1992: LOST IN SPACE ISSUE 6 (INNOVATION COMICS)

From May 1992: Innovation's LOST IN SPACE issue 6.

1988: DOCTOR WHO SILVER NEMESIS VHS

From 1988: On air this month, to mark DOCTOR WHO's 25th year on the telly, was the flawed Cyber-romp SILVER NEMESIS.

This was the BBC VIDEO VHS release. The scan has reproduced quite darkly because it was printed on a special foil paper (contradiction?) that gave it a suitably metallic finish.

Tbe tape is notable for including a US documentary not subsequently included on the DVD.

1992: PERSONALITY PRESENTS STAR TREK: PATRICK STEWART

From July 1992: Another entry into the PERSONALITY PRESENTS STAR TREK run, this time focused on the Next Gen crew. The first issue, naturally, focused on Patrick Stewart.

Make it so.

1985: FANTASY EMPIRE ISSUE 16

From March 1985: the 16th issue of American fan magazine FANTASY EMPIRE.

1996: THE 5 TIMES ISSUE 7 (THE UK BABYLON FIVE FAN CLUB)

From New Year 1996: the 7th issue of the fanzine THE 5 TIMES, published by THE BABYLON FIVE UK FAN CLUB.

1988: SOMETHING IS OUT THERE UK VHS COVER

From 1988, the UK VHS rental release of US SF mini-series SOMETHING IS OUT THERE.

This two-nighter was a curious - and not always terribly logical - combination of MOONLIGHTING, ALIEN, THE HIDDEN and INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS and - in truth - plays like any number of straight-to-tape SF thrillers of the period despite some a-list talents behind the camera.

Filming - in an arrangement that could only make sense to a studio accountant - was split between LA and Australia despite the fact that the whole thing is based in Los Angeles with only a brief excursion off-world.

Aired as two nights of feature-length programming, this tape combines the two parts into one extended movie. Fortunately no-one considered a shorter cut to squeeze onto a shorter tape. There was no sell-through release and this - and the series that followed - has never troubled DVD. It was also shown on SKY ONE in the UK.

NBC, having apparently failed to grasp the lessons of V's failure, promptly concluded that America was desperate for a weekly series. In an industry ruled my market research, it never ceases to amaze me how often network executives get it so wrong. They assumed that audiences would rush back for the romantic adventures of the leading duo (one a tough cop... the other a pretty alien with a lot to learn about Earth) but punters really wanted more monsters. Something the telly types had neglected to supply.

The weekly series mustered a mere eight episodes, of which the network aired only six, before the plug was pulled and the show axed. All the episodes, with new introductions from cast and crew, eventually surfaced of the SCI FI CHANNEL.

1989: FANTAZIA ISSUE 1

From 1989: Turtle Power! The first issue of British mainstream media & comics mag FANTAZIA (Disney lawyers take note: no relation).

This rode the wave of the post-BATMAN super boom with a mix of superhero fare covering film, TV, comics and - unusually - RPG. And even - as this cover shows - theatre.

This always seemed like a "lets do anything we fancy" type mag with a diverse range of contents which didn't seem to adhere to the original mission statement. Horror and SF movies also started to sneak in as the remit flexed. Even the animatronic sitcom DINOSAURS managed to snag a cover.

One of the highlights was the Hollywood Heroes feature filed monthly by Andy Mangels. This was the same piece he filled for US fanzine AMAZING HEROES but with better presentation.

Launched in 1990 and published monthly by Pegasus, this clocked-up 18 issues before folding into the pages of ACADEMY (22 issues between 1990 and 1992). The latter part of the run enjoyed better production standards including squarebound printing. Distribution was predictably patchy and I used to have to go to one newsagent in a neighbouring village to find a copy.

1994: THERMAL LANCE ISSUE 16

From April 1994: the 16th issue of British DOCTOR WHO fanzine THERMAL LANCE.

1992: DOCTOR WHO YEARBOOK #2 (MARVEL UK)

From 1992: the second DOCTOR WHO YEARBOOK, published by Marvel UK and (as per tradition) dated for the year ahead.

