All of the below are now available at the Black Tower Comics & Books storefront and you can keep updated with CBO -
www.comicbitsonline.com
or on our Black Tower Comics & Books facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Black-Tower-Comics-Books/136656043030326?ref=sgm
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 | Black Tower British Gold Collection 1
For the first time in 60 years some of the lost gems of the British Golden Age of Comics are reprinted! Scanned and cleaned to the best standard possible -see The Phantom Raider,Ace Hart,Secrets Of The Super Sargasso Sea,Phantom Maid,Electrogirl,Skybolt Kid,Wonder Boy,Dene Vernon,Professor Atom and many,many others! Its fun and action all the way -The British Golden Age shines through!
Print: £8.00
| | |  | Black Tower British Gold Collection 2
The second collection of British 1940s comic strips featuring Maxwell The Mighty,Slicksure,Iron Boy,Alfie,Ace Hart and more. Featuring the work of Alf Farningham and Harry Banger. Specifically designed to feature more humour than the previous volume this should be a treat for all comic collectors. Reprinting the full content of The Meteor and The Rocket Comics from 1948.
Print: £6.00
| | |  | Black Tower British Gold Collection 3
This is the third volume in Black Tower Comics’ collection of Golden Age British comic strips that have not seen print for 50-60 years! Included in this volume is a bumper crop of Ace Hart:The Atom Man strips and an article on the character. A complete 1949 comic in Smugglers Creek;Denis Gifford’s Search For The Secret City and science fiction legend Bryan Berry’s rendition of Kid Carter -Teenage Tec! A must for all comic collectors and historians.
Print: £6.00
| | |  | UK GOLD COLLECTION 4
The fourth volume of this series features some great finds of the lost era of British comics: Ace Hart The Atom Man Captain Comet -Space Ranger TNT Tom Clive Lynn -Space Reporter Superstooge "The White Gorilla" Atomic Tuffy Cast Iron Chris Sigord and many others!
Print: £7.00
| | |  | Back From The Dead
William McCail’s 1940 classic is reprinted for the first time in 60 years. If you are into British Golden Age comics or early comics in general this is for you. Robert Lovett rises from the dead and finds he has some startling powers:deaths follow,as does a determined Scotland Yard detective determined to track down the mysterious killer!
Print: £6.00
| | |  | The Purple Hood Collection
It was the Swinging Sixties! Britain was hip as hip could be -The Beatles ruled Pop! And everyone was looking toward a bright future…if there wasn’t a nuclear war! Middle Eastern threats,Eastern European fascists,flying saucer flying megalomaniacs and super mole machines and others threatened our little island. But we had the ultimate answer to these:The Purple Hood -International crime-smasher! Michael Jay’s Purple Hood now collected into over a hundred pages of action and text back-up. This is THE ultimate collection!
Print: £8.00
| | |  | The Adventures Of Mark Tyme Collection
Only two issues were published of The Adventures of Mark Tyme. As with the companion title,The Purple Hood,the artist was Michael Jay who has since faded into obscurity. Join Mark Tyme on his time travelling adventures to Roman Britain,the Stone Age,a pirate island,9th century Britain,outer space and other destinations.
Print: £8.00
| | |  | Krakos -Sands Of Terror!
Created by William A. Ward for Swan Comics in the 1940s,Krakos was one of Ward’s supernatural anti-hero types. Used,with Swan’s permission,in Black Tower Adventure strips in the 1980s/1990s,this is the character’s first solo outing. But will Krakos fulfill the Goddess Isis’ dream and become the new pharoah of a New Egyptian Kingdom that will encompass all of the Middle East? Did anyone actually ask Krakos? The book contains information on Ward and his work plus sample pages rescued after 60 years of neglect!
Print: £6.00
| | |  | THE BAT TRIUMPHANT!
In 1941,The Bat sets about modernising the backward Duchy of Stahl,over which his dynasty has ruled since 1410 A.D.. The Bat is soon involved in experiments with the infamous Count Cogliostro. One of these experiments involves suspended animation;The Bat deciding he will be the test subject. When he wakes,The Bat finds that not days have gone by but 51 years! Worse,his kingdom is in ruins and an enclave of Kamora. The Bat tries politics to win back his homeland and when that fails he decides to fight for it! However,he is unaware that some old,and new,enemies are lying in wait to stop him and all of them want one thing:The Bat dead! Originally a back up strip in Black Tower Adventure in 1994,The Bat proved very popular as an anti-hero. The story was never completed. It is now. New edition -added art pages
Print: £6.00
| | |  | Tower Tales Of Terror
The main feature,"The Curse Of The McQuilligans", starring Xendragon,leads off this collection of horror,ghostly and twist-in-the-tail stories. The classic Torch Of Vengeance is a tale of a wife’s rather Gothic vengeance while Graveyard is a cautionary tale for those curious to look into graves! Demons,time travel and much more.
