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The Complete Harlem Heroes

Started by Greg M., 13 August, 2010, 02:17:08 PM

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Greg M.

I've wanted to see this reprinted in full ever since reading the first few parts in one of the 80s annuals, and am hugely impressed to see it in a collected volume. Major thumbs up to Rebellion for some of the less obvious stuff they're putting out in trades, like this, Flesh, Stainless Steel Rat - can't wait for the complete Meltdown Man! So, a few observations:

The artwork is superb – twenty four consecutive Dave Gibbons episodes, showcasing all that wonderfully crisp, clean dynamic drawing skill? Yes please! And then Belardinelli takes over and leads Giant and co into 'Inferno', and things get, frankly, increasingly insane, with some of the most wonderfully grotesque art of the Italian master's career. Belardinelli's take on Artie Gruber is absolutely hideous – Gibbons's version looks like a fairly plausible cyborg-zombie but Massimo's  is like something that crawled out of a nightmare.

As for the story... well, 'Harlem Heroes' ironically keeps its feet more or less on the ground, and while a bit repetitive (oh, another aeroball game!), is delightfully bloodthirsty and cracks along at a fair pace. 'Inferno', on the other hand, is completely mad, and takes all the little eccentricities present in HH and supersizes them till they dwarf everything else. Men in shark costumes, the Philadelphia Freaks, flying robot wolves on motorcycles (!) – it's all here. Scripter Tom Tully's trademark seems to be killing characters off in an incredibly sudden and abrupt matter (see 'Mean Arena'), but I would love to know what was going on behind the scenes in the last episode of 'Inferno'  – it's as if Tully loses control of what's going on entirely, as some fairly major things happen off panel, [spoiler](Slim and Zack are killed)[/spoiler] and Tharg starts narrating halfway down one page!

Very much of its era (love the jive-talk), but great to see it out there. Anyone else picked it up...?

Dandontdare

#1
I wasn't sure if the Inferno stuff was included in this volume. Definitely one to go on my list. I remember as a 10 year old being totally blown away by Belardinelli's art, expecially Artie Gruber, my favourite villain. I still have the star scan of him coming out of a grave - though I now wish I hadn't cut it out of my prog!

I'd forgotten that weird final episode. Is that when [spoiler]they had Giant strapped across the booby trapped goal and everybody got killed one by one? It was like the last episode of Blake's 7, a real massacre[/spoiler]! I'd also be interested to find out if there was a story behind the off-scene stuff and Tharg's narration.

Peter Wolf

Quote from: Greg M. on 13 August, 2010, 02:17:08 PM
I've wanted to see this reprinted in full ever since reading the first few parts in one of the 80s annuals, and am hugely impressed to see it in a collected volume. Major thumbs up to Rebellion for some of the less obvious stuff they're putting out in trades, like this, Flesh, Stainless Steel Rat - can't wait for the complete Meltdown Man! So, a few observations:

The artwork is superb – twenty four consecutive Dave Gibbons episodes, showcasing all that wonderfully crisp, clean dynamic drawing skill? Yes please! And then Belardinelli takes over and leads Giant and co into 'Inferno', and things get, frankly, increasingly insane, with some of the most wonderfully grotesque art of the Italian master's career. Belardinelli's take on Artie Gruber is absolutely hideous – Gibbons's version looks like a fairly plausible cyborg-zombie but Massimo's  is like something that crawled out of a nightmare.

As for the story... well, 'Harlem Heroes' ironically keeps its feet more or less on the ground, and while a bit repetitive (oh, another aeroball game!), is delightfully bloodthirsty and cracks along at a fair pace. 'Inferno', on the other hand, is completely mad, and takes all the little eccentricities present in HH and supersizes them till they dwarf everything else. Men in shark costumes, the Philadelphia Freaks, flying robot wolves on motorcycles (!) – it's all here. Scripter Tom Tully's trademark seems to be killing characters off in an incredibly sudden and abrupt matter (see 'Mean Arena'), but I would love to know what was going on behind the scenes in the last episode of 'Inferno'  – it's as if Tully loses control of what's going on entirely, as some fairly major things happen off panel, [spoiler](Slim and Zack are killed)[/spoiler] and Tharg starts narrating halfway down one page!

Very much of its era (love the jive-talk), but great to see it out there. Anyone else picked it up...?

I shall pick this up on saturday if its in the shop or else i wioll buy off Rebellion.Really though i should say that i am only really buying it for Inferno as i am not that fussed about Harlem Heroes.

The ending of Inferno definately seemed very abrupt and rushed and the strip obviously wasnt allowed to run its course which was a great shame and its as if the inclusion of Tharg at the end was exactly that and its like Tharg was saying "Enough !!".

And yes i am counting days until november for MM and it is excellent of Rebellion to reprint these strips as i love them to death.I will buy more than one copy as well because they might not be available again like Flesh.
Worthing Bazaar - A fete worse than death

Greg M.