1991: PERSONALITY PRESENTS STAR TREK: WILLIAM SHATNER

From June 1991: PERSONALITY PRESENTS THE ORIGINAL CREW: WILLIAM SHATNER, the first of a long run of unlicensed biographical STAR TREK tie-ins published during the 1990s boom by PERSONALITY COMICS.

Depending on the creative team, these unauthorised retrospectives either took the form of traditional cimic strips or - like this Shat-tastic starter - illustrations with accompanying text. I picked a career highlight, below, by way of an example.

I steered well clear of these when they were published but recently stumbled upon a pretty good run of copies which I picked up as interesting oddities in the Trek publishing pantheon.

1995: THE SECRETS OF THE X-FILES VHS COVER

From 1995: More X-FILES. More VHS tape goodness.

From memory (it's a long time since I watched this) this was a compilation of clips from the show which was released (possibly only as a rental tape or store exclusive) to accompany the tape releases of selected two-parters (tarted-up as feature length installments) prior to their UK TV premiere. A nice little money spinner for Fox when the show was at its pop culture peak.

I have a hunch I might have picked this up from the HMV flagship store in London... but I can't be sure.

1995: STARLOG PRESENTS THE X-FILES AND OTHER EERIE TV

From December 1995: the lawyer-dodging STARLOG spin-off THE X-FILES & OTHER EERIE TV, a one-shot mag notable for apparently using every XF publicity still in the Starlog archive ... more than once in many cases. There's only so many times you can see Scully propping up a filling cabinet before it starts getting very dull very fast.

1987: AIRWOLF II: THE STAVOGRAD INCIDENT VHS COVER

From 1987: AIRWOLF II: THE STAVOGRAD INCIDENT on UK VHS.

Not ringing any bells? That's not entirely surprising.

This 'sequel' to the original straight-to-tape (although it may have had a theatrical release in some overseas markets) AIRWOLF movie (actually a spiced-up version of the TV movie starter peppered with additional material to qualify it for an '18' certificate... an unusual release plan for a TV show with strong playground appeal) is actually a spliced together two-parter from the show's woeful fourth season.

CBS pulled the plug on the expensive show after three seasons (actually 2.5 as it debuted as a mid-season replacement, pitched against BLUE THUNDER in the chopper wars) leaving Universal in a pickle. They needed to bulk up the episode count so they could reap the rewards of reruns in syndication. They needed another season of episodes to make the package substantial enough to tempt local stations.

Enter cable outfit, and fellow MCA business, USA NETWORK to bankroll another season. Hurrah. But the economics of cable demanded costs stripped to the bone. The original cast and production team were all let go, cheaper replacements hired and production shifted to Canada. Other economies included raiding the stock footage library, editing the show on tape (giving it a cheap sheen) and skimping on sets and costumes.

The new writers jettisoned the continuity of the first run by bringing in Hawke's hitherto lost in Vietnam brother as the 'Wolf's new pilot. Enter Barry Van Dyke, apparently Universal's go-to guy for cheap shot-on-the-fly follow ups (hello GALACTICA 1980).

I'm not sure if the new episodes ever made it to ITV but I did see a few when the show went unto reruns on BRAVO in the early noughties. The whole final season is on DVD but, presubably on quality grounds (the picture and optical effects look pretty poor throughout and presumably don't exist in anything approaching HD), doesn't appear as part of the UK BR set. This 'film' never made it onto a digital format.

FANTASY EMPIRE COLLECTOR'S SPECIAL 6

From the random scans folder: FANTASY EMPIRE COLLECTOR'S SPECIAL issue 6, published in the States but devoted to British fantasy telly.

1983: STAR WARS MEETS THE A-TEAM: MAD MAGAZINE ISSUE 259

From November 1993: the ultimate pop culture slam-jam: THE A-TEAM meets STAR WARS!

The cover of MAD (UK edition) issue 259.

1994: THERMAL LANCE ISSUE 14

From February 1994: THERMAL LANCE issue 14.

Published by Alan Connor and Gary Finney (the 'Cybercontrollers') out of an editorial address in Derby, this was a British DOCTOR WHO/ all-things-SF zine (which - inevitably - meant they did THE X-FILES as well) that I purchased regularly through the mail for several years.

This was the first issue I purchased. Unlike many of the other zines I bought during this period, I've hung onto my Thermal Lance (matron!), so I can add them to the online STARLOGGED archive.

