This October, the Treasury of British Comics will produce a gorgeous tribute to one of the unsung masters of British horror comics – Jordi Badía Romero.
Out on October 17, Misty Presents The Jordi Badia Romero Collection celebrates Romero’s incredible art from supernatural girls comic Misty in a sumptuous hardcover art book that collects stories from the 1980s and showcases this remarkable and criminally–overlooked artist, who died in 1984.
Hailing from Catalan, Jorge (or Jordi) started his career in the early 1950s on Spanish romance and adventure stories. He moved over to on romance stories for UK publisher Fleetway and The Super Cats for Scottish publisher D.C. Thomson and, throughout the 1960s and ‘70s, he worked with his brother, Enrique Badía Romero – artist on Modesty Blaise and Axa. As Jorge B. Galvez, he contributed to US magazine Creepy in the 1970s and worked on Tarzan comics in the 1980s.
This deluxe over-sized 128-page art book celebrates the art of a lost master of horror illustration and is a must for collectors of great comic book art!
It was the story that got a comic banned – and Carlos Ezquerra’s infamous Kids Rule O.K.! cover is now available on a quality T-shirt!
Launched in 1976, Action was the ground-breaking, highly-influential comic that paved the way for 2000 AD – filled with shocking tales of football hooliganism, savage sharks, rampaging teenagers, high octane gore, and extreme violence!
Ezquerra’s legendary cover for the series, showing what critics claimed was a chain-wielding teen attacking a policeman, is now available on a T-shirt as well as the series’ famous ‘Aggro: it’s a way of life’ slogan!
Set in a world without adults where gangs of teenagers run amok, Kids Rule OK! featured feral gangs of children and teenagers exacting revenge on the adult world – the strip helped lead to the comic being branded a “sevenpenny nightmare” and newsagents refusing to stock it. A toned-down version of Action returned a month later, but lasted barely a year before being folded in stablemate Battle.
Hibernia is proud to announce that it has teamed up with the Treasury of British Comics to publish COSMIC COMICS!
COSMIC COMICS is a collection of legendary comic creator Kevin O’Neill’s formative work on titles such as 2000 AD, Lion, Tornado, and Starlord.
It brings together a diverse selection of his work, from humour strips like Captain Klep and Dash Decent, to early Future Shocks and his amazing painted covers for the 2000 AD Sci Fi Special and Starlord – and much more!
This collection showcases the early development of his artwork as he progressed from art editor of 2000 AD to co-creator of Nemesis the Warlock, Metalzoic and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.
“After years of telling everyone how fantastic British comics are it was great to see the Fleetway archive find a new home at The Treasury of British Comics,” said David McDonald from Hibernia. “They are doing incredible work bringing back classic characters, not only in reprint but with new material too, and we are delighted and very excited to have the chance to bring some of that archive back to print in association with the Treasury brand.
“The Treasury of British Comics allowed us to delve into their archives, and we have brought what Hibernia is known for – quality reproduction, excellent restoration and great comics! Richard Pearce, Hibernia’s designer, has really hit this one out of the park, bringing poorly-printed newsprint back to life in a superbly-designed package.”
Every year, the first Saturday in May sees comic stores over the world take part in Free Comic Book Day, a wonderful celebration of all things comics!
And for this year’s FCBD, the best of British funny comic makers will be gathered together in the Treasury of British Comics Funny Pages, featuring the incredible artwork of the likes of Leo Baxendale, Ken Reid, Robert Nixon, and more luminaries of laughter.
Inside the Treasury Of British Comics’ Funny Pages, you’re going to delight to discover, or maybe re-discover, some of the absolute classics of Brit Comics Funny Pages, all part of the incredible Rebellion archive. Featuring the likes of Sweeney Toddler, Grimley Feendish, Faceache, Gums, and many more, it’s going to be the funniest free comic book day of all this May 5th!
Richard Bruton took time to chat comedy and comics with the man behind the funny pages, the Treasury Of British Comics’ Keith Richardson.
