Do You Take A Chance On Comics You Buy?

It was an early 1950s British comic annual and I had no idea whether I owned a copy. I convinced myself that I did but then said "Sod it. Buy it!"  It was cheap so I bought it.

It arrived and I was sure I owned it so started browsing through it. Then I saw the strip I never expected to. It was the actual origin of a British character and it was a shock. Really I never thought I would see the origin story because the annuals are rare and finding them is nice but you just expect the standard reprints from weekly comics and not the "I want to read that one" strips.

 It was a bit weird as this was the second time that I had found a gem. I had previously purchased a Girls annual and it was pretty standard stuff until I found the strip featuring a female super hero I had never heard of before. I checked around and the character was not even referenced by the late comic historian Denis Gifford!

I have a habit of finding old or Independent comics that I just purchased out of curiosity and found real gems. People buying comics today just want Marvel, DC, Image and the other comic companies and any company not DC or Marvel they call "Independents" but they are not -they sell and earn far more money than a true Independent. You see a comic and think "Nice cover -is it worth buying though?" -buy it! Don't deprive yourself of finding a real treat (yes, it might be awful but let's be positive).

I know a few words in Chinese, French, German and Dutch but do I ignore and not pick up comics because they are in a foreign language? Hell no: A comic put together well you should still be able to follow a story even if you cannot read the text.

I have been criticised because I like Salvador Dali paintings -do I give a crap? No. I gave up trying to analyse why I like something a very long time ago. Sadly, I see little Small Press or Indie comics these days  but if you see any give them a try.

Oh...yeah, I also publish comics!

Marvel Legends Spider Man Retro Wave Kaine Electro Spidey Unlimited Revi...

Cinebook Ltd Newsletter 205 - January 2025

 

Dear Reader, Let’s start 2025 with a bang or three, shall we? There’s certainly plenty of that in this month’s selection. Take Amazonia, for example. There’s jungle exploration complete with hidden treasure, stalking jaguars, Native attacks, British sleuths on the trail of a mysterious meteorite in Dracula country … and always the strange albino man-creature, who’s starting to display some rather impressive powers. That’s a lot to deal with, even for a seasoned agent like Kathy Austin! All rivers flow to the sea, and this is where our second title takes us. The Bluecoats find themselves temporarily assigned to the US Navy, and prowling the English Channel in search of a Confederate corsair. It’s a real episode of the American Civil War, and it makes for an exciting adventure, as well as a funny one! Finally, we have the return of modern Buck Danny, who for his part is leaving the Navy to return to the US Air Force. Tasked with testing the abilities of a new robotic pilot system, Buck and his friends soon find themselves in a middle of a deadly game of sabotage and industrial espionage. Caught between rogue killer Ais and a global criminal organisation, can our heroes prevail? January with Cinebook – on land, at sea, and in the air! Amazonia 3 Marchal, Rodolphe & Leo Episode 3 Two separate expeditions into the heart of the Amazon rainforest have trespassed upon Yanomami territory. On one side, Reinhard and his Nazis are looking for a sunken submarine and the gold it transported. On the other, Kathy Austin and Captain Delio of the Brazilian Navy are tracking a potentially extraterrestrial being … Read more The Bluecoats 18 Lambil & Cauvin Duel in the Channel 1864. The USS Kearsarge, a Union warship, puts in at the port of Amsterdam. Its mission in Europe: to stop the predations of the Alabama, a confederate privateer that’s been preying on the transatlantic trade. Aboard are Blutch and Chesterfield, threatened with a firing squad by an irascible general, and sent to lie low in the Navy … Buck Danny 14 Gil Formosa & Frédéric Zumbiehl Project Skyborg Buck and his friends are sent to Edwards Air Force Base on a new top-secret assignment. Their joy at being test pilots again is short-lived: they are in fact to test and train an artificial intelligence program that could very well one day replace them in the cockpit of a fighter jet … Read more Blake & Mortimer The Complete Collection 3 Blake & Mortimer The Complete Collection 4 North-American readers, to locate a comic book shop near you that stocks or can order these titles and many more, use this handy Read more   Or, if you're a retailer yourself, please go to: Read more The Bluecoats 18 Duel in the Channel Harry Dickson 2 The Court of Terror

I Got Two New Ultramen

 I was looking for something totally unrelated to Ultraman when two soft vinyl (Bandai) figures popped up and very cheap so I thought "treat yourself" and I did.

Joining my Ultramen galactic peacekeeping force are....

Ultraman Dyna Miracle Form Blue & Silver

UltraMan Zero

I just do not want them competing with my 4 inch Green Lantern Corps!

