Action and adventure
Action and adventure |
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Page 12 of 42  'Flash Gordon' (King Features Syndicate, 1936). Art/script: Alex Raymond (known as 'the artist's artist') More populist in approach were the TV-inspired comics that blossomed in the 1960s; a boom that corresponded with the uptake of TV itself in British homes. The best was TV Century 21 (City, 1965), which was devoted to strips about the Gerry Anderson puppet shows ('Captain Scarlet', Thunderbirds', 'Fireball XL5' and so on), and which had a cover made up to look like a futuristic newspaper. The artwork, by Frank Bellamy, Ron Embleton and Don Lawrence, among others, was often astounding, and had the effect of 'breathing life' into the marionettes. The most popular of the other TV titles were: TV Tornado (City, 1967), which boasted 'Bonanza' and 'Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea'; Countdown (Polystyle, 1971), which featured 'Dr Who', 'UFO' and 'The Persuaders'; and Look-in (Independent Television, 1971), with 'Kung Fu', 'Worzel Gummidge' and 'Potty Time'. It is ironic that the medium later accused of destroying comics sales should simultaneously have provided such a boost. In America, adventure comics traced to different roots, and were the result of the fusion between newspaper strips and pulp novels. The genesis of the former has been explored in Chapter 2; the latter were essentially books produced for a predominantly working-class readership on pulp paper. Between 1920 and 1930, they supplanted the old dime novels, and introduced a new kind of sensationalist genre fiction, with categories like westerns, romance, crime and science fiction becoming particularly popular. Like the comic books that came later, they usually sold for ten cents and sported colourful, often lurid, covers.  Excerpts from 'Dich Tracy' (1949) and 'The Spirit' (1946)  Panel from Superman (DC Comics, 1941). Art: Joe Shifter. The title that more than any other redefined the way comics were perceived in America, and whose star became the quintessential symbol for the country's fortunes. |