BLIMEY! The Blog of British Comics: Cor

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Wednesday, February 13, 2019

EIGHT new specials coming our way from Rebellion this year!

Rebellion Publishing have just announced the titles of the specials they'll be publishing this year... and there are more than we expected! We already knew about some, such as the Cor!! and Buster Special and the 2000AD Villains Takeover Special but there will also be several more!

The supplied image states that these aren't the final covers. Hopefully the Cor!! and Buster Special will use the original logos (which were very strong and stylishly timeless).

Anyway, here's the press release...

Rebellion is making holidays special again this year with a whole slate of classic comic book specials for new readers and nostalgic parents alike!

We're resurrecting some of the most beloved comic books in British history – from humour to football, from superheroes to girls’ comics, they'll be packed with all-new material!

SEVEN new specials will be storming the newsstands between April and October, each one honouring a different part of the British comic industry - the Cor!! and Buster Special, 2000 AD Villains Takeover Special, 2000 AD Regened, 2000 AD Sci-Fi Special, Tammy and Jinty Special, The Vigilant, Roy of the Rovers 65th Anniversary Special, Scream and Misty Presents The Thirteenth Floor.

Buster and Cor!! were two of the biggest humour comics in Britain – and now they’re back and they’ve brought their friends! The 48-page Cor!! and Buster Special will hit newsstands in on 17th April, retailing at £4.99. From the world’s naughtiest baby, Sweeny Toddler, to Gums, the most incompetent shark in the seven seas, this one-shot special will feature top comics talent including a cover by Neil Googe (The Flash), and strips by Ned Hartley (Star Wars), Cavan Scott (Doctor Who), John Freeman (Crucible), Lew Stringer (Combat Colin), Abigail Bulmer (2000 AD) and Tanya Roberts (TMNT)!

The dastardly and the iniquitous will be taking over 2000 AD on 4th May – the 32-page US-format 2000 AD Villains Takeover special sees the baddies from some of the 2000 AD’s biggest strips, including Judge Dredd, Strontium Dog, and Sláine, get their moment in the spotlight! Available only from comic book stores for the low price of just 99p/99c!

On 8th May, the kids are taking over as 2000 AD gives way to 2000 AD Regened – a one-off special issue of the Galaxy’s Greatest Comic intended for all ages! Following the massively successful Free Comic Book Day issue of Regened in 2018, the pint-sized anti-heroes return for another bumper Prog for kids of all ages and species! 2000 AD Prog 2130 will be 100 packed pages, retailing at £4.99 from all good stockists!

In 2018, the comics world lost one of its best creators – Carlos Ezquerra. This June, the 2000 AD Sci-Fi Special will pay tribute to the co-creator of Judge Dredd and Strontium Dog with a special issue focusing on some of his greatest moments. It will also include his unpublished work on Specter, a new series he was working on with long-time collaborator John Wagner. The 48-page special hits shelves on 19th June at £4.99.

In the 1970s and 1980s, comics aimed at girls outsold those aimed at boys – and Tammy and Jinty were two of the biggest titles. This June, these classic titles return, retooled for the 21st Century and with a host of new creators producing high-quality strips that pay tribute to the legacy of trail-blazing comics while introducing a new audience to the medium! The 48-page Tammy and Jinty Special lands on 27 June, priced at £4.99.

After its smash hit debut last year, The Vigilant returns in August, resurrecting the greatest home-grown superheroes Britain has to offer – a team unlike any other, a challenge none have faced before! Even if superhero comics have never been your thing, take up the call of The Vigilant with this 64-page special – out on 14th August , priced at £4.99.

Following his spectacular return to comics, Roy of the Rovers gets his first new special in September for his 65th birthday and the start of the new footie season! The golden-footed hero is back for a new generation! The Roy of the Rovers 65th Anniversary Special kicks off on 11th September with a bumper 128-page £9.99 issue!

And in time for Hallowe’en, the Scream and Misty Presents The Thirteenth Floor arrives on 16th October with a 48-page £4.99 special filled with the best chills that British comics can deliver! Created by John Wagner, Alan Grant, and José Ortiz, The Thirteenth Floor is where the homicidal caretaker computer Max puts those he doesn't like – a mysterious floor of the tower block he controls where he keeps their worst fears. Few, if any, survive if they get on Max’s wrong side!

All the Rebellion specials will be available from good newsagents, as well as comic book stores via Diamond Distribution, and through 2000 AD’s webshop and apps.

