Every Wednesday (Or Thursday If You Are British)

By John Freeman on 17 July 2009

Much has been made by British reviewers of DC’s new tabloid size Wednesday Comics. This is a modern take on the American style of comic based pullouts from the Sunday newspapers which ran multiple stories in colour in the same publication and were therefore very different from the small single story monthly titles that dominate the US comic market.

British readers (of a certain age) don’t see it for the American newspaper comics sections that it emulates, instead they look at it and with a shout of “Topper!” or “Beezer!” begin to wax nostalgically about lying on the floor reading these large format British anthology comics in their youth. Whilst readers didn’t really need to lie on the floor to read a small digest such as Commando, the size of the big British humour comics virtually demanded it.

Of course some British newspapers had similar concepts. The Sunday Times had the separate Funday Times section throughout the Nineties while the Sunday Post still retains The Broons and Oor Wullie strips in a similar way although the comics section of that paper is no longer the separate pull out that it once was.

As with the large format British titles, Wednesday Comics is an anthology and it is good to see that the American obsession with superheroes doesn’t extend to every single page. Indeed Britain’s own Dave Gibbons is flying the Union flag in some small way in it by writing the story of Jack Kirby’s post-apocalyptic character Komandi.

About the Author
Latest Posts

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.