The Valiant Book of Mystery and Magic 1976

The 1970s saw a rising interest in fiction dealing with horror and the occult. The Exorcist and The Omen in the cinema for example, The Pan Book of Horror being a popular series of paperbacks, and the relaxation of the Comics Code allowing vampires, werewolves and other horrors in American comics that were reaching more UK newsagents than ever before. Teens, adults, (and kids if they could access it) enjoyed nothing better than a good scary story. 

How could British comics join the fun? The Children and Young Persons (Harmful Publications) Act 1955 had forbidden the production of horror comics in the UK due to alleged effects on children, a kneejerk reaction to 1950s horror comic imports (see here). However, stories of the supernatural had continued to appear in British comics occasionally, although they tended to be very tame.

In 1975, IPC decided to publish a one-off hardback edition called The Valiant Book of Mystery and Magic. The closest thing they could get away with to a horror comic without being too graphic. Most of the stories featured The Spellbinder character; the old magician who had been the lead strip in Lion weekly. (By this time Lion had merged into Valiant.) However the book also contained several one-off mystery stories illustrated by IPC's top artists.

The book had 144 pages, mostly in black and white. The full colour lead strip, The Hand of Tuthoon, written by Frank Pepper and drawn by Fred Holmes, reintroduced readers to The Spellbinder, revealing how Tom Turville had awakened his ancestor Sylvester Turville from suspended animation.

The book also included one of the Spellbinder serials from Lion, edited into a 33 page adventure. The rest of the book featured all-new material. Perhaps the most intriguing strip was The Final Victim, an early collaboration between Pat Mills and Joe Colquhoun several years before they created Charley's War for Battle. In The Final Victim, Colquhoun drew himself as 'Albert Weems', a comic artist down on his luck. Presumably the comic's managing editor 'J.J. Legrun' was based on IPC's Jack LeGrand. Here's the whole story...

Joe Colquhoun also illustrated some other material in the book, including two text stories, The Red House and Nightmare and the short comic story The Man on the Road...

Other great talent in the book included Eric Bradbury...

...Fred Holmes...

...and of course Geoff Campion, the main Spellbinder artist who also contributed some art for text stories and the endpapers...

The Valiant Book of Mystery and Magic was a one-off, which suggests it either didn't sell very well or IPC decided to shy away from the subject. It's a fantastic book though, as you can see from the examples I've shown here. Well worth seeking out if you don't have a copy. 

There's one hugely important thing about it that you may have noticed; the stories all carry writer/artist credit boxes. Hats off to the editor for doing this as it was definitely not usual IPC policy at the time, and wouldn't be seen again until 2000AD started publishing credits a couple of years later. 

Colquhoun in colour!

We're probably all in agreement that the late Joe Colquhoun was one of the greatest artists of British comics. He was a master of black and white strips as evidenced from his work on strips such as Roy of the Rovers and Paddy Payne in the 1960s and Charley's War in the 1980s. In 1968 Fleetway gave Joe the opportunity to produce a strip in full colour when Football Family Robinson debuted on the covers of Jag dated 27th July 1968.

Most comics of the time were printed on cheap newsprint, where the only colour would be added by the art department as basic flats due to the limitations of the printing method. However, Jag had the luxury of web offset printing by Steel Bros. of Carlisle, which meant that artists could colour their own work with an unlimited palette to suit the superior paper and printing. For most of its short run, Jag was also a big tabloid comic, so the artwork really stood out.

Here's the second episode of Football Family Robinson, from Jag dated 3rd August 1968...

...and episode three from Jag dated 10th August 1968...

Sadly, Jag didn't last, and when IPC took control they merged it into Tiger in 1969. Joe Colquhoun continued on the artwork though, with the strip now running as a centre spread every week. This episode is from Tiger and Jag 17th May 1969... 

IPC tended to shift artists around at times and by late 1969 Joe Coloquhoun had been replaced on Football Family Robinson by John Gillatt. (Colquhoun was put onto a new Tiger strip, Splash Gorton, in black and white.) However, in 1970 IPC's new humour comic Cor!! was launched, which initially featured an adventure strip in its centre pages; Kid Chameleon. The strip was illustrated by Joe Colquhoun in full colour.

I'm not entirely convinced that episode one of Kid Chameleon was coloured by Joe as it doesn't look like his technique, but anyway here are the first three episodes of the strip from Cor!! Nos.1 to 3, dated 6th, 13th, and 20th June 1970...

Truly a brilliant artist!

Charley's War republished in huge omnibus edition

Next to Frank Bellamy's Thunderbirds strips, Charley's War must rank up there as one of the most often reprinted British comics strips. Deservedly so, for not only is the saga one of the most superbly written and illustrated stories to have appeared in UK comics it also carries important messages about war that resonate to this day.

Now, Titan Books have packaged together the early years of the strip in a huge 320 page softback entitled Charley's War: A Boy Soldier in The Great War. Many of the pages have even been sourced from the original artwork, and the reproduction is excellent, on good quality paper, making this an essential collection.

