1979: THE BLACK HOLE UK VHS COVER

From December 1979 (although this hails from much later): Disney's Star Age would-be blockbuster THE BLACK HOLE.

Despite the numerous - and sometimes obvious shortcomings - I rate this as one of the icons of the era. Both because it's an entertaining - and spectacular - movie in its own right but also because of the ubiquitous merchandising it spawned.

This is the UK sell-through VHS cover. I think this is one movie thst really demands a bells-whistles-and-B.O.Bs BR release.

1979: THE BLACK HOLE PRODUCTION ART

From the pages of STARBURST magazine: Disney production art from THE BLACK HOLE.

1979: THE BLACK HOLE Movie Novelization

 

From 1979: THE BLACK HOLE movie novelization.

There were certain books that were essential items in any Star Warrior's library during the peak of the Star Age... and this was one of them.  

The ubiquitous Alan Dean Foster supplied the words and the deal was sweetened by the obligatory insertion of a selection of colour stills in the middle. 

The publisher was clearly so confident that this one would fly off the shelves with minimal effort that they didn't even bother with the usual back cover blurb. 

1980: THE BLACK HOLE and STAR TREK THE MOTION PICTURE MEGO TOYS

It's the battle of the STAR WARS wannabes.

This is an ad, published in US comics dated April 1980, plugging the action figure lines from the two Christmas 1979 would-be SF blockbusters THE BLACK HOLE and STAR TREK THE MOTION PICTURE.

Both lines, scaled to Kenner's Star Wars figures, came from MEGO in their unsuccessful attempt to make amends for not snapping-up the Lucas license (they also took a punt on BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25th CENTURY and - err - THE DUKES OF HAZZARD) but neither line proved very successful.

According to the Mego multi-part history published in Tomart's toy magazine, The Black Hole license proved a major stinker for the company (which is a shame as the figures were really rather nicely made) but they recouped some of the dollars they'd lost by striking a deal with Disney over the TRON name, trademarked by the toy maker through the MICRONAUTS line.

The HEROES WORLD name would loom large in the future history of US comics.  That was the retailer Marvel rashly snapped-up in December 1994 (the company was originally spun-off from Marvel's own mail order business in the mid-seventies) with grandiose plans of upgrading the local retailer and distributor into Marvel's exclusive in-house distribution business.

That sparked the dash-for-exclusivity that saw other publishers rush to sign their own deals.  The fallout left Diamond Distributors, alongside Heroes World, as last-man-standing.  HW proved a stinker and was eventually closed in 1997 as Marvel struggled with bankruptcy.  With no other options available, Marvel were forced to go cap-in-hand back to Diamond.  Whoops.

1982: THE BLACK HOLE in TV TIMES (ITV Publications)

Christmas 1982 was a vintage year for movies on ITV: MOONRAKER, SUPERMAN THE MOVIE, THE MUPPET MOVIE and - the big Christmas Day offering - Disney's THE BLACK HOLE!

It's hard to over-emphasise how big a deal this was at the time.  Home video was only just getting established and, in my case, it would be a good few years before we finally got around to renting a top-loader from Granada.  I'm not even sure that Disney, initially reluctant to embrace the new format in case it ate into their traditionally lucrative business model of re-releasing films every few years to draw the next generation of fans back to the big screen, had even released the film on tape.

After the initial cinema release (and any re-release), the only way to catch a glimpse of the film was in programmes like BBC ONE's Bank Holiday schedule-filler DISNEY TIME (clips from TBH turned-up in three editions between December 1979 and May 1980) and SCREEN TEST.  In fact, I can even remember looking forward to seeing Screen Test because I knew a clip would be featured.  I also recall that the programme coincided with either our TV developing a fault or there being a transmitter fault.  Probably the former.

These days, films seem to arrive on disc, download and TV within months of them being on the big screen (sometimes less) but way-back-when, it took years for them to reach TV.  If anything, TBH seems to have been fast-tracked (possibly by virtue of its under-performance at the box office) seeing as it had only been released over Christmas 1979.

Although it didn't make the cover of the TV TIMES Christmas double issue (the only issue we would buy, along with the festive RADIO TIMES, all year), it did have pride-of-place inside... complete with some absolutely terribly artwork of the cast which - I assume - are deliberately dire although its possible ITV Publications just hired a particularly crap artist.  At least V.I.N.CENT looks right.

