Comics UK

Kashgar wrote:Thanks to the wonders of a somewhat ancient technology I.e an old notebook I happen to have with me I can confirm that the strip you are referring did appear in Wizard rather than Victor and was actually titled 'The Monsters from Wave Rock'. It appeared in Wizards dated (24/11/73)-(26/1/74).

I don't have my notes with me, but I suspect that the original appearance of this serial was in the text version of The Wizard in the early fifties, with the title Lower Twittering stories. The radioactive liquid had seeped into Luckton Brook. The first instalment was called He Saw The Start Of The Terror.

The story that Ramirez has provided us with a sample of is The Day of The Giant which started in issue 765 (dated 18/10/1975) of The Victor and ended in issue 780 (dated 31/01/1976).

The pages that Ramirez has shown us are from the first episode.

And now that I have seen a picture of that Samurai story, it is ringing a vague bell. If I remember rightly, it struck me as a sort of Kampgruffe Falken kind of story where the enemy is portrayed in a fairly sympathetic light. This is now going to bug me. Thanks Ramirez...

Sorry about the misidentification ahead of the visual evidence.

I think the samurai story was just called 'Samurai' in English. This was written by Pat Mills and at least partly drawn by Carlos Cruz. It ran in Battle from July 15th to September 9th 1978.

I'm pretty sure Secrets of the Demon Dwarf retained the same title throughout but I'll see if I can locate the first episode to check.

philcom55 wrote:I think the samurai story was just called 'Samurai' in English. This was written by Pat Mills and at least partly drawn by Carlos Cruz. It ran in Battle from July 15th to September 9th 1978.

I'm pretty sure Secrets of the Demon Dwarf retained the same title throughout but I'll see if I can locate the first episode to check.

Oh thank you Phil. I knew that I had seen it before and I have just dug out an issue from that run. Interesting to see that Operation Shark was running at the same time. The issue that I dug out had Mike Dorey on art duties for Operation Shark.

Phoenix wrote:I don't have my notes with me, but I suspect that the original appearance of this serial was in the text version of The Wizard in the early fifties, with the title Lower Twittering stories. The radioactive liquid had seeped into Luckton Brook. The first instalment was called He Saw The Start Of The Terror.

colcool007 wrote:The story that Ramirez has provided us with a sample of is The Day of The Giant which started in issue 765 (dated 18/10/1975) of The Victor and ended in issue 780 (dated 31/01/1976).

Now that Colin has found the actual serial in The Victor, I am upgrading my suspicion to a claim that the serial about the strange events in Lower Twittering will have influenced the writer of The Day Of The Giant, which I have not yet extracted from my collection as I have only just got back from Cornwall.

Derek I have a feeling that the strip based on the Lower Twittering stories was actually published in the Victor in the late 1960's but as I haven't my extensive notes to hand I cannot recall the title offhand. I also have a feeling it was illustrated by Vincente Ibanez although I have no firm foundation as to why I think this is correct. Will check notes when able.

Kashgar wrote:Derek I have a feeling that the strip based on the Lower Twittering stories was actually published in the Victor in the late 1960's

I think you may be misunderstanding the point I was making, Ray. Last Saturday I was working purely from memory when I assumed that The Monsters From Wave Rock was a picture rerun of the Lower Twittering stories, because although only one giant frog was mentioned, the title implied a good few more, and in any case if some radioactive fluid had leaked out it was hardly likely to affect just one animal, hence the word Monsters in your title. My upgrade was from a suspicion that The Monsters Of Wave Rock and the Lower Twittering stories were essentially the same story to a claim that the Lower Twittering stories influenced the writer of The Monsters Of Wave Rock. I still believe that to be the case. To save you looking your notes out Lower Twittering stories appeared in picture form as The Time Of The Giants in The Victor 504 (Oct. 17 1970) - 513 (Dec. 19 1970).

Thanks for clearing that up Derek.

And the search continues. The next is a football story that ran for thirty-something weeks, where a whiz kid named Simon Brains (or Braynes maybe) acts as a coach to a bunch of local kids despite that his family want him to do his homework instead. I have a feeling that this might be "Brainey 's bombers" from Scorcher. I also believe that the artist is Julio Schiaffino who also produced Mighty Mouse & Hot shot Hamish. Let me know if that is the most probable answer.

I 'm also searching the title of another strip drawn by Francesc Masip (who also did Run Rogan run). Its greek title is "Terrible toys" and is about two kids -brother & sister- who stay awake when all the adults are asleep due to sleeping gas that house toys released. Then they 're trying to stop the scientist who controls the toys and intends to rob the city. I know it 's not the "Toys of doom" story that was drawn by Solano Lopez.

That 's it for now...

I think your right about the football story being "Braineys Bombers" as that was drawn by Schiaffino.
Could the second strip be "The Terror Toys" which ran in the early issues of Jackpot?

That 's probably the story I was looking for.

Anyone knows who was the artist of the motorcycle story "King of the track" that ran in Tiger?

I think the artist you are looking for is Yvonne Hutton.

Thanks a million, Chris...

chrisb wrote:I think the artist you are looking for is Yvonne Hutton.

Interesting! I am quite keen to know more about female artists as they tend to be little-known and little-represented - can you or anyone upload any images at all?