ARCHIVED NEWS - SEPTEMBER 2006
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DANGER MOUSE!
25/9/06: Marking his 25th anniversary, Cosgrove Hall's Danger
Mouse is
celebrating in style this month with the release of a special boxed set
of his adventures from Fremantle Home Entertainment - a staggering of 161
episodes featuring the voices of David Jason as suave DangerMouse and Terry
Scott as the lily-livered Penfold.
DangerMouse made his initial appearance on 28 September
1981, the first of 161 great episodes. Throughout his adventures the
super spy was supported by his loveable bumbling assistant Penfold,
as they battle to save the world from the clutches of the evil Baron
Greenback.
Created by the award-winning animation
house of Cosgrove Hall, Danger Mouse was
the first UK cartoon to make it big on American TV it also proved a huge
global hit being shown in over 70 countries. At one stage DangerMouse
even out-performed a Superman movie premiere on UK TV attracting 21.59
million viewers compared to a mere 16.76 million for the iconic superhero!
Danger Mouse also
enjoyed a successful run in the jumior TV Times title Look-In,
as well as appearing as a back up strip in Marvel Comics Count
Duckula title in the US.
(Cosgrove's Danger Mouse should not be confused
with the less famous 1960s character from Odhams Smash comic inspired by
Danger Man - more
on him on Toonhound).
The 12-disc 25th Aniversary collection, retailing at around £49.99.
includes rarely-seen behind the scenes footage from the Thames Television
archives, including an exclusive look at David Jason and Terry Scott
in action and how to draw DM, a brand new interview with Mark Hall and
several exciting new games!
Web Links
•
Buy the 25th Anniversary DangerMouse box set from Amazon.co.uk: Click Here
INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY COMICS
SPECIAL
25/9/06, with thanks to Tim Webber): As media
partner for the Comica festival and to preview some of
the guests and events, The Independent is publishing
a special comics-themed edition of their Sunday
Review on 1 October 2006, edited
by Tim Lewis with assistance from Comica director Paul
Gravett.
As well as a cover-featured
interview with Marjane Satrapi, a profile feature on
Alan Moore, Melinda Gebbie and Lost Girls, an interview
with Kevin Smith, and a preview of Guy Delisle's Pyonyang,
almost all of the magazine's other regular departments
will be comics-themed: Nick Abadzis illustrates the Food
feature; Barnaby Richards does Gardening: Simone Lia
does the Restaurant review; Neal Fox covers London Fashion Week;
Paul Gravett provides the week's world map on comics;
and Tom Gauld and Simone Lia are the guests in the How
We Met column.
If that wasn't enough, the issue also
launches the Sunday Review's ongoing weekly serialisation
of the complete comic entitled Building
Stories by Chris
Ware. While this appeared last year in the New
York Times Magazine, this version will be unedited and uncensored,
as Ware intended it.
MY HERO NO MORE
25/9/06: downthetubes is
sorry to report that the BBC's superhero spoof My
Hero is no more.
"The BBC have said - very graciously I have say - no more My
Heros thank you," says series creator Paul
Mendelson says, in an email thanking dtb for
its coverage of the show. "Thank you so much for your unwavering support
over the years. Read More...
STRINGER
SPOOFS WHO
25/9/06: Cartoonist Lew Stringer has created a new villain spoofing
Doctor Who for an upcoming strip for Fleetway's TOXIC.
One of Team Toxic's
most relentless enemies, the rear-ended rapscallion of rudery Butt-Face
returns to wreak his revenge on the Team in TOXIC #80 (on sale 8 November).
"This
time Butt-Face has created a cyborg in his own image... the Cy-Bum-Man!"
Lew reveals. "The battle between Team Toxic and their new metal nemesis
explodes in a special double-length four page story as the Team confront
this seemingly unbeatable menace."
Who said satire was dead?
In other Lew Stringer-related news, US publisher Active Images have just
unleashed their own Brickman
site which features
a daily dose of Brick-mania. Designed by John Roshell,
the site uploads a different page from the book Brickman
Begins every day.
"This way new readers can preview the book before they
buy," says Lew, "and existing readers can laze in front
of their monitor and re-read it, happily bathing their
eyes in low-level radiation confident that their "hard
copy" of the book remains in mint condition.