Yeah, Dandontdare, that's the final episode of Inferno all right - where [spoiler]Louis gets shot in the back and is dead in one small panel (after saving everybody!) whilst Moody Bloo is shot in one and dies in the next[/spoiler], which is probably a major triumph for a Tom Tully character (all the Mean Team [spoiler]went in one go, didn't they?)[/spoiler]My biggest sympathy is for [spoiler]Zack[/spoiler] though... at least we see what's going to happen to [spoiler]Slim[/spoiler], but [spoiler]Zack gets narrated out of existence![/spoiler] Oh and you'll be glad to know that the star-scan you mention is included at the back of the book. For me, the best Artie pic is when he turns up in Giant's apartment in the middle of the night, when Giant's in bed, and propositions him ... sorry, advances menacingly on him.

And another note... Slim's surname is Shafto. Slim Shafto. Oh dear. Never mind, countdown for Meltdown Man starts here...

Colin YNWA

Didn't the end to 'Inferno' get the comic into all sorts of problems with the management at IPC. If I remember by 'Thrillpower Overload' correctly it led to people being moved off the comic and even in its heavily edited state get a few people into a lot of trouble?

Might be getting a bit muddle there with an earlier episode which lead to the end being cropped, forget which way around it was?

Aaron A Aardvark

Inferno is associated with the word "controversial" - I assume because of all the cool beastly violence. I can't remember much about it, apart from the ending.

Anyway, there must have been some kind of error because the Cambridge Forbidden Planet actually has a copy, so I'm looking forward to some death sport action this weekend.

Greg M.

Hmm, that controversy is starting to ring a bell, thought I hadn't realised (or had forgotten) it stirred up so much trouble. I suppose it might have been the nature of the violence - I think I recall hearing that the scene where Artie Gruber pours fuel all over a prone Giant and prepares to set fire to him didn't go down too well. Maybe IPC management thought that this was the sort of thing it was easier for kids to replicate, compared to, say, Dredd shooting someone.

Jim_Campbell

Quote from: Greg M. on 13 August, 2010, 04:23:11 PM
Maybe IPC management thought that this was the sort of thing it was easier for kids to replicate, compared to, say, Dredd shooting someone.

Keep in mind that these were the same management that objected to Judge Cal pickling someone to death for similar reasons...

Cheers!

Jim
Stupidly Busy Letterer: Samples. | Blog
Less-Awesome-Artist: Scribbles.

Greg M.

Quote from: Jim_Campbell on 13 August, 2010, 04:28:06 PM

Keep in mind that these were the same management that objected to Judge Cal pickling someone to death for similar reasons...


Oil drum, lots of vinegar, someone's little brother.. you never know. "But Mum, being pickled makes you happy, look, Judge Slocum's smiling!"

Yeah, maybe not.  :)

Peter Wolf

I went to my local comic shop and picked up a copy late this afternoon and i even rushed all the work i had to do today to get to the shop in reasonable time.

Also and this is good news is that the book was only out on Thursday and the shop i go to [Daves Comic Shop] had 5 copies and now they have all sold out.It seems that they flew out of the shop which is not bad going for a strip thats nearly 30 years old and what i considered to be a minority interest.

It just goes to show that there is plenty of mileage in these old strips that havent been reprinted before and its a curious feeling when something you have waited for so long actually gets reprinted.
Worthing Bazaar - A fete worse than death

Greg M.

Quote from: Peter Wolf on 16 August, 2010, 05:39:40 PM
I went to my local comic shop and picked up a copy late this afternoon and i even rushed all the work i had to do today to get to the shop in reasonable time.

Also and this is good news is that the book was only out on Thursday and the shop i go to [Daves Comic Shop] had 5 copies and now they have all sold out.It seems that they flew out of the shop which is not bad going for a strip thats nearly 30 years old and what i considered to be a minority interest.

It just goes to show that there is plenty of mileage in these old strips that havent been reprinted before and its a curious feeling when something you have waited for so long actually gets reprinted.

As you rightly say, even within the 2000AD canon, you'd think something like 'Harlem Heroes' wouldn't be a big seller, but it sounds like your local comic shop is doing great business on it! Brilliant – the more this sells, then probably the better chance of getting more obscurities dredged from the vault. (Not that HH is truly obscure, given that it has a certain place in history from being in Prog 1.) I am guessing the comparative scarcity of material from 'Inferno' in particular has lured a few inquisitive souls out. On the subject of early works of Belardinelli, I am guessing the old Dan Dare strips are probably not reprintable due to issues with rights to the character? Whenever myself and the guy from my local shop discuss how impressed we are with the trades, he always gets nostalgic for the Biogs...

Jim_Campbell

Quote from: Greg M. on 13 August, 2010, 04:34:08 PM
you never know.