This year, Rebellion’s FCBD Comic is slightly different, coming not from 2000 AD but from the Treasury Of British Comics. What was the idea behind putting out Funny Pages?
Keith Richardson: Funny Pages is just a way of highlighting some of the range of incredible work that we have available through The Treasury of British Comics. The largest chunk of what Rebellion purchased to become the Treasury are titles that are humour titles. So, it just seemed like the obvious choice, saying here are some humour titles of yesteryear, but you’re going to love them because they still hold up today.
There are lots of UK collectors, of a certain age who are very excited that we do have the Treasury. But, then again, there’s a hell of a lot of people that don’t know anything about it. We’ve got a lot of characters who are still really cool, really cool, or the concept is absolutely brilliant.
When it came to deciding just which artists, which strips would be represented in Funny Pages, how on earth was it done? There’s just so much material available to you in the Rebellion archive!
KR: First and foremost, I was a child of the 70s, so I grew up devouring this material, mainly the IPC stuff. I wasn’t really a Beano reader. Nutty though, that was a great title. But I’d pick up Monster Fun, Shiver and Shake, Buster, Cor!, I used to have a little box in WHSmiths, full of these.
I had a feel of the strips that were popular back then, such as Frankie Stein, Faceache, always massive draws, Gums was really popular when he was in Buster. So a lot of it is down to things I knew were popular, back in the day. But, also a lot of going online and seeing what sort of things people were talking about. And then, stepping back and asking what would be popular today, what would work today, what would still be seen as funny today? A lot is just a gut instinct, what would work for contemporary audiences.
Looking at the selection of material in Funny Pages, there’s a lot of colour material in there, despite so much of the old material being black and white.
KR: Absolutely, we’ve delved deep in the archives, but a lot of the strips have come from the annuals, simply because I wanted to put as much colour as possible into Funny Pages. It’s just that audiences, especially American audiences, gravitate towards colour and don’t like black and white. Not every strip is from annuals, but a large chunk are. There’s some black and white strips in there as well, but I wanted to populate it, mainly, with colour work. And although some people say that some of the annual strips aren’t quite as good, I made sure I got some really great strips for The Funny Pages.
What are you hoping for with The Funny Pages as this year’s Rebellion Free Comic Book Day comic?
KR: I hope a lot of older readers will pick it up as well, not just for themselves but for their children as well. It’s all about exposure, especially in the States. We just want to let people out there, especially knowing that a lot of FCBD comics are going to the States, that there’s a lot more to Rebellion than 2000 AD. We’ve put 2000 AD out there before for FCBD and people are, hopefully, more aware of it. But, having The Funny Pages out for this year’s FCBD allows us to say, you’ve seen what 2000 AD is like, now check out this other brilliant British material.
We want readers to know that we already have some extremely gorgeous collections of strips which you’ll see showcased in Funny Pages or the Cor!! Buster Special, such as the Faceache collection, Ken Reid’s Creepy Creations, we’ve got a collection of Leo Baxendale’s Sweeney Toddler coming out in July.
How exciting is it for you to be in charge of bringing back so many old favourites with The Treasury of British Comics in general, and the best of the humour comics through Funny Pages and the Treasury?
KR: It’s exciting times. It’s been a lot of fun, an exciting couple of years, and it’s only getting better. Funny Pages and the Treasury is about showcasing British talent that a lot of people haven’t heard of. Because British comics didn’t begin and end with Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, Brian Bolland, and Dave Gibbons. We know how brilliant those guys are, and my God, they were brilliant but we’ve got a much richer history than that. We have artists from the past, like your Ken Reids, your Leo Baxendales, your Tom Patersons, who are just, in their own way, just as great as the guys that the Americans already know.
Ken Reid, for example, his stuff is so beautifully grotesque, but also so contemporary. It feels absolutely timeless. And who inspired Alan Moore? It was Ken Reid. Alan Moore is a massive Ken Reid fan, but you’d be hard pressed to find a lot of Americans who even know who Ken Reid is. Hopefully, we’re able to change that with The Funny Pages and The Treasury.
