Oddities #20191206

It is a universally accepted truth in fiction that heroes need villains, and darkness needs light. And just like every rose has its dawn and every night has its thorn, one of the most persistent thorns in Judge Dredd's side is his long-time arch-nemesis Judge Death. Hailing from a dimension where it's been decided that …

Oddities #20191129

My first encounter with Scott Adams' comic-strip Dilbert -- for a long time one of my favourite newspaper strips -- was via this poster advertising Xhibition 94, a "corporate development conference" taking place in San Jose, California, in June 1994. A quarter of a century on, I don't remember acquiring the poster, but the bottom …

Hatch, Match & Dispatch – December 2019

The rules: these are only the “big” anniversaries (25, 30, 35, 40, 45, 50, 60, 70, 75, 80, 90 & 100+ years), dates are cover-cover dates where known, monthly comics with no confirmed day of launch default to the first of the month, and this list is accurate only to the best of my knowledge, …

Oddities #20191122

Cerebus the Aardvark was an independent comic published, created and written Dave Sim, with art initially by Sim alone, then from issue #65 by Sim and Gerhard (one of those one-named stars, like Madonna or Bono or Elvis) that ran for three hundred mostly-monthly issues from December 1977 to March 2004. The lead character, Cerebus, …

Comics That Never Were #2

Launched in 1975, the hard-hitting all-war comic Battle Picture Weekly was a major hit for IPC/Fleetway. It was created in response to rival publisher DC Thomson's successful Warlord, and when word came that DC Thomson was preparing a semi-spin-off all-action comic with focus on more than just war stories, IPC figured they should do the …

Oddities #20191115

Dredged from the cloudy depths of memory canal... the Dublin Event Guide for 7-20 April 1992! Yes, that's Judge Dredd on the cover, drawn by absolute legend Cam Kennedy, reproduced almost certainly without permission -- the cover is not credited within, nor even directly mentioned. Dublin Event Guide was -- as the name implies -- …

Noncomics: William Shatner – The Unauthorized Biography

Once again Uncle Rusty has delved into his Star Trek cabinet, and this time emerged with a rather odd publication indeed... This ain't no comic-book, folks, though it looks and feels very much like one at first glance and first touch. William Shatner - The Unauthorized Biography is one of many similar books published by …