boyajian@akov68.DEC (Jerry Boyajian) (08/30/84)
THE MAD ARMENIAN'S GUIDE TO BRITISH COMICS
FOUR-ISSUE LIMITED SERIES
(Collect them all. Trade them with your friends.)
Inspired by Jeff (Moriarty) Meyer's request, I am about to submit a series of
articles covering British comics. Nota bene: I am hardly an expert in this area.
I'm just learning about them myself, but I thought that others might appreciate
what I've learned so far. This series is currently intended to appear in four
installments. I'll be keeping all of them on disk for an indefinite period of
time, so if anyone is missing any and wants them, send me mail and I'll send the
missing installments. The series will appear over the period of a month or so,
so don't start thinking that you're missing future installments already. As cur-
rently comtemplated, the first installment will cover Quality Communications (eg
WARRIOR, but in slightly more detail than previous postings), the second, I.P.C.
(eg. 2000 A.D.), the third, Marvel-UK, and the fourth, random publishers (of
which there aren't many).
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#2 -- I.P.C. Magazines
Sorry it's been so long since the first installment, but (1) I've been busy
lately and (2) everytime I think I'm ready to write this, some more info comes
into my hands that I want to include. As it is, I'm going to have to severely
edit myself if I want to keep this thing from getting out of hand. Well, on with
the show.
I.P.C. (not to be confused with I.T.C., who brought you THE MUPPET SHOW) is the
largest comics publisher in the UK. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that
most of I.P.C.'s line is probably not of any particular interest to net.comics
readers, and so won't be discussed here (besides, I know very little about them,
so I couldn't tell you about them anyway). They are weekly comics about sports,
teen-girl romances, kid-type funnies, etc. I'm presuming that you folks aren't
really interested in such. Anyways, what I *will* be touching on are four comic
weeklies: 2000 A.D., STARLORD, THE EAGLE, and SCREAM.
First, a word about British weekly comics. They are not like American comics in
format. Their size and shape is generally about the same is the Sunday newspaper
supplements like PARADE, etc., and they usually run 32 pages. Rather than have
one main feature and possibly one or two back-up features, they usually contain
5 or 6 strips that run anywhere from 4-8 pages. The paper used is about on the
same level as regular comic book newsprint and they are usually printed in black
and white, with color covers (of the same paper stock as the inside) and maybe a
center spread in color.
Now, I.P.C.'s top seller and main comic (at least for our purposes) is 2000 A.D.
This comic started in the spring of 1977 and is now over 380 issues. It's popu-
larity is most likely due to its main feature, "Judge Dredd", which started in
Program (Issue) #2 and, to my knowledge, hasn't missed an issue since (so don't
expect Eagle Comics to run out of Judge Dredd material anytime soon). Since you
are probably familiar with Judge Dredd (as well as Nemesis, Robo-Hunter, and the
Harlem Heroes) because of the Eagle Comics reprints, I won't bother to go into
detailed descriptions of those features. Among the other popular features are:
"Dan Dare"*, "MACH 1" (a "hyper-powered" man), "Invasion" (war in the 1990's),
"The Ro-Busters" (a robot rescue organization), "The A.B.C. Warriors" (a pre-
quel to "Ro-Busters"), "Strontium Dog" (a mutant Galactic Bounty Hunter), "Rogue
Trooper" (a genetically-engineered soldier), "Flesh" (and its sequel "Flesh II",
dinosaur hunting in the Triassic), and "Slaine" (Sword & Sorcery in Prehistoric
Britain).
<* "Dan Dare" is a comic feature from a 1950's boy's weekly, THE EAGLE. The ori-
ginal publisher was eventually bought out by I.P.C., and "Dan Dare", the adven-
tures of a space pilot, was revived as one of the lead features in 2000 A.D.>
For those of you interested in SWAMP THING writer Alan Moore, he's done several
2-3 page, one-shot stories, as well as 3 regular features: "Skizz" (adventures
of a shipwrecked alien on Earth, which, knowing Moore, is nothing like E.T.),
"D.R. & Quinch" (comical adventures of two non-humans on another world), and
"The Adventures of Halo Jones" (which just started, so I haven't read it yet,
since I won't be getting future installments for a while).
STARLORD was another weekly from I.P.C. that ran for 22 issues back in 1978, af-
ter which it "merged" with 2000 A.D. (a polite way of saying that it was can-
celled and some of its features went to 2000 A.D.). It was intended to be the
first monthly comic from I.P.C., but plans were changed just before it began.
Because it had been intended as a monthly, it was in a slightly different format
from the others, being 8-1/2" by 11-1/2" with heavier (and painted) covers.
"Ro-Busters" and "Strontium Dog" were the only two of its features that survived
the merger with 2000 A.D.
