog. "As this was the comic above all others that totally captured my imagination as a child and as no one has ever attempted to do this before, I jumped at the chance.

"The intervening months have been a whirlwind of Wulf activity, involving meetings with the people at Express Newspapers, talking to people who were close to Ron, seeking out material which would help shed light on the creation of this epic strip and uncovering hitherto unseen by all but a few, original Wulf boards."

Carefully restored, the collection, which will be introduced by top artist Dave Gibbons, who describes the upcoming book as "a classic UK comic art must-have", will run to 300 plus pages of art, plus all the annuals, plus any other piece of Wulf artwork generated by Ron.

"It really is a gargantuan project," says Peter.

The collected Wulf the Briton will come in two different editions: a regular edition and a very limited leather bound and slip cased edition of just 100 copies. "The slipcased edition will feature some absolutely stonking pages shot from the original artwork, much of it only recently unearthed and not having done the rounds of the collector' s circuit and in absolutely pristine condition.

"The pages will be printed at the same size the comic was published so there has been very careful work done to ensure that there is no loss of Embleton's brushwork, we want owning this book to be as pleasurable as having an entire run of the original comics but with the added convenience of being all bound together in a durable format."

"Wulf the Briton was without doubt Ron Embleton's comic masterpiece," feels Peter, talking about the strip earlier in the year. "He took over the strip - a single page cover feature on Express Weekly in 1957. As a result of Embleton's artistic input it went from being an OK'ish main feature to at least, aesthetically speaking, a rival to Frank Hampson's Dan Dare."

It's clear that Peter and everyone involved have put a lot of hours into getting this project right (and more hours to come), delivering the material in the kind of format that fans of such British classic comics material crave. We eagerly await news on a publication date.

• David has posted some 'teaser images' of the project over on his Cloud 109 blog

First 2000AD Dredd cover to go under the hammer

Veteran comics artist Barrie Mitchell, perhaps best known for his work on Roy of the Rovers, is selling some of his art - including the 2000AD cover that was the first to feature Judge Dredd.

Featuring on Issue 5 of 2000AD, published in March 1977, the cover sees Dredd in action against a giant robot, Krong, inspired by the story in the same issue, which was drawn by Carlos Ezquerra.

Despite having the honour of being the first Judge Dredd cover artist, Barrie's 2000AD career is quite scant in comparison with the huge amount of work he has done for a slew of publishers down the years. His credits include work for girls titles such as Bunty, Mandy and Diana, as well as action titles like Look-In, Pow and Wham, and various Marvel UK titles. He was the final artist on the Roy of the Rovers comic, drawing the strip from October 1992 until its cancelalion in March 1993, returning the character in 1997. He also worked on the The Mirror's Scorer strip in 1989-1990. (More info here on this downthtetubes comic artists page)

The cover will be auctioned by Island Auctions at Cowes Masonic Lodge on the Isle of Wight on 5th August 2010, as part of a larger sale of special auction of Fine Art & Maritime Collectables during Cowes Week.

In addition to this 2000AD art, Barrie told downthetubes he is selling some other pieces of art, some by other artists, in the auction. These include some pages of his own Doctor Who strip for Doctor Who Magazine, featuring Third Doctor Jon Pertwee, two pages of his Roy of the Rovers work, a signed page of the Penthouse strip Wicked Wanda by Ron Embleton, bought some years ago at a Society of Strip Illustrators event, two examples of John M. Burns Seekers and a page of Dan Dare from the Eagle, drawn by Keith Watson in the late 1960s. (Barrie wasn't able to tell us which story this art was from).

• Island Auctions web site: www.shanklinauctionrooms.co.uk or telephone 0198386

• Barrie Mitchell's 2000AD Credits

New Eagle Times Celebrates 60 Years of Eagle

The latest issue of Eagle Times, Volume 23 Number 2, Summer 2010, is on sale now from the Eagle Society, with highlights that include a photo-illustrated report on the Society's April 2010 gathering 'to celebrate Eagle's 60th Anniversary in Southport and a look at the ways in which alien languages were treated in the Eagle's 'Dan Dare' saga.

Also included are features on Space Captain Jim Stalwart by downthetubes contributor Jeremy Briggs - story synopses and foreign reprints, including in Spain's Futuro, of this 'forgotten' strip from 1954 drawn by Dan Dare artist Bruce Cornwell for Junior Mirror, a look at some of artist Ron Embleton's lesser known work, a review of some of the 'Authentic Plastic Assembly Kits' made by Eagle/Wall Plastics Ltd in the 1950s, plus recollections of the origins and activities of the Astral Group 'Dan Dare' Club in the 1970s.

