(detail from a 1948 Graphis profile of Searle, borrowed from the very fine Perpetua Searle fan site)

Very sad to hear of this, a true original and one of a regrettably dwindling great generation of cartoonists who influenced many of today’s greats in the field. In fact the Bloghorn points us to this post of theirs where the great Martin Rowson’s article for the Cartoon Museum’s catalogue on their Searle exhibition is reproduced; you can read all of it on Bloghorn, but I think it is worth quoting this particular paragraph as a fitting memorial to how Searle was seen not just by readers by by fellow cartoonists:

“In 1999 Ronald Searle was judged, by his fellow cartoonists, to be the greatest cartoonist of the 20th Century. It’s a judgement I thoroughly endorse, though as someone who was brought up on Searle, like most people of my generation born in the late 50s and early 60s, I thought distant worship would be as close as I ever got to him. After all, Searle famously scarpered when I was about one, so I, along with other British cartoonists, could only ever venerate him as the King Across the Water.”

Goodbye, Ronald – you made us smile with your inventive art and singular wit, and that is a precious gift to share with people.

(Anne McCaffrey, pic borrowed from Suvudu)

The Twitterverse this evening started passing around news that Anne McCaffrey, one of the great writers of science fiction and fantasy, had passed away. I couldn’t find any confirmation online until just a few moments ago – James Long directed me to Tor and I see noted SF publisher Del Rey also being quoted now on Suvudu confirming the sad news: Anne passed away at her home in Ireland on the 21st from a stroke at the age of 85. Not just an enormously international bestselling author for decades, Anne was also a trailblazer, being the first woman writer to win the Hugo and Nebula awards. I loved the way she decided to portray that most fabulous of all fantasy creatures, the dragon and her Ship Who Sang remains for me one of my favourites and a beautiful idea, one I believe she was very proud of herself. About fifteen years ago I had the pleasure of hosting Anne for a reading and signing session; she absolutely delighted the readers who had come in eagerly to see her, chatting away with each one after the reading while signing their books. I recall her making light of growing older (even back then) – she found the chair by the speaker’s stand difficult and preferred a stool as easier for her to get onto. As she eased herself on to it she pointed to her hip and said never mind, despite this I can still ride the horses at home in Ireland. Then with a smile she added, of course I need a stablehand to give me a good shove up onto the saddle first, but once I’m on that’s it. Much laughter and smiles. That was a great author event and I’m glad I got to meet her, even if only once, but of course, like many, many others I met her in numerous other forms through her books, time and again, and we always have those. Good night, Anne, you made our imaginations soar on great dragon wings; may your ship always sing.

(cover for Anne’s Dragon’s Time, artwork by the brilliant Les Edwards)

Pádraig Ó Méalóid has kindly produced this extensive obituary for the FPI Blog.

Mick Anglo 1916 – 2011 RIP

Mick Anglo was born Maurice Anglowitz in the Bow area of the borough of Tower Hamlets in London’s East End to Hyman and Rachel (nee Pelter) Anglowitz. He claims he was born on the 14th of June, 1916, even though his birth certificate gives the date as the 19th of June, due to his father registering the birth late – it wasn’t actually registered until the 28th of July, well over a month later.

He was the youngest of a family of five boys, the others being Andrew, Sidney, Stanley and Richard. After school in the Central Foundation Grammar School in Cowper Street in London’s Islington Mick got a scholarship to the Sir John Cass Art School in Aldgate. He left school at eighteen and eventually got some freelance work drawing clothing designs for one of the London fashion houses.

In 1939, at the age of twenty-three, he enlisted in the army at Oxford, becoming an infantryman in the Royal Welsh Fusiliers, and at one point found himself working as a cartographer at Earl Mountbatten’s headquarters in Sri Lanka. He also did some cartooning work for SEAC, the official army newspaper for the South East Asia Command, and later on for the Singapore Free Press. On the 29th of December 1940 he married Minnie Cedar in the Wembley District Synagogue in Hendon, London. On their marriage certificate, both their fathers are said to be tailors, and it turns out they lived on the same street. Mick’s occupation is given as Fusilier #6468556, with his civilian occupation as commercial artist noted in brackets, while Minnie was a tailoress.

