The mysterious 5 By 5 Festival announced for this year, which caused plenty of discussion on comics news groups on both sides of the Atlantic after it was wrongly linked with rumoured plans for a ComicCon in the UK, has been cancelled.
Organiser Liam Fisher told downthetubes this morning that the Festival has been cancelled “due to a lead sponsor dropping out last minute.
“To continue this year we would have to charge and that’s not something we want to do,” he says. “We’re planning to launch the festival next year exactly how we intended it to be and we’ll be presenting monthly four day film events from August onwards.”
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John is the founder of downthetubes, launched in 1998. He is a comics and magazine editor, writer, and Press Officer for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He also runs Crucible Comic Press.
Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine and Overkill for Marvel UK, Babylon 5 Magazine, Star Trek Magazine, and its successor, Star Trek Explorer, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics; and has edited several comic collections and graphic novels, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”, and Hancock: The Lad Himself, by Stephen Walsh and Keith Page.
He’s the writer of comics such as Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs”, with Dave Hailwood.
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