Comic Clippings - 3 August

I've had a busy couple of days -- the phrase "running to stand still" springs to mind. However, lots of good things have been happening and a few very interesting bits of information have turned up lately that will eventually make it onto the blog.

I had a chance to look at a couple of the upcoming Carlton books yesterday and one in particular, the Look-In reprint, looks especially good. The artwork, especially the colour strips, has reproduced really well and I think it should do well. It's not one of my books, incidentally: the Look-In was edited by Graham Kibble-White, who blogs at a site called Off the Telly and contributes to something called TV Cream. It's the usual mish-mash of feature material and strips that Carlton are becoming known for and the only negative is that it will definitely leave you wanting more... the complete run of John Bolton's 'Bionic Woman' or runs of Arthur Ranson's strips or Mike Noble's strips... the list of strips that ought to be reprinted is pretty extensive but I'd hate to be the one to sort out all the rights.

Lots of odds and ends of news to catch up on so I'll leave you with the following round-up while I go and figure out whether the guy who used to draw Captain Diamond spelled his name Ratcliff, Ratcliffe or Radcliffe. Honestly, the questions some people ask...

* As predicted, the Dandy has been relaunched in a kind of BeanoMax format, now called Dandy Xtreme, the price rising from £1.30 to £1.99 and the publication schedule dropped to fortnightly, although the numbering continues from the weekly. The switchover occurred with issue 3426 which appeared on 2 August. Lew Stringer covers the relaunch on his blog (26 July).

* Warren Ellis is profiled by Karen Holt for Publishers Weekly (28 July).

* Richard Elson, 2000AD and Sonic the Comic artist, is interviewed at Sonic the Comic Online.

* Alex Fitch's I'm Ready For My Close Up radio show interviews Steve Yeowell on Tuesday, 7 August. You will be able to download the interview a a podcast, usually posted a day later. Alex has lined up a show featuring Glenn Fabry and John McCrea for the following week.

* Nikolai Dante artist Simon Fraser is interviewed at Walrus Comix about his serial comic 'Lilly Mackenzie and the Mines of Charybdis' (via ACT-I-VATE), influences and pen nibs.

* John Freeman of Down the Tubes and ROK Comics is interviewed at Nightgig (1 August). You can listen to the broadcast or, as I've just done, download it by right clicking on the 'listen now' button. John has also recently launched a... not sure what it is -- a kind of hub, I guess, for listing various useful blogs (his own Down the Tubes blog, Lew Stringer's Blimey!, Bear Alley and a few others) plus a Forum. Take a look at downthetubes.ning.com.

* Ian Wheeler reviews the new Transformers comic from Titan Magazines. Simon Furman and Geoff Senior were recently interviewed by Alex Fitch in the two-part episode of I'm Ready For My Close Up which you can download here (Part 1) and here (Part 2).

* Richard Bruton reviews two books by Ian Edginton & D'Israeli, Scarlet Traces and Leviathon at the Forbidden Planet International blog (31 July).

* Kevin Patrick reviews the latest Commando book ANZACS at War on his Comics Downunder blog. The book was originally compiled for the Aussie market. The latest Commando spin-off book is due to appear in the UK from Carlton in about 4 weeks time.

* Talking of reprints, Amazon now have the cover up for Eagle Annual: The Best of the 1950s Comic edited by Daniel Tatarsky. The title implies the best of the weekly comic. I can't see the book on Orion's own website but Amazon have the publication date as 4 October.

* Ilya (Ed Hillyer) is editing a second volume of The Mammoth Book of Best New Manga, to be published by Robinson in October.

* IDW has announced that it will be producing a new Doctor Who title out in early 2008, to be scripted by former Dr Who Magazine editor Gary Russell and drawn by Transformers artist Nick Roche. Russell T. Davies will oversee the book which will feature the David Tennant doctor and his latest companion, Martha.

* Amongst the winners at this year's Eisner Awards were Grant Morrison & Frank Quitely (Best Continuing Series for All Star Superman), Sean Phillips (Best Limited Series for Criminal), Neil Gaiman (Best Archival Collection/Project for Absolute Sandman) and The Art of Brian Bolland by Joe Pruett (Best Comics-Related Book). Neil Gaiman was this year's winner of the Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award. A full list of winners can be found here.