Cinebook - Backlist Titles | 2009

Guess what, just when I took a breath thinking that we have reviewed pretty much 90% of the titles released by Cinebook as Backlist in 2008, here we are pounded with another set of classic titles from the Franco-Belgian Genre.  Yeap, Cinebook have launched their much expected second batch of Backlist titles to mark the new year 2009, in India.

In our foremost Cinebook debut post, back in 2008, we debated on the topic of whether the deal between Cinebook and Westland will continue, bringing us these wonderful titles, at a bargain price. 

But, subsequent enquiries to Westland didn’t return any favourable response. One of the bigger problems with Indian based companies, is that their zero-response attitude towards readers or fans, unless you have links with a distributor or an inside friend. So, the news of whether or when we will see the next batch of Cinebook, was never known until Oct’08.

On Oct’08, as a desperate act, I logged a request to our dear old friend, Terry of CBO, to check directly with Cinebook’s Olivier Cadic to assess the probability of Indian re-entry.  Guess what, the relentless Terry came back within a couple of a days, with this good news on CBO.  According to which, Westland and Cinebook brokered a return deal at the Frankfurt Book Fair, last year. 

Well, it was sweet news to me, and since then I was expecting to see them hit the stands in India.  My further queries to Westland office on the availability of these titles, were met with a cold shoulder, as always.

Nevertheless, here we are with another set of wonderful issues from Cinebook.  One thing I feared was about the pricing of the titles this time around, with the economic slowdown. But, the good hearts in the biz, seem to have stuck on with their earlier success mantra of bargain prices, tailor made to Indian Comics fan’s budget.

So, without further due, here is the complete list of Cinebook comics available in India, as part of the first batch for 2009:

Aldebran/Betelguese INR 350 | Leo | 4 Titles   # 01: The Catastrophe # 02: The Group # 03: The Creature  # 01: The Survivors	Alpha Renard & Jigounov | 2 Titles  # 01: The Exchange INR 350 # 02: Wolves’ Wages INR 195
Billy and Buddy  INR 195 | Roba | 1 Title # 01: Remember this, Buddy?	Blake & Mortimer INR 250 | Hamme & Benoit | 3 Titles  # 04: The Francis Blake Affair # 05: The Strange Encounter # 06: S.O.S.Meteors
Buck Danny  INR 195 | F Bergese | 1 Title # 01: Night of the Serpent	Cedric INR 195 | Leloup & Cauvin | 1 Title  #01: High-Risk Class
Clifton  INR 195 | Groot & Macherot | 1 Title # 06: Kidnapping	Ducoboo INR 195 | Zidrou & Godi | 1 Title   # 03: Your Answers or Your Life
Green Manor INR 350 | Vehlmann & Bodart | 1 Title  # 02: The Inconvenience of Being Dead	IR$ INR 350 | Desberg & Vrancken | 1 Title  # 02: Blue Ice
Lady S INR 350 | Hamme & Aymond | 1 Title  # 01: Here’s to Suzie	Largo Winch INR 350 | Hamme & Francq | 1 Title # 03: Dutch Connection
Lucky Luke INR 195 | Morris & Goscinny | 4 Titles  # 12: The Rivals of Painful Gulch # 15: The Daltons in the Blizzard # 16: The Black Hills # 17: Apache Canyon	Melusine INR 195 | Clarke & Gilson | 1 Title   #03: The Vampires’ Ball
Orbital  INR 195 | Pelle & Runberg | 1 Title # 01: Scars	Pandora’s Box  INR 195 | Pagot & Alcante| 1 Title # 01: Pride
Papyrus  INR 195 | De Gieter | 1 Title # 03: The Assassinated Pharaoh	Queen Margot INR 250 | Cadic & Derenne | 1 Title  # 03: Endangered Love
Scared to Death INR 195 | Mauricet & Vanholme | 1 Title # 02: Malevolence and Mandrake	Bellybuttons, The INR 195 | De Gieter | 1 Title # 01: Who do you think you are?
Bluecoats, The  INR 195 | Lambil & Cauvin | 2 Titles #01: Robertsonville Prison #02: The Navy Blues	Scorpion, The  INR 350 | Desberg & Marini | 2 Titles  # 01: The Devil’s Mark # 02: The Devil in the Vatican
Thorgal INR 350 | Hamme & Rosinski | 2 Titles # 04: The Archers # 05: The Land of Qa	Yakari INR 195 | Job & Derib | 1 Title  #06: In the Land of Wolves
Yoko Tsuno INR 195 | Leloup | 1 Title   # 03: The Prey and the Ghost