Print: £6.00
| | |  | Journey Of The ID:The Dr Morg Trilogy
Metapsychophysics meets comics. Its the next natural evolutionary step in comic books! For the first time all three parts of the highly acclaimed Dr. Morg Trilogy are combined into one volume:WORDS WITHIN WORLDS,AFTER ORWELL and the final explosive THE DEATH OF DR. MORG!
Print: £6.00
| | |  | Black Tower Adventure 1
It’s back! Twenty-five years ago the digest sized Black Tower Adventure first appeared featuring some later-to-be top UK talents and the title was put on hiatus in 2007. Now it’s back,bigger and better than ever! Part 1 of the mega Return Of The Gods:Twilight Of The Super Heroes comes in at 43 pages! Thaddeus Twatt In The Twatt-Verse -first part of a truly microscopic titanic tales [which makes sense if you read it!]. Kotar & Sabuta race to face The Deadly Dilemma Of Sigismund Benfriggisund! The cold war between China and Russia couldn’t get any hotter as The Phoenix Team stumble into the evil Salamander’s plan. And more? Of course. Comics ARE Fun!
Print: £6.00
| | |  | Centaur Heroes vol.1
Centaur -the short-lived publishing house of some of the first and most unique Golden Age heroes that still live on in legend today! The Eye Sees! Truly weird and bizarre! The Clock! Airman! The Sparkler! The Blue Lady! Plymo! The Arrow! And others. Volume 1 is a treat for all Golden Age comic fans and a must have!
Print: £5.00
| | |  | Centaur Heroes 2
The Skull,The Shark,The Blue Lady and Amazing Man! These were part of the First Wave of US Golden Age comics that also includes Mini Midget and Mighty Man. This book also reprints the one and only appearance of the very first comic book Owl from 1940! A must for comic fans and Golden Age buffs!
Print: £6.00
| | |  | The Hooper Interviews
From a huge selection of interviews covering the Small Press,Independent Comics from the UK,Europe and US,here are a few of the best from over 25 years.
Print: £15.00
| | |  | Some Things Strange & Sinister
After more than 30 years as an investigator and more than forty as a naturalist,the author has opened some of the many files he has accumulated dealing with such things as.. The Terrifying Events At The Lamb Inn,The Ghosts Of All Saints Church,Dead Aquatic Creatures of Canvey Island,captured bigfoot like creatures in India -all exclusively presented for the first time and with new added research previously unseen. Photographs,maps,line drawings and more to make 305 pages looking at Things truly Strange and Sinister. Cryptozoologist,Ghost Hunter,Ufologist or Fortean:this book has something for everyone -including the just plain inquisitive!
Print: £12.00
| | |  | Some More Things Strange & Sinister
Follow-up to the hugely successful Some Things Strange & Sinister.
Print: £12.00
| | |  | Cruisers In The Clouds
If you have any interest in history or the development by the pioneers of hot-air ballooning,including the first use of parachutes in the 1800s,then this collection of articles by John Lea from 1905 and illustrated by H. J. Hodges,is for you.
Print: £6.00 Download: £6.00
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TERRY HOOPER TALKS ABOUT THE BAT TRIUMPHANT!
by Frank Barrell
I’ve known Terry Hooper a very long time and wasn’t surprised that
he hasn’t been shouting about his Black Tower books. He never
does.
Some Things Strange & Sinister is a treat for anyone involved
or interested in UFOs,Ghosts,unknown creatures or just plain
weird phenomena. The success of the book has led to Amazon
jumping in to sell it and the cover price increase was dropped
because Terry insisted it made the book too expensive.
Now there is The Bat Triumphant! a 66pp black and white comic
album. I decided to corner the man himself,a rather dangerous
tactic,and ask a few questions. Time to see whether you can
squeeze blood from a stone!
Frank:Terry,The Bat Triumphant! has been around a good while
if not as a completed book then in serial form. When did you
start working on it?
Terry:uh,1985?
Frank:A..little..bit…more info?