How about the future, what plans do you have for Free Comic Book Day 2020?
KR: If it goes down really well, next FCBD, we’ll possibly apply for two titles again, and next time round it might be an Action collection from the Treasury, where you might see the likes of The Spider in there, or Robot Archie, or Mytek The Mighty. Maybe the year after that we might try a girls collection for FCBD. The sky’s the limit!
Prepare to guffaw and giggle your way through the all-new Cor!! & Buster Humour Special from the Treasury of British Comics – out now!
Taking the greatest comedy characters British comics has to offer, the new special bring old favourites into the 21st Century and is guaranteed to raise a smile!
One strip that just had to be in the Special is Ken Reid’s Frankie Stein, the bumbling, smiling misunderstood monster that first appeared in Wham! and would later appear, drawn by the equally brilliant Robert Nixon, in Shiver & Shake, Whoopee!, and Monster Fun.
In the Cor!! & Buster Special, everyone’s favourite monster comes to you from Cavan Scott and Mike Hoffman…
What does it mean to be bringing back Frankie Stein for a new generation of readers? Cavan Scott: It was fantastic – I had literally been reading the original Ken Reid strips in a collection a few weeks before the call came. Keith (Richardson – editor of Cor!! & Buster) asked me if I wanted to write it and I came back with an enthusiastic ‘yes!’
Mike Hoffman: It was definitely a challenge and adventure! I remember Frankie Stein well from my time living in the UK back around 1964-70. I basically copied each character once from Ken Reid’s art, then allowed my own drawing approach to come into play as I laid out the pages.
Characters like Frankie, along with the rest of the classics in the Cor!! & Buster Special are all much-loved, well remembered strips, done by some genuine comic legends. Did you have any sense of that weight of history pressing down as you tackled Frankie?
Cavan Scott: There’s always trepidation when taking on a beloved character written by giants in the field. I’ve felt it whether I’m writing Judge Dredd, Princess Leia, Doctor Who or Minnie the Minx. But that trepidation is good. It makes you want to do your best work! How did you balance bringing your own twist or something new to the strips and yet still being true to the spirit of the originals?
MH: I found there was quite a bit of latitude creatively in terms of artistic freedom, as long as I stayed relatively cartoony, like for example building the faces on circles first, the characters would be recognizable. I think even if a live-action movie were made of Frankie Stein, with actors in the roles, it would still be recognizable to fans of the original strip. That’s kind of a testament to Ken Reid’s fingerprint. I had to find that balance between the cartoony-ness of the original and whatever naturalism I wanted to bring to it.
What memories of Frankie Stein do you have from your childhoods?
CS: I didn’t read the Ken Reid originals first time around, but knew Frankie from Robert Nixon’s strips in first Whoopee and the holiday specials. I later discovered Mr Reid’s sublime work when I picked up some back issues of Wham! at a car boot sale. I soon started to hunt down copies of Shiver and Shake and Monster Fun. It’s fair to say that Frankie was a big part of my childhood, and probably one of the reasons that I’m such a big Frankenstein fan!
MH: Yes, I’m 60 this year and as I mentioned have lived in the UK, so I remember Frankie Stein and Beano, 2000 AD, Thunderbirds, Dr. Who, Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) and all the standard British fare, even down to Bill and Ben the flowerpot men!
When it comes to the old comics, we’ve already seen a great deal of classic works coming from the Treasury of British Comics, but what do you think of what’s been done thus far and what have you really loved?
CS: Even though I have a lot of the original comics, I couldn’t resist the limited edition of The Thirteenth Floor. It’s fantastic to see the care that is being taken with these wonderful strips. Faceache too. I think it’s a crime that there are generations of British kids who don’t know these wonderful characters.
What are your thoughts on comics for children and how do you see things developing in the future?