When he got married his surname was recorded as Anglo, as was his father’s, who was by now styling himself Harry Anglo, rather than Hyman Anglowitz, so Mick Anglo was already halfway to the final version of his own name.

(Two of Mick Anglo’s Johnny Dekker books – pics from Micksidge’s Flickrstream)

After he returned to civilian life Anglo went looking for work in comics, and the first company he worked for was Gerald G Swan, followed by work for a lot of others, including Paget Publications, for whom he drew Wonderman, and Martin & Reid, where he ended up working as an editor, and for whom he wrote a number of books, including thirteen American-style private eye novels for which he also drew the covers, featuring the adventures of Johnny Dekker, and including titles like ‘Gowns and Gunsels’ and ‘Lugers and Larceny.’

It would have been around this time that Anglo had his first dealings with L Miller and Son. In an interview with Roger Dicken in Alter Ego #87 (TwoMorrows, Raleigh, July 2009), Mick Anglo describes how he first came upon them:

“As I recall, it was a still drab post-war Britain, and I’d been doing this, that, and the other to keep body and soul together. One day in the early 1950s, my next-door neighbour showed me a couple of bright American-style comics bearing the distinctive triangular logo L Miller and Son, an English company, with a 6d price on them, and he suggested I check them out for some further artistic work. I duly visited their warehouse headquarters in Hackney Road, London, and was fortunate to meet the son, one Arnold Miller, who, it turned out, had formed his own branch of the company to publish original British space comics, as the bulk of the lines up until then were American reprints, such as Captain Video. Anyway, he was raring to do a series under his own banner ABC (Arnold Book Company), and I was very interested, as you can imagine.

I showed him some of my work I’d brought along, though what it was escapes me, and he was suitably impressed. It was then, during discussions, to my surprise I discovered that the boss, Arnold’s father Len, was in fact the same man who once sold me comics as a kid! … After some in-depth discussions re could I create such-and-such and find other artists, etc, things started to buzz, and very soon I formed Mick Anglo Limited, and found myself searching for suitable premises for a studio. Eventually I located some rooms at the top of a rickety flight of stairs in an old building at 164 Gower Street, London NW1, long since demolished, which became the Gower Street Studios.”

Mick Anglo’s first work for L Miller and Son was Ace Malloy of the Special Squadron #50 in August 1952, published under the Arnold Book Company imprint, at which point Anglo was apparently already in his studio at Gower Street. Further work for the Millers followed, both for Arnold Book Company and for L Miller and Son Ltd itself, including titles like Space Comics (1953), starring Captain Vic Valiant of the Interplanetary Police Patrol, and, later on, Space Commander Kerry and Space Commando, both in 1954.

Fate was about to hand him his most significant job, however. This is what he had to say in Alter Ego #87:

“One day in late 1953, I think, the Millers rang me to say, ‘Come over, Mick – urgent – very urgent!’ I went to the warehouse premises, and much consternation! Len was in a right old mood. It seemed that in the USA Fawcett had lost a court fight with Superman comics, etc, and could no longer market their Captain Marvel character; thus Miller, in turn, wouldn’t receive further supplies of the comic plates to print Captain Marvel. They held the license to reprint the comics in Britain, and he was one of their very lucrative lines. This created big problems! … So boss Len needed a substitute real fast and could I come up with something?”

Mick Anglo says that he went back to Gower Street and thought about it, and decided that what they needed to do was create a British copy of Captain Marvel to step into his shoes, and to carry on instead of him. The character Anglo apparently suggested to take Captain Marvel’s place was virtually a carbon copy of him. The name Billy Batson was turned into Mickey Moran, with Moran being a young copy boy for the Daily Bugle newspaper, as opposed to Batson’s position as a reporter for Radio Whiz; the costume was changed from red to blue, and the cloak was done away with, for being too much trouble to have to draw all the time; the dark hair became blonde; the magic word SHAZAM!, given to Batson by the wizard Shazam, was replaced by the word KIMOTA! – a slightly altered backward spelling of the word Atomic – given to Moran by Astro-physicist Guntag Barghelt, making Marvelman’s powers science-based, like Superman’s, rather than magic-based, like Captain Marvel’s; and the transformation was all but complete. All that was needed was a name.

