Death Camp Jones

A Fistfull of Ass!

2007-07-24T12:09:00.000+01:00

With thanks to Bolt-01

Now Getting It Ready For YOU...

2007-06-12T14:52:00.000+01:00

Huey Lewis and The News once informed us that 'It's Hip To Be Square', but once you glims glance upon the Book of Beyondo that is Duke Étrange's WORLD of WEIRD, you'll never grok a right-angle the same again.

Prepare for an anthology like they made way back in Endzone, Jack - hosted by that beatnik of the bizarre Duke Étrange - and enter a world of freaks, geeks and menacing muck-men

Get in the groove with 44 pages of out of this world weirdness, where politically incorrect superheroes mix it up with sinister saucer-squares

Just three of your English pounds will buy you into apocalyptic visions, hot coffee and even hotter jazz, plus all the nutty ziggerboos you can shake a Ginsberg at

Duke Étrange's WORLD of WEIRD - not so much a way of life as a sort of picture book with some words in it!

Swingin' Soon, Cool Cats...

2007-02-14T22:48:00.000Z

Clown About Town

2006-10-15T17:08:00.000+01:00

Okay, well here's something that I've been doing for a new anthology by Chrissie Harper (www.chezchrissie.co.uk) about a clown, based on a dream I had involving foetal orphans, cats and giant eyeballs. I think there's a reason I don't remember my dreams as a rule, and this is the first one I actually recalled since childhood. Well, apart from the one where I was editing an Al Ewing script and Bryan was a middle aged plumber from Stretham. Anyway (because it fills up some space and makes it look like I'm actually doing something), here's my description for panel 4 of page 1 - prepare to be underwhelmed when entering my world of nonsensical madnesss:

Splash: our protagonist – GRIMALDI – sits in a moth-eaten armchair, his feet up on a foot rest, as he watches the television, laughing his head off. He is a middle-aged clown, but he looks about as seedy as the chair in which he is rooted. Hair sprouts out in great bunches from either side and on top of his head, but appears almost as though it is flowing, like it was underwater. He holds a smoking cigarette in one hand, and a black cat sleeps contentedly, curled up in his lap. The room around him is suitably messy and full of clutter and useless ephemera, and the wall is lined with faded posters with titles such as STABFOOT LIVES!, GOOGLY GOGO! and THE ORANGE FROM HELL!, whilst most notably in the centre of the wall sits a poster of Grimaldi himself in front of a circus big top, with the words THE GREAT GRIMALDI in ridiculously large type beneath. Through a window in the b/g, we can see a man with an elephant’s head and an eye patch floating past as though he were unusually weightless, holding on tight to a string attached to a balloon in the shape of a large eyeball.

And here's the actual panel itself, as drawn by artistic wunderkind extroadinaire Dragan Kovacevic - you can see the entire first page over on Dragan's blog (http://hammerson.blogspot.com/2006/10/great-grimaldi.html) - nice, innit?

How I Got My Legs Broken By Frank Miller...

2006-09-08T20:22:00.000+01:00

Here's a strip that I actually drew as well as wrote. I say 'drew', but even a blind man who had no conception of what a comic was could see that someone's been cribbing like crazy from Frank Miller. I feel that I should point out that it wasn't traced, but actually drawn freehand, though that's sort of like admitting that you can cheat with your eyes closed.

Anyway, the strip's going to be seeing the light of day in Lost Property, published by the Mighty Bolt-01 Machine, by way of trying to say thanks for his pulling our arses out of a particular deadline-based fire recently. Sensibly though, he's decided to use less litigious linework, so the art on this version isn't the one that'll be used in the book.

Anyway, c'mon then Miller, ya damn pussie - do yer worst!

I'm lucky no one actually reads this shit, or else...wait, what's that soun

Love a Rebel...Love a Rogue!

2006-06-27T23:51:00.000+01:00

Get on down to ground-groove, granddad! Rogue Trooper - yes, that's right Rogue Tooper! - dances to a new disco beat when he unexpectedly finds an enemy in his path that he could never defeat. His own heart!

