1988: THE FIRST EAGLE AND BATTLE MERGED ISSUE

From January 1988: the first combined issue of EAGLE AND BATTLE.

As with the previous week's house ad for the merger, the combo is pretty low key.  I almost missed that this was the first combined issue when I was flicking through a stack of random back issues in one of my boxes...  There's none of the hoopla that surrounded the TIGER merger of previous years and there's a real sense of 'that'll do'.

The transferred strips were Stormforce (which appears to have already been doing double-duty in both BATTLE and EAGLE anyway), Charley's War and Johnny Red.

BATTLE did continue to appear as the occasional annual and special... I certainly have a copy of a special that was published (in the old tradition) several years after the main comic had been killed off.

1988: MERGER ALERT: EAGLE ANNOUNCES THE MERGER OF BATTLE

From 1988: MERGER ALERT!  Here's how the EAGLE announced the impending arrival of the refugees from the fall of BATTLE.

Despite the traditional hype ('Big News Issue!') it's obvious from the two-page house ad that this is now EAGLE AND TIGER style combination of equals (at least until the dust settled).  The BATTLE logo is conspicuously smaller than the Eagle's.  Funny that.

I think, by this point, two-thirds of the BATTLE strips were reprints anyway with only the fairly new Stormforce (introduced - after a treading-water hiatus - to plug the large gap left by the withdrawal of ACTION FORCE).  Maybe that helped to stunt in-house enthusiasm for the merger.  

1988: LAST ISSUE ALERT! THE FINAL ISSUE OF BATTLE

From 1988: Last Issue Alert!  Years after the first predictions of its impending demise, BATTLE was finally overwhelmed by enemy forces (the enemy being changing tastes and a changing market) and plucked from the battlefield by - yup, you guessed it, EAGLE.

Given the deadlines and the on-sale date, it's easy to imagine that this issue, number 673, was put together just before the staff broke for the Christmas holidays and the end-of-year break.

By this time, despite the better printing that IPC/ Fleetway had switched to the previous year, BATTLE was a mere shadow of its former self.  The loss of the ACTION FORCE franchise had done some serious damage (although Marvel's glossy successor was faring little better in a tough market) and Stormforce, their in-house successors were more gimmick than traditional military might.  Charley's War and (as seen here) Johnny Red were really holding the fort... although one or both may have slipped into reprints by this point.  Overall, BATTLE followed the same slow decline as the other IPC weeklies... more and more reprints as budgets got tighter and tighter.

IPC had launched BATTLE back in March 1975 to counter the early success of WARLORD, launched by DCT the previous September.  Marvel UK also had a crack at their own me-too weekly, FURY, but that didn't work out so well.  Battle eventually outlived Warlord, which closed in September 1986.  The genre champion was, without doubt, Warlord's older sibbling VICTOR.  Launched in January 1961, it didn't retire from active service until November 1992.

Battle folded into EAGLE, management's go-to title for failing comics.  It's almost surprising that SUPERNATURALS and RING RAIDERS didn't go the same way but Fleetway opted to burn-off the remaining inventory from both early cancellations in end-of-run one-shots.  Stormforce had already been appearing in Eagle for a month-or-so, presumably part of a plan to prepare for the merger.  Or an indicator that the Eagle was also short of material pre-merger.  Charley's War and Johnny Red remained Eagle mainstays for the rest of its run.

1982: BATTLE RELAUNCH ISSUE

From 1982: You've seen the previous week's preview... now here's the first relaunched, now-an-adventure-comic issue of BATTLE.

None of the three new strips fit the existing BATTLE formula and it's obvious that IPC had realised the finite appeal of the all-war format of old.  The three newcomers all feel like they could all have been lifted from a particularly exciting night's viewing on ITV... although the martial arts might have made the IBA a little nervous.

Maybe the management were already thinking about a future without BATTLE and were introducing adventure strips that were better suited to being shifted into another title... possibly the new EAGLE, launching around this time.

By the following year, the rumours of an impending closure had grown louder and were now being reported in the fanzines... but then ACTION FORCE entered the circulation warzone and - much to the grumblings of the old guard - took over half the page count.  Were they really any worse than Truck Turpin?  IPC and Palitoy formed an alliance because the publisher needed the business and the toy company needed a comics partner after their early plans, announced to the toy trade, to launch a new weekly with MARVEL UK somehow collapsed.

1982: THE 'LAST' BATTLE

From February 1982: Relaunch alert!  BATTLE is about to get a bold new mission!

It's generally agreed that IPC's BATTLE (created by Pat Mills and John Wagner and launched in March 1975) was a cracker of a comic... not least because it gave us Johnny Red and Charley's War, two strips that outlived (albeit by reprints) the comic itself.  And still in print today.

The critics are quick to claim the at the rot really set it when IPC signed a deal with the 'devil' and gave over half the page count to strips promoting the ACTION FORCE toys.  I have to disagree with that... I'm a big fan of the Action Force era and recently aquired an almost-complete run of that period in Battle's history.