Terry:1985. I had the Bat awaken to find Stahl,his kingdom,a
Soviet enclave. There were a lot of small countries under
Soviet occupation and as “Stahl” sounded very central European
I thought I’d place it there.
Frank:That’s the version you dropped -where you had a Soviet
Hind helicopter gunship being confronted mid-air by The Bat?
Terry:Yep.
Frank:So why did you drop that version?
Terry:Bloody Russians. I do all this then the “Soviet Union” falls
apart and all these states like Estonia,Lithuania,Latvia,etc.,get
their independence. No consideration for comic creators -though the
Americans never stopped Soviet bashing.
Frank:Do you still have those pages?
Terry:No. I have one roughly pencilled page and I’m guessing the
rest were lost in one of my house moves -though there may be a box
somewhere…
Frank:Originally,the Bat was published by Gerald Swann and you talked
to him and you said you were not too impressed?
Terry:Denis Gifford had the same reaction I did. Swannhad been one
of those war time entrepeneurs who published all this material but
in his later years the comics seemed to mean nothing to him and he
was more interested in talking about his pulp magazines.
I said to him I was a big fan of his old comics and I’d like to do
something with The Iron Warrior,The Bat and other comic characters
he published and the response was “Oh,do what you like with them” and
then talked about the pulps again!
Frank:Why is it these people publish comics but go into books and
tend to ignore their comic history?
Terry:Honestly,he was publishing pulps before and no US comics coming
into the UK he saw a way to make money. Simple as that.
Frank:And your plans to republish the original Swann strip?
Terry:Ask Ben Dilworth where-ever he is! He had my copy to make lazer
photocopies [no computer scanning for s back then!]and that was the last
I saw of it. If I could find good quality scans then I might rethink
the publishing idea but UK collectors just do not want to share!
Frank:I know that you were a big fan of the old UK comic Fantastic and
they serialised The Sub-Mariner Tales To Astonish stories where he tries
to win back Atlantis -did this influence you?
Terry:It was serialised in Terrific you twit -remember I showed you those
issues? Anyway,not really influenced by them. I do recall that I
needed a back-up strip starting with Black Tower Adventure no.51 which
would have been…
Frank:In 2000.
Terry:Okay,in 2000. I found the first part of The Bat that had been
drawn in 1994 and thought that part 2 was somewhere so I’d not need
to draw part 3 for a few months.
Frank:That was the bumper 52 pages issue with the yellow cover?
Terry:Yes. Only as I got to part 5,I think it was,did I realise that
this was a quest for The Bat to get his homeland back. They were just
meant to be space filling back ups.
Frank:But The Bat proved popular?
Terry:Yes. I think the biggest fan was Lee Davis who published Mondo.
I remember how,after The Bat confronted the Blauraben I got a letter
from Lee saying “what a b*******!” Then I heard there were other fans
but I decided to leave publishing for a while to package comics.
Frank:I know you said that you finished the story because you were bored
and the changed the title and redrew a lot of the art?
Terry:Yep. “The Bat” seemed a bit short for a book so I thought it needed
a more dynamic title and “The Bat Triumphant!” said it all..but DON’T flip
to the last page!!
The originally published parts were redrawn and when it came to prepping
the pages for printing a lot of cleaning was done.
Frank:Now people might get confused that the book has an original The Bat
strip but NOT the Swann Bat?
Terry:No,the Swann Bat was a 1940s strip by William A.Ward who drew a lot
for Swann. The second Bat is by George McQueen and was published in 1952 by
Cartoon Art Productions[CAP] -their character is more supernatural avenger than
anything else.
Frank:And a new [CAP] Bat strip?
Terry:Yes. I’ve no idea what happened to the first strip I drew with this
character so I drew another. My room is full of many ‘lost’ little
treasures!
Frank:I’m surprised you don’t lose your computer.
Terry:Hmm. Getting bored talking about this..
Frank:Hey,I can’t believe you’ve answered all these questions! So,are there
text features in the album?
Terry:Oh yes. On Ward’s The Bat and McQueen’s The Bat!
Frank:And next?
Terry:Merriwether-God’s Demon Thumper. That should be out in July and then
a couple other albums before the follow up to Some Things Strange And Sinister
and a book of interviews.
Frank:I can see your eyes glazing over with boredom so I’ll say thank you
and let the folk know the book is orderable via this link!
http://www.lulu.com/content/paperback-book/the-bat-triumphant/7216178
Terry:Thank you. Know I need to go and set a snare for the postman.
Frank:And he’s not kidding.