According to Derek Wilson’s article “From SHAZAM! To KIMOTA! – The Sensational Story of England’s MARVELMAN – The Hero Who Would Become MIRACLEMAN” in Alter Ego #87:

“The first name change suggested – and most obvious one – was finally adopted … although other names were seriously considered, including Miracleman and Captain Miracle, which were registered as possibilities.”

“That first name was, of course, Marvelman.”

In a short interview with George Khoury in Kimota! The Miracleman Companion (TwoMorrows Publishing, Raleigh, 2001), Anglo says this:

“Yes, it was my creation except everything is based on somebody else. A bit of this and a bit of that. With Superman, he’s always wearing this fancy cloak with a big ‘S’ on his chest … I did away with the cloak so that I didn’t have to draw the cloak, which was awkward to draw, and played with a gravity belt, and they could do anything without all these little gimmicks.”

Six months after the launch of Marvelman, Mick Anglo formed Mick Anglo Limited, UK company number 537200, which was registered on the 21st of August 1954 – with Anglo having filled out the forms in his solicitor’s office nine days earlier, on the 12th of August – with a nominal opening capital of one hundred pounds split into one hundred shares of £1 each, with ten of those shares being drawn down and allocated, nine to Mick Anglo, and the other one to his wife, Minnie.

The exact circumstances surrounding the creation of L Miller’s Marvelman, however, are still the matter of some conjecture, as is Mick Anglo’s part in it. He certainly did have a part in that creation, but whether as primary and only creator or simply as work-for-hire, following detailed instructions from above, is still not clear, nor is it likely to be, it seems.

What is clear is that Mick Anglo, through Mick Anglo Ltd and the writers and artists at Gower Street Studios, provided the Millers with Marvelman material for the next six years, until the title went from weekly to monthly, and became a reprint title.

Marvelman wasn’t the only superhero title that Anglo created, although most of those that followed were based on his earlier work. There was Captain Universe, AKA The Super Marvel, who was a man called Jim Logan who said the magic word GALAP to be changed into his alternative incarnation, published for one issue in 1954 by Arnold Book Company; Captain Miracle, a man called Johnny Dee with the magic word El Karim, published for nine issues by Anglo Comics starting in 1960, just after Anglo ceased working for the Millers; and Miracle Man, a man called Johnny Chapman with the magic word Sundisc, published for thirteen issues by Top Sellers in 1965. The last two are said to simply be redrawn Marvelman stories, in much the same way that some of the Marvelman stories are said to be redrawn Captain Marvel stories.

As the years went on, Anglo continued to work in UK comics, but more at the production end, as an editor and packager, rather than as a writer or artist, and his output, over all the years, is substantial, and significant. He also wrote several books for Jupiter Books, like ‘Penny Dreadfuls and other Victorian Horrors,’ and ‘Man Eats Man: The Story of Cannibalism.’ It was also for Jupiter Books that he wrote a series of books with the series title of ‘Nostalgia – Spotlight on…’, including Nostalgia – Spotlight on the Fifties, which contains an article called The Age of Marvelman, which contains his version of the story of the creation of Marvelman.

In 2007, Anglo’s Marvelman rights were sold to Emotiv and Company, allegedly for four thousand pounds. What exactly those rights are, and where they come from, has also been the matter of much conjecture, but neither Emotiv, not Marvel Comics, who subsequently bought those rights, have publically clarified any of these issues, nor do they appear to intend to do so in the foreseeable future.

(From Miracleman #1, published 1985, by Alan Moore and Garry Leach)

Much has been said, particularly in the past few days, of Mick Anglo’s place in British comics’ history. For myself, I don’t think he was the huge creative genius that people try to make out he was. He certainly wasn’t the hugely influential, legendary comics’ creator that the American comics media seem to want to make him out to have been.

What he was, rather, was a man who worked hard to make a living in tough times, and who ended up providing employment for not only himself, but many others as well. He was not interested in owning any of the rights to the characters he worked on, but simply in doing the work he was asked to do, and getting paid for it.

His set up was as a comics packager, producing a finished periodical to specifications from a publisher, and this is what he did. In these more enlightened times, that may not seem like much, but at the time it was good honourable work, which he did to the best of his considerable ability. He worked hard at what he was good at. That seems a good enough for epitaph for any of us.

