Rebellion to publish Scream/Misty Halloween Special in 2017

[sheridan]

I liked the Misty collection I got for my birthday last year, and look forward to reading Volume Two, but unfortunately the logo isn't a patch on Scream!  It looks more like something that belongs on Beano, Dandy, Whizzer & Chips and the Ilk, rather than 2000AD, Eagle, Scream! or even Tiger.

And I'm saying 'even' Tiger because it's the least creative of the logos I mentioned above.

[AlexF]

So excited about this! Love the reprints that I've managed to find for both Scream and Misty, and super-psyched to see top creators tackling scary comics for the under-12s. My children will have just turned 8 when this goes on sale - must see if this keeps them awake at night.

[Muon]

So excited about this! Love the reprints that I've managed to find for both Scream and Misty, and super-psyched to see top creators tackling scary comics for the under-12s. My children will have just turned 8 when this goes on sale - must see if this keeps them awake at night.

It would be awesome if this comic caught the imagination of kids today, but I'm genuinely puzzled as to how you reach them in 2017. In 1984 I'd scan the shelves of my local newsagents or a kid would come to school showing off the vampire fangs he'd got free with Scream, but how do kids come across comics now, especially when there's so much other stuff competing for their attention?

[IndigoPrime]

John Freeman wrote an interesting piece that touched on this, in part noting how supermarkets face these comics. They've in many cases shifted from being self-determined purchases by kids with their own money, to parental purchases. The relatively high entry prices benefit sellers in terms of profit per item (meaning stocking fewer copies of each).

The question will be whether this type of publication still appeals to kids – and I very much hope it does. (Does anyone here get The Phoenix? I've never seen a copy of that for sale, but is that bagged, or just a vanilla comic?)

[sheridan]

John Freeman wrote an interesting piece that touched on this, in part noting how supermarkets face these comics. They've in many cases shifted from being self-determined purchases by kids with their own money, to parental purchases. The relatively high entry prices benefit sellers in terms of profit per item (meaning stocking fewer copies of each).

The question will be whether this type of publication still appeals to kids – and I very much hope it does. (Does anyone here get The Phoenix? I've never seen a copy of that for sale, but is that bagged, or just a vanilla comic?)

Only ones I've ever seen have been individually, not-bagged comics (though one of those times is a pile of back issues in the Big Green Bookshop, Wood Green, and the other time has been on the magazine rack of Waitrose).

[Magnetica]

Whenever I am in the supermarket or the Co-op with my kids they invariably ask me to buy them a comic. They then choose what they want. My son (7) will usually buy either Ultimate Spider-Man or Lego Star Wars. Both of these actually have very little comic strip in them (about half?) with the rest being puzzles or features. What strip there is self contained with no attempt at any ongoing story. So it is easy to skip any given issue without feeling you have missed out. That is something that simply never applied to 2000AD - from a kid when I first started reading it properly (after a couple of false starts) to today I could never bare to miss a Prog and I never have.

It is the same with what my daughter (5) buys - very little actual comic strip but loads of things to colour in and puzzles etc. She had even less loyalty to any of them and just buys whatever takes her fancy at the time.

[Professor Bear]

Manga sells loads in Japan, and manga is dreadful*.  If you can sell dreadful comics to a populace widely regarded to occupy the most hyperactive tech-savvy popular culture on Earth, I think you can sell good comics to kids who probably aren't even allowed to own a phone until they're 12.


* I know that reads like a bit of a generalisation - because it is - but luckily for me it is also completely true.

(Does anyone here get The Phoenix? I've never seen a copy of that for sale, but is that bagged, or just a vanilla comic?)

Just a vanilla comic, no bags, no free gifts.  It does have puzzles, mind, but rather than something chucked together in a "make your own word search" programme and plastered with clipart, the puzzles are actually part of ongoing features, with one strip - Von Doogan - essentially being a weekly series of logic puzzles that would give the Times crossword a run for its money.
The Phoenix recently put its cover price up for the first time in five years (it used to be £2.99), but the subscription rates remain exactly the same, so I imagine the raise had more to do with supermarket/newsagent sales.

[IndigoPrime]

I notice The Phoenix was doing subs trials on Facebook recently. I nearly grabbed one, but mini-IP's only just three, so it's probably a bit old.

As for the ongoing stuff, I recall when I was a kid comics were quite varied in that regard. Many of the action/licensed ones weren't particularly self-contained, although US imports often were (such as Spider-Man imports, which were coloured fare from the 1960s, like Molten Man). But the humour comics were rarely anything other than one-shots, and yet commanded a certain kind of loyalty from readers. It's a pity that isn't really being ingrained in kids, although, as Freeman says, at least the market is still scrapping (even if a lot of it isn't supporting nearly as many creators these days).

[Eamonn Clarke]

Interview with Robo-K33f about the special.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/2000-ad-publishers-revive-two-classic-british-horror-comics-halloween-1025958

[IndigoPrime]

I'm thinking a Battle & Oink! Summer Special

Heh. Actually, it would be good to see a revival of the comedy comics somehow. Perhaps there's no market for that kind of thing these days, but I'd love to think at least a special might be viable.

[Professor Bear]

Do a SCREAM! & Oink crossover called SQUEAL! and I will buy two copies - already making it Rebellion's second-highest seller.

[Woolly]

I'd be all over an Oink! special like a rash!
Especially if they could get the original creators back (Charlie Brooker, anyone?) and possibly even aim it at adults this time. I always look back on it as 'Viz for kids' anyway.

[M.I.K.]

Weirdly enough, Davy Francis did the art for a one page story in last year's Hallowscream!

(the pig reference on the cover is a coincidence)

[BPP]

2000ad needs Davy Francis.

[staticgirl]

Speaking as someone on the distaff side who owns every copy of Misty but is only dimly aware of Scream through its merger with Eagle I am quite happy for the Scream logo to be given prominence. If I was launching a horror comic now I would call it something like that even if it was aimed at girls. 

Misty is a bit subtle and only worked in the 70s because of the tradition of giving girl's comics girl's names so it was part trad girls comic (with non scary and positively bouncy logo) and part dank fenland graveyard.

So I am happy to see a scary comic called Scream (and Misty) with a picture of a pretty lady on the front and hope it appears to both boys and girls of a gothic persuasion and sells by the bucket-load. I have preordered my copy anyway and am spreading the word.