Ranger was an attempt in 1965 to return to the 1950s heyday of the Eagle with comic strips and factual information in a highly illustrated and well produced format. The comic ran for 40 issues from September 1965 to June 1966 (plus 2 annuals) but failed to gain enough of an audience and so was amalgamated into Look and Learn.
Steve
This was an excellent but short lived magazine, famous for launching "Rise and Fall of the Trigan Empire". More appropriate to this site are the close fitting and glass helmeted space suits worn by the cadets in "Jason January, Space Cadet".
ReplyDeleteThanks Ian. I followed your recommendation and searched Jason January (great name!)and found I had already covered it in the guise of a comic strip called Space Cadet as featured in "Space Wars Fact and Fiction" listed somewhere to the right. Thanks for the education though.
DeleteHi Steve, I wondered if with the wealth of information on your site you might already have JJ. Well done! Yes I found Space Wars (the WHS first publishing and its - not so rich colour printing - Treasure Press reprint) and was delighted to see again that Campion artwork. Thinking of Trigon Empire I guess you have Don Lawrence's suits from Storm (The Deep World)? Great artist but not so good on design. Looking at the complexity of Moebius suits they seem a little utility by comparison. You have such a treasure of information... Excellent site.
ReplyDeleteCheers Ian. No I didn't have that already but I do now! Big thanks. Lovely art and I really like that suit. Being a child of the 70's, that's what a space suit should look like. - If you can imagine your Action-Man wearing it then its on the money! Joking aside it's sort of similar to the Anderson UFO suits, don't you think
DeleteThose UFO/Doppleganger helmet props with the raised strips certainly looked authentic which I guess is why they surfaced in several productions throughout the seventies. (Might be worth looking at The Prop Gallery site to see if they have them. The bought a lot of Space 1999 suits.) The Moonbase consol was reused by the BBC so I guess Elstree must have sold the props off. Don Lawrence was a superb figurative artist. My favourite space suits of his are the Trigan ones you see in the very first page of his epic, the ones with the original circular glass collar. On another topic my Action Man had that silver Mercury suit as I was a child of the sixties. Wish I still had it, that toy encouraged my imagination and was perfect as it was the same proportions as the Captain Scarlet puppets.
ReplyDeleteI was a child of the late 60's early 70's so I had to inherit by big brother's Action-Man with the Mercury suit...it did not survive the transition of owners very well
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