Special Globe Guard 1

 

32pp

A4

Black and White

£10.00 UK -online store will list international prices

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The Special Globe Guard (SGG) a world-wide network of super heroes and adventurers who can be called upon whenever an overwhelming threat -Global or local- rises. The UK section is headed by war veteran Captain Samson Tornado and apart from a few over boisterous members to contend with everything seems to be as quiet as it can be.

Out of the blue Spellcaster appears and warns of a hostile fascist take over of a parallel Earth. Not something the SGG would deal with but in this case it is claimed that the Dark Lord Kaos has resurrected two of Tornado's war time enemies and they are planning a massive attack on the SGGs Earth.

Determined to deal with his old enemies Tornado heads off for the war torn Earth with Spellcaster and a small team... but everything is not what it seems.

This volume contains a preview of Black Tower Super Heroes vol. 2 No. 2: The Ultimate Game!

Laterne Laterne

 

A blacklight, also called a UV-A light, Wood's lamp, or ultraviolet light, is a lamp that emits long-wave (UV-A) ultra violet and very little visible light. One type of lamp has a violet filte material, either on the bulb or in a separate glass filter in the lamp housing, which blocks most visible light and allows through UV, so the lamp has a dim violet glow when operating.Blacklight lamps which have this filter have a lighting industry designation that includes the letters "BLB". This stands for "blacklight blue". A second type of lamp produces ultraviolet but does not have the filter material, so it produces more visible light and has a blue colour when operating. These tubes are made for use in "bug zapper" insect traps, and are identified by the industry designation "BL". This stands for "blacklight".

What has this to do with Schwarze Laterne? Nothing.

The character is based on a number of things -in Germany as a kid I saw a lot of the fairy tale and myth TV shows for kids (in the UK they were billed as Tales From Europe -The Singing Ringing Tree for one) and I took the idea of a man with a magic lantern from one of these but as that was over 50 years ago don’t expect the story title!

I then started reading various UFO magazines and books where they mentioned “solid light phenomena”-we’ll avoid the fakery and lies behind this but just say that it was an interesting idea. A man with a magic lantern that created solid light phenomena of a sort. But I then thought that every magic or otherwise lantern uses light so why not a “black light” -the lantern was magic after all.

The Schwarze Laterne was created in the mid 1970s so long before DC Comics did its storyline where their lanterns split between yellow and green and red -not sure if they had a black lantern but black is a negative not a colour, Anyway I lost interest in DC at around that time as the reboots were so regular that it made their titles unreadable.

I think I gave the Schwarze Laterne a Deutsche Michel cap originally. Seemed a bit lame. So the origin.

Ulrich Meier was 10 years old when he went off to explore the nearby forest as usual. He practically knew the forest like the back of his hand so it came as a surprise to find and old and very spooky looking cottage in amongst the tree. From behind him a croaky old voice spoke his name and he turned to find a red haired old woman who introduced herself as Katharina Henot. I ought to point out that there was a Katharina Henot or Henoth (1570 – 19 May 1627) who was probably the first German post master and an alleged and an alleged witch who was burned at the stake for sorcery in Koln (Cologne). She is one of the best-known German victims of the witch hunt, and the best known case in Cologne but whether there is any connection…? You can read more about her here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katharina_Henot

On with the story. Ulrich had no fear of Katharina for some reason so when she invited him into the cottage for some cake and soda pop he followed. Once inside he was almost excited by glass jars ful of various trinkets as well as the fact that the interior looked like a drawing of some old witch house. He became drawn to a black lantern on the table where he sat eating cake and Katharina spoke:

“You are drawn to the lantern, aren’t you? It seems to have guided you here” and Ulrich excitedly asked whether he could touch the lamp and was told “Yes, you may. But be warned young Ulrich it is no oil lamp. This is a lamp of magical black light and it belonged to Schwarze Erich long ago.”

As Ulrich inspected the lamp he was told that Erich had lived long ago in the days of Charlemagne and was a renowned sorceror but that he had died when trying to use the lantern to attack a local priest for what he considered an insult. As Katharina explains all of this a solid black smiling face appears from the lamp and though taken aback Ulrich shows no fear. The face says (its mouth not moving) “This is the one. He has no fear of the Black Light. Teach him” and then the face vanished. Ulrich is asked by Katharina if he wishes to learn how to use the black lantern but warns him that if he agrees to learn then he much selfishly dedicate his life to helping not just the people of Earth but all of its life forms. Ulrich agrees.

