http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy0YWPic1vw&feature=endscreen

why Black Tower (Well, ME!) Is VERY Excited.

Why am I excited? Well, two VERY well known comic creators are going to be doing work for Black Tower.  Joel Stransky and Pierre Labbat are working on The Bat George McQueen’s Bat NOT William A. Wards).

“Who?” you ask.

Well, the clues are in the names and there are a couple “Creator illoes” to follow…but you won’t recognise them from these. According to Stransky (in a thick Midlands accent): “Imagine me with no beard. No hair. Oh the cries from on high!” And Pierre Labbat…well: “This is how I see meself. Dark, suave, sophisticated. Not pissed out of my head with food stains on me best shirt!”

This is all just fun. Labbat and Stransky (well, Stransky mainly) say: “We’ll go to our graves as ‘that mysterious duo that worked for Black Tower’ and the quest to find out who we really are will go on and on -unless you blab!”

Me? No, oh mage of the Midlands!

Anyway, news to follow…at some point.

Black Tower Comic Books For India...My Attempts!

So, it was a cold August night and I got an email from an editor at Diamond Comics in India. He had read through a proposal I'd sent to bring Diamond up-to-date and into the super hero age. 

"Great!" I thought, but then he said: "We need new characters 48 pages in colour" then came the "we'll need it in four weeks"! 

I worked and worked, re-thought some old characters and then told the editor I would produce colour guide roughs for approval before doing final colours -I also lettered everything so Diamond's translators could see what they would need to translate. 

THREE weeks later I sent everything off. Nothing. Sent an email. Nothing. Then phoned...someone would call me. They never did. Gulshan Rai the top man at Diamond was supposed to have okayed this. 

The special delivery package HAD been received...after two months I gave up and I never even got paid. 

What follows are SOME of the rough colour pages plus, where strips are not complete, the black and white versions plus an assortment of specials for you!

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 Sabu the Mystic and his small assistant, Piku, was a bit of fun. I didn't want everything to 

be just dark.

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Insecto-Kid. Any resemblance to a certain Fly-man is totally coincidental. In the concept 

pages sent to Diamond were the up-dating and costume change due for the character in 

issue 2.

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Couple of pages of India's own Fantastic Four...plus 1....India 5. Other pages are 

somewhere.

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All I can remember about Power Shield is that it fitted in with Black Tower continuity -

characters, etc. Other than that I HATED it. I think it was because I drew and re-drew that 

feckin MiG.

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I think these were Diamond or Raj(?) comic characters. More of the old project roughs. 

Sharp eyed Indian friends will recognise most of the characters. What might have been!!!

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Black Fox which was meant for Muthu Comics in Southern India (Tamil). They took my 

scans of Robot Archie versus The Spider (sent as a favour to the publisher) then nothing. 

meh.

Big rule I've learnt: never EVER take anything for granted until the contract and a pay cheque is in your hand!