Web Links
• Lew Stringer's Official web site: lewcomix.tripod.com
• TOXIC web site: www.toxicmag.co.uk
EAGLE
WRITER DIES
23/9/06 (with thanks to Ian Wheeler and Steve Winders): We're sorry to report
that Peter Ling, co-creator of the long-running soap Crossroads and who wrote
for
The Avengers, Doctor Who,
and the original Eagle died recently. He was
80.
Ling, whose credits also include co-creating the BBC soap Compact with
Hazel Adair and Dixon of Dock Green, was a hugely
succesful author who had his first novel published aged 18 and began writing
for radio while in a sanatorium while being treated for tuberculosis after
the Second World War. He sent material to various comedians -- including
Jon Pertwee -- for consideration and wrote radio dramas for the BBC's Saturday
Night Theatre
He wrote the schoolboy story 3Js for Eagle, which ran for several years and earned
the praise of Eagle founder Marcus Morris for his work.
He met with
Hazel Adair and co-created Compact for the BBC
and the pair then went on to co-create Crossroads,
a series which featured one of the first regular paraplegic characters in
a soap and the first-ever regular black character, a mechanic called Joe MacDonald,
played by Carl Andrews
Ling wrote
just one Doctor Who transmitted story, The
Mind Robber, which he novelised in 1986.
Steve Winders recalls Peter Ling telling fans at an Eagle Society Weekend that he was commisioned to submit a treatment for another Doctor
Who story during the Peter Davison era. This story would have brought a romantic element for Davison's younger Doctor, but producer John Nathan Turner decided not to go with it. Look at Doctor
Who now...
Ling came up with the idea for his soap opera Compact while waiting to see the editor in the reception area of a Woman's magazine. All the activity going on around him set his creative processes in motion and soon afterwards he was presenting his ideas for a serial set around such a magazine to the BBC. Compact only ran for around three years, but towards the end BBC bosses, who wanted it to compete with Coronation
Street, set it a high audience target which it only narrowly missed. A few more thousand viewers and it could have been running to this day.
During his varied writing career he also penned songs, including one for Matt
Monro, Why Not Now, which reached the charts
in 1961. In the 1990s Ling wrote for radio, penning delights such as the acclaimed The
Genius of Gideon Fell, centring on an archetypal English eccentric
created by American-born John Dickson Carr, portrayed by Donald Sinden. He
also adapted the Sherlock Holmes story The Golden Pince-Nez and
an Arnold Bennett novel, Imperial
Palace,
for the medium.
• Peter Ling (27 May 1926 - 14 September 2006) is survived by four children.
Web Links
• Peter
Ling on Crossroads - Crossroads Appreciation Society web site interview
•
The Times obituary: Click
Here (registration may be required)
PANINI
LAUNCHES "YOUNG SPIDEY" TITLE
23/9/06: Panini recently launched a new pre-school
magazine centred on Marvel super hero Spider-Man.
Spider-Man & Friends is
the latest magazine under the Marvel banner from Panini and the company
says it offers something new and unique for young super hero fans.
Aimed at boys and girls aged 3-5 years old, Spider-Man & Friends features
many well-known super heroes including Spider-Man, Spider-Girl, Captain
America, Thor and Doctor Octopus, and are used to entertain and educate
in a fun and imaginative way.
"Hopefully we can give boys (and girls!) a magazine that doesn’t
try to be too worthy – but more of a ‘my first comic’,
packed with loads of fun," editor Simon Frith told downthetubes.
"We decided that Spider-Man & Friends would
have to stay clear of crime fighting, or any kind of fighting for that
matter. Instead, Spidey’s traditional villains are actually
his friends... It’s just that some of them are a little mischievous!"
Issue 5, for example features Spider-Man and Spider-Girl investigating
the disappearance of water from a swimming pool, only to find Doctor
Octopus has come up with a novel way of washing his dog...
The first issue was published 14 September,
and can be found in all good UK and Eire newsagents, and supermarkets.
It includes a four-page story written by Rik Hoskin and drawn by Nigel
Dobbyn, pull out reward chart, and an eight-page activity section comprising
of colouring, counting and spelling activities on crayon-friendly paper.