After leaving the cottage, having agreed to return next day, Ulrich arrives home and explains what has happened to his elderly adoptive parents. His father (Federlin) lit his pipe and told Ulrich “If your mother says yes then you may go back. If she says no then I will go and speak to her sister” Ulrich is puzzled and his mother (Walpurga) explains that she is a witch and Katharina her sister whom she has not seen “for many a year” but that she is “one of the Old folk” (like druids almost) who are tasked with finding people worthy of magical knowledge and gifts. At which point Ulrich is almost explosive in his excitement as on his Earth (EP 56765) events in the 17^th century caused witches to no longer be hunted and executed but respected as they had worked together to find a cure for The Blue Death that swept though Europe. Ulrich is sent to bed and his mother tells Federlin that she will go and speak to her sister.

On waking next morning Ulrich finds his parents smiling widely and his mother tells him “You may go to see my sister. You are to become the first Schwarze Laterne in 400 years!” From that day and then every other for the next ten years Ulrich is taught how to use the lantern and on his 21^st birthday he is not greeted by Katharina at the cottage door but a beautiful young woman with long red hair. Ulrich is immediately attracted to her and they end up sleeping together but as he wakes he hears the words “Thank you. I have your seed” and he sits up to find himself… in the forest. The cottage has vanished. Telling his parents about this his mother says that if the cottage and her sister are no longer there then he is now truly qualified to be the Schwarze Laterne. She adds “My sister always did have an eye for young men with raven hair” (the intimation is that the young woman was Katharina which left things very open for later stories). His mother goes to an old chest tht he had never noticed before and takes out the clothing he will now wear as Schwarze Laterne but to protect the secret of who he is she also gives him a domino mask.

One day while trying the lantern’s power a tree speaks to him. A conversation then ensues about how trees can communicate with each other even if they are on other worlds -some having been taken from Earth by alien explorers centuries before. Ulrich is told that the lantern can not just let him fly but if he wants to, and knows the location, he can travel to another world far better “than the blundering Munchhausen”. On that day Ulrich was told of a distant world and an image appears in his head of a binary star system and one particular planet and Ulrich is pulled up into the air before finding himself in space and from there is on the alien world in minutes.

Over the next 15 years Schwarze Laterne becomes a familiar visitor on other worlds and on one trip he is encased in the black light for three days. Once he is freed from the black light he finds the beings on the planet in a state of shock. Telepaths are in comas due to a great psychic wave that came from Earth. Ulrich returns to Earth as quickly as he can but finds utter devastation with only a few surviving humans -the Zeit Geist had devastated his Earth =killing billions including his wife Erica and their two children, Hans and Liselotte. His parents now appear (having not aged in the decades and usher the survivors through a magical portal to a safe world. His mother tells him that he must now pursue Zeit Geist to save other worlds and that he can never return home -this is the curse of the black lantern. His mother opens another portal leading to the next world Zeit geist is attacking and as he enters this his mother says “Goodbye”.

From here on Schwarze Laterne meets heroes on other devastated worlds until they finally arrive on Earth 664 just before the start of events depicted in The Trial.

Schwarze Laterne was in at the end of Zeit Geist and since that time has become linked with the German super team D-Gruppe.

After being told by Rotkäppchen of her encounter with an alien in the Black Forest Ulrich has his curiosity piqued and so checks D-Gruppe’s extensive archives and learns that a UFO supposedly crashed in the Black Forest in the 1930s. “But that was long ago” he thinks. That night, as he sleeps on a church steeple (well you do, don’t you?) he has a vivid dream of the young red-headed woman from years before on his Earth, She tell him that he must go to the Black Forest and find the alien ship which is still there but hidden as it could destroy the world. Ulrich wakes and determines that he will go to the Forest and find the craft.

This leads to the story Schwarze Laterne - Schwarzwald - Schwarzer Tod (Black Lantern Black Forest-Black Death) or as it was going to be sub-titled “An Honourable Way To Die”.

The Invasion Earth Saga... More Than Just An Invasion

 

Paperback

A4

Black & White

331 Pages

Price: Reduced to £21.89 

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It begins slowly.  It always does. It's a deception that everything in the world is as it should be and that never changes.