The cover illustration for Eagle Times shows the celebratory Birthday Cake which was cut and consumed by members of the Eagle Society at the Southport event on 14th April 2010 - the 60th Anniversary of Eagle's first publication.

• Membership of The Eagle Society is via Annual Subscription to Eagle Times magazine, which is published four times annually. The Subscription rate for 2010 is UK, £23; Overseas £34 (in £s Sterling, please). Please apply by snail mail to: Keith Howard, 25A Station Road, Harrow, Middlesex HA1 2UA United Kingdom. Enquiries: eagle-times@hotmail.com

• Full contents list on the Eagle Times blog

First Beano Book, Marvelman Cover Art up for auction

Over 200 items of British comics and art form the Summer 2010 auction at UK auction house Compalcomics, including a rare Beano book discovered in a charity shop and cover art for an early issue of Marvelman by creator Mick Anglo.

Beano Book No 1 was found in a pile of annuals at the back of a charity shop in St Andrew's, Scotland and luckily, the manageress, Tammy, and her volunteer, Matthew, realised it was something special and sent it to Compalcomics to be auctioned on behalf of Cancer Research UK. The book is in robust, bright condition and estimated at £1500-2000.

But that's not the only rarity in the catalogue which includes art by Ken Reid, Dudley Watkins, Martin Asbury and John M. Burns and some rare Dan Dare toys.

An 1890 bound volume of Comic Cuts 1-26 is available, the scarce first issue with creamy fresh pages. Cheerio 1-49 is at lot 4 and bound with Kinema 1-36 which it became in April 1920, and there's a bunch of low grade Film Funs (including No 1) at lot 10, all at No Reserve.

Tiger Tim was enormously popular in the 1920s and lot 21 includes his first six annuals with a Painting Book and the rare Bruin Boys wooden train set, the characters all with coupling and wheels (apart from Porky Pig, whose obvious weight put paid to a set).

Football is very much on many peoples' minds this Summer and The Football Post, which was only printed in Nottingham, concentrated on their great local teams, Forest and County. There are 146 clean, flat issues from 1935-39 at lot 30. Sports paper Topical Times gave away some superb free gifts and their 1933 selection of football stars coloured cards and supplements are highly collectable. You could've used a pair of Stanley Matthews' shorts to make a tent. Have a look at lot 32.

Hotspur complete years are well to the fore with unusually high grades for 1934 and '35 and the title is well represented right through the war years along with Wizard's two rare Holiday Books, one with a cover no-one in their right minds would surely ever commission today. The Beano and Dandy's lesser sibling, Magic Comic, only ran for 80 issues to 1941 and a particularly good selection including Nos 2, 3 and 4 awaits your attention. The Beano also competes in this rarified atmosphere.

Talking of atmosphere, Superman was first reprinted in the UK with The Triumph in 1939 and most of these issues should fly at lot 63. Also flying will be Dan Dare's Spaceship and Rocket Builder construction sets (Mum, whaty'do you do with my spanner?)

Wrapping off this huge auction, there's a fine selection of artwork on offer including Desperate Dan, Oor Wullie and The Broons by Dudley Watkins, Frankie Stein and Faceache by Ken Reid and Reg Parlett, a 1957 Mick Anglo Marvelman cover, two pages of John M. Burns Bionic Woman from Look-In, along with two pages of Battlestar Galactica from the same comic by Martin Asbury, plus rarely-offered with Ron Embleton art from his satirical Penthouse strip Oh! Wicked Wanda - and some great Rupert the Bear work, too.

The US section profiles The Batman #5 and #11, first issues of Amazing Spider-Man, Avengers, X-Men and Giant-Size X-Men #1; and there's also a high grade Brave And Bold #34 - the first Hawkman adventure.

• Bids will be accepted until Tuesday 1 June at 8 PM UK time. To go directly to the main page for the catalogue, click here: www.compalcomics.com/catalogue

• Compalcomics holds four auctions a year. As a member of this list you will receive a message shortly before auctions open and close. Results of most auctions are posted online two weeks after the closing date.

Eagle Times Celebrates 60 Years

The latest issue of Eagle Times (Volume 23 No 1) is now available from the Eagle Society and, naturally enough, is an issue dedicated to the impending 60th anniversary of The Eagle on 14th April.