Charley's War began in the pages of weekly war comic Battle-Action back in 1979. Written by Pat Mills and illustrated by Joe Colquhoun it tackled the drama of trench warfare in World War One. A series set in the trenches was not an easy subject to turn into a gripping war story for boys, but the creators produced the most remarkable strip of its time. Thanks to Pat Mills' diligent research and Joe Colquhoun's gritty, detailed artwork Charley's War looked authentic and engrossing, but the most important aspect was that this was an anti-war strip, published by the same company that had churned out ridiculous gung-ho stuff such as Captain Hurricane. Quite a coup for the creators. 

Naturally, as Charley's War was appearing in a comic for young boys the extent of the horrors of trench warfare couldn't be fully shown, but even with such restraint, the strip contained tough stuff and pushed the boundaries further than any British war comic had before. Actually, saying the strip was aimed at boys does it a disservice. The level of the writing and artwork is high and allows Charley's War to be enjoyed by readers of any age or either gender. 

To show the tragedy and futility of the war, the strip didn't shirk on its body count, with some supporting characters suddenly meeting untimely ends. The villains of the story ranged from a particular nasty German sniper to the loathsomely sadistic British officer Lieutenant Snell. Charley is the likable everyman of the strip who suffers countless hardship. In this regard the story is written very much like a strip in a girls comic or even a Dickensian novel, playing on the emotions rather than the simplistic cliffhangers of other UK boys serials of the day such as The Steel Claw or Adam Eterno. This element made Charley a more sympathetic and rounded character which undoubtedly added to the popularity of the strip. The scope broadened even more when the story began to show the home life of Charley's family as well, including his spirited younger brother Wilf and his shifty cousin Olly. 

If the classic strips themselves were not incentive enough to buy this mighty tome (and they certainly are) the book has a few extras too. Up front, there's Neil Emery's ten page chronology of the series, which is superbly informative but is perhaps best read after the strips as it's full of spoilers. (It also covers the stories that go beyond this volume, so if you haven't already read the whole series, be aware that this reveals everything.) There's a four page article by Steve White on the evolution of the tank, and extracts from an interview that Stephen Oldman did with Joe Colquhoun back in the early 1980s for my fanzine Fantasy Express. (A note says that I granted permission for it to be used in the book but as I've always maintained, the copyright of the interview rests with Stephen Oldman. I merely published it.) 

In the back of the book, Pat Mills has written an eight page commentary on the stories. This gives a great insight into the creation of the strip and shows Pat's huge respect for the incredible drawing skills of the late Joe Colquhoun. 

Big as this omnibus is, it only covers less than half of the full Charley's War saga. Titan have previously published the entire series in 10 hardback books, and this collects the first four volumes. Personally I prefer this format to the hardbacks and their easily damaged dust-jackets, and I hope the whole series is collected in more giant softbacks such as this. 

Charley's War: A Boy Soldier in The Great War is a bargain at £19.99 for 320 pages. It's stitched, not glued, which is a bonus as the pages can be opened wide with no fear of splitting the spine. If you've never read the strip before, this is definitely the book to get. And if you have read it before, this chunky, durable book is a great accessible format to read and read again. 

ISBN: 9781781169148

This week in 1969: TIGER AND JAG

It's been a while since I featured Tiger on this blog so here's a quick look at the issue that was on sale from 19th to 25th April 1969. This was the 4th combined issue of Tiger and Jag, with IPC having taken over the Fleetway comics and trimming back the weaker selling titles. The Roy of the Rovers cover is by Yvonne Hutton, whose linework still looks fresh and modern even today. Tragically, Yvonne died in a car accident in the early 1990s. 

The following Skid Solo story is drawn by John Vernon. It's a significant episode because it introduces 'Sparrow' Smith, who became a regular supporting character. (Click on all pages to see them much larger.)

The Nosey half-pager at the end of the Skid Solo story was drawn by Alf Saporito, who a year later became the regular cover artist on Gus Gorilla for Cor!! 

Since its merger with Jag, Tiger had inherited that comic's web offset printing process which was a higher standard of printing, and allowed artists to paint their colour pages instead of relying on the flat colour overlays that the newsprint comics used. Just look at the quality of this full colour Football Family Robinson centrespread by Joe Colquhoun...

Tiger later became an all-sports comic, but in 1969 it still featured a variety of subjects. One such strip was Saber, King of the Jungle, illustrated by the excellent Denis McLoughlin...

Here's a few snippets of some of the other strips in Tiger and Jag that week, starting with Typhoon Tracy drawn by Graham Allen using a less cartoony style than that which he'd used on The Nervs for Smash!

Custer by David Sque...

Black Patch the Wonder Horse by Sandy James...

...and the long-running Johnny Cougar by John Gillatt.

Finally, to add to the flavour of the year 1969, here's a few of the adverts that appeared in that issue, including one of the legendary "Great News, Pals!" announcements for two comics joining forces...

By the way, - you can see more classic ads from other comics in previous posts on this blog. Here's a few links:

http://comiconline24h.blogspot.co.uk/2007/03/junk-food-and-comics.html

http://comiconline24h.blogspot.co.uk/2007/03/seventies-nostalgia-adverts-in-comics.html

http://comiconline24h.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/seventies-nostalgia-more-adverts-from.html

http://comiconline24h.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/more-ads-from-1970s-comics.html

http://comiconline24h.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/ads-from-comics-of-1960s.html

http://comiconline24h.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/advertisements-for-comics-of-past.html

http://comiconline24h.blogspot.co.uk/2007/03/anti-smoking-strips-of-sixties.html