Author Archives
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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Planetary Stories with a British flavour…
(via writer Erwin K. Roberts): The coming of the new year also brings new issues of the quarterly sister web magazines Planetary Stories and Pulp Spirit, described by their editor as an online homage to the S-F pulp magazines of… Read More ›
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Weetabix to launch new Shaun the Sheep Promo
Shaun the Sheep creators Aardman have teamed up with Weetabix to launch a special promotion on over 20 million packs of Weetabix, Minis, Bitesize and Ready Brek in the UK. Yes – that’s right. 20 million boxes of Shaun covered… Read More ›
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Commando Webbing: 12 January 2009
Over Christmas the boffins on the Commando Mag site launched a sneek attack under the radar and added a fourth complete on-line Commando story before they had even finished the third. Last Laugh is a World War II story of… Read More ›
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Paul Cornell Signing in London
Captain Britain and Doctor Who writer Paul Cornell will be signing copies of the Captain Britain and MI13 – Secret Invasion graphic novel, the first collection of the Marvel Comics series, at Forbidden Planet later this week (Thursday 15th January)…. Read More ›
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New Judge Dredd Movie: First Look
(via Rufus Dayglo and I09): 2000AD artist Jock has posted some designs for the new Judge Dredd film online, prompting excitement from fans hoping this time round the movie won’t turn into the disappointment for many of the Sylvester Stallone… Read More ›
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Tintin is 80!
Happy birthday Tintin! 80 years ago this weekend (on 10 January 1929), Hergé’s Tintin made his first appearance in Le Petit Vingtième, the weekly children’s supplement of Le XXe Siècle. With Steven Spielberg working on a Hollywood film of the… Read More ›
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Woolworths RIP
What is the least popular of the current batch of Doctor Who action figures? If the closing down sales in Woolworths were anything to go by it was the Destroyed Cassandra, a toy which rather looks like the sprue left… Read More ›
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Panel Borders Podcast News
Alex Fitch of ResonanceFM and Panel Borders has been in touch with information on his new broadcasts / podcasts: On Air Now: Strip – The work of Raymond Briggs The UK’s only weekly radio show about comic books returns after… Read More ›
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Fox Challenged on Watchmen
Above: the latest promotional video for Watchmen featuring more on the Minute Men’s role in the movies story and includes brief interviews with Zack Snyder and Dave Gibbons who worked on the graphic novel with comic’s writer Alan Moore. By… Read More ›
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Ex Astris on Clickwheel
The Ex Astris strips first featured on ROK Comics are now appearing on Rebellion’s iPod and iPhone service Clickwheel. Ex Astris is a multi-strand CGI-created strip written by John Freeman and drawn by Bill Storie (aka Mike Nicoll). The strip… Read More ›
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Tube Surfing: 8 January 2009
• Things to buy this month – Marvel Heroes #3 from Panini UK, which allegedly features an Iron Man story by Al Ewing and Kev Walker, and Judge Dredd Megazine #280, on sale now in UK newsagents, which has the… Read More ›
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Frost, Pegg for TinTin?
After what seems like months of no news on the project since it was first announced back in May last year, reports are appearing online suggesting Simon Pegg and Nick Frost have reportedly signed up to play the Thompson Twins… Read More ›
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In Review: Aya of Yop City
• Written by Marguerite Abouet • Art by Clement Oubrerie • UK Publisher: Jonathan Cape • Released: 15 January 2009 For the residents of Yopougon, everyday life is good. It is the early 1970s, a golden time – work is… Read More ›
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Mike Battle: Stirred, Not Shaken!
For years Sgt Mike Battle, the creation of artist-writer Graham Pearce, has been defending America (and sometimes her allies) from harm… but in his latest adventure he has to call in some help in the form of a certain British… Read More ›
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More Manga in Barrow
Kate Holden from IndieManga has been in touch to let us know she’s running another Manga workshop in Barrow. “Bookings won’t be open for a week or two yet, but it’s still free of charge and will be at Barrow… Read More ›
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Dick Turpin Heads for UK Comic Shops
UK indie publisher TimeBomb Comics has gotten off to a great start in 2009 with their Dick Turpin comic listed in this month’s UK Section of Diamond Previews, making it available to order from all UK and European comic shops…. Read More ›
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Poopsheet Wants Your Comics!
The Poopsheet Foundation, a US-based organisation whose primary focus is mini-comics and their history, from their underground/new wave “birth” in the 1970s to the current scene of today, is actively seeking comics collections both for use in their web site’s… Read More ›
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Tube Surfing: 5 January 2009
• Empire Online, illustrating the news with a tasty image of Judge Dredd by Dylan Teague, report Danny Boyle’s DNA films has snatched up the rights to return the famous Judge to our screens in a story that remains so… Read More ›
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Wallace & Gromit Game Peek
It seems to be a day for Wallace & Gromit news – no surprise, perhaps, given the ratings success for the pair over the festive season. Telltale Games have just released the first in-game screenshots from their upcoming new series,… Read More ›
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Shades of Yesteryear! Looking Back at British Comic Fanzines
Over on social community Facebook, former 1980s fanzine editor Russell Willis, who now lives in Japan, has posted a huge number of covers to some fondly-remembered British fanzines of the period, including this example of SCAN, edited by me,… Read More ›