The issue includes an examination of the career of Sergeant Bruce, whose single-episode exploits ran for nearly four years in the 1960s Eagle, firstly as 'Sergeant Bruce, C.I.D.' and then in 'Can You Catch a Crook?'; a tribute to Geoffrey Bond (1920-2009), best known as the writer of 'Luck of the Legion' and who wrote the 'Justin Tyme' strip for Eagle Times; reminiscences of some of Ron Embleton's 'discarded' artwork; and a look at the life and career of Paul Trevillion, better known for his sports illustrations and his work on 'Roy of the Rovers' for Tiger, who drew some of the 'Can You Catch a Crook?' and 'U.F.O. Agent' strips in the 1960s Eagle.

Of particular interest to downthetubes fans, will be our very own Jeremy Briggs' feature on Jim Stalwart, Dan Dare artist Bruce Cornwell's 'forgotten' Space Captain, whose exploits graced the pages of the Junior Mirror in 1954.

Also featured is a revisit to the Eagle connections with Ladybird Books, including some examples of the work of Roy Worvill (writer) and covers by the artists Robert Ayton, Frank Hampson, Frank Humphris and Martin Aitchison, including a Humphris 'Ladybird' Rough, showing the sketch which led to one of the full-page illustrations in the Ladybird book.

• Membership of the Eagle Society entitles you to copies of Eagle Times, which is published four times annually. The Subscription rate for 2010 is: UK £23, Overseas £34 (in £s Sterling, please). Apply by snail mail to: Keith Howard, 25A Station Road, Harrow, Middlesex HA1 2UA United Kingdom. Enquiries: eagle-times@hotmail.com

Century 21 Collection News

Details of the strips in Century 21 Volume 4 - the latest in a great series of books from Reynolds & Hearn featuring some of the best strips from the Gerry Anderson-inspired weekly comic TV Century 21 and other comics - have just been released.

FIREBALL XL5: Timeslip - Art by Mike Noble
FIREBALL XL5: The Sword of Damacles - Art by Mike Noble
STINGRAY: The Flying Fish - Art by Ron Embleton
THUNDERBIRDS: Destination Sun - Art by Frank Bellamy and Don Harley

THUNDERBIRDS: The Quake Maker - Art by Frank Bellamy
ZERO X: The Ghosts of Saturn - Art by Mike Noble
CAPTAIN SCARLET: Unity - Art by Ron Embleton
CAPTAIN SCARLET: Satellite 4 - Art by Ron Embleton
UFO: The Movies - Art by Martin Asbury

The book is available in paperback (ISBN 978 1 904674 15 3) from all good bookshops but there's also a limited edition hardback (ISBN 978 1 904674 14 6) on offer only from the publisher's web site (www.rhbooks.com), signed by Thunderbirds creator Gerry Anderson.


Reynolds & Hearn have also announced that their Century 21 Annual 2011 - collecting stories from the classic TV Century 21 annuals from the 1960s - will now go ahead next year after all. Expect to see the book released in August. The released dummy cover, left comprises images from several of the original annual covers.

Ron Embleton's Wulf the Briton

Blimey! It's Another Blog About Comics: The blog site cloud-109.blogspot.com is showcasing an impressive array of quality artwork including a serializing of Ron Embleton's Wulf the Briton from Express Weekly in 1959.

"This was simply one of the best adventure strips to have appeared in British comics and the hi-res scans have been cleaned up and presented large size for study," notes Lew Stringer. "Artist Peter Richardson provides a commentary alongside the strips."

According to Peter, Wulf the Briton is regarded as Ron Embleton's comic masterpiece. He took over the strip which was a single page cover feature on Express Weekly in 1957, making it his own and certainly putting it on a par with Dan Dare, which was running in Eagle.

Embleton, who went on to draw strips for TV Century 21 and many other titles, was paid £200 a week for drawing, painting, and lettering the strip, at a time when the average weekly wage in the UK was £12.

• You can begin reading the first episodes here: subsequent chapters can be found using this search.

Book and Magazine Collector 318

The latest issue of Book and Magazine Collector is now available and features the first part of a series of articles entitled Forgotten British Comics on the titles of the so called Pirate Publishers, those companies that produced often one-off comics titles during the paper rationing on the late 1940s and the comics boom of the early 1950s.