Release dates for six of the specials are:

Cor!! and Buster Special - 17th April
2000 AD Villains Special - 1st May
2000 AD Sci-Fi Special Carlos Ezquerra Tribute - 19th June
Tammy and Jinty Special - 27th June
The Vigilant - 14th August

Scream and Misty Presents The Thirteenth Floor – 16th October

A mock up by me, using the original logos.

Rebellion currently have a special offer where you can order six of the eight specials as a bundle. The page to go to is here:
https://shop.2000ad.com/catalogue/specials/B0011

Wednesday, January 30, 2019

Announcing the COR!! AND BUSTER SPECIAL

Cover by Neil Googe.

This April, Rebellion are launching a Spring Special featuring brand new stories of classic humour characters!

Cor!! and Buster Special features a cover by Neil Googe showing a cast of classic characters in Trafalgar Square, including Ivor Lott and Tony Broke, Faceache, Frankie Stein, X-Ray Specs and Buster himself, - and I'm pleased to say that the special will include a three-page intro strip that I drew, from a script by John Freeman.

Here's the PR....

The greatest characters from Britain’s golden age of humour comics return this Easter for a one-shot celebration of daft and zany fun!

Rebellion Publishing is proud to announce the Cor!! and Buster Special will be tickling your funny bone this spring and a whole new generation of readers are about to experience comics’ humour at its finest!

The 48-page special will hit newsstands in the UK and Ireland, and comic book stores in the UK, Ireland, and North America, on 17th April, retailing at £4.99.

It will be the first use of the vast number of classic humour characters by Rebellion since it acquired the archive of comics publisher IPC and the Cor!! and Buster Special offers new takes on some of the greatest characters from Britain’s golden age of humour comics, with an edgy celebration of daft, zany fun.

From the world’s naughtiest baby, Sweeny Toddler, to Gums, the most incompetent shark in the seven seas, this one-shot special will feature top comics talent including a cover by Neil Googe (The Flash), and strips by Ned Hartley (Star Wars), Cavan Scott (Doctor Who), Abigail Bulmer (2000 AD) and Tanya Roberts (TMNT).

The special will also complement Funny Pages, Rebellion's title for Free Comic Book Day on 4th May, which will be available for free from participating comic book stores around the world.

Editor on the Cor! and Buster Special, Keith Richardson, said: "Humour titles like Cor!! and Buster were a massive part of many a childhood but have been sadly missing from the newsstand for years - the time is ripe to bring these amazing characters back for a new generation. Just at a time when many kids will be on their Easter break, this special will introduce them to some of our favourite classic characters, but all with a modern twist. For us, it's time to put the comical back into comics!"

Humour comics were once a constant staple of the British newsstand, with dozens of titles filled by some of the industry's greatest talents, such as Leo Baxendale and Ken Reid. IPC/Fleetway titles such as Cor!!, Buster, Whizzer and Chips, and Shiver and Shake entertained generations of children for decades. They were part of the acquisition by Rebellion of arguably the world's largest archive of English-language comics in 2016 and 2018.

More info soon, - and keep an eye on the Down the Tubes website for an exclusive interview with the project's editor, Keith Richardson!

Sunday, December 31, 2017

The New Year COR!! (1973)

If my settings are right, this post should go live around midnight so a Happy New Year for 2018... and for 1973 in this case! Here are a few examples from the New Year edition of Cor!! which introduced The Goodies as a new strip, based on the very popular TV show of the time.

The cover art is by Joe Colquhoun, proving that he was as adept at humour as he was for adventure strips. Amongst many other strips, Joe was the original artist on Roy of the Rovers in the 1950s, drew the adventures of fighter ace Paddy Payne in the 1960s, and the gritty anti-war strip Charley's War in the 1970s/80s.

He'd used his lighter touch on strips such as Cap'n Codsmouth and Football Family Robinson for Jag so was ideal to draw The Goodies strip for Cor!!

Cor!! was mainly a humour comic, with an occasional light adventure strip. One of the funnies was Whacky, a boy fated to find himself in situations that led to him being whacked on the backside. (It was the 1970s.) The sadistic teacher in this strip gets his just desserts, but it really does read like a very peculiar strip to modern sensibilities with "Sir" obsessed with whacking the boy for no other reason than the teacher obviously gets a kick out of it! Art by Mike Lacey...

5 Minute Wanda was another new strip that began in that issue. Some IPC humour characters were based on a very flimsy premise. In this case, a girl who gets bored after five minutes. Art by Graham Allen...

Jasper the Grasper had started out as a very short lived series in Wham! in the 1960s, drawn by Ken Reid. This revived series for Cor!! was drawn by Trevor Metcalfe. That's still Ken's old logo though.