You'll laugh, you'll cry and you'll jive the night away with this amourous tale of the genetik superfreak that comes from beyond believability to shatter your frontal lobes with the savage emotions barely contained within its telling!

Hold onto your hearts, friends - it's going to be a bumpy ride!

Skip to the End 2: The Revenge!

2006-06-13T23:26:00.000+01:00

5...4...3...2...1...DCJ is GO!

2006-05-06T19:42:00.000+01:00

Yup, only one week to go until it's sales day in Bristol, and most of the comics are sort of finished. Kind of. Anyway, assuming that we get the bloody things finished on time, and that we can then get them over to Blighty in time for the con, our wares are as follows:

Wild West Wendy
Richmond Clements & Vicky Stonebridge
To save her immortal soul, Wendy will need to test it to the limits for 40 days and 40 nights. It was good enough for Christ: it's just about good enough for Wendy!
24 pages, b&w, A5, £2

Cannibal Salad
Bryan Coyle
There is nothing to fear but fear itself - but fear itself fears having to read Cannibal Salad!
24 pages, b&w, A5, £2

Shido
Bryan Coyle & Ed Berridge
In the forgotten depths of space lie the ruins of the Nameless Empire. A land plagued by poverty, banditry and death - where a lost ghost slips from the shadows, seeking vengeance...
24 pages, b&w, A6, £1.50

Skip to the End

2006-04-02T21:36:00.000+01:00

It has been said in the past that people require 'more bangs for their buck'. But what if you could have something that was all 'bang'? If you're like us (and let's face it, who wouldn't wish for that happy possibility?), you'll probably always skip straight to the end of a strip to see how it finishes before deciding whether to commit your might mental processes to the challenging task of reading the whole thing. So why bother with all the tired foreplay when the twist's the thing? The Earth always blows up in the end anyway.

And so in this spirit, we present to you, gentle reader, the final panels of three chapbook spectacluars. To show you more might irrevocably damage your very mind itself through brain-blowing pictographic thrillcitement! So sit tight, hold on to your unbelieving eyes and prepare to skip to the end...

The Coming of Cosmoose!

2006-03-28T18:50:00.000+01:00

If this be doomsday...when the awesome holocaust strips the planet bare of its life-sustaining energies...the day when calls Cosmoose! Our planet contains the energy it needs to sustain itself. Cosmoose absorbs it at will...as he has done for ages, in countless galaxies throughout the cosmos! So flee now, puny survivors...flee whilst you still can! Cosmoose is indifferent to your fate! What import are brief, nameless lives...to Cosmoose? Cosmoose is not evil! He is above good...or evil! He does what he must... for he is Cosmoose! All that concerns Cosmoose is its eternal hunger. And so, throughout the cosmos, worlds must die...that Cosmoose may live!

Daikaiju-A-Go-Go

2006-03-22T19:01:00.000Z

Here's a preview pic that Bryan's knocked off for the strip that we're doing for MangaQuake #2, which has just changed from being 15 pages to 27 at the last minute. It's not Godzilla though...just something very similar, but not legally actionable. We hope.

In other news, we've had five pages of Cannibal Salad done (and very nice they look too), Wild West Wendy has made a start and I've finished off some more Shido pages, so everything seems to be bubbling along well. I've just got to write some of these fucking articles now...

Crusoe Fiction

2006-03-15T20:32:00.000Z

Here's something else requestered from the files of Lost Property - this did actually see print, but only in black and white, not in glorious Coylecolour (I think some of this may have been coloured with pens, but don't quote me on that). Interestingly (only to me, admittedly), the dialogue for this was just pulled directly from the very first script that I ever wrote, and was crammed into the Crusoe setting. This might explain why it's not actually funny. But it does look nice. If nothing else, this goes towards my ongoing campaign to get Bryan to agree to doing an all-colour book in the near-future. If you want to support the Coyle Colouring Campaign, please leave a comment and hoot your literary horn as your drive past on the old information superhighway bypass.

In other news, I finished inking the first batch of Shido pages yesterday - Huzzah!! That's nine pages down - more please!

Ultimate Gandhi

2006-03-11T00:52:00.000Z

Here's a strip by Bryan that was left out of the last issue of Lost Property...can't imagine why though...