Few notable misses from this set are:

• Lucky Luke: As expected, #11: Western Circus, #13: The Tenderfoot, #14: The Dashing White Cowboy released by Cinebook in 2008, have been given a miss, since they were published in India by Tara Press, already.   
• Iznogoud: Cinebook have published 3 issues of Iznogoud up until 2009, but they chose wisely against distributing them in India; The reason is that Euro Books have currently planned to publish 12 issues of Iznogoud in India in 2009.
• Largo Winch: #2 issue was released back in 2008, but it is missed out in this lot.  I was certainly hoping to see the story unfold in this issue, but it seems we might have to wait for the next batch, and be content with #3 for now.
• Biggles Recounts: Issue #3 was missed out. No qualms, as I didn’t find the series impressive enough to miss. But #3 was promising enough, since it was to talk about Wright Brothers and their inventions.
• Biggles: Spitfire Parade was released by Cinebook in 2008, but as Euro Books have already published majority from the Bergese set in India, the miss is understandable.
     
  Note: As per the latest news, Cinebook have stopped publishing Biggles titles, due to a legal disagreement between the Original French publisher Le Lombard and the people who represent Biggles copyrights. I hope that the issues are sorted out soon, and we will get to see more Biggles titles under the brand of Cinebook.

Due to the recent change in the distribution cycle of Cinebook in India, we would not have to wait for a year or so for each batch of those wonderful titles. Westland have now started ordering Cinebook titles every month on an incremental basis, which is a good news for me, and most importantly will help to continue the series uninterrupted.

As you might have guessed, we will be looking into each of these series more in detail in the upcoming posts at Comicology.  So Stay Tuned, to know more on these gems from the Franco-Belgian Genre.

Here is a snapshot (at the left) of my Complete Cinebook collection (from both batches of 2008 & 2009).  Doesn’t it gives a good show :). It certainly looks huge on my shelf, and only back in 2007 I was thinking that Euro Books is the biggest set in recent years (snapshot at right).

No doubts, Cinebook instalments are much better in content than Euro Books. 

Not to forget it is also much heavier on your pockets then the later. But isn’t it worth the money? :)

Talking of Collections, I couldn’t help but talking about about one of my largest buys ever recently.  Couple of years back, when I visited Uncle Sam’s country, I picked up one issue each of Titan Book’s New Modesty & Bond Series Collection.  They were highly priced (when converted to INR, obviously), but I thought I could own it as a one-off showcase piece in my collection.

But, when I recently witnessed Chennai’s Odyssey Bookstore, showcasing the complete Bond & Modesty collection on the stands, I couldn’t stop myself from the tempting offer laying before me to own them, even though they were priced directly at the exchange rate, once again. Dollar seems to have followed me all along :-).

Nevertheless, the classic comic strips of Bond & Modesty deserve their price, and I convinced myself over a month, to lay my hands on the complete set in 2009.

It remains (and I hope it stays) till date my biggest spend on any specific comic series.

At least, the one good thing I did amidst all these buys, is opting for an email Credit Card statement instead of the traditional physical ones.  Well, as all you might know, It saves me from some prying eyes back home, and a lot of trouble thereafter :).

Well, we are in for a long deal of reviews at Comicology, with all these recent buys.  So strap on, and let’s zoom past them for months to come.

Last Updated: 23 December 2010 - with new Cinebook Titles for the year.

