London Film and Comic Con in Pictures

By John Freeman on October 7, 2013 • ( 2 )

London Film and Comic Con 2013 - Steve Cook

Photo © Steve Cook

Here are some of the brilliant Steve Cook‘s fantastic photographs from this weekend’s London Film and Comic Con, which he has kindly allowed me to re-post. Kindly invited by Mike Conroy to the event (thank you, Mike!) had a great time on Saturday, catching up with some of the old team from Marvel UK as we recalled the heady days 25 years ago now. The company now long gone, absorbed by Panini in 1995, back then the company was publishing titles such as Transformers and The Real Ghostbusters for the British news stand (Simon Furman recalled that at one point Transformers was selling some 250,000 copies per week).

Transformers artist Geoff Senior and writer Simon Furman, who are busy working on a new creator-owned project, due for release next year. Photo © Steve Cook

Andy Lanning and Alan Cowsill were also on hand, offering some tantalising hints of things to come in their Revolutionary War mini series for Marvel, which will see the return of Death’s Head II and other Marvel UK characters in January 2014. Liam Sharp is contributing one cover for the series, as are other Marvel UK artists.

Steve White, now Senior Editor at Titan Comics, also talked about Marvel UK’s approach to its planned range of comics for the US market back in the early 1990s and how at one point it was seen as an opportunity to create more Vertigo/2000AD styled titles, rather than the superhero-skewed fare the company eventually published under Paul Neary’s direction.

Me with Rian Hughes, who was at the event promoting his new book Soho Dives, Soho Divas. Rian and I go way back, on and off – his Science Service for Belgian publisher Magic Strip was my first commercial commission as a comic writer, a pairing brought about by Paul Gravett and Peter Stanbury back in the 1980s. The JNT-inspired finger point seemed appropriate for the moment. Honest. Photo © Steve Cook

London Film and Comic Con was positively filled to the brim with TV and film-related actors doing signings and the Comic Zone seemed fairly busy, with artists such as Stephen Baskerville, PJ Holden, Rian Hughes, Dave Taylor, Lee Townsend and many others in attendance (including Ian Sharman and Conor and Lizzie Boyle), and the team behind the new Brighton graphic novel busy promoting that great-looking new book.

The event was great fun and it’s definitely worth bookmarking their web site for news on the next event.

Resident Alien Writer Pete Hogan. Photo © Steve Cook

Photo © Steve Cook

• More great pics here: http://secret-oranges.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/london-film-comic-con-2013.html. These are all of course © Steve Cook and you should contact him for commercial use enquiries.

About the Author
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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.