IN AND OUT OF THE EAGLE 6

WITH JIM DUCKETT

It’s a sobering thought but the first recorded Dan Dare adventure was set at least thirty years ago! This was Moon Run in the EAGLE Annual for 1961, which includes Dan’s first meeting with Digby and consequently must take place before the Mars 1988 story which was featured in the 1952 Annual where Dan and Digby already know each other. Born in 1967, Dan would now be fifty one, although having spent the best part of a decade in suspended animation, travelling to and from Cryptos, he would now effectively be about forty. With his return in 2012 and the Mekon’s invasion of Earth defeated, by 2016 the Pescod threat would probably be over too and by now Dan and friends may well be involved in the Terra Nova adventure, meaning we’ve reached the end of the Frank Hampson era in real time! At least Frank Bellamy, Don Harley, Eric Eden, Keith Watson and David Motton’s work should keep us going for a few more years, but none of us will be around in 2177 when Dan is revived with a new face for his 2000 A.D. adventures!

Most sobering of all though is the fact that in our version of reality, the possibility of a colony on Mars as depicted in Mars 1988 is still many years away. We have yet to land a man on the planet. But to end on a happier note, at least we aren’t likely to be invaded by robots controlled by intelligent reptiles from Venus any time soon, either.         

IN AND OUT OF THE EAGLE 5

WITH JIM DUCKETT 

When EAGLE began, radio was still king and two of its most popular strips originated as BBC radio series. PC 49 began in 1947 and 112 half hour adventures of the London policeman, played by Brian Reece, were made before the programme ended in 1953. PC 49’s adventures began in the first issue of EAGLE and ran until 1957. The radio adventures of Riders of the Range, featuring Paul Carpenter as Jeff Arnold, began in 1949 and six serials were broadcast between 1949 and 1953, with the EAGLE version beginning in December 1950 and running till March 1962. Unlike strip versions of later television series in other comics, which were invariably notably inferior to their originals, the EAGLE versions of both these radio series compared most favourably, probably because they were written by their creators and illustrated by excellent artists in John Worsley and Frank Humphris, who made the strips their own. Their success is evidenced by the fact that both outlasted their radio counterparts by several years.

Of the characters who were specially created for EAGLE, Dan Dare featured in a hugely successful series of radio serials on Radio Luxembourg between 1951 and 1955, where he was played by Noel Johnson, who had originated the popular Dick Barton character in 1947, for BBC radio. The BBC produced their own four part Dan Dare serial in 1990 to mark EAGLE'S fortieth anniversary, which featured Mick Brown as Dan and Donald Gee as Digby. In 1954, EAGLE began its own promotional programme on Radio Luxembourg, called Spread Your Wings and this featured a six part Luck of the Legion serial, narrated by Norman Shelley as an old legionnaire. Sergeant Luck also appeared on the commercial Springbok Radio in South Africa in 1979 in his own series, written by his creator Geoffrey Bond, twenty years after the strip ended in EAGLE.  

IN AND OUT OF THE EAGLE 4

WITH JIM DUCKETT

Eagle turns up in some unexpected places. In Simon Bartram’s children’s picture story book Man on The Moon, first published in 2002, set partly on the Moon and partly on an Earth highly reminiscent of the 1950s, the hero ‘Bob’, who travels daily to the Moon to show visitors round is shown with a copy of Eagle on his bed as he sleeps at the end of a busy day. The book proved a great success, winning the Blue Peter Book of the Year Award in 2004 and inspiring two picture book sequels and a series of story books about the character for older children.

  

IN AND OUT OF THE EAGLE 3

WITH JIM DUCKETT

The first character created for EAGLE to feature in a television series was Anthony Buckeridge's Rex Milligan, who appeared in a series of six plays on BBC television in 1956, repeated in 1957. Buckeridge's more famous creation Jennings also appeared on television, but the character was not created for EAGLE. In 1957, John Ryan's Captain Pugwash, who ironically had not proved popular in the weekly, first appeared on BBC television, with the most recent new series being produced in 1998 and a live action film now being planned!


Another television series that emerged from EAGLE was Peter Ling's popular school text serials about The Three 'J' s, which were made by the ITV company Associated Rediffusion in 1958, when Peter was Head of Children's Serials. Two serials were broadcast in fortnightly episodes. They were Trouble at Northbrook, which lasted five episodes and Northbrook Holiday, which ran for six. Unfortunately neither of these serials survive.