Comics historian David Ashford takes a break from the magazine's long running Great British Comics Artists series to look at the now almost forgotten comics that some of those artists began their careers in. The first part of the series looks at Scion comics who's output included titles such as Big Pirate, Gunflash and All-Sorts Comic

The interest these comics generate for the modern comics reader most often is for the artists they include and Scion titles had art by Ron Turner, Ron Embleton (who simply signed himself as Ron) and Joe Colqhoun amongst others. The interest for the magazine collectors in these comics is the prices that these rare titles go for with the article covering 10 Scion comics ranging in price from £8 to £15 each.

Book and Magazine Collector issue 318 is available for £3.50 from WH Smiths and Easons, or from the B&MC website.

Other Pirate Publisher comic strips were reprinted in Ugly Duckling Press' Great British Fantasy Comic Book Heroes which was reviewed here.

In Review: Great British Fantasy Comic Book Heroes

During the Second World War, with imported resources costing ships and lives, paper was one of the many things that came under the ration. In Britain comics were not a wartime priority and publishers had to cancel some titles while reducing the page count of the survivors. Paper rationing continued after the war throughout the 1940s and while the big publishers slowly built up the size and regularity of their remaining titles, some entrepreneurs saw a gap in the market for more comics printed on any paper that they could get their hands on. These became what were known as the Pirate Publishers, small time companies that put out often one-off comics with lurid titles such as Dynamic Thrills, Oh Boy Comic or Electroman.

Today these comics are incredibly rare and in this book Phil Clarke and Mike Higgs of Ugly Duckling Press have pulled together a wide selection of these 1940s and 1950s titles into one A4 size 464 page hardback under the title of Great British Fantasy Comic Book Heroes. The majority of the stories reprinted in this title feature superheros with some science fiction heroes added in a special “Sci-Fi Thrills” section towards the end. In amongst forgotten stories of TNT Tom, Ray Spede, Superstooge and Ned Nomad are some rather more familiar characters such as Space Ace, Swift Morgan and Marvelman and it is the more familiar characters and those illustrated by familiar names that are the draw in this book.

After a detailed ten page introductory article on the history of the titles and the characters that are reprinted in the book, it is the three Marvelman, Young Marvelman and Marvelman Family strips that are perhaps the ones that will raise the most curiosity today. Are they any good? "Holy Macaroni!", of course not - at least not to our adult eyes more used to reading Alan Moore or Neil Gaiman Marvelman stories illustrated by the likes of Alan Davis and Garry Leach. These old stories are childish and illogical but it has to be remembered that they were successful enough in their day for the character to be revamped for Warrior.

Indeed many of the stories reprinted are by artists that today would only be classed as producing bad fan art. It is too tempting to choose the worst art in the book with perhaps Hello Phantom Maid just pipping some others to the post.

However there are also early stories by some well known and respected names. Ron Turner is represented by three stories. Captain Sciento and Space Ace show typically stylish Turner art, with the Space Ace story being perhaps the best in the book, and a very early story entitled The Caverns Of Doom. Early Ron Embleton art is present in The Planet Of Doom and Captain Atom while Denis McLoughlin's detailed art is represented by Swift Morgan and The Beast From Outer Space.

However the one artist from that period and type of comic that deserves more attention is Norman Light. While his art style can be nicely summed up as "naive" it is also detailed and his spacecraft and other designs in Galactic Patrol have an enjoyable period feel to them. It would be good to see reprints of more stories written and illustrated by Light.

So while the contents may be hit and miss they do represent the Pirate Publisher comics of the time. The various stories have been digitally enhanced for the book and printed larger than the original comics and the reproduction is impressive. Of course there has to be a drawback and with this book it is the cost - £75 including UK postage. Collectors may consider buying such titles as Absolute V For Vendetta or the Captain Britain Omnibus for similar prices, titles that they will often already know, but for most this book will be a step in the dark.

So is it worth it? For those with a passing interest then probably not but for the collector it will be an impressive addition to their reference collection covering a barely known piece of British comics history and with only 100 copies of the book being printed it will remain almost as rare as the comics it reprints.

Great British Fantasy Comic Book Heroes is available for £75 from Blase Books, Hazelwood, Birchfield Road, Redditch, B97 6PU.

More details on ordering are available by e-mailing - blasebooksATaol.com.

New Century 21 Cover Exposed

Publishers Reynolds & Hearn have just given us a 'first look' at the cover of their third collection of comics from 1960s comic TV Century 21.

Titled Escape from Aquatraz, it features the submarine Stingray, as realized by the late, great Ron Embleton.