Shura - Recognise (Official Visualiser)

TOKYO's OLDEST TOY SHOP | GODZILLA-YA with @japanbookhunter

New Duke & Serpentor Super7 ReAction + Figures

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Black Tower Gold - British Golden Age Comics Collected Volumes

  Going by what people are asking now IF you can find the comics reprinted in these collections, just the comics in the first volume would cost you around  £200/.$210.  The complete collection -for which in a number of instances there are absolutely no copies being sold-  would cost you around £500+

Which means you get some rare gems to see for more than cut price!

A4

B&W

94 pages

Price: £8.00 (excl. VAT)Prints in 3-5 business days

http://www.lulu.com/shop/terry-hooper-scharf/black-tower-british-gold-collection-1/paperback/product-12183527.html

For the first time in 60 years some of the lost gems of the British Golden Age of Comics are reprinted!

Scanned and cleaned to the best standard possible -see The Phantom Raider, Ace Hart, Secrets Of The Super Sargasso Sea, Phantom Maid, Electrogirl, Skybolt Kid, Wonder Boy, Dene Vernon, Professor Atom and many, many others!

Its fun and action all the way -The British Golden Age shines through!

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A4
Paperback
B&W
68 pp

Price: £8.00 (excl. VAT)Prints in 3-5 business days

http://www.lulu.com/shop/terry-hooper-scharf/black-tower-british-gold-collection-2/paperback/product-12183569.html

The second collection of British 1940s comic strips featuring Maxwell The Mighty, Slicksure, Iron Boy,Alfie, Ace Hart and more.

Featuring the work of Golden Age Greats Alf Farningham and Harry Banger.

Specifically designed to feature more humour than the previous volume this should be a treat for all comic collectors.

Reprinting the full content of The Meteor and The Rocket Comics from 1948.

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A4
Paperback
B&W
68 pages

Price: £8.00 (excl. VAT)Prints in 3-5 business days

http://www.lulu.com/shop/terry-hooper-scharf/black-tower-british-gold-collection-3/paperback/product-12183586.html

This is the third volume in Black Tower Comics’ collection of Golden Age British comic strips that have not seen print for 50-60 years!

Included in this volume is a bumper crop of Ace Hart:The Atom Man strips and an article on the character.

A complete 1949 comic in Smugglers Creek; Denis Gifford’s Search For The Secret City and science fiction legend Bryan Berry’s rendition of Kid Carter -Teenage Tec! A must for all comic collectors and historians.

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A4
Paperback
B&W
86 pages

Price: £8.00 (excl. VAT)Prints in 3-5 business days

http://www.lulu.com/shop/terry-hooper-scharf/uk-gold-collection-4/paperback/product-12184087.html

The fourth volume of this series features some great finds of the lost era of British comics:

Ace Hart The Atom Man, Captain Comet -Space Ranger, TNT Tom, Clive Lynn -Space Reporter, Superstooge, "The White Gorilla", Atomic Tuffy, Cast Iron Chris, Sigord.....

and many others!

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A4

Paperback

B&W

68pp

Price: £8.00 (excl. VAT)Prints in 3-5 business days

http://www.lulu.com/shop/terry-hooper-scharf/black-tower-gold-5back-from-the-dead/paperback/product-12184231.html

William McCail’s 1940 classic is reprinted for the first time in 80 years.

If you are into British Golden Age comics or early comics in general this is for you.

Robert Lovett rises from the dead and finds he has some startling powers: deaths follow, as does a Scotland Yard detective determined to track down the mysterious killer!

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A4
Paperback
B&W
35 pages

Price: £5.00 (excl. VAT)Prints in 3-5 business days

http://www.lulu.com/shop/terry-hooper-scharf/black-tower-gold-6/paperback/product-16249586.html

Yes! Now at issue 6 and bringing you more lost strips of the British Golden Age of Comics.There's a collection of strips featuring non other than TNT Tom and one of the weirdest UKGA characters -the Iron Boy.

Ever heard of Ingy Roob? Or his pet "Stretchy"? You will have if you read this issue.How about Dennis M. Readers Cat Girl?

Two other UK comics are reprinted in full, both from 1946 and the only issues ever published:Lucky Dice and The Fudge.

Black Tower -keeping UK comics history alive!

And if you want all of the above in one huge volume then....

A4
Paperback
B&W
405 pages

Price: £25.00 (excl. VAT)Prints in 3-5 business days

http://www.lulu.com/shop/terry-hooper-scharf/the-ultimate-british-comics-gold-collection/paperback/product-22041282.html

Combining volumes 1-6 (still available as individual issues but that works out far more expensive) of the BT Golden Age British Comics Collections (minus adverts) this is the ultimate for any Golden Age collector or historian or just plain comic lover.