In other news, the inking of Shido continues slowly but hopefully fruitfully, and we should be getting Wild West Wendy and Cannibal Salad sorted in time for Bristol (though I may well have just jinxed it now...)

Plus Bryan and I are working on a certain scaley daikaiju with firey atomic breath...in a non-legally actionable manner, of course...

Et Review, Brute?

2006-02-27T23:21:00.000Z

Here's a review that cropped up in the just-released Redeye #5, courtesy of Adam York:

If you're one of those people that skipped through the text in Alan Moore's Watchmen because it looked boring alongside Dave Gibbons' fabulous artwork, I have two things to say to you. The first is this: go back and read those pages, they're fantastic and thought provoking and add so much to the story, you really missed out there. The second is: whatever you do, don't do the same with Pony School, because if you do, what you will find is a strange comic with an odd visual style and a seemingly inappropriate storyline. But that would be missing the point...
Pony School is a little piece of postmodern satire, wrapped up neatly in a comic. The passages of text that punctuate the story itself tell of the (fictional) history of the comic itself, from its initial incarnation in 'Fairytale Princess' where the story centred around 'Jenny's attempts to come to grips with the minutiae of pony riding', through successive buy-outs and mergers, ending up in a violent boys comic where Jenny is 'a government spy'.
The absurdity of both stories is handled brilliantly with a dead-pan, faux documentary approach and you feel that rather than reading a comic, you are reading a history of the mainstream British comics industry. One moment you are reading about the tragic life of the publisher P.T. Dunbar, the next you are following Jenny towards an explosive climax of violence and gymkhana. It is an odd mix that works surprisingly well. There are some nice touches too: there's a glossary of terms including entries such as 'bridal', 'dressage' and 'The Intelligence and Security Committee'. There's also a letters page, taken to be an excerpt from one of the many incarnations of the comic, which made me laugh out loud several times before I managed to finish it.
As I mentioned, the artwork is a little strange though suitably uses a mangaesque style to depict both the espionage action and the pony riding with some competance and wit. The shading is a bit patchy and seems to be a mix of hand-drawn and CGI, whilst the lettering is a little ugly, but perfectly readable. In a way this adds to the back-story that Pony School fought long and hard to appear in comics for the general public, despite a rough edge and some questionable content. I don't think I have ever read anything that manages to address the moral issues involved in pumping our children full of commercial comics in such an elegant way. It makes a serious attempt at witty satire and I think it pulls it off perfectly.
If you are of a naturally cynical disposition, this will make you laugh from start to finish.

Penny Ryder's Pal Tobermory

2006-02-24T21:06:00.000Z

Presenting the latest comic from DCJ - Tranny the Power Horse. The story is unique in its ballistic simplicity - Tobermory, the loyal equine companion of Pony School's Penny Ryder, is granted mystical superhuman powers when he is visited by the ghost of King Arthur whilst visiting Stonehenge as part of a history excursion-cun-riding lesson. Imbued with the amphropomorphic trans-gender powers of speach, cognitive reasoning and the ability to fly, like his owner Penny he is dedicated to just one thing - protecting Great Britain. Under the tutilage and guidance of Arthur's deceased spirit, Toby will begin a journey round the globe to prevent an occult catastrophe of apocalyptic proportions that has been millennia in the planning...

The first issue in the 'Golden Warriors of Troy' story arc sees Toby travelling to San-Francisco, and setting up a front as transexual private investigator Paris DuCraine, in a deadly war of nerves with the local drug-pushers who are headed by the sinister shaggy form of Bigfoot Bill, the Yeti-Czar of Old Frisco Bay. PLUS, exclusive to this issue, the tragic and never told before origin story of Tobermory...believe me readers, this will be a story that you MUST NOT MISS! Just make sure you have plenty of kleenex on standby...there won't be a dry eye left in the house...!

Expect explosive action, street-bound justice and hot female impersonator hi-jinx in a comicbook near you soon...and we promise that ONE CHARACTER WILL DIE IN THIS ISSUE!! Would we lie to you...?

Excelsior to you gentle reader, and 'till next time...'nuff said!