Priced at £1.75 and cover-mounted with a fabulous Spider-Man mask for
instant role play appeal, the first issue also includes a box of 40
stickers that compliments the reward chart. Spider-Man & Friends will
be published every 4 weeks following the launch, with an exciting free gift on
every issue.
• Click here for more information on the latest issue of Spider-Man and
Friends
SHE-HULK SNEAK PEEK!
22/9/06: Top comics artist John Royle very
kindly sent us this stunning Spider-Man cover for Panini
UK featuring She-Hulk, Spidey and the Rhino. John tells us the upcoming
story by Ferg Handley also guest stars Doctor Strange, Spiderwoman
and Daredevil. Inks and colour provided by Dylan Teague.
LEAGUE OF GENTLEMEN RETURN WITH BLACK DOSSIER
20/9/06: Writer Alan Moore and artist Kevin O'Neill return to the world of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen this October in The
Black Dossier -- a hardcover graphic novel from DC/Wildstorm.
England in the mid-1950s is not the same as it was. The powers that be
have instituted some changes. The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen have
been disbanded and disavowed, and the country is under the control of an
iron-fisted regime. Now, after many years, the still youthful Mina Murray
and a rejuvenated Allan Quatermain return in search of some answers --
answers that can only be found in a book buried deep in the vaults of their
old headquarters -- a book that holds the key to the hidden history of
the League throughout the ages: The Black Dossier. As Allan and Mina delve
into the details of their precursors, some dating back centuries, they
must elude their dangerous pursuers who are hellbent on retrieving the
lost manuscript... and ending the League once and for all.
The Black Dossier is described an elaborately designed, cutting-edge volume that
includes a "Tijuana Bible" insert and a 3-D section complete with custom glasses, as well
as additional text pieces, maps, and a stunning cutaway double-page spread of
Captain Nemo's Nautilus submarine by Kevin O'Neill.
• Buy it from Amazon.com: Click
Here (Hardcover)
• Buy it from Amazon.co.uk: Click
Here (Harcover)
FREAK BROTHERS PILOT ONLINE
20/9/06: The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers film pilot
is online at last, via YouTube and
other sites: the film is being made in Bristol. If you're not familiar
with the Furry Freak Brothers this is probably meaningless to you, but
it's quite fun regardless!
Web Link: www.youtube.com/watch?v=YINWUjFQRDU
BEANO, EAGLE AND TV21 HIGHLIGHTS OF AUCTION
The Autumn 2006 auction at Compalcomics
(www.compalcomics.com) closes soon. One of four auctions held annually,
this one features 273 lots in our Autumn catalogue including what the company
describes as two particularly "exceptional" items;
a Beano Comic No 1 and a Dandy Monster Comic No 1.
The Beano is one of the
three highest graded copies to be offered at auction and the Dandy book,
kept in a brown paper wrapper for most of its life, is Very Fine Plus, by
far and away the highest graded example ever seen for sale.
The company's offerings
of bound volume collections continues with further choice UK titles on
offer, including John Bull, Comic Life, Jungle Jinks, Sexton Blake and Tiger
Tim’s
Tales 1-24 and The Wonder. On the artwork front, this auction features
a wonderful piece of Dudley Watkins artwork starring those loveable mischief-makers,
Lord Snooty And His Pals.
There's also is a near complete run of Eagle for
sale and a very high grade collection of TV Century 21 as well.
Bids will
be accepted until Tuesday 5 September at 8 PM UK time.
INVASION RECALLED
3/9/06: Rebellion has issued a recall for their recently-released
collection Slaine: Books of Invasions 2 due
to a printing error. If you have already purchased a copy of this
title please return it to the place of purchase for a refund or
order for a replacement copy.
The
title is going back to press and new copies will be dispatched to stores
as soon as they are available.
A CONFIDENT DEAL WITH THE DEVIL!
The Eagle Award winning Silver Bullet ComicBooks website has just
reviewed the latest edition of Monkeys with Machineguns (www.monkeyswithmachineguns.com),
rating the book as "Confident" and
with some very kind words to say about UK based writer/artist team Chris
Lynch and Stu.Art.
Read the review:
www.silverbulletcomicbooks.com/smallpress/115684441215039.htm