Earth’s heroes and crime-fighters are going about their daily tasks –fighting a giant robot controlled by a mad scientist’s brain, attackers both human and mystical -even alien high priests of some mysterious cult and their zombie followers and, of course, a ghost and a young genius lost in time. 

Pretty mundane. 

But psychics around the world have been sensing something.  A "something" that sends feelings of sheer terror through their psyches.

There is a huge alien Mother-ship near the Moon. Undetected by deep-space radar and other instruments, only a few on Earth have sensed it and they cannot penetrate the hull but only feel psychic screams and....worse.

And then it begins: strange orange spheres isolate and chase some of Earth’s heroes who then vanish into thin air –are they dead?  An attack by an old foe or foes -?

Black, impenetrable domes cover cities world-wide. 

Then it becomes clear to those within the domes what is going on: Alien invasion of Earth! 

A war between the Dark Old Gods and the pantheons that followed! 

Warriors from Earth’s past having to battle each day and whether they die or not they are back the next day! 

No one suspects the driving force behind the events.  One single evil guiding events.  Events that could cause destruction and chaos throughout the multiverse.

Assaulted on all fronts can Earth’s defenders succeed or will they fail...is this truly the end? 

The Cross-Earths Caper: Part II of the Invasion Earth Trilogy

Paperback, 

A4

Black & White

107 Pages

Price: £12.00

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Following the events on Neo Olympus and the Boarman invasion of Earth, many heroes and crime-fighters have withdrawn from activity. Some are trying to recover from injuries while others are fighting the mental scars left by the events.

But things have to go on.  As heroes from other parallels who helped during the recent events return home, members of the Special Globe Guard are shocked at the sudden appearance of Zom of the Zodiac. Never a sign of good things a-coming!

Very soon, a group of heroes mount a rescue mission and find that a quick rescue mission can turn sour equally quickly. As they overcome one challenge the the heroes become lost between parallel Earths and face new threats.

 Sometimes one Earth just is not enough. The complete story published in issues 7-10 of Black Tower Adventure now in...one handy dandy book!

A4

B&W

124pp

£15.00

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It all began in 1987 and the Black Tower Universe has seen alien attacks, heroes kidnapped to be put into the middle of a war of the gods. 

Despite the deaths and losses the heroes -crime fighters, super powered and members of the magical union have come back but now unaware that alien races are escaping through the Sol system and that a mysterious space fleet is heading towards the inner planets, they find themselves trapped or distracted. 

The Many Eyed One is finally coming. 

The Multiversal Council has quarantined Earth and forbidden any to help. 

The evil has spread and there is treachery striking at the very core of Earth's defenders

A4

B&W

126pp

£15.00

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Following on from events in Green Skies V. 3 Part I the Clone Zone Boyz are increasing in number while those who created them, the Vampirons, continue to plot and await the arrival of their 'God' -The Many Eyed One. 

The Druid finds that his physical and mental state are deteriorating and even the Rev. Merriwether cannot help him. 

Shockingly, the Clone Zone Boyz claims someone close to Merriwether and this leads him to team up with two 'unsavoury' characters. 

In space Krii and Tyn hrrn face a seemingly unstoppable enemy. 

On The Moon the Selenites and representatives of other worlds meet and decide that Johnny Apollo, the Z-Man, is the only one who can lead the counter invasion fleet. 

With the enemy striking Mars and then the Moon things look grim

 A4

B&W

208pp

£16.00

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The gathered Sol Defence fleet is prepared to make its final stand led by Johnny Apollo the Z Man. If it fails to halt the invaders then the doomsday weapon will be detonated and destroy the entire Sol System. 

Meanwhile, unaware of the threat in space, Jack Flash, the Avenger and others prepare for a final show down with the Many Eyed One; a final confrontation they know they do not have the power to win. 

Is this Humanity...the Earths...final day?

woven into The Green Skies is the story of the harbinger of destruction: the story of Varik Dann -The Man Who Walked Through a Door and Into Another World

Varik Dann is but one character as we follow the attempts of heroes and adventurers as well as the military as they try to confront the Clone Zone Boys with no idea of who or what is behind them. And in space the very existence of not just the Earth but the solar system rests on efforts to stop an alien invasion fleet and if it cannot be stopped them there will be no conquest: the entire solar system will be destroyed by a doomsday device.