I'd argue that the last true issue of BATTLE is this one.  The last to pretty much (mergers allowing) to follow the 'total war' formula as concieved back in '75.

As you can see by this two-page teaser before... BATTLE was about to become an 'adventure' comic, throwing in new strips that tapped into the popular trends of the time... action TV shows, martial arts and - ahem - CB radio.

'The Hunters' were two special agents of the sort that can be assigned to any mission, anywhere, at the whim of the writer.  The comparisons to LWT's THE PROFESSIONALS were numerous.  'The Fists of Jimmy Chang' channeled the martial arts boom... probably about a decade too late.  Marvel London had been serving up Masters of Kung Fu across a variety of titles since the Seventies (and would continue to do so.. a strip even made it into their version of ACTION FORCE).  Indeed, so tired was the franchise looking in 1979 that Dez Skinn reworked the reprints, in MARVEL COMIC, to create his own Professionals inspired knock off.  'Truck Turpin' was Battle's trucker movie, and quite possibly hoping to excite fans of BJ AND THE BEAR.

The reboot did at least hang onto some of the older strips... a tradition that would continue even after the Action Force takeover.

The changes must have worked... at least for the moment.  The new formula continued right through 1982 and most of the following year.  The first Action Force strip, initially a four week booking, appeared in July 1983.  The powers-that-be must have been chuffed because - just in time for the Christmas sales season - Battle became BATTLE ACTION FORCE in October.  The licensing deal ran through to late 1986, at which point the comic reverted to being BATTLE and slipped into a holding pattern until it could introduce Storm Force (basically a great idea for a toy line... without the toys) in 1987.  That move kept Battle in business a bit longer... but those last issues were pretty scrappy (despite better print quality) and it was clear that, under the ownership of Robert Maxwell, everyone was just managing decline.  It was cancelled, after 673 issues, in January 1988.

1977: MERGER ALERT! BATTLE PICTURE WEEKLY AND ACTION MERGE

From 12 November 1977: Big News Issue!  BATTLE PICTURE WEEKLY announces the impending merger of the once-loved (especially if you were a journalist or a campaigner looking for an easy target or something to get all worked up about) ACTION.

I wasn't reading BATTLE (or ACTION) back in 1977 (or, indeed, anything at all) so it's hard to judge whether this merger would have been welcomed by the readers of Battle.  I'm assuming Action's reduced readership would have been less chuffed by the news their weekly was doomed.  On the face of it, Action still had some strong strips but it's hard to see how Spinball Wars (formally Death Game 1999 before Action's tone-it-down-now reboot and then Spinball after the hiatus) fits the war weekly formula.  Despite yet another tiitle change.  At least we didn't get 'Hookjaw Wars', which meant Action's best-known strip didn't survive the closure.  The other strips seem a more natural fit and probably spiced things up sitting alongside the surviving Battle troopers ('Fighting the Japs... Indian style'. Ahem).

Don't be tempted to confuse the BATTLE ACTION run with the later BATTLE ACTION FORCE era.  Same weekly: different times.  

1984: BARON IRONBLOOD BATTLE ACTION FORCE HOUSE AD

From 1984: It looks like - judging from the illustrations in the new issue of the Diamond PREVIEWS door-stopper - that a certain BARON IRONBLOOD is about to be introduced to the new IDW/ Hasbro shared universe.  Which - if I'm reading the runes correctly - would make me want to snap up a copy in a round three months time.  They've given him a makeover so he looks a little less like Ned Kelly.  I can't imagine why...

In the meantime, here is a bit of vintage Baron Booby Buckethead in an IPC House Ad for another buy-it-for-the-next-month retention ruse: a Baron Ironblood poster hogging one of the colour pages of BATTLE ACTION FORCE.

Good luck making the four parts line-up!

1983: ADVERT FOR BATTLE'S AIR ACES BOOKLET

From January 1983: an IPC in-house advert (published in the EAGLE) for another one of those clip-and-collect circulation-maintaining booklets so beloved of the Youth Group during this period.  This time: BATTLE'S AIR ACES BOOKLET!

1983: BATTLE CELEBRATES 400 ISSUES

From January 1983 (although it would have been on sale during the tricky post-Christmas wrap-up of the previous year): IPC's BATTLE celebrates its 400th issue.

The cover neatly shows how far the weekly had shifted from its original war/ combat formula into a broader 'action' line-up in an attempt to stem sagging sales.

I suspect that there were some doubts in Kings Reach Tower as to whether Battle would see out the year as a standalone title.  Rumours were swirling that it was being prepared for the chop and a merger with the EAGLE.