I distinctly recall that BBC ONE had scheduled DEATH ON THE NILE up against TBH which - in those far away days of one household TV - led to family friction over which one to watch.

My school also recorded the movie and played it, I think over two or three days, as a lunchtime "movie club" on a TV in one of the classrooms.

1979: THE BLACK HOLE in STERANKO'S MEDIASCENE

MEDIASCENE ISSUE 39
SEPTEMBER/ OCTOBER 1979

Not only is Jim Steranko a comic book legend (his sixties S.H.I.E.L.D strips deserved their rare - for the UK - colour outing in CAPTAIN BRITAIN weekly although why his classic cover from Nick Fury Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D adorns the cover of FUTURE TENSE 1 is anyone's guess) but he has also published a number of works on geek media... including Marvel's FOOM (which I'll get to someday) and MEDIASCENE.

I must admit I was only vaguely aware of this tabloid seventies fanzine (launched as COMIXSCENE in late 1972, morphed into MEDIASCENE after its seventh issue and rebooted again - as PREVUE in 1980) until recently.  Copies just don't seem to surface very often.  Then, I stumbled across a dealer with multiple back issues and - on an (expensive) whim I decided to buy all the issues in his collection that prominently featured geek media productions I have a soft spot for.  I wasn't disappointed.

Since then, I've been perplexed as to how to present them here.  Their size means there's no way my A4 scanner will cope with them.  The solution presented itself recently: a scanning app for my iPad.  I don't think the results are 100% satisfying but - for now - it's the best solution I could devise.

I'll be posting more issues from time-to-time as I think their contents - and particularly their often stunning (and seldom seen) covers - are well worth a look.

This issue, from late 1979, heavily features THE BLACK HOLE and would have been on-sale just before the film hit movie theatres.  It's a film I really enjoyed at the time on the big screen (I left the cinema positively dizzy after the climax) and, watching it again recently, I was still struck by (generally) how good it was.  Sure, the plot is not great, the science highly dubious and the characterisation pretty thin but (apart from some rouge wire work) it looks and sounds amazing (I recently acquired a copy of John Barry's highly memorable score) with some really original production design (which - apart from the robots - successfully avoids the aesthetics of the STAR WARS universe so readily embraced by its rivals).  I just wish Disney (who are still talking - in vague terms - of a remake) would pull their finger out and release a bells-and-whistles BR release that really raids the archives for the definitive screen experience.

This was big news in the school playground at the time so I was surprised - decades later - to discover it was only considered marginally successful, hence: no sequel.  I think I read a quote somewhere (Tomart?) from the then-boss of toy maker MEGO who - as I recall - said sales of the tie-in toys were a disaster.  If it makes him feel better, I had V.I.N.CENT, Maximilian and the Sentry Robot (who's internal elastic band snapped... requiring some parental maintenance).  I'm sure I would have also owned B.O.B, S.T.A.R (nothing says "future" like robots with acronyms as names) and 'Humanoid' if the second wave of figures had reached the UK.  I'm not sure - however I would have begged for Earnest Borgnine: the action figure.

1980: THE BLACK HOLE in FAMOUS MONSTERS MAGAZINE (Warren Magazines)

I've been listening to John Barry's memorable score for Disney's THE BLACK HOLE and that inspired me to go scurrying off to the STARLOGGED vaults and unearth this eye-catching FAMOUS MONSTERS (162, April 1980) cover and accompanying feature.

The movie generated considerable coverage across the genre press so this isn't (by any stretch) the best of the reportage (shocker!) but I still thought it was fun to rerun it here.

TBH was huge in my primary school playground (it had all the requisites: space ships, lasers, cute robots and menacing robots) so it surprised me to discover - decades later - that this was considered something of a flop at the time.  Maybe the lack of sequels should have been a clue.

1985: EAGLE OCTOBER COVER GALLERY (IPC)

There was a treasure trove of eighties 'stuff' up-for-grabs in EAGLE in October 1985, as the first cover below shows.  All lovingly rendered by some poor unfortunate (uncredited) artist.  Many of which (I think) had been prizes in previous competitions, suggesting the IPC powers-that-be had been stashing away a few extras.

And - btw - Disney's lawyers really should have sued the designers of that robot.

For some reason (and I only spotted this when uploading the covers this morning), I'm missing the issue dated 19 October 1985.  I assume it was published so I've either misfiled it or I don't own a copy.  I'll try and do something about that at some point.  Sorry!