This volume will hopefully emulate the success of the company's first two volumes, which feature a range of superb strips from the classic British comics TV Century 21 and Lady Penelope.

Also just released by R&H is the UFO Technical Manual, which, if you buy it from their web site, comes with a free Skydiver poster.

In the early 1980s, Earth was engaged in a deadly war against hostile extra-terrestrial aliens from a dying world. Unbeknown to the general population, our only line of defence in that war was a secret paramilitary organisation with a manned lunar outpost and headquarters hidden beneath a British film studio. This organisation maintained a fleet of advanced vehicles and spacecraft in order to combat the alien menace - a secret army of sophisticated hardware on constant patrol on land, in the sky, under the sea and far out in the depths of space.

Now, 30 years on, details of that secret war are finally emerging with the publication of the previously top secret documents of SHADO - the Supreme Headquarters Alien Defence Organisation. Within these pages, spectacular computer-generated illustrations and plan views of the many SHADO vehicles reveal the organisation's incredible machinery and weaponry, together with verified accounts of the role played by that hardware in the defence of the Earth.

• S.I.D. - Space Intruder Detector advance warning satellite maintaining scan for UFOs
• Skydiver - nuclear-powered submarine on patrol beneath the world's oceans
• Sky One - supersonic strike aircraft ready for action in Earth's atmosphere
• Mobiles - amphibious ground vehicles with overwhelming firepower
• Space Interceptors - first line defence spacecraft based on the Moon

Gerry Anderson's UFO Technical Manual celebrates the 40th anniversary of the ground-breaking live-action adventure series UFO, which originally captured the imaginations of television viewers in the early 1970s and has gone on to become one of British TV's best-loved and most highly-regarded science fiction programmes.

• Buy Century 21: Classic Comic Strips from the Worlds of Gerry Anderson Volume 1 from Amazon.co.uk

• Buy Century 21: Classic Comic Strips from the Worlds of Gerry Andserson Volume 2 from amazon.co.uk

• Buy Gerry Anderson's UFO: The Technical Manual from amazon.co.uk - But don't forget, the Skydiver poster is only offered via the Reynolds & Hearn web site

Dandy Issue 1, Amazing Fantasy #15 Up For Sale

There's still time to bid on items - including a rare copy of the first ever Dandy - from British online auction site Comic Book Auction's Summer Catalogue.

Included in the British section of the catalogue is an extremely rare first issue of DC Thomson's humour title, Dandy. Published in 1937, this first edition introduced Korky the Cat, Desperate Dan, Keyhole Kate and their chums and is described as "a well worn copy with 3 inch spine tear and multiple edge tears although only minor loss." Only 20 copies of this first issue are known to exist, so expect some high bids, well above the £500-£600 reserve.

Also included this time are some also rare wartime Beanos, all with bright fresh covers and white/off white pages. Since a lot of paper was recycled for the war effort, copies of these issues are probably even rarer than some of the pre-war titles such as Champion, Butterfly, Hotspur and Schoolgirls' Own, which are also being offered.

Original Desperate Dan art by Dudley Watkins - a staple of most these regular auctions - is also offered, including work published in a 1942 issue of the Dandy. (Artist Dan paints the town with bristles from his beard. The pictures are so realistic the mayor gets Dan to camouflage all the tanks and planes for battle!).

Of interest to many downthetubes readers though will be a page of Ron Embleton art featuring Wulf the Briton from Express Weekly 155 (published in 1957), in which Viking Wulf proves himself to the warrior tribesmen in his quest to solve the riddle of the Sphinx. Also beng offered is original Dan Dare art from the Eagle by Desmond Walduck (featuring both Dan and the Mekon), Supercar and Joe 90 art, a Dan Dare space gun, bound copies of Eagle and Lion, issues of TV Century 21 - including several rare and much sought after Specials - Valiant, Tiger and more.

For US comics fans, the chance to own the first appearance of Spider-Man in Amazing Fantasy #15 is sure to stir plenty of interest, even if the issue comes stickered with a British 9d tag. A first issue of Amazing Spider-Man is also in the auction, along with plenty of ther goodies including Fantastic Four #1, X-Men #1, Millie the Model, Batman #20 from 1944 - the first Batmobile cover - and lots of other goodies.

• Bids on items, which include comics and original art, will be accepted until Tuesday 9 June at 8 PM UK time (GMT).