Well, I'm with Bill Hicks on that score -- anyone that stupid, it's not like we lost the cure for cancer. Next traffic jam I'm in, I'm closer to the front.

Cheers!

Jim
Stupidly Busy Letterer: Samples. | Blog
Less-Awesome-Artist: Scribbles.

O Lucky Stevie!

 
Quote from: Greg M. on 16 August, 2010, 06:08:51 PM
As you rightly say, even within the 2000AD canon, you'd think something like 'Harlem Heroes' wouldn't be a big seller,

Stevie believes that Dave Gibbons is big with the kids these days due to a flimsy little pamplet going by the name of Clockkids or summat.  ;)

Little Stevie seriously can't wait for Diamond to ship his copy. Loved Harlem Heroes. In fact, even though it was that Dan Dare centrespread redolent of Futurity & Wonder that melted his face off in his first prog, when he put pencil to paper the following day to create his own sci-fi comic because the Prog 6's cover was already becoming detached f & he just couldn't wait another for his next fix*, it was an ultra-violent future sport strip involving jetpacks that emerged. Couldn't give a toss about sport at school, but that's undoubtedly because it didn't involve jetpacks &, as every 9 year old knows, jetpacks are the future. None of this wireless networking & tweeting & planes impregnating skyscrapers nonsense. Not unless said plane is actually a rocket carrying radioactive waste & also involves a team of rescue robots; that quite naturally is the future too, in more than one sense of the word but Stevie's digressing here.

So those stick figures zipping around with jetpacks on pages ripped from the middle of an exercise book. Whatever this sport or the strip itself was named has long vanished into the paper shredder of time, but what does remain is the final panel. For one of the rules of this game is that ball is purposely booby trapped & as it explodes, taking out a mid-air scrum, it seems as if that pencil was channelling Tom Tully one character exclaims, "Hell! Atomic balls!!!"

Got the Extreme Edition reprint. Loved it.

But it's Inferno that's got Stevie all a-trembling. For not only was it drawn by his next favourite artist after Ken Reid, but he only got to read the first half due to being sentenced to the Long Walk between progs 40 to 188.**

So come to daddy's rookas my malenky soomka of jive talkin', jet propelled, horrorshow ultraviolent.

*Ritalin wasn't as freely available in the 1970s as it is today.

**Waking up screaming in terror of the giant spiders from Flesh was a single, isolated aberration, yr 'onour.

"We'll send all these nasty words to Aunt Jane. Don't you think that would be fun?"

Greg M.

Quote from: O Lucky Stevie! on 17 August, 2010, 08:15:47 AM

Stevie believes that Dave Gibbons is big with the kids these days due to a flimsy little pamplet going by the name of Clockkids or summat.  ;)

'Tis a fair point, but one wonders if renewed post-movie interest in the above has translated into a such a general climate of Gibbons appreciation that copies of, say, 'The Originals' are flying off the shelves? (Hell, maybe they are, I have no idea.)

Quote from: O Lucky Stevie! on 17 August, 2010, 08:15:47 AM

Little Stevie seriously can't wait for Diamond to ship his copy. Loved Harlem Heroes. In fact, even though it was that Dan Dare centrespread redolent of Futurity & Wonder that melted his face off in his first prog, when he put pencil to paper the following day to create his own sci-fi comic because the Prog 6's cover was already becoming detached f & he just couldn't wait another for his next fix*, it was an ultra-violent future sport strip involving jetpacks that emerged. Couldn't give a toss about sport at school, but that's undoubtedly because it didn't involve jetpacks &, as every 9 year old knows, jetpacks are the future. None of this wireless networking & tweeting & planes impregnating skyscrapers nonsense. Not unless said plane is actually a rocket carrying radioactive waste & also involves a team of rescue robots; that quite naturally is the future too, in more than one sense of the word but Stevie's digressing here.

So those stick figures zipping around with jetpacks on pages ripped from the middle of an exercise book. Whatever this sport or the strip itself was named has long vanished into the paper shredder of time, but what does remain is the final panel. For one of the rules of this game is that ball is purposely booby trapped & as it explodes, taking out a mid-air scrum, it seems as if that pencil was channelling Tom Tully one character exclaims, "Hell! Atomic balls!!!"


I mourn the fact that you weren't old enough to be writing for 2000AD at the time, though one suspects you'd have had trouble getting that one past IPC. But if only...  :) I'm sure Pat Mills would have approved.

Aye though, everyone knows jetpacks and sports where people die frequently and publically are the two surest indicators we are finally living in the future - and Harlem Heroes had 'em both!

Aaron A Aardvark

HH is a bit of a relic but I quite enjoyed Inferno. It was like they got to the end of HH and said, "right, let's do that again but with more of everything."

Giant's plan to buy an Artie Gruber android as a memory aid could be the stupidest idea ever.

(At least one of Belardinelli's trademark artist's cameos in there, I think.)