(Doctor Strange and The Thing in this lovely piece by the great Gene Colan, borrowed from Cartoon Flophouse)

We’re all deeply saddened to hear that one of the great legends and icons of the comic world, Gene Colan, has passed away at the age of 84. His friend (and I think also his art agent?) Clifford Meth has a post up on ComicMix. It was well known less than a year after losing his beloved wife Gene had been undergoing medical treatment and indeed some comics sites and folks had been involved in selling art and fundraisers to help offset his medical bills, but it is still a terribly sad day for all comics lover to lose such a hugely respected and iconic figure. I’m not even going to attempt to place Gene into some historical context – I noticed Clifford remarked in his piece that he’d leave that to the likes of Tom Spurgeon and frankly so will I, because I know Tom will write something on Gene which will honour and respect the man and his outstanding work. Goodbye, Gene, you made a huge amount of readers tremendously happy and leave us with an enormous body of amazing work. I think I will leave this with one quote from Gene himself, which Cliff used, in what sadly turned out to be his last interview: “There isn’t anything I have to be afraid of, love is the answer.”

Some sad news just breaking that the wonderful artist Jeffrey Catherine Jones has passed away; there aren’t many details emerging yet as to the cause, but a growing number of sites are reporting it, including Comic Reporter and Michael Netzer (whence comes the short video below) and the artist’s Wiki has just been updated to this effect too.

(above:one of the artist’s paintings, borrowed from the galleries on Jeff Jones’ own site; below Black Rose by Jeff Jones, again borrowed from her own site)

Jones, who in the 90s underwent gender reassignment surgery, created all manner of amazing illustrations, including cover art for science fiction and fantasy novels, such as the classic Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser by Fritz Leiber, as well as in the 70s being an important part of The Studio in Manhattan’s hip Chelsea area, sharing studio space with some giants of illustration and comics art like Bernie Wrightson, Barry Windsor-Smith, and Michael William Kaluta and Jones was, as the Wiki entry points out, revered as an amazing painter by no less a body than the great Frank Frazetta (you don’t get much higher praise than that, surely?). As I said there aren’t many details yet, I’m sure there will be more information emerging over the next few days.

(cover art to Fritz Leiber’s Swords Against Death, a Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser novel, artwork by Jeff Jones, pic borrowed from Cadwalader Rinngold’s Flickr)

(above and below, pages from I Bled the Sea by Jeffrey Jones, borrowed from her own site)

(recent collected edition of Trillo and Risso’s Vampire Boy from Dark Horse)

The last words the late, great Jon Pertwee’s third Doctor spoke to Elisabeth Sladen’s Sarah Jane Smith before regenerating. I think a lot of Doctor Who fans of a certain age will recall that scene and understand the sad relevance of it tonight: it’s hard to believe, but we lost the wonderful Elisabeth Sladen. In fact looking at this clip above it’s a bitter thought that now three of the four actors in that scene have been taken from us, what with us losing Nicholas Courteney so recently too. I noticed a handful of people on Twitter asking if it was true and wondered myself – after all it wouldn’t be the first time someone has been declared dead online only for it to turn out to be a false rumour repeated swiftly around the web. But the Twitter mentions kept coming, everyone asking if it had been confirmed, then a number of Doctor Who sites started to say it was true, followed by sites like Digital Spy and even Neil Gaiman saying on Twitter that it looked like it was true. I was sitting at home hoping still it would be false – Liz isn’t old (only 63, which isn’t old, not these days) and I hadn’t heard of her being ill. I mean the most recent series of the Sarah Jane Adventures only finished not that long ago. Then the BBC television news confirmed it and that she had been suffering with cancer for some time. It was true. It’s taken me, and I imagine all fans, without warning, leaving us all shocked and terribly saddened.

I grew up with Sarah Jane as the Doctor’s companion, first with Jon Pertwee then Tom Baker. The three of them in Doctor Who are one of my glowing, nostalgic memories of 70s childhood, one of the things that made it a great time to be a kid. I’ve followed Doctor Who through my child then adult life; I’ve delighted in seeing it reborn, was overjoyed at seeing Liz brought back in to meet up with David Tennant’s Doctor and that they addressed the effect travelling in time and space with the Doctor had on her character, then on the huge fan response to that tale I was even more delighted to hear she was getting her own series. Sarah Jane, taking what she learned from the Doctor and defending the Earth, a very appropriate response from a character who was brought in to be a bit more of a self reliant female character in the 70s era of Women’s Lib. And this new children’s science fiction adventure made older fans my age happy and the new generation of kids who were totally sucked into both Sarah Jane and the new Doctor Who shows; how many older fans sat contentedly down with their own kids or nephews or nieces to watch Sarah Jane and smile at how much the new generation loved her? And now there won’t be any more.