Mr Stransky

 Let me know how you are doing!

A Statement

 I am a noted independent artist writer living in a society that consumes only pap. I am, therefore, ladies and gentlemen, penniless. I thank you.

Horror Express

 One of my all time favourites!

STRANGE AEONS - Childe Roland - The Hounds of Tindalos.

 

STRANGE AEONS: What Do They Say by Stormclouds

 

Louane - mode avion (clip officiel)

 

The Miracleman Copyright Saga (Updated And Complete)

 Last of the confusing Maracleman posts so dig this.

Oooh, There Are Some Shennanigans In The Comic Business

 

You know, Marvel thinks it owns Miracleman because they bought the character from Mick Anglo. As noted already, Miracleman looked like Marvelman but was not. Old time British publishers were a rather shady bunch at times. 

 Samuel Assael (John Spencer) you can find a little more about here:

https://britishgoldenagecomics.blogspot.com/2019/10/samuel-assael-aka-john-spencer.html?fbclid=IwY2xjawVEu3xleHRuA2FlbQIxMABwZG9mAWJyaWQRMERqQllVaXc3RWlNcUU5S2JzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEewDin3n0IqY9q-ArjUc8uZ0e5VKO3ByzNs5bU-V_Ezwl3ipHUrK1Wp7w7dsk_aem_1XFCG7gzUVSL4E1FJIDHHA

Now I parted with cash for rights and that was it. However, it seems there was some "odd" double dealing going on and that got sorted out -it is a very long and boring story.

Gerald Swan I did a deal with to rights for characters and at the time I also assumed that included rights to the actual book titles. I only found out by accident from comic historian Alan Clark that he had purchased rights to the actual titles from Swan -something Swan neglected to tell me. There was some argument between two others who had purchased rights (the same rights) to the pulp side of Swan's business. 

When I enquired about Anglo and Marvelman I was told in no uncertain terms that the character was sold off when Anglo quit comics. I was told rights had gone to Alan Class of Class Comics the black and white reprint publisher. Alan didn't think so but then I recall that Ally Sloper fanzine in the 1970s was co-published by Class. He says it was not.  

   

See a pattern here?

I've noted before how I got a phone call early one morning from Myron Fass in the USA who kept calling me "kid" (annoyingly).  I purchased rights to the then Captain Marvel (the "Split!" one) and a month later I paid out more.   Fass was, apparently, "a character" and in three weeks he almost drove me nuts and always phoned between 0130-0200hrs. He was definitely a shifty fella!

Thorpse and Porter I visited in the 1970s and did a deal with but by that time every penny I had was gone and, to add to problems, the person who was going to pay for printing decided that Indie music was what he wanted to get in on. I tried John Brown (who was publishing Viz at the time) and even Titan who really messed about and were definitely wasting my time deliberately -luckily I have two witnesses to what happened at Titan's rather dingy basement office.

I often laugh when I read or hear what people who never knew me at the time, never knew anything about what I was working on and never asked me later say. They are very authorative in knowing nothing. "Produce the contracts and details" often gets a very subtle but rude response.  I am the most open publisher you will find and I hide nothing but I have no time to spend scanning and posting up documents that are no one's concern. Of course, these people are all peripheries these days (and for the last 20+ years).

I was told, by publishers, how to rig sales figures and literally cook the books. If you ever wondewred what happened to the excellently printed Wasted magazine: if you go to Companies house you will find this: The company confirms that its intended future activities are lawful.

Go to HM Revenue and Customs and you find that there was a, uh, tax problem. 

Today it is probably harder to get away with shady dealings especially if things are posted and publicised online  so dirty deals, tax evasion and a lot more are no longer possible. It is the same in the US and no doubt other parts of the world but if you go back even to the time of Penny Dreadfuls and the Platinum age there were crooked deals and the ones who got the short end were the writers and artists.

Marvel Comics have the right to Miracleman but my question, not that important unless you are a comic historian, is who did Anglo sell Marvelman to originally and I can dismiss the Amalgamated Press because I had them check and they would have made a big show of acquiring the character. Alan Class? Samuel Assael?  No idea.

My guess is that reading comics is far more fun than sorting out the shennanigans!

And the Vampyre Laughed....