CS: What I wouldn’t give for a new Buster weekly on the shelves. It’s not an easy sell by any means, with only the Beano surviving the cull of humour weeklies in the 1990s. Specials are great, but kids need to build associations week-in, week-out. The question is, will kids pick them up without plastic tat on the front? Maybe, maybe not, but that’s when comic-loving parents, teachers and librarians come in. When my kids were of the right age, the Beano was the only weekly available, so I bought it for them. I doubt they would have picked it up by themselves. It would be great to see publishers like Rebellion working with schools and libraries to introduce the characters. Authors visit schools and libraries – why not comic artists and writers? I know many already do, but with the support of a comics publisher such as Rebellion, we could really start getting kids reading comics. There have also been attempts to publish digital kids comics, to varying levels of success. It would be great to see a smartphone-friendly app like webtoons delivering humour comic material to a generation of kids who are already glued to their screens. I realise this is all very easy to say, but if we want kids to read comics we need to give them comics. They won’t necessarily find them for themselves.
What’s your story? How did you get into comics and what have you worked on so far?
CS: My first ever comic published was a Power Rangers strip for Jetix magazine back in the mid-noughties. Since then I just kept badgering people until they let me write for them, most noticeably the Beano where I wrote everyone from Bananaman to the Bash Street Kids and Titan with Doctor Who. Granted, I’d already had a fledgling career writing licenced fiction, but I was like a dog with a bone. While I was always careful to be polite and try not to get on anyone’s nerves, I also wouldn’t give up.
More recently have written Star Wars Adventures, Tales From Vader’s Castle, the Real Ghostbusters and Star Trek for IDW, Doctor Who, Vikings, Tekken and more for Titan, The Incredibles 2 for Dark Horse, Pacific Rim Aftermath and Vertigo Quarterly for Vertigo. I also recently wrote the Rogue Trooper strip from the up-coming all-age edition of 2000 AD.
MH: I started freelancing for Marvel, DC, Dark Horse and many other publishers back in the early 1980s. I drew characters like Batman with Neil Gaiman scripting, nine issues of Swamp Thing, Hellraiser, Hellblazer, and probably more I’m forgetting! Around 1992 I decided to self-publish and have mainly done that since. My own characters are things like Tigress, Madame Tarantula, Minister Sinister, Squid Girl and many more. Plus I’ve created animated cartoons, many themed Music albums like my Halloween favourite “Monster University”, which is only one letter short from the Pixar film, which it predates by several years.
Who are your influences?
MH: My first major influence in Comic Art was Jack Kirby, and I still use his approach to visual storytelling, like reading left-to right, establishing clear eye-paths for the reader, and use overlapping forms to create depth, even though the other trappings and details are my own. My second biggest influence was Frank Frazetta, which sent me in the direction of learning Classical painting technique, which I use in my Fantasy Art work.
CS: Neil Gaiman is my spirit animal and I’m addicted to the works of Guillermo Del Toro. When it comes to animation and story-telling, I bow before Dave Filoni and will read any comic Greg Pak writes. When it comes to British humour comics, my longest running hero is John Geering, and if it wasn’t for a love of Bond, Holmes and Doctor Who, I doubt I’ll be writing today.
Prepare to guffaw and giggle your way through the all-new Cor!! & Buster Humour Special from the Treasury of British Comics – out now!
Taking the greatest comedy characters British comics has to offer, the new special bring old favourites into the 21st Century and is guaranteed to raise a smile!
Just one of the delights inside is the return of Hit Kid, the mysterious mini made man from Krazy comic, originally drawn by Sid Burgon. This early years Equaliser hired himself out to any kid with a problem, dispensing pint-sized justice with pop guns and catapults, and all for payment in cakes, sweets, and fizzy pop! Bringing this most bizarre idea back is Robin Etherington (one half of the Etherington Brothers) and newcomer Dave Follett.
Let the enemies of kids everywhere quiver…
Robin, Dave, you’re bringing back a lesser known character from Kraxy for the Cor!! & Buster Special, the under-age avenger, Hit Kid. Is he a character you remember well?