This issue (A5, coloured paper cover, black & white interior, photocopied) has several articles on WHO ("A load of old codswallop, if you ask me": A review of The Green Death) and RED DWARF (In every dream home a hard-light: After series 6, does Red Dwarf deserve a fandom?). Other bobbins include a look at the current state of WHO ("Perhaps Who-fandom will go the way of Prisoner-fandom, destined to briefly flare up again every ten years or so whenever the series is repeated"), the 1993 Whotopia Derby fan poll results (Favourite latex extra: Cybermen... with a whopping 10 votes compared with 4 for the second-place Daleks) and assorted news stories (Amblin still negotiating with the BBC, the much derided CHILDREN IN NEED/ EASTENDERS sketch nabbing 14 million viewers.... and DOCTOR WHO CLASSIC COMICS in danger of going under).

TL became more ambitious over time: shifting to DTP production and - eventually - a more glossy A4 format.

1997: STAR WARS UKINVERSE: MAGAZINE OF THE OFFICIAL UK STAR WARS FAN CLUB ISSUE 2

From 1997: the second issue of STAR WARS UKNIVERSE, the shortlived newsletter of the briefly revived OFFICIAL UK STAR WARS FAN CLUB.

Not to be confused with the original fan club of the seventies and eighties... nor the unoficial early nineties incarnation I've been posting recently... this was another officially sanctioned enterprise timed to coincide with the re-release of the original trilogy and the early buzz around the prequels.

This passed me by entirely at the time but i recently found issues 2-4 in a London comic store so picked them up cheap. I don't remember seeing the magazine in any stores at the time so I assume it was only sent out to paid up members.

Tbe fourth issue also happens to be the last... the closure of the club and the end of the newsletter apparently down to a Lucasfilm decision to streamline such licenses.

Although, in the age of the web and an abundance of genre magazines, its hard to see that there was a particularly large niche for an official club when Lucasfilm were already licensing several official magazines with overlapping content.

1992: LOST IN SPACE ISSUE 5 (INNOVATION)

From March 1992: LOST IN SPACE issue 5, published in the States by Innovation.

If I recall correctly, this issue explained away some of the more bonkers bits of the TV show by saying they were Penny's accounts of far more dramatic moments in the life of the J2 crew.

1970: DAN DARE LION COVER (IPC)

From 1970: the only time that official Pilot of the Future DAN DARE graced the front cover of LION after the EAGLE (original flavour) merged the previous year.

1992: DOCTOR WHO YEARBOOK (MARVEL UK)

From 1992: the first (of four) DOCTOR WHO YEARBOOKS published by MARVEL UK in the 1990s.

These hardbacks, containing a mixture of features, prose and comic strips, marked a triumphant - and somewhat surprising - return of a publishing tradition that had petered out the previous decade. The last of the often unloved (by fans and the show's productiin team) World Distributors annuals had hit the shelves back in 1986. World pulled the plug on the long-running series because of falling sales, declining interest in the show and doubts over its very survival.

Marvel aggressively expanded their WHO offering - despite the TV show having closed at the very end of the previous decade - by adding the ongoing CLASSIC COMICS and POSTER MAGAZINES, continuing with the periodic specials and adding BLAKE'S SEVEN and HAMMER HORROR titles intended to tap into a similar nostalgia market.

The move was even more surprising because the annuals market had itself entered a slump. In previous decades, publishers were able to rely on the annual income from a myriad of books based on current or past media brands, comics, magazines, toys, movies, pop stars and anything else that might catch the buyer's eye on those big
table displays in WH Smith, Martins, Menzies, book and department stores (indeed, department stores often seemed to carry more obscure titles overlooked by the mainstream multiples... which made them an essential destination when making the traditional gift list for the Christmas season) but by the turn of the decade this market had all but collapsed. Which may have actually strengthened Marvel's hand by making them a bigger player in a diminished market.

Compiled by the editorial team behind the regular magazine, these were certainly a considerable improvemenI over the efforts of the previous decade. The line, along with all the spin-offs from the core mag, eventually floundered when Panini took over the Marvel UK operation and streamlined by closing the 'non-core' magazine line (including the about to launch PLAYBACK and BIZARRE) with the exception of last-man-standing DWM itself.