 

Marvelman. Miracleman. New (NOT) Miracleman

I have some Marvelman and Young Marvelman comics and annuals. Really fun and the case of the stolen giant marrows had me chuckling. Up until the 1990s the British loved their allotments and gardens. Growing fruit and veg boomed especially during/after the Second World War.  A lot of 1960s kids like me were presented with steamed/boiled marrow as part of Sunday dinner.

Confession: I could not stand marrow. 

The genius of Mick Anglo, and he was a bit of a comic genius (far more than Alan Moore or anyone else ever gave him credit for), was that he got artists working on strips that to any British kid was full of things they would be familiar with -weird aliens from TV puppet shows and of course the sacred marrow.

Read in 2026 they are still fun books. But, no, we just cannot allow fun comics can we?

And so, in the 1980s, I walked into a newsagents with my brother, Mike, and there was this magazine called Warrior. I looked -that was Marvelman! I bought. We got home and I opened it up to find that...it was not Marvelman. It was ...Miracleman?

Okay, Dez Skinn "purloined" the character assuming that it was public domain. He had worked at Fleetway so was aware of the "Thirty Year Rule". It is a rule that existed for...well, from the Platinume Age to 2000s but when you do something or use a character and  the slime involved in the periphery of comics in tyhe UK do not want you to they start protesting there is no such rule. There is and a chat with HM Copyright Office told me that they knew it existed.

The 30 Year Rule that Skinn employed stated that if a character had not seen publication in 30 years it was open to use. There was a 35 Year Rule which was a safety guard meaning the character was out of use but you allowed a further 5 years "in case". 

I mentioned this to the late Gil Page who was Managing Editor at Fleetway and had been there starting as an office boy when it was still Amalgamated Press -45+ years man and boy. Gil told me it was a known rule and Fleetway had used it themselves but giggled and told me "Best keep that quiet!" (I think I know the characters he was referring to now).

People are still criticing Skinn over "stealing" Marvelman but he was acting on well known and used rules so yah-boo-sucks!

Alan Moore "rebooted" the character to Miracleman and I must admit liking the series at the start as I switched off any Marvelman memories. However, as the series progressed you could see Moore's usual school boy minded excesses taking over. The graphic "Child birth" issue was one such because you had to ask why we needed to see a graphic child birth? It made no difference to the story it was just Moore being Moore.

I have posted before about the whole Alan Moore nad Eclipse farce where someone sold the character when they had no right to and "poor Alan" was (not) ripped off again. Eclipse was the company that published the "controversial" child birth issue but then the series just stopped....as did Eclipse.

Marvel then stepped in as it did not want any loose character running around that could use the name Marvel (when Marvelman appeared it was many years before Timely/Atlas become Marvel so use of the name yah-boo-sucks. They republished some of the black and white strips and I loved that.

Marvel Comics then finished the storyline which started with Moore and then Neil Gaiman before the latter "got cancelled". As someone at Marvel stated "We dodged a ------ bullet with that! If the story had broken earlier we would have junked the series!" I guess the loss of money would have been hurtful to the accountants!

After all of that Miracleman was never name changed back to Marvelman and why not doesn't make much sense since they purchased the Marvelman character from Anglo (was there anything odd in that deal (ahem) such as Anglo insisting that Marvel could use the character likeness but not the Marvelman name -it had t remain Miracleman to distinguish it from his fun creation (just saying. People talk).

Anyhow, as I stated when Marvel purchased the character, there was talk that they intended to make him American. As Lee said in the 1970s: "Make comics American" (yeah, I watched that edition of Pebble Mill at One on the BBC at the time.

And so, in 2026, a failed Captain America causes all sorts of chaos in a rather messy and almost unreadable Avengers Armageddon and suddenly....becomes Miracleman. Well he ain't Mike Moran so the dignity of the original Marvelman is intact.

Miracleman in Marvel's new Avengers title

Miracleman joins the Marvel Universe as the final member of the new Avengers lineup in the upcoming issue of Avengers #1, debuting on November 4, 2026. David Colton, the 21st-century Captain America, inherits Miracleman's legacy and extraordinary powers, which include flight, superstrength, durability, and the ability to switch between human and superhuman forms. Miracleman's arrival is a significant development in the Marvel Universe, as he is expected to play a pivotal role in the new era of heroes.

We know how Marvel's previous "New Eras" have gone.

We'll see. But as a side note that "costume" looks bloody awful!