Robin Etherington: Yes, I get to reprise one of my favourite characters. [Editor] Keith Richardson approached us and offered a number of strips – that no one else had nabbed Hit Kid at that point is the best news I could have received! As a kid I had stacks of Cor and Buster next to my Beano’s and Dandy’s. I loved the mood of those comics – they were slightly more dangerous than the mainstream.
Dave Follett: I read what I could get my hands on down here in South Australia. The humour was a major draw card.
How did you approach a new Hit Kid? Was there any sense of trepidation about messing around with a childhood favourite?
RE: Not trepidation exactly. You want to do the best job possible, and evoke the same sense of playful fun that flew off the pages back in the day. I’ve worked on a lot of franchised strips so I have a good feeling when I find that sweet spot between the original voice and my own. Actually approaching the page was extremely straight-forward. I read as many old strips as I could get my hands on, then worked out how to make my sense of humour fit with the original. With only two pages to play with, it had to be lean, but that’s the real appeal of this type of tale.
DF: It would have been foolish to replicate the style exactly so I did my best to meet my own high expectations as Hit Kid was a real favourite when I was younger.
Is it the Hit Kid some of us remember so well, or have you brought your own twist to the character?
RE: I only really updated one aspect, and that was the identity of the main character himself. Hit Kid’s cause – protecting the innocent and serving justice to the bullies of the world – has not changed in the slightest. In fact, in the modern age, his mission feels more relevant than ever! But I had a new idea about WHO was behind the wayfarer’s.
DF: Pretty hard not to bring something new, it was staying close to the originals in spirit that was our aim in any case. We all still need Hit Kid in our daily lives
The Cor!! & Buster Special comes as part of the Treasury of British Comics, which has already seen some absolute lost gems brought back. What do you think of what’s been done thus far and what are you particularly looking forward to seeing?
RE: It’s a great lineup so far but there are a lot of phenomenal titles that need attention. Personally, it won’t be a true Treasury of British comics until OINK is collected into a single prestige volume featuring all 68 issues … and as that’s a former Fleetway title, I have high hopes! If they made a NEW issue of Oink, I’d happily throw my hat in the ring to write Rubbish Man…
DF: There was a semi regular half page mini strip in Buster called Kip the Kat (or something like it?!) about a sleeping cat that would be the bane of the owners. For some reason I loved it, for all its uneventfulness. Can’t find mention of it anywhere, so it’s probably nowhere near as good as I remember, but remember it fondly I do! But of course, there’s PLENTY of other creators’ works that I’d love to see more of.
An important aspect of the Cor!! & Buster Special is that it, hopefully, gets these classic humour characters in front of a new generation of kids. What are your thoughts on comics for children and how do you see things developing in the future?
RE: At the moment, everyone seems keen to promote comics as a reading medium. I have a lot of conversations with publishers who are looking to enter the market for the first time. The future is looking brighter by the minute.
DF: Finally, people are realising comics are a medium and not a genre, and the best way to foster the passion for this much maligned medium is to create more outstanding work for all readers, young and old. The sheer volume of comics and graphic novels that are available to read these days is phenomenal, you need only go to your nearest comic shop to see the variety and genres out there for young and old.
Finally, let’s hear a little about yourselves… what’s your comics background?
RE: I came up from the Small Press scene, making comics at home, stapling pages myself – the old-fashioned way! Four years of comic conventions all around the country later, our work was spotted and we were offered the chance to work for Titan on their Dreamworks title. That was our first big break. As one half of The Etherington Brothers, I’ve written three all-ages graphic novels that have been nominated for an array of awards. I’ve produced comic stories for bestselling brands like Star Wars, Transformers, Wallace and Gromit, The Dandy, The Phoenix, Kung Fu Panda and How to Train Your Dragon as well as writing for animation and film. Our How to Think when you Draw and Write tutorial series is the UK’s most successful comic Kickstarter of all time.
