Tube Surfing: 18 December 2008

• Latest details on the subscription-only weekly comic The DFC are among the updates to our British Comics On Sale Now list on the main downthetubes site. The page has gotten quite lengthy thanks to all the information some publishers are now kindly supplying, so we’ve split our information on new comics over two pages!

• Talking of The DFC, Mo-Bot High artist Neill Cameron is spreading festive cheer via his blog at, posting a Santa a Day from now ’till Christmas! Our favourite so far? Probably Kung Fu Santa

• E-Cards aren’t everyone’s cup of tea but they are a good way to reach a huge number of contacts especially as postal prices rise. Wizards Keep creator Tim Perkins has uploaded his to his blog: entitled “The Last Drop” it’s also available as a limited edition A5 card set, which you can purchase from Wizards Keep.

• Continuing our Christmas theme, over on Bear Alley, Steve Holland has published a special treat. Franco Giacomini has very kindly sent over scans of a sequence from an early strip drawn by Tony Weare, shortly before he began the strip on which his fame rests, Matt Marriott. City Under the Sea was published in 1954 in the Daily Herald. Enjoy!

• Talking of Christmas treats, cartoonist Lew Stringer has almost completed his round up of Christmas comic covers, with a post devoted to current covers yet to be published. Read part 9 over on Blimey! It’s Another Blog About Comics!

Rod McKie has written an interesting article for the Forbidden Planet International blog, talking about cartooning today, the fewer spots open to cartoonists in newspapers and journals. Rod says it is a bit of a downer but he has a second related part coming which will be more positive.

• It’s not British comics-related, but since I work on the site, a quick plug for Nicholas Yanes interview with Brahm Revel on scifipulse, who’s written and drawn Guerillas is a nine part series published by Image Comics. “Guerillas takes place during the Vietnam Conflict and follows a new recruit who accidentally falls in with a platoon of experimentally trained chimpanzee soldiers,” explains Revel. “The story centres on the relationships and bonds that form within a platoon during the hardships of war despite race, creed, or in this case, species.”

• An appeal for help now. Over on ComicBitsOnline Terry Hooper is asking if anyone can help with scans of some British small press comics from the 1960s and 70s, including some with some fantastic titles such as Owl Jumpers and The Toad Papers.

The Twelve artist Chris Weston is back from abraod and back in the saddle on his blog, with some samples of his The Little Guy strip for Time Out, which he says he’s hoping to get polished off over christmas. No rest for The Weston.

• Someone never lost for words when it comes to Internet posting is Warren Ellis… until that is, he read this strip by Dharbin entitled Warren Ellis: King of the Internet. “I am not entirely sure what to say,” Ellis responded.

• Mark Wallinger’s transparent TARDIS will be part of an exhibition at London’s Hayward Gallery in February before touring to Leeds and Swansea. Wallinger’s work is a full-size re-creation of a traditional police box in mirrored steel. Placed in the corner of a room, the mirrored surface gives the impression that the sculpture is transparent. “In the early days of Doctor Who the Tardis always faded away and disappeared,” he tells The Guardian. “I wanted to make an object that was trying not to be there,” said Wallinger who is perhaps best known for his work State Britain, a recreation at Tate Britain of Brian Haw‘s protest display outside parliament. He won the Turner Prize in 2007.

• Talking of Doctor Who, Tony Lee has published a sneek peak of a double page spread from #6 his Doctor Who: The Forgotten story for IDW featuring all ten Doctors. Just a shame the thing isn’t officially on sale in the Uk when it comes out in the New Year, eh?

• And finally for this round up, with all the doom and gloom about despite the Christmas season, is there anything to look forward to in 2009? Well, look out for some baragins in the sales and early months from retailers. UpMyStreet.com reckons that in January and beyond prices are set to get even lower as they still clamour for our money. “This could mean the less successful follow in the footsteps of Woolworths, but we might as well enjoy the bargains while we can.” Not all prices are low of course, Diamond having implemented an immediate price hike on many US comics on sale in the specialist stores recently…

• (For some genuine Christmas Cheer, try here! Courtesy of the ever wonderful Etherington Brothers).



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