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Siruvar Malar – Survival #1-11 | 1988

When I started Comicology few years back, I wondered would I be able to keep up the tempo and the same energy level to continue it for long?  Well, I believe that question is now partly answered, as I am proud to announce that this our 50th Comic post at Comicology.  The 25th Comic Post at Comicology was only achieved in September last year.  So, with all your permissions, let me pat myself for being more active up recently.   

It is certainly a time to cherish, and what better way than posting about a comic series announced at the start of the year 2009, featured in one of the beloved Tamil Children’s magazine in South India, Siruvar Malar (சிறுவர் மலர்).

We have spoken enough about Siruvar Malar, in the post here.  So, let’s move onto the longest comic series ever published in that magazine, named as Uyirai Thedi (உயிரை தேடி), which literally means In Search of a Life.  The Series captivated children's and teenagers for over a year.  Me being one of them, can talk you through a first-person account.

The Series was originally featured in erstwhile UK Young Boy’s magazine, Eagle, which had a publishing run from 1950 to 1994. Eagle is best known as the comic magazine which debuted Dan Dare, Pilot of the Future, comic series.  In 1980s, immediately after the completion of  “The Thirteenth Floor” (about which we spoke in detail during our last Thigil Comics review at Comicology) the Eagle started the Survival Comic Series, which spoke about a horrible future, where the entire population on earth is wiped out by a mutating Virus.

You would wonder that the series has its similarities with the George Romero’s Living Dead film series, but there is a difference in Survival.  The Killing Virus as portrayed in Survival, had only killed all the adults in the world.

The plague had spread throughout the Earth, the only survivors were a handful of children (who have a rare blood group) and a few adults who had mutated into fearsome creatures. The strip followed one boy, named Pinkie, as he gradually contacted more of the surviving children.

Typical, to the golden age of British Comics, the Survival also was serialized as 4 or 3 pages per episode, where the end panels usually puts the characters in seemingly dangerous situation, and the following episode’s opening panels gets them out of it.  This makes the readers glued to the comic series as they follow episode after episode.

The series is said to have been originally inspired by the then famous British TV Series, Survivors, which aired during 1975.  Recently, the Survivors series has been re-booted on BBC, which has completed Season 1.  As expected, words are that, the series is no way compared to its original version. 

If you look closely at the Logo of the TV Series, then you can detect that the same was also used in 28 Days Later, and 28 Weeks Later post-apocalyptic science fiction UK films, where the former was directed by, recent Academy Award winner for Slumdog Millionaire, Danny Boyle.  I wonder, why there was never a mention about the similarity, or who copied whom. Even though the concept of deadly virus in both medium were totally different.  I especially liked those two movies, as they had a complete different plot than the Living Dead Series by Romero (which I should admit I was a never a fan of).

There was also another Hollywood Movie named I am Legend, in 2007, starring Will Smith, which was also about a Virus ravaged future, but had close resemblance to the concept of the Survival Comic series, in terms of rare blood type as a reason for survival. 

The Movie is actually an American take on the 28 Days Later, but it did have its fair share of Thrill.  Especially the scene where Smith is cornered by his own tricks, and thrilling minutes when the Zombies approach him in the shades of darkness.  Thanks to fellow Comiker ShankarV, for reminding me of the movie.

Coming back to our topic, the Survival Comics series had a same plot like another comics series, titled Kids Rule O.K.,featured in Action Comics magazine during 1976.   The series was Written by Jack Adrian, with Art by Mike White.  It was different from the Survivor series, in the way that it was depicted as Children's Vs the surviving Adults, with some gore in its panels.

But, the continual and senseless violence depicted in the comic series eventually led to parent comics magazine Action being banned in Britain. Luckily, Survival series didn’t meet that fate, as it involved far more appealing plot than the former one.

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Survival comic series was written by D. Horton and wonderfully illustrated by Jose Ortiz; the same artist who did the works on the previous episode The Thirteenth Floor.  Little is known about the writer, but about the artist, we will see more on our next pending post on The Thirteenth Floor.