Donovan's Dad was originally by Terry Bave but this one is drawn by Les Barton (who'd been the original artist on I-Spy for Sparky). I don't know if this was a fill-in or whether Les was the permanent replacement, but it's a very nice page.

Eddie - He's Always Bored was so similar to 5 Minute Wanda that I'm surprised both characters appeared in the same comic. Both strips even had the same artist in Graham Allen. It was always good to see Graham's work though, as he'd been one of the regulars on the Odhams comics and the first artist on The Nervs for Smash!

Most of these strips are now ©Rebellion Publishing. I think Jasper the Grasper may be still owned by Time Inc. though (as it originated in Wham!) and The Goodies are presumably still owned by... The Goodies!

Thursday, November 30, 2017

Introducing COR!! (1970)

Cor!! only lasted for four years but it's well remembered by readers who bought it in the 1970s. The second launch of IPC's new humour line (after Whizzer and Chips), issue 1 was published on 30th May 1970 (although advertised as 1st June). Before that though, it was announced in other comics. The half page advert above, sharing space with paid ads, appeared in Tiger dated 23rd May 1970 (on sale 16th May 1970).

A week later, this four page ad appeared in Tiger dated 30th May 1970 (on sale 23rd May), revealing a little more (but not much) about the new comic. (Click on the spread to see it larger.)

A week later, on 30th May 1970, Cor!! was launched and another four page ad appeared in its companion comics. This one from Tiger dated 6th June...

The ads were no more than teasers really, but it was enough to secure Cor!! a stable readership. (Ads appeared on TV too, long gone now perhaps.) Here's the cover of the actual first issue, drawn by Mike Lacey...

You can read more about Cor!! No.1 in a blog post I wrote several years ago...
https://lewstringer.blogspot.co.uk/2010/05/40-year-flashback-cor-no1.html

Sunday, July 23, 2017

BUSTER AND COR!! - First merged issue (1974)

At fifteen years old in 1974 I was going through my "British comics are just for kids" phase and didn't really appreciate what a good comic the merged Buster and Cor!! was. At the time, I was beginning to "grow out" of humour comics and stopped buying Buster shortly after.

In truth, Buster and Cor!! was a solid comic with some great talent working on it. At 15, I was too old for it of course, but in retrospect, looking at it from a creative viewpoint, it was one of the best comics around at that time. Let's take a look at a few of the strips from this first merged issue...

One of the significant things about this issue is that the Buster strip itself saw a change of artist from Angel Nadal to Reg Parlett (who also drew the front cover). I'd grown up with Nadal's version and wasn't too keen on the change, but it can't be denied that Parlett was ideally suited to the strip and its fast paced slapstick situations...

The merger also saw some new strips starting that week that hadn't been seen in either Buster or Cor!! before. One of which was Snooper, by the always-wonderful Leo Baxendale...

Whenever comics merged, it was always a concern that some favourites would be pushed out. Thankfully, Ken Reid's excellent Faceache strip had proved popular to survive. (A collection of Faceache strips will be published by Rebellion in November.)

Another new strip was Marney the Fox, written by Scott Goodall and drawn by John Stokes. It was rare for strips in Buster to tug on the emotions as much as Marney did but it made for compelling reading. (Marney the Fox is another collection coming from Rebellion this year, and the one I'm looking forward to the most.)

Val's Vanishing Cream was one of the strips that had transferred over from Cor!! and was drawn by Mike Lacey. A typical IPC humour strip in that it featured a kid with a gimmick. That could restrict the humour somewhat but this is a good episode...

This issue gave the comic the opportunity to fill in new readers with the backstory of Fishboy before he embarked on a new adventure. A kind of British equivalent to Aquaman, this is another strip by Scott Goodall and John Stokes that deserves collecting.

There was a lot of good material in this issue and this was just a sample of pages. Rebellion now own a lot of classic material ripe for reprinting so I hope that readers support the Treasury of British Comics books so that we see more!
https://treasuryofbritishcomics.com

Thursday, August 25, 2016

Great News, Chums! Rebellion buy Egmont's archive

Classic comics of the 1970s.

