Comic Cuts — 10 October 2025

Just in case you missed it, I posted an extra Comic Cuts column on Sunday about my exploits at the Colchester Comic Mart. Scroll down, or follow this link if you want to find out what happened.

You can probably guess how I spent the day after the Mart. Proofing and snoozing and watching the new Shane Black movie, Play Dirty. I've been looking forward to seeing this since it was announced because it's based on the Parker novels by Richard Stark (Donald E Westlake), which I like, and it was co-written and directed by Black, whose previous crime noir movies (The Long Kiss Goodnight, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and The Nice Guys) have been excellent. 

This one, not so much. It was good enough for passing a Sunday afternoon, but no more than that. Too many car chases/train chases and not enough sparkling dialogue, some pretty ropy special effects and a John Wick level body count don't add to making this a Parker movie of note. I still rate Point Blank with Lee Marvin and the Director's Cut of Payback with Mel Gibson as the best Parker adaptations. The Jason Statham Parker wasn't bad, but I haven't felt the need to rewatch it. That probably puts it on a par with this new version.

Monday and Tuesday were madcap. I needed to get the proofing on the AIR ACE COMPANION finished and I still had quite a way to go. The rush was because I wanted to get a second proof ordered alongside my restocks—now you know what the takings from the weekend went on! More books!

I'd gone through the book by Monday evening and fired up my old PC on Tuesday morning to make all the required corrections. There was only one major gaff, where I'd managed to put some pictures over the text on one of the biographies. The only way to fix the problem was to drop a couple of pictures. That still leaves about 320 pictures, so the book is still a visual treat. 

I managed to get the new book order placed before midnight on Tuesday, so I should have some restocks, and the second proof with me before the month is out. Any further corrections needed can be done quickly and that puts me on course to get this out alongside MYTEK THE MIGHTY Volume 4 in November, in plenty of time for Christmas as promised.

The Post Office delivered their twice-annual present on 6 October, increasing the price of postage for all "large letter" parcels both domestic and international. I'm going to have to sit down and seriously look at my costs, because my print costs also increased in August and I ended up with an order that came through Amazon actually costing me money—once you totted up the cost of production, postage to get the book to me, then the international postage and packaging to get the book to the customer, it added up to more than what Amazon sent me after taking their large cut.

Talking of postage... Our local post box was found wrapped up in a mysterious move by the Post Office last Monday. Like most villages, we have a village shop that has a post office counter just down the road. The post box sits just outside. There are also a couple of other traditional tall round and smaller square boxes dotted around the place. I use the one nearest for convenience and the fact that it is the most likely to be emptied daily.

I know the people in the shop well (I'm posting stuff most days) and there was confusion and anger. Apparently this was done without warning and not even the Post Office employees sent out in their vans to pick up the post knew anything about it. All the staff were told was that the post box was going to be replaced with an automatic postbox of a kind that scans a parcel as it was posted and opens a drop-down drawer. They're solar powered (so no more knitted postbox toppers) and I might need a "Royal Mail app" to post things. And it might be three months before the new box arrives.

The staff in the shop were already having to face the ire of customers who wanted to post stuff out to North America (Royal Mail suspended shipments recently until a new duty system could be implemented) and  Canada (where postal staff are on strike). Now you can't post anything out of hours at that box, probably the most convenient one for the most people.

Visiting the shop yesterday, I learned that the box would soon be back to normal as it is in a conservation area and the Post Office aren't allowed to put in a new box; in other words, it now looks like the box has been dressed up in a Hallowe'en costume just for October.

I'm writing this Thursday morning as I have an appointment in town to have an eye check-up to see if I need new glasses. I'll leave that as this week's cliffhanger. Come back next week to find out...