In the spring of 1982, I.P.C. started up a revival of the old weekly, THE EAGLE,
and quite naturally picked "Dan Dare" (which had been in limbo since Oct. 1978,
when the aforementioned merger took place) as the lead feature. I haven't seen
any issues, so I don't know what other features are in it. It's gone well over
100 issues at this point, but because of lower sales, there is talk of it merg-
ing with 2000 A.D. In the same breath is talk of spinning off Judge Dredd into
his own weekly to make room for the EAGLE strips.
Last, but not least, there is SCREAM, a suspense/horror title that started this
past Spring. That I know of, there is only one continuing feature, "Monster",
the initial episode of which was written by Alan Moore. All other stories are
one-shots.
In addition to the above weeklies, I.P.C. also publishes a series of Annuals,
which are a bit different from the Annuals that we are used to here. Rather than
being a double-sized comic, the British Annuals are hardcover albums that con-
tain some new material and some reprints. That I know of, there are Annuals for
2000 A.D. and JUDGE DREDD (and there has been at least one DAN DARE ANNUAL). In
addition to these there have been at least two 2000 A.D. SCI-FI [sic] SPECIALS,
which also have new and reprint material. In fact, last Winter's Special had a
14-page Judge Dredd story drawn by John Byrne! That Special, as well as the just
released Summer Special, also contain reprints of a Judge Dredd newspaper strip.
I have seen the two Specials, as well as some Annuals for sale in the U.S.,
though it isn't common for any comic shops to sell any of the weeklies. There is
one store in Worcester, MA that gets in a bunch of 2000 A.D. issues every couple
of months, but I haven't seen any of the other I.P.C. comics for sale here. What
are available in the U.S. though, are the Eagle Comics and Titan Books reprints.
The Eagle Comics I assume you're all familiar with. The Titan Books are a series
of 8-1/2" by 11" trade paperback albums, printed in black and white.
So far, there have been 11 Judge Dredd albums and 8 non-Dredd albums. Most of
material in the Dredd albums have appeared in the Eagle Comics series, though
some hasn't. One of the Dredd albums is in color, reprinting stories from two of
the Annuals. Of the non-Dredd albums, 2 are for Robo-Hunter and one for Nemesis
(with a second due soon). The other 5 are: 2 Ro-Busters, 2 A.B.C. Warriors, and
1 Charley's War (which reprints a war story serial from another I.P.C. weekly,
BATTLE). Among the features promised for future albums are: Strontium Dog, Rogue
Trooper, and more Judge Dredd, as well as non-I.P.C. newspaper strips such as
Garth, Jeff Hawke, and Modesty Blaise.
You may well ask what reason one may have for getting the Titan Books if the ma-
terial is the same as in the Eagle Comics. Well, first of all, you can read a
good chunk of the stories at once (in some cases, the stories aren't through yet
in the Eagle versions, but are in the Titan versions, "The Judge Child Quest",
for example. Secondly, they are printed in the same size as the original appear-
ances in 2000 A.D., and in black & white (as in the originals). The Eagle Comics
on the other hand, are a reduced size, and the addition of color often muddies
the artwork, which was originally meant to be in black & white. Thirdly, the
Titan albums reprints every page of the original stories as is (including most,
though unfortunately not all, of the relevant covers). The Eagle Comics, in
order to present the stories in a standard page length, often leave out original
splash pages and/or cut and paste pages to squeeze three pages worth of original
into two pages. On the other hand, I have noticed that the Eagle Comics versions
sometimes have a few re-drawn or newly-drawn panels that aren't in the original
versions.
Before I go, one more note for completists and collectors. If you are a Judge
Dredd fan, there are four issues of 2000 A.D. that you must have: 71-72 & 77-78.
The stories appearing in those issues will never, ever be reprinted due to a
legal settlement. The four stories are chapters of the "Cursed Earth" storyline
which you may remember from the Eagle Comics JUDGE DREDD #4-9. In #71-72, Dredd
gets caught in the middle of a war between the two petty empires of MacDonald's
and Burger King (seriously, folks! The chapters are called "Battle of the Burger
Barons" and "Burger Law!"). In #77-78 ("Giants Aren't Gentlemen" & "Soul Food"),
Dredd runs across some familiar characters from commercials, such as the Jolly
Green Giant, Speedy Alka-Seltzer, and the Michelin Tire Man! Needless to say,
certain parties were Not Amused and made trademark infringement noises at I.P.C.
And so, you'll never see those stories unless you have the originals (I'm lucky
enough to have found copies, gloat gloat). What's really unfortunate about it,
though, is that the chapters in #77-78, plus the cover to #77, were drawn by
Brian Bolland. So, if he's ever popular enough to warrant collections of his
work, they'll be missing a couple of stories.
That's all for now. I hope it won't be as long until the next installment as it
was since the last one.
--- jayembee (Jerry Boyajian, DEC, Maynard, MA)
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