Breaking news: Rebellion, the publishers of 2000AD, have acquired the rights to the archive of Egmont comics. That includes comics that were previously published by IPC from 1970 onwards such as Cor!!, Battle Picture Weekly, Action, Whizzer and Chips, Jet, Shiver and Shake, Monster Fun, Whoopee!, Tammy, Misty, Speed, Thunder, Krazy, Scorcher, Score 'n' Roar, Roy of the Rovers and more.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-37177877

Although it's too early to say what Rebellion's plans are I'm speculating that we'll be seeing book collections of classic strips, not the actual return of weekly comics to newsstands. After all, they already have a collection of Misty strips coming out next month, so I'm guessing we'll see more product like that, which will be excellent.

Cover art by John Richardson.

This is promising news as Egmont had done very little with their back catalogue and it was mostly languishing in limbo. Of course, the icing on the cake would be if Rebellion could also gain the rights to the comics published prior to 1970, which are now owned by Time Inc (who also seem to be doing nothing with them).

Amongst the strips I'd like to see collected are Adam Eterno and Black Max from Thunder, and a compilation of Ken Reid's Creepy Creations and World Wide Weirdies illustrations would be perfect. Let's see the return of The One-Eyed Wonk of Wigan!

No doubt more news on this exciting topic will be revealed soon!

Art by Ken Reid.

Friday, December 18, 2015

The Christmas COR!! (1970)

This first festive edition of IPC's Cor!! was packed with Christmas strips from some of the top artists of the time. Under the nicely decorated logo, the Gus Gorilla strip was by Alf Saporito. Anthropomorphous animal strips were a bit passé by 1970 but Gus maintained his position throughout the four year run of the comic.

On page 2 of this 32 page comic, with art by Mike Lacey, Whacky was a strip about a kid fated to meet corporal punishment every week. Thankfully, such practices in school died out a few decades ago. In fact it wasn't that common even in 1970. I'm glad to say I was never whacked at school, and very few of my fellow pupils were.

The great Reg Parlett had a number of strips in Cor!! but I've just chosen Freddie Fang to show here today. Top cartooning from a master of his art.

That week's episode of the Kid Chameleon serial sensibly didn't divert into a Christmas theme for the sake of it. However, with full colour art by Joe Colquhoun it's too good to ignore...

The other adventure serial in Cor!! at the time was Robby Hood and his One Man Band. Artwork by Ron Turner. This one did employ a festive theme.

A strip by another favourite artist of mine; Graham Allen (who was the original artist of The Nervs for Smash!) drawing Spoilsport...

On the back page, another popular Cor!! character; Teacher's Pet, drawn by Norman Mansbridge...

There's a few more old Christmas comics to show before the 25th so come back soon!

Saturday, December 06, 2014

Colquhoun in colour!

We're probably all in agreement that the late Joe Colquhoun was one of the greatest artists of British comics. He was a master of black and white strips as evidenced from his work on strips such as Roy of the Rovers and Paddy Payne in the 1960s and Charley's War in the 1980s. In 1968 Fleetway gave Joe the opportunity to produce a strip in full colour when Football Family Robinson debuted on the covers of Jag dated 27th July 1968.

Most comics of the time were printed on cheap newsprint, where the only colour would be added by the art department as basic flats due to the limitations of the printing method. However, Jag had the luxury of web offset printing by Steel Bros. of Carlisle, which meant that artists could colour their own work with an unlimited palette to suit the superior paper and printing. For most of its short run, Jag was also a big tabloid comic, so the artwork really stood out.

Here's the second episode of Football Family Robinson, from Jag dated 3rd August 1968...

...and episode three from Jag dated 10th August 1968...

Sadly, Jag didn't last, and when IPC took control they merged it into Tiger in 1969. Joe Colquhoun continued on the artwork though, with the strip now running as a centre spread every week. This episode is from Tiger and Jag 17th May 1969...

IPC tended to shift artists around at times and by late 1969 Joe Coloquhoun had been replaced on Football Family Robinson by John Gillatt. (Colquhoun was put onto a new Tiger strip, Splash Gorton, in black and white.) However, in 1970 IPC's new humour comic Cor!! was launched, which initially featured an adventure strip in its centre pages; Kid Chameleon. The strip was illustrated by Joe Colquhoun in full colour.

I'm not entirely convinced that episode one of Kid Chameleon was coloured by Joe as it doesn't look like his technique, but anyway here are the first three episodes of the strip from Cor!! Nos.1 to 3, dated 6th, 13th, and 20th June 1970...

Truly a brilliant artist!

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Running from 2006 to 2019, BLIMEY! was dedicated to British comics past and present. The images of old comics on my blog are copyright their respective publishers and are only used here for review purposes. They have been scanned from my own personal comics collection, in over 50 years of collecting.The prose articles, with the exception of press releases, are Copyright © Lew Stringer and must not be reproduced without permission.