Siruvar Malar, started featuring the Survivors comic series, translated into Tamil as Uyirai Thedi (உயிரை தேடி), as a weekly feature starting from 29-Jan-88.

The first episode was of 4 pages, while the rest were a standard 3 pages per episode.  The Original series in Eagle was full Black & White. But, Siruvar Malar back then was following a colour scheme of alternative colour pages in its weekly.  So, we witnessed some breathtaking coloured pages once in a while, during Survival’s run in Siruvar Malar.

Since the Survival Series was featured over an year, with 61 episodes in Siruvar Malar, I am planning to review them over a series of posts at Comicology.  So, for the first part, let’s discuss the storyline as depicted in the first 11 episodes of the series.

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The scene opens up with images of a dying world, with streets and hospitals in total chaos, ravaged by a killer virus.  Scientists who try to find a cure, are also impacted by the deadly virus, virtually rendering the whole humanity, helpless.  People die in bunches, all the places, and we reach the epicentre of the storyline, in a city named Barancoat, in Britain.

Pinkie, a survivor, walks across the desolate streets, filled with the remains of mutated bodies by the killer virus.  Apparently, he survived the virus because it had no impact on children's with a rare blood group.  But, Pinkie finds no other survivors in his locality, and decides to pursue his search by walking through and beyond the locality. 

In his journey he initially witnesses a Prison, whose gates were opened up so the in-mates could flee for their life.  But it had little impact as mutated bodies laid in and around the desolate place. Pinkie is then attacked by a mutated adult, but before it does any damage, the virus puts it out of its misery.

On further through, he is attacked by a Tiger which escaped from the erstwhile Zoo of the locality.  But, he is saved by an Elephant, whom Pinkie finds as a good friend to travel along with.

Pinkie then decides to spend the night in an abandoned Airfield, but wakes up in the middle of the night, with the humming sound of flying aeroplane.  But, his joy of finding a survivor, at last, fails again. The kid who was driving the aeroplane crash lands it, and dies on the hands of Pinkie.  Pinkie repents on his fate, and wonders would he ever see another living human being. What follows him then is the attack by blood-thirsty dogs, rats, and even a man like Gorilla.  He finally manages to find a Car which he plans to drive out of the city, little does he know that there is an unwanted passenger as a fellow rider in it, as Chapter 11 ends.  Does he manages to get away, or does he find any survivors? or then detailed in the next episodes. Now here is a surprise for you, as in celebration of 50th post, I planned to upload the complete Survival series at Comicology.  Here are the first 11 episodes as discussed in our review.

The Original publication is no more in business, and there are some sites like backfromdepths which also has few episodes of XIII & Survival at their web space.   So, I believe as a matter of promotion, this might be allowed.  Anyways, this is a One-Time-Only too for Comicology.  So, enjoy the episodes, for which I eagerly awaited every Friday, and hopefully there are more with the same feeling. We will continue further episodes in our next Survival comic post at Comicology.  So, Stay Tuned.

I hope you enjoyed reading this post, and also the first 11 episodes of Survival aka., Uyirai Thedi. If so, please leave your comments to mark your presence. I will meet you all again with another comics review over here at Comicology.  Adios Amigos !!

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Muthu Comics #311 – Buck Ryan | The Saint | Feb '09

Muthu #311 – Buck Ryan   120 Pgs | INR 10 | B6 | B/W Laminated/Paperback

The entire world might have celebrated the New year 2009 in January, but for Tamil Comic fans, it had to happen only in the mid of February.  The reason, our beloved Prakash Publishers (PP), have launched their first comics edition of 2009, in the form of Muthu #311.  Muthu #310, starring Martin Mystery, was released way back in Oct’08, and the last release from publishers, Lion #205, was in Nov’08.  So, it is the longest break once again for Tamil Comic fans, which by now I believe everyone would have got accustomed to. I finally received my Muthu copy on 13/02, after numerous calls to Lion/Muthu Office enquiring about the edition, as some fans had claimed that they received their subscription copy weeks back.  The reason behind this confusion, as I came to know of was that our publishers had received a sample set (of 20 copies) from their binders, and in “good spirit” they decided to courier them to select people first-up.