Catalogue Links:

• British comics, annuals and artwork
• US Golden Age comics
• US Silver Age Marvel comics
• US Silver Age DC comics
• US 1970's & 1980's comics

Tube Surfing: 11 April 2009

• ComX publisher Eddie Deighton has just been interviewed for a new article, published here on comicon, giving a little insight into the company and his thoughts on the industry, offering advice for small publishers and comments on viral marketing. He also talks about the 90-page graphic novel Path, which sailed under most people's radar.
The terrific Cla$$war and John Higgins' Razorjack - we hope to post reviews of both next week - are available this month as hardcover and softcover collected editions, respectively.
Somewhat chastened, perhaps by the problems that beset ComX in the past - most beyond the company's control, not least the theft of their equipment, Eddie says that, "this time ‘round, we’re not going to rush projects just to maintain a presence in the public eye.
"From both a financial and timing perspective, we need to make sure all aspects of the publishing model are working efficiently before we solicit them for release," he continues. "We are still self-publishing, indie-publishing, whatever people want to call us, so we still have to count the pennies back at base.
"..Our publishing model, at least for the time being, is going to focus on graphic novel format, collected editions, complete story-arcs, etc. That was one of the big lessons we learned from our last foray into the comics industry. Read the ful interview here on comicon
Watch out also for another interview with Eddie in an upcoming issue of Judge Dredd: The Megazine.

• Talking of interviews, Insomnia Publications publisher Crawford Coutts has been talking to the Edinburgh Evening News, commenting on the recently announced news that the publisher is getting support from Business Gateway as part of Scottish Enterprise's Growth Pipeline. ""We see enormous potential in the USA and Canada," he told the paper. "...We are now working further with Business Gateway to look at how we expand further in the industry and link with other industries such as TV, film and merchandising."

• (via Forbidden Planet International): Will The DFC return? The good news is, publisher David Fickling say it will, next year as an independent title. "We are going to come back next year independently,” publisher David Fickling told the Federation of Children’s Book Groups in Sussex, journalist Jayne Howarth reports. He also revealed that when Philip Pullman, who wrote The Adventures of John Blake for the comic, heard of the closure he told David that the “story must continue.
“Don’t let the closure of your comic stop your great enterprise,” he said.
Steve Holland also notes a news item published in The Bookseller (5 April) noting that the growth in sales of graphic novels could see the title relaunched reportng David was exploring different options for the comic's future. "It's a special creation that should come back and needs to come back in some way," he said. Steve offers some comment on the graphic novel model.

• Robert Downey Jr. is officially back in the superhero business. Production started Wednesday on Iron Man 2, the sequel to his 2008 blockbuster about the Marvel Comics character. Meanwhile, PA News reports Scottish actor Alan Cumming says he would be interested in returning to the X-Men franchise. "Nobody's said anything about it, but it might be quite fun to go back," he commented. "I was supposed to do it again and they didn't pick up my option for a third one. It was sort of 'superhero interruptus'."

• Former Punch cartoonist Noel Ford has been talking to the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation website Bloghorn about how he became an artist. "I didn’t have much choice," Noel, who is editorial cartoonist for half a dozen national UK publications andproduces work for calendars, greeting card and book illustration (including the Grumpy Old Men series of books). "Brainwashed by having Film Fun and Radio Fun read to me from the age of two, bombarded with my Uncle’s and Auntie’s huge backlog of Beanos and Dandys, I drew my first cartoon around the age of five (Child to mother, “Why are bananas nice?” Mother to child, “Because you like them.”) Okay, okay, I was only five, remember." He's Bloghorn's Artist of the Month, which has also been promoting the new edition of Foghorn Magazine.

• Steve Holland reports he is hard at work on The Art of Ron Embleton book, reprinting some of Ron's finest work from the pages of Look and Learn. "With about 600 pages to choose from, it's going to be a cracking book," he enthuses, posting some examples of Ron's wor on Bear Alley.

• Over on the Birmingham Mails' Speech Balloons column, Paul Birch plugs the return of revamped (sorry) and reinvigorated fanzine From the Tomb. The story is a .jpg, so you'll just have to exercise your fingers and click the link!

• If you're a fan of the Robin Hood legend, you may get a kick from these designs for an animated Robin Hood movie by Jon Haward. "In 2004 a writer friend of mine asked me if I would be interested in drawing designs for a Robin Hood animated movie... sadly like a lot of things, they didn't get the funding."

• Talking of design work, there's a smashing post on long-time 2000AD contributor D'Isreaeli's blog on how a selection of Dredd artists have portayed the architecture of Mega-City One over the years.

Happy Easter!