1980: THE BLACK HOLE ANNUAL

Ever wondered what happened to the luckless survivors of the ill-fated Palomino after their encounter with ruthless Reinhart and the Cygnus?  If the answer is YES then you obviously didn't read this 1980-published THE BLACK HOLE ANNUAL.

The stocking-stuffer reprinted the third and fourth issues of the short-lived US comic (the first two adapted the movie and reached the UK in the form of this IPC special) which took the crew through the black hole and into an alternate dimension with mirror-images of themselves and Maximillian and his boss.  At the time this all seemed amazingly cool but - today - not so much.

The page count was padded-out by some nice behind-the-scenes features, with colour pics, on the making of the film.

The original US comics are pretty hard to find.  Publisher Whitman pulled their line from traditional distribution streams (and the growing number of specialist stores) in favour of multi-issue bags sold via mass market retailers.  However, according to contemporary accounts (in fanzines like THE COMIC READER) the results were hit-and-miss with distribution extremely patchy.

The disappointing box office, combined with Whitman's problems, killed the comic after the fourth issue.

1979: THE BLACK HOLE (Starlog Magazine)

STARLOG issue 27 is the magazine that just keeps on giving: here's yet another article from that epic October 1979 issue, a preview piece for underrated Disney epic THE BLACK HOLE.

1980: THE BLACK HOLE ADAPTATION (IPC)

I've had these scans on file for so long that I'd forgotten that I'd never quite got around to running them: this is the British edition of the THE BLACK HOLE movie comics adaptation, published under-license, by IPC in 1980.

It's a magazine-sized, black & white, version of Whitman's typically "that'll do" adaptation.  As you'll see from the sample interior pages, below, it's clear no-one was striving for the highest quality results. It really is no wonder that the likes of Whitman succumbed to falling sales when you imagine how much better this would have been if it had been adapted by one of the big two (even with their notorious lack of interest in the properties they licensed).

There's no credits that I can find in either this or the original US version (published as a two-issue run and also collected into book form).

The second page shows Whitman's minimalist interpretation of the movie's bonkers through-the-black hole conclusion.  There's no Dante's Inferno to be found here, presumably because the publisher got cold feet about the idea.  Or the film makers hadn't decided how to close the flick by deadline.

If you wondered what happened to the Palomino crew next, Whitman published another two issues which plonked them down in a mirror universe (giving them the chance to encounter the movie's villains all over again).  Those two issues hit the UK in the form of the one-and-only BLACK HOLE ANNUAL (which I'll cover in a future post).

The US also say a Disney-sponsored strip adaptation for newspapers, by none other than the mighty Jack Kirby.  Unfortunately, I don't think it appeared in any British paper.

1980: THE BLACK HOLE & INCREDIBLE HULK WALL'S ICE LOLLIES AD

It's freezing in ol' London Town this morning... which has - inexplicably - put me in the mood for ice lollies!  I dunno.... don't ask, don't tell!

So I've unearthed this summer 1980 (6 July 1980 to be precise) advert for Wall's Ice Lollies, originally published in IPC's weeklies, featuring a couple of very familiar geek brands.

A Black Hole you can eat.... so bold!

1979: THE BLACK HOLE UK BUBBLE GUM WRAPPER

Here's something I found online: the UK wrapper for THE BLACK HOLE Bubble Gum Card, published by Topps around 1979-80.  As far as I know, the 88 cards were the same as the US release... but we didn't get the stickers.

I remember collecting these (along with the blue-boardered STAR WARS and BATTLESTAR GALACTICA sets) courtesy of the local market stall.  Even then, it was considered madness to actually consume the pinkish strip of gum which always bonded itself to the top card.

1979: THE BLACK HOLE MOVIE TRAILER

MAN IS ABOUT TO ENTER... THE BLACK HOLE!

Here's the original trailer for Disney's 1979 entry into "The League of Star Wars Wannabes".  

The movie generated a lot of playground buzz at the time (as did STAR WARS, of course, BATTLESTAR GALACTICA and BUCK ROGERS IN THE 25th CENTURY) so it comes as a surprise to discover neither the movie nor its copious merchandising were considered terribly successful.

It cost $20 million to produce (with a generous marketing and distribution budget on top) and grossed $36 million in North America, the 21st highest grossing movie of the year.

A JOURNEY THAT BEGINS WHEN EVERYTHING ENDS.