Many readers will recall seeing Dan Dare in a CGI series on Channel Five in 2002. Originally produced by Netter Digital, who went bankrupt during production, the series was completed by Foundation Imaging. There were several unsuccessful attempts to produce a live action Dan Dare series, but Dan and Digby, played by Niven Boyd and Jimmy Yule were featured in several TV advertisements for Mobil Oil in 1987.

IN AND OUT OF THE EAGLE 2

WITH JIM DUCKETT

   

       
The first three adventures from B7 Media's Dan Dare audio productions are to be broadcast on B.B.C. Radio Four Extra next month. The series stars Ed Stoppard as Dan, Geoff McGivern as Digby and Heida Reed as Professor Peabody. This will be the third version of Dan's adventures to feature on radio. Between 1951 and 1955, Radio Luxembourg broadcast Dan Dare serials in fifteen minute episodes, five nights every week. Noel Johnson, who had played Dick Barton in the B.B.C.'s popular adventure serials, played Dan and John Sharp played Digby. In 1990, to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of Dan and EAGLE, the B.B.C. produced a four part serial which dramatised Dan's first adventure from EAGLE. This serial starred Mick Brown as Dan and Donald Gee as Digby.    

IN AND OUT OF THE EAGLE (1)

WITH JIM DUCKETT 
  

Eagle Times features a regular column called In and Out of the EAGLE and we are going to feature some of these to give a flavour of the magazine's content. 

Basil Dawson’s original EAGLE novel Dan Dare on Mars is well remembered by fans, but in 1977 the New English Library published a paperback adaptation of part of Frank Hampson’s first Venus story. The book was written by Angus P. Allan, a prolific comic strip writer, who contributed to TV Century 21 and became the principal writer for Look In, another comic based on television characters. He never contributed to EAGLE, but his father was Carney Allan, who wrote the wartime adventure strip Mann of Battle, which ran in EAGLE from 1962 - 64. The novel ends with Dan’s rescue of his friends from Mekonta and the Dapon’s sacrifice in destroying the Mekon’s Telezero ships, leaving out the Treens’ visit to Earth and the eventual defeat of the Mekon. Several frames from the original strip were used to illustrate the book, but reprinted in black and white.

1977 was a good year for Dan and EAGLE, for there was also Marcus Morris’ The Best of EAGLE, which reprinted extracts from many strips and features from the first decade of the weekly. Dan himself was revived for 2000A.D. comic, although in a much altered form, which did not please many of his old fans. The reason for this renewed interest was Frank Hampson’s Yellow Kid Award presented to him at an international convention of strip cartoon and animated film artists in Lucca, Italy, just two years earlier, when he was voted the best writer and artist of strip cartoons since the war by a jury of his peers. This awakened interest in him and in Dan Dare by the British press.

Eagle Times Vol 31 No 2

Summer 2018 Contents

• 'Charles Chilton & the Indian Wars' - The 1^st part of an in-depth series dealing with Native Americans and how they were interpreted in Riders of the Range.
• ‘Thoughts on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’ – Thoughts on the life of the famous author and his only story to appear in the Eagle, The Lost World.
• ‘Newly Discovered Dan Dare Reference Material’ – A couple of examples of newly discovered Dan Dare concept sketches.
• ‘The Eagle Society Annual Gathering 2018’ – A fun and in-depth report of the dinner.  All the talks and activities are covered with plenty of photographs.  This year it was held at the Hilton in Leicester.
• ‘Dundee: Venue for the Eagle Society Dinner 2019’ – This article gives us a flavour of what the city will be able to offer the Eagle Society during their visit next year.  It mentions a number of the major attractions that will be available.
• ‘Connaught Racing Cars: 1948 to 1957’ – An article on the Connaught company and how the Connaught B-Type centre spread fuelled a passion in the author for their cars.
• 'In and Out of the Eagle' - more instalments in the series that presents Eagle-related snippets
• 'Space Fiction Movies in Eagle's Times' part 5 - continuing a look at films about space exploration and alien visitations to the earth, the bread-and-butter of the Eagle's Dan Dare adventures between 1950 and 1969. This part covers 1963-65 and includes (among others) Ikarie XB-1, The Day Mars Invaded Earth, First Men in the Moon, Unearthly Stranger and Ghidorah the Three Headed Monster.
• ‘The Case of the Educated Archie – Part 2’ - an Adventure of Archie Berkeley-Willoughby of Scotland Yard. A new story inspired by the character created by Alan Stranks for his radio show P.C.49
• ‘Whatever Happened to My Ten Percent’ – The text from one of the most anticipated fun talks of this years Eagle Society dinner.  It wonderfully covers various topics including King Richard III being found in Leicester, is humankind actually regressing and many more.