Lew Stringer has a great spread of pictures from the very earliest days of 2000AD (including one which predates the actual comic, being an advert for Prog 1 in an early February 1977 issue of sister publication Battle). For those of us of a certain age these images and the 30th anniversary of the comic bring back a wave of memories. As Lew comments, the advert made it look like something new and very exciting and it was exciting. You should go over and have a look at Lew’s blog for some of these rare images he has assembled; I couldn’t resist borrowing this one (Lew has a much bigger version here) from the centre page spread (in colour! a huge deal back then!) which introduced the revamped Dan Dare to a new generation of readers.
(the revamped Dan Dare with art by Massimo Belardinelli in 2000AD’s first issue)
Belardinelli’s artwork from this strip was the most amazing bit of comics artwork I had seen at that time; imagine being ten in 1977, brought up on the Beano, Warlord, Battle, Batman, Superman and then suddenly this is put in front of your young eyes and you realise comics are so much more than you had thought until then. And it was thanks to that new incarnation that I was introduced to the original Dan Dare as my dad read my comic and told me, it’s good, but the original Dan in the Eagle was even better. Original Dan Dare, I wondered? Years later I would pick up the lovely, oversized hardback DD collections by Hawk books for my dad and today Titan’s Classic Dan Dare books have pride of place on my shelves (dad was right, they are indeed brilliant comics). I suspect most British comics fans of a similar age have had their reading choices similarly influenced by that then-new SF comic of ‘hyper-heroes’. Thirty years later and still thinking about those early stories, who would have thought…
March 8th, 2007 at 5:12 pm
I was also ten in 1977 when 2000AD first came out, and I also became hooked on Dan Dare through that version. I also later discovered the superb original 50′s version thanks to my Dad. So… SNAP! :-) The 2000AD Dan Dare center-spread above is an awesome piece of artwork, it has been so many years since I saw it last. I wish someone would reprint all the 2000AD Dan Dare stories too. All the very best, Pete.