Features....

*Ace Hart 

*TNT Tom 

*Electrogirl 

*Wonderman 

*The Phantom Raider 

*Captain Comet 

*Acro Maid 

*Phantom Maid 

*Dene Vernon 

*The Iron Boy 

*The Boy Fish 

*Professor Atom 

*The Tornado

 *Powerman 

*Wonder Boy 

*Slicksure  

*Masterman 

*Dane Jerrus 

*Alfie 

*Tiny Tod  

*Maxwell The Mighty 

*Back From The Dead 

*Zeno At The Earth's Core 

*Colonel Mastiff  

*Ally Sloper  

*Super Injun  

*Super Porker  (oo-er, no, Madam, ooh), 

*Tiger Man  

*King Of The Clouds  

*Captain Comet 

and MANY others!

Plus text features defining The Ages OF British Comics (Platignum, Gold, Silver), the artist William A. Ward and more.

If you knew nothing about British comics of the Platinum, Golden and Silver Ages then once you buy and read this book you'll be a goddam comic intellectual dinosaur! Yipes!

All in that beautiful Iron Warrior cover exclusively drawn for Black Tower by that meta-gargantuoso talented Ben R. Dilworth!

I sold my family to be able to get this book out! Help me buy them back by purchasing your very own 

whizz-o copy today!

TOY REVIEW | Batman Forever Carded Figures & Batmobile By Spinmaster! #t...

Blog Uploads and Updates (as I hide from the storm outside!)

 

I have been uploading some pages to the UK Golden Age Heroes and British Golden Age Comics 1939-1951 blogs over the last few days -links you can find on the blog roll to the right  -the blog roll being on the Right should not be seen as any kind of political statement or stance 😂

Once I have a technical paper out of the way and have finished the two new Black Tower comic albums I may slap together all the material I had for Comic Bits 3 which is usually heavy on art, rare comic strips and British comics history.

After all I have a few character discoveries to reveal and that is always usually done in my publications rather than online where stealing other peoples' work is common practice. You want to steal my work then pat for it!

Once I get some time (now that I have a new camera -a Christmas present as I am not rich enough to buy one myself!!) I want to photograph the Hong Kong comics I have as I promised that in December but things catch up with me!

If anyone has any links to blogs or sites looking at old Hong Kong made toys or comics please let me know as I am sure there must be Hong Kongers out there knowledgeable in HK comic history and I find it puzzling when I get messages from people in China and HK who tell me they learnt a lot from my posts.

Anyway, the longer I type on here the further away the interesting work is!

Element Girl Is BACK...So Who Is She?

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The Hand of the Mystery Man

Here is a treat: The Hand of the Mystery Man starring Black Whip in a story from The Ranger number 50 of volume 3, 23rd January, 1932  in a story by John J. Garbutt.

I have more of these text stories if anyone is interested.

Johnny Neg

 

Writer/Artist:Ben R Dilworth
Characters created by Terry Hooper-Scharf
A4
B&W
40pp
£7.00
https://www.lulu.com/en/en/shop/terry-hooper/johnny-neg-no-1-july-2020/paperback/product-vmv2ev.html


Ben Dilworth gives his own spin on the character Johnny Neg: a hard-boiled detective in a unique universe. 

What does a detective sound like in a place where everything can -and has- happened? A decadent place where the end of the world is assured to occur? 

1984 meets the Apocalypse on steroids! 

Text stories include: "Let's Talk It Over", "BrainDrainer", "Stamp" and "StokeHeadDead" 

Strips include: "Mutoids", "Home", "Mob Rools", "Love Robot", "Suicide Balls" and "The Ghost Bar" 

And for added delectation --there is a GoBo insert (you DO know who GoBo is, right?

The Masked Marshal: Life by the Gun

 

A4

B&W 

24pp

£7.00

https://www.lulu.com/en/en/shop/terry-hooper/the-masked-marshal-no-1-november-2020/paperback/product-nj2geg.html

 It's the Wild West and one man, his identity hidden by a mask, has been made a United States Marshal with a remit to travel where ever he needs to and an even more secret remit: rid the West of the outlaws and killers and make it safe for American citizens -use any and all methods.

 The toll A Life By The Gun will take is unknown to the Masked Marshal but is inevitable. 

Ben Dilworth guides Stransky & Labbat to bring us stories of gun law: 

Bad Law 

Bushwackers 

The Old Man of the River 

Snowball 

Clayton Gang 

Some times even hitching up your horse while you take a drink can lead to death.