I’m sure many of you are as upset as I am and will join all of us here at the FP blog in offering our condolences and best wishes to Elisabeth’s loved ones; for all of us she is a huge loss, taken to early, but that loss will be a felt a thousandfold among her family and friends who must be struggling even more than any of us to process this shocking loss, and our hearts go out to them. Goodnight, Liz, you were my favourite companion when I was just a wee boy, you were still my favourite companion as an adult, you made a lot of us happy and made us smile and that’s a wonderful gift to give to so many people. You will be missed.

(Diana with adorable kitty, pic borrowed from and (c) her author-approved fan site)

I missed hearing about this at the weekend until a friend in my SF book group mentioned it to me – very sad to report that the wonderful fantasy author Diana Wynne Jones has finally succumbed to her long fight against cancer. Diana’s books have been enjoyed by legions of fans (among them one Neil Gaiman, who dedicated the orginal Books of Magic to Diana among several other ‘witches’ of words), both adult and most especially younger readers, charming them and also offering some serious, although loving criticism of the fantasy genre too. Her many books included the Chrestomanci chronicles, the Derkholm and Dalemark novels and many more and, as many of you will know already, the delightful animation Howl’s Moving Castle by the great Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli was based on Diana’s books. Given the drip of news over the last year or two about Diana’s battle with cancer the news is not entirely unexpected, but still terribly sad nonetheless, but she leaves a rich legacy of wonderful books that will still be read by all ages for many years and on her fan-run approved site notes that there is still a short younger reader’s novel to come later this year – Earwig and the Witch – and David Fickling will publish a collection of Diana’s lectures, talks and articles next year. Goodbye, Diana, you will be missed.

(trailer for Howl’s Moving Castle, based on the books of Diana Wynne Jones, (c) Studio Ghibli)

Nicholas’ portrayal of the Brigadier, with his clipped, classic British senior officer voice, had its heyday in the 70s, most especially with the dawn of the Jon Pertwee era, when the Doctor was exiled to 20th century earth and became the scientific adviser to UNIT, the United Nations Intelligence Taskforce, which the Brig lead against all sorts of foes, from mad scientists with rampaging robots or dinosaurs brought forward to modern day London through to alien invasions, all with his customary coolness – famously even when facing a stone gargoyle brought to demonic life the Brig barely bats an eyelid, remains cool and calm and orders sharply “chap with the wings, five rounds rapid”.

(Nicholas Courtney with Tom Baker’s Doctor; from the tartan scarf and hat I imagine this is a promo pic from their visit to Loch Ness)

After the Doctor was freed from his earthbound existence and resumed wandering time and space the Brigadier would still be seen from time to time, working once more with the Doctor (in several of his incarnations), his last Who appearance being in the Sylvester McCoy era Battlefield, where he memorably diverted the Doctor and faced the monster himself at the finale. I always rather liked that scene:  no grand OTT heroics that a US show might have gone for, instead the quiet heroism reminiscent of a 1940s British war film. The Destroyer towers over him and asks “Can this world do no better than you as a champion?” “Probably. I just do the best I can,” replies the Brigadier. Before saving the world.

Nicholas remained a Who fixture even after that final appearance, however, lending his smooth voice to many audio adventures and an appearance in the Sarah Jane Adventures, although sadly he didn’t make an appearance in the revived Doctor Who, although he was mentioned and of course UNIT has made some serious appearances in the new show. Sad to think that now he never will. SFX magazine has reprinted an old interview with Nicholas on their site as a tribute.

Giant robots, dinosaurs, Daleks, Daemons, Ogrons, Autons, the Master, Zygons, even the Loch Ness Monster, the Brig faced them all alongside the Doctor, always with the calm, unflappable senior officer coolness, protecting the Earth long before we’d heard of Torchwood. Goodbye, Nicholas, you were a big part of the childhood of many of us and we’ll remember you and that era with a fond smile.