Obviously, I was not fortunate enough (or may be not in the elite club) to receive this initial dispatch, and had to wait a couple of weeks for receiving the same.

But it is definite, that our publishers would be refraining in future to send this batch release, as they would have surely got bugged by the enthusiastic readers’ repeated calls and queries on the availability of this comics issue :).

It’s a double bonanza, as it contains two classic stories from the 1960’s, with

• Buck Ryan (christened in Tamil Comics as Detective Julian) starring Norungiya Naanal Marmam (நொறுங்கிய நாணல் மர்மம்); and
  
• James Bond fame Roger moore starrer, Paavamai Oru Puli (பாவமாய் ஒரு புலி).

Here is the Editor’s own Comics-Time, where he puts-over his take on these classical stories.

Editor also silently describes the big debate which we had over the Martin Mystery stories continuity, with a hint that we may never see him again in Muthu.  We had earlier discussed in our last Muthu Comics review, about Editor Vijayan exhausting all the English editions of Martin Mystery so far in our comics.  So the great debate is answered, and I for one will be disappointed, as I felt Martin stories as a star attraction for Muthu Comics, which added all the more oomph factor for the otherwise most classic reprints, for which Muthu Comics has been now renowned for.

By now, everyone would have got their copies of Muthu 311, so let’s look at the storylines in detail for this Muthu extravaganza, on the way detailing the creators behind these series.

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Buck Ryan aka Detective Julian, needs no introductions for Tamil comic fans, as he has made a couple of appearances in Muthu Comics earlier.

In this issue Ryan explores mysteries surrounding a series of kidnapping cases targeting the elite and the rich. The act is done so swiftly that some of the kidnappings even happen when the police force are right at the crime scene.  Readers are left to wonder and ponder how this hideous crimes are committed without any traces.

But typical to Ryan’s style, he starts probing by piecing together the little evidences he gets around the crime scenes (for e.g., exploring a broken thistle) and figuring them out with other incidents happening around the city. 

It should be noted that, Ryan gets a massive assist from unlikely sources, like people coming into complain about their problems, which makes his job even more easy, as he finally nabs the mysterious mob boss at his own layer. (Actually, the suspense of who the mob boss was long revealed by an advertisement featured in Last Muthu Comics.  Maybe, Editor didn’t think of it back-then).

In between we get to see some sweet moments, like our local artists handwork on enforcing the censorship, without compromising the panels (which has become a de-facto standard for our Lion-Muthu editions), Julia’s Indian Saree Act (proud to see a reference to Indian females, even though Julia’s feeling that the cloth is too small for a Saree, might have been proven wrong, if the story was written at the present modern era pioneered by Indian actresses on silver screen).

Ryan packs a surprise of his own by playing as a dead body to enter the mob’s secret place.  I should say I was surprised with this turning point, credits goes to artist-writer duo.

By the way, did anyone notice a probable reason why our editor decided to name Buck Ryan as Detective Julian? I believe he might have wanted it to rhyme closely with his assistant named Jula.

Also, the reasons may be that he would have wanted to avoid naming him with his original name, as Buck Ryan was already introduced by erstwhile Rani Comics to Tamil comics fans, as Raayan (ராயன்), closely rhyming with his real name. 

But, long time Tamil Comic fans would have noticed that the Artwork is pretty different between these instalments of Buck Ryan stories, which has valid reasons, for which we will explore more on this classic comics hero’s origins.

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Buck Ryan was original created as a fictional young private investigator, to be featured as a comic strip for UK’s Daily Mirror Newspaper.  The creator of the series was writer Don Freeman and artist Jack Monk.

Don Freeman (real name, John Henry Gordon Freeman) (1903-1972), was the youngest of three children's to his parents, all of whom surprisingly had an inept interest towards writing stories right from their childhood.   Freeman was the first among them to get his creations published for other audience, by joining Daily Mirror, at the early age of 15, initially as an Office-boy.  But he was known to have contributed to the children's page of the newspaper as early as 1922. 

