David Leach tells it like it is

Comic artist, writer, animation artist, colourist, editor, David Leach has had quite a career and he's been interviewed by Alex Fitch about it on Resonance FM. There's a podcast of the interview now available for you to listen to here:
http://podcasts.resonancefm.com/archives/12472 

I've known David for nearly 30 years since we were contributors to Oink! comic and I count him as one of my closest friends in the comics industry. (I went to his wedding many years ago too.) So I'm pleased to see him receive some recognition on Resonance FM. The interview reveals him to be as straight talking and enthusiastic as ever - and it's funny too, so have a listen.   

Original Thugs!

A last minute mention that my auction of original Tom Thug pages from Oink! and Buster ends this evening. If you're interested, please visit my eBay page here:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/graphite47/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=&_trksid=p3686

All bids are appreciated. Thanks in advance, and good luck! 

Piggin' History!

Many of us who started our comics career in the 1980s were spoilt in a way because we had the ultra-brilliant Oink! to work on. Oink! was a humour comic like no other. It's often unfairly and inaccurately described as a "junior Viz", and publishers IPC may have initially wanted something like that, but Oink! was unique and had its own style (or 'sly-le' as they might have put it). Some of us were quite raw in our abilities when we started but Oink! gave us chance to develop and experiment.

Unlike other humour comics of the time, Oink! had no formula, no house style. The art styles were varied, the content was ever-shifting, the attitude was more irreverent, the humour was cheekier. So different it unsettled the establishment, and WH Smith moved it away from the children's comics section in a bizarre attempt to prevent its intended audience from seeing it! That undoubtedly cost the comic a lot of potential sales, but many of its loyal readers stuck with it, as evidenced by the anecdotes and recollections on the Oink! Facebook group. 

One of those loyal readers, Phil Boyce, even set up an Oink! Blog, and now he intends to publish a book telling the story of the much-missed comic. Here's what he had to say:

"It's Oink!'s 30th anniversary in two years and I'm officially announcing a brand new book to mark the occasion.  It's planned to tell the whole story, from initial conception right through to the Round the Bend TV series and then on to the modern day.  The story of the comic was already a fascinating one, but there's much more to tell believe me!  Alongside this the book will contain a good, hefty amount of the very best in strips and features from the comic and what is surely the greatest team ever put together for one - as the front page of The Oink! Book 1988 stated, they were "Britain's Best!".

While this blog is very much my own personal journey through Oink! from the perspective of a fan, the book is going to be the creators' tale - their take on our very favourite comic."

This is very exciting news indeed for ex-contributors to the comic and for its fans. For more information, read the rest of Phil's post on The Oink! Blog here:

http://the-oink-blog.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/working-on-title.html

Phil has only just announced his plans so there's a long way to go yet but keep checking his blog for developments. I'll also post more news here of course, as the book comes together. 

The Case of the Kidnapped Celebrities

Oink! was an excellent comic. For the readers it offered a refreshing change from the relatively rigid formula of other comics of the time, and was wildly unpredictable. For those of us who were lucky enough to contribute to it, the comic gave us the opportunity to develop our abilities and at the same time have a great deal of fun with its flexible format of varying themes and one-off stories. 

One of those one-off strips was The Case of the Kidnapped Celebrities which I scripted and Mike Higgs illustrated. I'd been a big fan of Mike's The Cloak in Pow! in the late sixties, and was fortunate to become his assistant for a year or so in the 1980s. Mike had left children's comics for a while because he'd refused to conform to the restrictive formula of the IPC weeklies of the 1970s. He'd been constantly busy though, producing numerous children's books, commercial illustrations, and his Moonbird newspaper strip for his local paper and abroad. 

Mike liked Oink! because it was fresher than its contemporaries. I felt it was high time Mike's talents were seen in British comics again so I suggested to him that we could collaborate for the comic. We worked on a few strips that were published, and I think Mike did a few of his own things for it too. (This later led to him drawing Thundercap for Buster in the 1990s.) 

Anyway, here's one of the strips we did. The Case of the Kidnapped Celebrities was good fun to write, and Mike did a fantastic job on the artwork in his own distinctive style. Even Mike's lettering is great!

This strip is from Oink! No.34, dated 8th to 21st August 1987. If you'd like to see a few other pages from this issue, head over to Phil Boyce's fantastic Oink! Blog now!