Entertaining Ed
Beguiling Bryan

The Way of the Warrior...

2006-02-17T22:00:00.000Z

A sneak preview of Shido, our long-planned Manga digest. It finally actually seems to be happening after various troughs and peaks, and from the bits I've seen so far, looks like it could be pretty good. More as it happens.

In other news, I'm currently inking the next page for the blog, so try to avoid that one if you can.

Doppleganger of Doom!

2006-01-27T20:54:00.000Z

Happy New Year!

Long time no post, so here's the first in what we hope will be a monthly series of rubbish stuck up here to make it seem like we're actually working.

It's my birthday tomorrow (so they tell me), and I'm supposed to be off out in a minute, so this is a short post. Lots of exciting stuff going on at the the moment - Wild West Wendy, Dry Bone Gumbo, The Monster With Hairy Teeth and lots of other ongoing stuff and bollocks. More will be revealed as and when...

Review Por Vu...

2005-12-14T01:59:00.000Z

Okay, it's been a little while, but illness and a huge backlog of scripts to critique has kept me from updating. As a treat, have a peak at the front cover to the DCJ ashcan that was being given away at Brighton (where we sold all out copies of Action Stations!, by the way).

In other news, things seem to be moving on apace - work has already begun on the Wild West Wendy one-shot (a spin-off from Action Stations!). This is our first venture publishing other people's work, so it's quite nerve-wracking, but thanks to both Rich and Vicky turning in stirling work, it looks like it'll be a blinder. I've had a sneak look at the cover, and you people are lucky sods, that's all I'm saying...! Hopefully we'll have another book to join Wendy for publication at Bristol in May, but we'll have to wait and see. More info as it happens...

Oh, and here's a link to a review of Action Stations! over at Silverbullet - really don't know what he's on about with the lesbianism though...
http://www.silverbulletcomicbooks.com/smallpress/113446358591933.htm

StabFoot Lives!

2005-11-17T19:07:00.000Z

We are only two days away from the Brighton comic Expo (19th - 20th November), and already excitement is building as the event is overshadowed by the sinister shadow of moosey doom. For StabFoot, the Avenging Moose of Verdun, will be unleashed in the special convention edition of Action Stations!

Catch your copy whilst you're still able, gentle reader!

Beware the Moose!

Forge Ahead

2005-11-07T11:24:00.000Z

Well, things are slowly progressing as we near the Brighton Expo (less than two weeks away), and most of these books we've been working on go on sale. Bryan and I have just produced a last minute contribution to MangaQuake (following my previous last minute contribution a week or two before). Work is also (hopefully) underway on a new strip, Stabfoot - the Avenging Moose of Verdun, and there's be banners, posters and even an Ashcan featuring previews of existing and upcoming titles. More pics and info as they come...

However, the purpose of this update is to display a rather wonderful preview pic of The Forge that has been passed onto me from La Coyle - I genuinely have to say that this is some of the best work I've ever seen him do, and can't wait to see people's reactions when it hits the net. You are lucky, lucky people. Look out The Forge at http://www.webcomicsnation.com/cavscott/forge/series.php

Aaaarrrghh!

2005-10-18T00:32:00.000+01:00

Well, it's more than a week later, and I like to think that we're all more than a week wiser. Dreddcon went well, and we sold out of all the issues that we had, plus sent off a load of Pony School's to be sold at Octocon outside Dublin (now also finished, so we missed the chance to build up a bit of excitement there!). Dave, Rich and Vicky's work went down a storm, and we were both very pleased with what they'd produced. We're currently looking into getting a full-length Wild West Wendy comic out for next year, so keep your eyes pealed as you'll hear about it here first!

Unfortunately, we've been having some printing problems, and haven't had the second print out as quickly as we should have, so there's currently a backlog of people waiting for issues, which is a bit worrying. Hopefully we should have this sorted by the end of the week.

There'll be at least one additional strip for Brighton (well, almost certainly two, but I don't want to promise anything yet), as well as hopefully the color version of the cover (lovely work by the man Coyle there, even if I say so myself, which I won't if you - that's right, you! - buy yourself a copy!)