He became assistant to Bertram. J. Lamb, who as "Uncle Dick" was the editor of the Mirror’s children’s pages, and he provided story lines to many of the titular characters featured in these pages. Shortly before, Lamb’s death in 1938, he took over as "Uncle Dick”, and continued to use the pseudonym for many of his creations, even though he also started attaching his name to few of them here and there.  Freeman had an unique knack of writing scripts, which unlike other writers, were not just limited to series of text.  In fact, his technique heavily relied on “rough” out the story, sketching it in “pencil” with his visualizations.  This proved a great help to artists, who were able to grasp his works to their style, with his visual plots.

Jack Monk (b.1901) on the other hand started his career as an artist initially with UK’s Daily Express, creating a couple of comic strips for them.  He eventually joined Daily Mirror, where he forged a long successful partnership with Don Freeman.  Both of them initially worked together in adapting Edgar Wallace’s Terror Keep cult-classic, into comic-strip form.  Eventhough, highly appreciated, the series couldn’t continue long, as it ended up with copyright disagreements.  This is when the creators duo, planned to create a comic-strip series of their own, and the result was Buck Ryan, a brown-curly haired, young British investigator fighting crimes, and bringing the wrongs to justice.

The series ran in Daily Mirror from March 22, 1937 to July 1962, a tremendous run of 25 long years.  Now that highlights why Ryan is shown with different art-styles, as there is a strong possibility that Monk wouldn’t have been the artist for all those lengthy years when the script ran.  It could also be from the fact that 25 glorious years would have given Monk a lengthy hand to try and improve on his artwork over.  But it should be noted that Buck Ryan was indeed a British classic comic strip, to be rated among the great fictional comic detectives of his time.

Freeman continued to script more comic series like Jane, Belinda Blue Eyes (both of which are often rated for adults for explicit content), and Garth (whom Indrajal & Rani Comics are more familiar with).  Monk also moved on to Fleetway and D.C.Thomson, in the process creating more comic series like ‘Commander Cockle’, ‘Inspector Jelicoe’, etc.

By far, Buck Ryan continues to add glory to these two great creators from British Golden Age of Comics.  No wonder our Editor S.Vijayan finds a place for this comic series time and again in his line-up.

This particular story of Muthu Comics, was collected in a Comic Book format in Australia, by a Comics titled “World Famous Comics”.  Here is a cover of that Original, which was #9 in that series.

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The recent 118 and odd page of Muthu & Lion Comics standard, prompts that Buck Ryan’s typical 60 to 70 page adventures aren’t enough to fill up the pages.  So, we have an un-announced surprise appearance in form of James Bond fame Roger Moore, in another adventure of his.

We had earlier described the origins related to The Saint series, created by Leslie Charteris, which was christened as Roger Moore, by Mr.Vijayan in Muthu Comics.  For the new-comers, here is a link where I have detailed the complete history of Saint Series in Comics form, while we reviewed Muthu #307, which also featured Saint as Roger Moore, in one of its stories. 

Have a read, before you proceed further with this new instalment of Saint in Muthu Comics, as it contains a write-up about why our Editor decided to name him as Roger Moore.

Paavamaai Oru Puli (பாவமாய் ஒரு புலி, another wonderful title by our Editor), which is the 2nd story of Muthu #311, details another Saint adventure, where he tries to decode a mysterious death of his rich friend Laila. 

During a party hosted at her palace, Laila decides to entertain her guests by playing as a Ring Master, along with her ageing Tiger pet, a sombre animal to say least. 

But, in a sudden rage, the pet tiger kills her, during the show.  Saint’s later probe reveals that the unexpected rage was actually caused by a chemically filled air-gun shot, brewing the suspicion surrounding her death.

The immediate heirs as per Laila’s will, are interrogated and the blame-game, and twists (for which Saint series are known for), unfolds in the following pages. 

