Comics Britania

By John Freeman on August 31, 2007

There’s been some interesting repsonses to the upcoming BBC4 series Comics Britannia on various comics boards.

As usual, anything like this is bound to be dissected and judged before it has even aired but in general, response seems positive, which bodes well for the series which will offer a general history of British comics and more.

I think those of us who have been involved in any way with TV production recently and in the past know that what we get on screen may well be at odds with the detail that we, as fans might hope for. But the very fact that the BBC commissioned something like this is great news. I also know that the team behind the series worked very hard finding the right people to talk to because they picked my brains often enough and I was pleased to be able to help.

If ratings are good, perhaps it will spur on further commissioning: more one-to-one interviews with top creators on both sides of the pond would be good; perhaps even a look at some of the European comics that have been a success here (or not, but are a success elsewhere that we should take an interest in).

We live in interesting times for comics. I’m having near daily chats with TV and animation people who are looking at the medium, keen to exploit its “short form” as a way to better deliver message on an increasingly more visual web, where despite the success of video, faster digestion of a message is seen as required (I’m not saying that’s necessarily a good thing, just that it’s happening).

Some organisations are taking an interest in comics purely for their potential to exploit them in other media, but there does seem to be an increasing awareness that comics offer a good means to deliver campaign and advertising messages, as well as entertain and provoke.

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John Freeman

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.