In other worlds, work is finally finishing up on FutureQuake and MangaQuake (in fact, I had to write a six page story in a day when an unexpected slot came in the day before I was off to Dreddcon!). Bryan has also finished his first page of The Forge, and it looks...well, there's no other word for it but simply...fantastic! I genuinely think this is some of the best work that he's ever done (though remember where you saw him first, Coyle fans!). No sneaky peaks, mind - you'll just have to wait for this issue to come out.

Oh, go on then - there's the first page of White Samurai, one of the new Action Stations! strips, drawn by Miss Emily Snape, at the top of the page. Don't say I don't treat you right!

Oh, and I'll be on a panel at the International Manga & Anime Festival 2005 on this Saturday, and involved in a further event on the Sunday. It's held at the County Hall in London, just by the London Eye, from the 21st - 25th October, and should be pretty sweet - they're showing Samurai Champloo! - and it's completely FREE! Be good to see people if they can make it down, as I'll be pressing the flesh pimping MangaQuake and upcoming DCJ title Shido...
www.imaf.co.uk

Less Than a Week to Go!

2005-09-25T18:37:00.000+01:00

Okay, Action Stations is due out in less than a week (next Saturday, to be exact), and we're cacking it a bit, but it looks like just about everything should be done in time. We've had most of our subs back from contributors and (I think) we've managed to get all our own stuff done, so it's just a case of printint and getting it all posted. We'd both like to give a big murmer of thanks to all those who've been generous enough to help us out at the last minute and provide their excellent services for free. You're splendid chaps, every man-jack of you!

Anyway, enough'a my yakkin' - here's a gorgeous Vicky Sotnebridge page of Wild West Wendy, which looks bloody superb. Get on your knees in supplication, mortals!

Interview To A Kill

2005-09-20T22:59:00.000+01:00

Okay, relatively quick post this time, but we're about a week and a half, and just over a week before the books have to be with me to go on sale, and I'm crapping myself. It's that point when you really start worrying about the various contributors getting all their stuff in - I'm sure I'd be worried to a much greater degree, but I'm just too knackered to be honest. There again, we've had two inked pages from Bolt of Destroy All Japs!, and I've seen some bits of Vicky's stuff, which looks like it might be some of the best work that she's done yet (and that's saying a lot). Bryan's also busy, getting Misty the Teen Detective, Jimmy McGuffin - A Life in Comics, and Communications Bunker (our letters page - with genuine letters!) together, as well as various editorial layouts and bits and pieces, and should be getting stuck into the cover now. Hopefully if we get it together on time, this should be a bit special.

Anyway, talking of Bryan, there's currently an interview up with Bryan over at 2000AD Review, for their new Small Press section http://www.2000adreview.co.uk/smallpress/2005/coyle/coyle.shtml
This was conducted by some not unfamiliar - well, what's a bit of nepotism between friends? Anyway, nip on over to have a butchers at the bonkers world of the man many know now simply as 'Dr. Mongoose'! Be afraid...

Mr. Bolt's Pretty Picture!

2005-09-15T22:26:00.000+01:00

Quick message, but we're now well under way for publication in slightly less than two weeks. There's a variety of things to look forward to, including Pony School, SAS, Wild West Wendy, Misty the Teen Detective and other space-filling stuff - I'll go into a more detailed lineup closer to the time, but for now, here's some of Mr. Bolt-01's stunning pencils for the Destroy All Japs! strip, written by (apprently) "long-term collaborator" Richmond Clements - you are all very lucky people!

Secret Agent Skipper

2005-09-09T21:19:00.000+01:00

Here's the first (unfinished) page from Secret Agent Skipper, which I'm rather pleased with. Look forward to seeing the exploits of Dave Morris - England's last line of defence against the sinister forces of International Communism - on 1st October.

We've also had word that there's going to be a review of Pony School #1 in the next issue of Redeye - http://www.enginecomics.co.uk/accentuk/aukframeset.htm - which should hopefully go well alongside the smashing review we got from Comics International - http://www.qualitycommunications.co.uk

Also, here's a link to Bryan's secret project - looks like it's going to be a corker:
http://www.graveyardshift.co.uk/uploaded_images/Project_Longinus-738011.jpg

Beggorah & Bejeezus!

