dogpoet

Apparently Parliament told him he could fuck off and they weren't going to let him have people swear allegiance to him as part of the coronation ceremony. He had such a snit about that they had to contrive a bullshit excuse to arrest a few protestors.

In other news, Fox is doing a bit of house cleaning:

In a further spiteful "hey, lookee here" to Jason, I was astonished to find googling Garner that he wrote a second sequel to The Weirdstone this side of the turn of the century, dealing with one of the leads getting inviolved in further supernatural shenanigans as an adult. The fact that I'd never even heard of this until I looked at garner's wiki page is a bit worrying: given the status TWOB has as a children's classic, you'd have thought there might ahve been more fuss about another sequel appearing in 2012, wouldn't you? (Still, reading list and all...)

Still enjoying the Omaran thing, I should note.

You're welcome, but that might have been morally equivalent to offering somebody a free taste of heroin: I remember there being a load of books along those lines in school libraries when I was a kid.

The Moon of Gomrath is pretty good as well, iirc.

And it's worth remembering that Garner has form as an fantasy editor as well:

Sadly, it seems to be all they've done, which is a shame. It's a magnificent video as well.

I wonder which was the issue that missed him out?

Wonderful artist: the fold ins are often magnificent, but those Snappy Answers cartoons from the '60s are better still...

This is rather fun:

Started in on Adrian Cole's Omaran saga over the long weekend. Four fat books, published by Unwin Hyman during the '80, so they even look like proper retro high fantasy, and all the other boxes seem ticked. Barely even into the curtain raising stuff yet, but it looks pretty grim dark with a sorceror who claims to be from another world being pursued by anti magic inquisitors and some looming hideous evil they're probably going to have to join forces against before the end of the book.

It seems a teensy bit overwritten, but at least there's none of the thesaurus trawling idiots used to do try to pep tabloid type diction into something more epic back when the likes of Eddings and Wylie were churning out freeze-dried Tolkien pastiches with all of the good stuff removed. I think Cole is probably trying to do Hodgson or Cabell rather than Tolkien though, and there is an upside to the attempted high style: the itinerant magic user is a huge guy, easily the size of a far pulpier fantasy novel's protagonist, but his thews have not even been mentioned, never mind described as mighty...

I didn't even know she was trans, to be honest.

Nice to see the obituary talking about stuff other than comics though: she knew the tarot inside out, that's for sure.

Now that she's stepped down and is learning to drive in preparation for her fleeing the country, it's time to remember wee Jimmy KrankieNicola Sturgeon...

First indictment upon the howling tangerine shitgibbon has gone through, and the whole situation is being handled with the dignity and grace you'd expect:

The man himself speaks his piece on Truth Social:

Quote

These Thugs and Radical Left Monsters have just INDICATED the 45th President of the United States of America, and the leading Republican Candidate, by far, for the 2024 Nomination for President. THIS IS AN ATTACK ON OUR COUNTRY THE LIKES OF WHICH HAS NEVER BEEN SEEN BEFORE. IT IS LIKEWISE A CONTINUING ATTACK ON OUR ONCE FREE AND FAIR ELECTIONS. THE USA IS NOW A THIRD WORLD NATION, A NATION IN SERIOUS DECLINE. SO SAD!

(It's not nice being indicated, to be fair.)

And the cartoonists are going ape:

That as well, but there always used to be a little row of them in the SF section in bookshops as well as their own tub on the market stalls.

Thanks. It's years since I've read that one, so I don't really remember what he looked like very clearly, but I'm sure he wasn't sporting a tie and I seem to recall some sort of hipster beard as well...

I didn't know he'd done another huge series of pulp-y potboilers besides the Survivalist stuff, Jason. I've never even heard of Track, but you did used to see the Survivalist stuff, even in proper bookshops.

That's true, I was forgetting that bit.

Isn't he wearing a leather during the flashbacks in that fill in Gant vs Gemma story as well?

(Mind you, the less said about his dress sense during the underpants and magic mushrooms issue, the better...)

Point taken.

To be honest, I thought it was a shame that the build up to the big climax of Carey's first story involved John dumping the donkey jacket he'd been wearing and digging out his trenchcoat...

Hendrix is, but Motorhead are missing for some reason. (Which is kind of weird as the book's got minor acts who were a big deal in the early '80s like the Jags and Toyah spread through it and more images of Blondie than anybody else: you'd think Motorhead would qualify for a book that was put together during the Ace of Spades era, wouldn't you? Presumably Lemmy hadn't been recognised as a living legend quite yet...)

There's one really surprising artist whose name I missed until I had another flip through the book last night: an illustration is credited to Mark Manning, so I wonder if that's Zodiac Mindwarp (that was), who I believe did work in graphic design before forming the prototype grebo band. The drawing (Johnny and Sidney out of the Sex Pistols) isn't half bad, either...

Not a comic, but it probably belongs more in this thread than elsewhere...

I've just got hold of Visions of Rock, one of those coffee table art albums that were popular in the '70s and '80s. This one is, obviously enough, illustrations and paintings of rock acts, but about half of the book is by artists who are now best known for their comics art. John Higgins has done a lot of the paintings, Brett Ewins manages a couple and has coloured several other artists line drawings and Bryan Talbot, Colin Wilson and a few names I don't recognise are in there as well, and even Neal Adams (the Who) and Kevin O'Neill (ELO) get a painting each.

The rather salacious text attached to the drawings of some of the female acts look a bit dodgy in this day and age, though...

In the Delano issues he'd be wearing a suit and no trenchcoat as often as not, at least if he wasn't crawling around in the gutter.

Maybe the slobby/scruffy John was Ennis' lasting legacy to the character?

And now I am reading Scaramouche and really enjoying it. There's a lot more humour in this one than there was in Captain Blood.

(ETA: I'm thinking the late Freddie Mercury had probably read this one as well...)

14 hours ago, JasonT said:

Uh, I guess this belongs in the DC thread...

https://bombmagazine.org/articles/secret-identity-the-fetish-art-of-supermans-co-creator-joe-shuster/

 

Sounds an interesting read, Jason. Thanks for that.

I wonder if the untucked shirt is just there to make the gaunt, lived in Constantine look less like the late William Burroughs, who was always immaculately turned out whenever the media came calling?

And it's lasted longer than the Spurrier Hellblazer series as well. Only two issues over that year, though...