DF: I couldn’t stop drawing comics in primary and high school, even published some mini comics with a good mate. Eventually I had a couple of 3 panel funny strips published when I worked as a casual illustrator for some Sydney newspapers, but on the side I’d been developing a longer form sci fi adventure story for Sunday papers that was ultimately published up by Dark Horse in 2010. I’m an Illustrator by trade, but I’ve created the weekly comic strip Kookabarry, wrote and drew Harry the Dog – Newshound for many years, published Uncle Silas: GENETIS in 2010, and I’m now working on Uncle Silas: EARTH as well as my fantasy adventure story Fia & Miguel.
Who is the rubber-faced ruffian gurning and scrunging his way through the Cor!! Buster Humour Special?!
Why, it’s none other than Ricky Rubberneck – aka Faceache!
The boy with a “bendable bonce”, Ricky’s skin stretches like rubber and he can scrunge his face into anything, whether it’s mimicing others or turning into monstrous creatures – but somehow he usually ends up coming a cropper!
And now he’s back in the Cor!! Buster Humour Special, courtesy of writer Ned Hartley and artist Steve Mannion – and he’s even more gruesome! Make sure you check out how Ricky’s malleable mug gets him into trouble in this 48-page special, packed with stories, puzzles, and more!
First appearing in Jet in October 1971, and continuing in Buster, Faceache was created by the legendary cartoonist Ken Reid. The character was also also drawn by Frank McDiarmid, with scripts credited to Ken Reid, Roy Davies and Warrior publisher Dez Skinn, among others. His adventures came to an end in October 1988, but his stories are being collected by the Treasury of British Comics.
Who’s the baby-faced terror cutting a swathe of destruction through the pages of the new Cor!! Buster Humour Special?!
It’s Sweeny Toddler – the demon baby!
Along with his partner-in-crime, Henry Dog, Sweeny is the bane of parents, park-keepers, dog wardens, and babysitters everywhere – a nappy-clad whirlwind of chaos who’s never shy of causing as much destruction has he can whenever he doesn’t get his way!
And now he’s back in the Cor!! Buster Humour Special, courtesy of artist Tom Paterson, who worked on the strip in the 1980s. When Sweeny’s long-suffering folks become exhausted by his reign of terror, they try to put him into a nursery so they can get a day of rest – but it’s never that simple with Sweeny, and the nursery teacher soon discovers that this is one toddler who can’t be tamed!
Created by Leo Baxendale, Sweeny Toddler first appeared in Shiver and Shake in March 1973. His escapades lasted a whopping 27 years, ending in January 2000! Writer Graham Exton and artist Tom Paterson worked on the character in the 1980s, when the chaos was dialled up to 11! He later appeared in Whoopee! as well as Whizzer and Chips, and then Buster.
He’s the adorable ape with an insane love of bananas – and now he’s back in the Cor!! Buster Humour Special!
As a big ape, Kid Kong spent his days as a circus attraction, feared and mocked by the public and kept by a circus owner who restricted him to a measly single banana a day!
So, one night, he broke out and went looking for more ‘nanas! He stole a school uniform and pretended to look just like a regular kid – and that brought him to the door of Granny Smith, the near-sighted, hard-of-hearing old lady who’s been like a … well … granny to him ever since!
And now he’s back, courtesy of writer Alec Worley, artist Tiernen Trevallion, colourist Jim Boswell, and letterer A. Mann in the Cor!! Buster Humour Special, which is on sale now!
First appearing as the cover star of Monster Fun #1 in 1975, Kid Kong was created by Robert Nixon and later drawn by Rob Lee. He later transferred to sister title Buster when the two titles merged, and his advanetures lasted until January 1982.
Prepare to have your funny bone tickled this April, as the Treasury of British Comics brings you The Cor!! Buster Humour Special, 48 funny pages of beloved character from the golden age of British humour comics!
Classic characters in all-new strips by some fabulous names in modern British comics, perfect for readers who remember these characters from the first time and just as perfect for a new generation of readers!
We’ve rounded up a few of the fabulously funny comic makers responsible for putting the comical back into comics…