Overall, it’s another classic suspense thriller, which will make every Muthu Comics fan proud.

There were some sweet moments in-between, like:

- Saint confronts the seemingly arrogant cousin of Laila, by giving her a witty reply, for her derogatory talk.

- Laila’s statement during her death-bed, to not kill her pet, as she believes it was forced to that rage, highlighting her good nature.

- Saint swiftly finds the evidence of Air-Gun by exploring the Armoury cum Firing Range located at the palace, all the while talking to a murder suspect.

These speaks volume on the effort of writer-artist duo, who were able to capture the essence and style of the hit Saint TV Series, upon which the comics were later inspired in the second innings.

Saint is supposed to be a cunning Thief as per his original characterization. But, since Roger Moore played his role, it seems they decided to wipe of that origin and present him in equals to a private investigator.  That’s how all his later adventures are portrayed as.

But, did anyone notice that the Roger Moore aka Saint series featured in the different titles of Prakash Publishers namely Muthu Comics, Lion Comics, and Thigil Comics, all had different styles of drawing.  Even the last Muthu series where Saint was featured, had a different art-style, about which I had expressed my reservations. 

But, surprisingly this Muthu Comics Saint title’s artwork is quite standardized, but it still doesn’t look like one drawn by Santiago Martín Salvador, who was the main artist of Saint Series in Sweden (and has previous experience of working on James Bond Comics itself, which explains his James Bond style artwork for Saint series too). 

Obviously, there could have been a host of artists for the series, seeing its long run during its second innings.  Hopefully, Editor would pick only from these pool of work, where the artwork is creditable, while selecting future Saint titles for Muthu Comics.

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Overall, Muthu’s current issue is a Classic Collector’s item to behold, for all Tamil Comic fans.  And Editor does leave us with a block-buster announcement that the forthcoming Comics Classics will feature the original size of Steel Claws Superhero act published decades back. 

As promising it may look like, I would have hoped him to have chosen a classic Steel Claw story, rather than a cheap imitation of Superhero genre by Steel Claw, which marked the demise of this wonderful British Comic-Strip. 

But, for the sheer reason that Editor is trying to re-introduce the A4 Size in Comics Classics (he tried it once last time for another Steel Claw adventure, but had cited poor sales as a reason for not continuing the same), let’s welcome the issue.  Here is the cover of the original Muthu edition of the same title. If you can read Tamil, then don’t miss out from checking out Comics Doctor’s full-blown preview for the Steel Claw issue, here.

Talking about Comics Classics, the back-cover highlights the last Comics Classics edition published in October last year, Comics Classics #23.  Mr. Vijayan is known for pre-producing the covers for many future issues, even before the issue is translated or in-production.  So that may be the reason for this late advertisement.

As per the norm, we get to see the forthcoming Muthu Comics advertisement, which features one of my favourite childhood classics magician Mandrake (Lee Falk’s another master-works).  Fans of erstwhile Indrajal Comics would remember that this story was featured in there issues back then, including Tamil.  But it’s one classic you would want to read again.

Also, Editor lines up Reporter Johny (Johny Hazard) and Wing Commander George’s series as the probable issues following Mandrake adventure.  Let’s see how long does it take for us to see those issues in the coming months.

The last time we discussed Prakash Publishers Lion Comics edition, we had the man himself making his presence felt at Comicology.  Would that happen again, or was that just a flash in the pan?  Let’s wait and see.

Also, did anyone notice that there are no advertisements about the XIII Jumbo Special with this month Muthu instalment.  That clearly foretells that the release of the special issue will be prolonged further, possibly because Editor had complained about not achieving the targeted advance booking mark yet, on his previous issues.  May be it is indicative enough for all those who haven’t booked their copy to do so.

Before we close the review, here is the original cover which was the inspiration of Muthu Comics #311 Cover. This time around it is from the Semic’s James Bond Series released in 1984. More about it here.

I will meet you all again with another comics review over here at Comicology.  Adios Amigos !!

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