And now for something a little different
Well, here's a bit of a change of pace. Reading dr_hermes posts of non-superhero stuff reminds me of the rich heritage of UK comics, and it's time to share the love.
Okay, a little background history; UK comics have a very different resonance than their American, and even their mainland European cousins. The focus is on younger kids, say, 15 and under, with many titles aiming for a lot younger than that.
Issues were made up of many strips, sometimes 9 or 10 in the same issue in a variety of formats; Some were single pages, some double pages, some serialised, some done-in-one, some black and white, some colour.
The topics cover a MUCH wider than their US equivalents and rather than being "themed" along the lines of "Young Romance", or "War Stories", they would mix and match comedy, horror, war, sport ("Roy of the Rovers" was an unbeliavably massive success) and science-fiction.
The names were generic but filled with character; "The Beano" (Home of anarchic "The Bash Street Kids", and OUR version of "Dennis the Menace" who, along with his dog Gnasher, lived up to his a name a whole lot more than his irritatingly sweet American namesake), "The Dandy" (Home of "Desperate Dan" and "Lord Snooty"), "Whizzer and Chips" (Were you a Whiz-Kid or a Chip-ite?), "Valiant" (Home of "Steel Claw", "Adam Eterno", Kelly's Eye" and others you can see here) and many other titles.
And that's not even going near those titles like "The Eagle", or "TV21" which are worthy of posts of their own sometime.
The late Joe Colquhoun (1926-1987) was a classic example of the sort of chap they got in to do the art, he could literally turn his hand to anything, and often did. there's an great interview with him here, where outlines some of the problems with the serial format, and he did it metatextually too! :) So without further ado, on with the show!
This is taken from my old copy of "The Valiant Book of Mystery and Magic" a 144 page hardback annual (as most UK comic annuals are) consisting of reprints of issues from Valiant. Story by Pat Mills and Derek Cribbling and art by Joe...
I love the fact he's actually drawing BADLY in the first panels, and small details like the artists board having a watermark on the back...
And I think in the first panel in this page, he means "FAT slob", but letterers are only human.
Dun-dun-DUN!
I love this story, it's like it's being written to be filmed as a nice half hour thriller. The sound of the murders being masked by fairground attractions is a brilliant little motif which just SCREAMS teleplay, no? Roald Dahl would be very proud....
Oh, and in case you were wondering.... this is what Joe Colquhoun looked like in real life