1984: THE 'V' STORYBOOK

From 1984: The 'V' STORYBOOK, published in the UK.

This is a softcover storybook which I found recently, completely by chance, stuffed into a dealer's box. I snapped it up. Of course.

Publishing informatiin is frustratingly sparse but it appears to be from the same outfit that also packaged and published the hardback 'V' STORYBOOK, sold only through the BHS retail chain, and the one-and-only UK annual.

What I find most interesting about this is how well illustrates how Warner Brothers and NBC were actively trying to reposition the show for a much broader (read: younger) audience.

The two mini-series had very clearly, on both sides of the Atlantic, been pitched and produced as adult shows. Both contained scenes of (mild) terror that - although tame now - were pretty much at the edge of what TV Standards & Practices would allow on broadcast TV at the time. And they delivered some of the most memorable small screen genre moments of the decade. 

But network and studio clearly concluded that the weekly series - a bad idea from the start - could broaden its reach by quietly dumping or reinterpreting some of the more adult elements of the mini-series in favour of a mix of SF, very mild scares (what will Diana eat this week?), largely consequence-free (unless the cast needed to be trimmed) violence and - increasingly (because talking heads are cheap to shoot) campy soap opera theatrics. 

This partly reflected the show's new Friday @ 8pm timeslot (a bit of scheduling which saw the third episode, Breakout, initially 'banned' by NBC as it was deemed unsuitable for the hour) and also reflected the studios plans to shift as much merchandise as possible. 

The 1984 debut was accompanied by a tsunami of stuff, much of it pitched at a younger buyer: comics, toys (although plans for a range of figures and vehicles never went into production once it became clear that the show was unlikely to make it into a second season), lunch boxes and trading cards all hit US stores.

Warner Brothers planned to repeat the same trick in the UK but were hampered by ITV's decision to keep the show out of primetime (I don't think any of the regional companies aired it in evening peak) and confine it to late evening slots. This was partly because the programme buyers had believed they were snapping up a continuation-in-tone of the mini-series that had delivered such good numbers for the network (10 million plus, despite a late start and strong competition from the BBC's Olympic coverage) rather than a perspective replacement for THE A-TEAM.

The strategy failed and NBC were forced to shuffle the show back an hour where it was exposed to strong competition from the other nets. The show shuttered after only 19 episodes (talk of a 20th being on the verge of going into production seems like little more than writers collecting a final paycheque and the studio half-heartedly trying to demonstrate how the show could be retooled to stay in business) and - despite early talk of another mini-series or TVM to wrap up the cliffhanger and reboot the failed franchise - interest waned fast and merchandising ended (the DC Comic shuttered after only 18 months... The more adult novels continued longer).

Below is a sample page from inside the book. 

2000: SCIENCE FICTION WORLD MAGAZINE PAPERBACK 4: FANTASY BOX-OFFICE HITS

From 2000: FANTASY BOX OFFICE HITS, the fourth and final paperback gifted with the first four issues of Britain's SCIENCE FICTION WORLD magazine.

This is really a smorgasbord of all the remaining genre movies thst didn't neatly fit into any of the previous categories - or page counts - of the previiys books in this really rather nice collection.

1989: PRIMETIME MAGAZINE ISSUE 15

From 1989: PRIMETIME (The Television magazine) issue 15.

1989: THE BOG PAPER ISSUE 1, WITH FREE GIFT (MARVEL UK)

On sale right now back in 1989: the first issue of the - ahem - unusual MARVEL UK weekly THE BOG PAPER. As the title suggests, this humour weekly was devoted to all things toilet.

It's unusual because the British Bullpen seldom embraced humour with any real enthusiasm, clearly preferring to leave it to the genre masters on the South Bank and in Dundee. Maybe, at the end of the decade,  Marvel sensed their traditional grip on a declining market was starting to weaken. Or maybe Marvel just had a mad moment.

It was also unusual for Marvel UK to invest so heavily in originated material (no reprints here) without a toy or media tie-in to prop up sales.

I've posted this initial issue before but my previous copy had long since parted company with the free gift. I found a replacement with gift still attached. Bog on!