2005-08-26T13:10:00.000+01:00

Well, all seems to be going well at the moment - I've finished the inks on the Pony School strip, and we've now expanded to a full issue: the Action Stations Winter Special! Alongside Pony School, we now have Secret Agent Skipper and Destroy All Japs! (which is being produced by my legendary FutureQuake alumnis Richmond Clements and Bolt-01!), alongside a Misty the Teen Detective text story that I've written and which Bryan will be providing accompanying illustrations for. Basically, the issue is a combination of circumstances, but really because of the surprisingly large number of people who've asked if we would do a 'proper' version of the Action Stations comic mentioned in Pony School #1. Since we won't be able to get PS2 out this year (not in it's original form, anyway), it seemed like a nice (if last minute replacement). We've also got some letters and fan art to round the issue out, and we might even squeeze out another couple of strips if we can find the time (remember it's only about a month until we want to see this thing printed!).

Meanwhile, on other fronts, Bryan's just finished lettering the next Binmen of the Apocalypse strip for The End is Nigh, whilst I've been working on a Protect & Survive feature (which appears as though it'll still be into the redraft stage when the maagazine is published) and I'm about to start a shorter article on World War One. I've also got a strip coming up for them, apparently to be drawn by Barry Renshaw (of Fusion/Redeye fame), though I've yet to hear anything back about this yet, so I remain healthily sceptical!

Bryan's secret project is slowly getting underway (I saw a doodle he sent me the other day, and it was bloody superb), and he's also drawing a werewolf script for something by the title of Lopus-Garou (I think!) which is written by FutureQuake editor Mark Woodland (it's really nepotistic, this Small Press world, isn't it?). For myself, I've been writing a lot of scripts for Bolt-01's Lost Property 2: Revenge of the Strip, which is a collection of short, newspaper style humour and adventure strips. Personally, I think this is going to be great, and is probably the book I'm most mooking forward to see at the moment. Bryan and I are writing an adventure strip together called 1949, centred around the too cool for school figure of airman Remmington Blaine.

On the FutureQuake front, half the editorial team's on holiday at the moment, so it's just me and la Clements in charge (AIIEE!!!). We seem to have most of our scripts in - #5's already full, and we're swiftly filling issues 6 and 7 - so most of our work is more about organisation and promotion, apart from the odd submission from reclusive genius Al Ewing. Rich and I are currently writing the Monster Squad strip for #6, following our successful combination (we hope!) on our Triumph of the Will strip that's supposed to see print in issue 5. We may even try and pitch a script of some kind to Panini, if we can get it together (Rich has already pitched stuff to The Judge Dredd megazine, Marvel Rampage, and has a strip coming up in Zap!, so I plan to hang on firmly to his coat-tails!). I've also got to finish a script about Music Halls and a ventriloquist's dummy for isse 6 (our Horror issue), which I'm told is destined for the back cover, though I've still got to get around to writing the second draft (I've got to write a song, and I hate that). Anyway, watch this space.

Next time I'll try and include some images and try and ramble less, in the hope that it's even half-readable.

Well Alright!

2005-08-10T15:00:00.000+01:00

Okay, well here's our blog for DCJ, which we never expected to actually bother with, but circumstances make monkies of us all. Things are currently quiet on the home front at the moment, as we're both extremely busy on various fronts, working on stuff from Lost Property and The End is Nigh to FutureQuake and Solar Wind. Also, Bryan has hada very exciting offer recently - more news as that comes up!

It's been a good (if busy) few months for us since we were launched at the Bristol Comics Expo in May, and have already completely sold out two print runs of the book, thanks in no small part to the adverts we placed in Comics International and the absolutely stupendous review they gave us (9/10). Anyway, for those interested in purchasing a copy of Pony School, the book costs £2 + 50 p p&p, and you should contact PonySchool@gmail.com

Anyway, just so it doesn't seem a complete waste of time, here's the drop dead gorgeous pencils from a page for the Pony School/Jimmy Chong free mini-comic that Bryan has drawn, and which I'm in the preocess of inking - enjoy!