Management, however, came up with a winning formula which propelled it past the 500 issue mark and kept it out of the Eagle's claws for several more years: A deal with toymakers Palitoy to devote half the pages to extended plugs for the ACTION FORCE toys.  Not only did it make the sums add up but it also attracted a new generation of readers.  And - despite the reputation of toy tie-ins (some of the ones that subsequently popped up in Eagle were pretty dire) the AF strips were generally of a pretty high standard... and some are actually quite memorable.  And the editorial team must have had great fun with Codename: Beaver.

1985: IPC JUNE FREE GIFTS HOUSE AD

From 1985: a June free gift boom courtesy of the IPC weeklies...

The humor (BUSTER and WHIZZER AND CHIPS) and boys 'adventure' weeklies (EAGLE AND TIGER and ROY OF THE ROVERS) served up, courtesy of a hook-up with stodgy breakfast biscuit provider (now, apparently, making inroads into China if the SUNDAY TIMES is to be believed) WEETABIX for cover-mounted promo badges featuring the briefly ubiquitous marketing creations (stars of TV ads, the improbable Weetabix Club and on-packaging appearances).  The badges were, probably, randomly distributed across the four titles.  

Odd-man-out was BATTLE ACTION FORCE who were fully engaged in the battle against global terror with a free, no-doubt Palitoy bankrolled, ACTION FORCE poster.

1987: ACTION FORCE Issue 1 (Marvel UK)

From March 1987: the first issue of MARVEL UK's new ACTION FORCE weekly.

This glossy, 24-page opener (accompanied by the second issue... a launch strategy never repeated... possibly because if you missed the first one then the next available jumping-on point was the third issue... possibly a disincentive to would-be readers) was certainly a blast after years of IPC's relatively low-rent treatment of the license in the pages of BATTLE ACTION FORCE (although, in retrospect, there's a lot of good stuff to be found therein and its a real shame that the chances of an official re-release are near to zero).

Most issues had a three-strip line-up: a new British strip (primarily used to align the weekly with whatever toy Hasbro were currently trying to shift through TV and print advertising), heavily edited (to create a unique British continuity pegged to the main strip) reprints from the core G.I. JOE book (hitherto unseen in the UK outside comic book stores) and a third feature which, in typical Marvel fashion, bounced around a bit (Masters of Kung Fu, now integrated in to AF continuity, popped-up at one point).

The new license and publisher was part of the fallout from structural changes in the British toy industry.  Palitoy, creators of Action Force, had shuttered and the brand transferred to Hasbro, the maker of G.I. JOE.  Action Force, after a strong independent start, had essentially already morphed into a British interpretation of JOE anyway.  Hasbro used the relaunch as a chance to apply their glossy marketing muscle (including key art, box art, slick TV advertising and episodes of the Marvel made TV show) to the line.  

The British Bullpen were already publishing THE TRANSFORMERS and had a strong relationship with Hasbro through their US parent (who, on both coasts, were heavily involved in several of Hasbro's lines of the time) so it was a no-brainer that the license would shift from Kings Reach Tower to Redan Place.  The existing Transformers weekly was used to prime readers for the impending launch of this title and, throughout the year that AF appeared, crossovers and other plugs were a regular feature.  

I think this launch issue revived the old British tradition of hyping a new title with a TV advert.  It rings a very strong bell.  Can anyone confirm?  Hasbro were certainly plugging the toys in a series of spots that utilized animation (from Marvel Productions) originally created for either US advertising or the TV show itself.  The US JOE book had benefited from commercials, bankrolled by the toy company, who used them as a handy way of circumventing strict toy advertising rules by plugging the comic... which just happened to feature whatever toy they wanted to shift in any particular season.  

The AF weekly ultimately only notched up a paltry fifty issues.  A quite surprising failure considering the quality of the product and the corporate backing for the brand.  Presumably the changes in the British comic industry conspired to make it too difficult to gain traction. 

The franchise bounced back with a US-format monthly which benefited from distribution in the States under the alternate title of G.I. JOE EUROPEAN MISSIONS.  The reprints of the core JOE title shuffled to THE TRANSFORMERS (apparently much to the disappointment of Simon Furman who favored using the slot to showcase a revolving door of reprints) and reprints from G.I. JOE SPECIAL MISSIONS were slotted into the short-lived THE INCREDIBLE HULK PRESENTS in 1989. 

1984: ACTION MAN STICKER ALBUM House Ad (BATTLE ACTION FORCE and EAGLE)

From 1984: An IPC House Ad for impending freebie ACTION MAN STICKER ALBUM (plus starter stickers), the tried-and-tested giveaway in the following week's EAGLE and BATTLE ACTION FORCE.

By the time the album came out, my loyalties were aligned to ACTION FORCE (the man's successor) so this seemed something of a throwback.  I never collected the stickers... and I've never met anyone else who did. 

1984: BATTLE ACTION FORCE House Ad (Marvel UK)

From 1984: a half-page House Ad for IPC's BATTLE ACTION FORCE, promoting the first instalement of a four-part BARON IRONBLOOD mask.  

It utilized one of the colour pages each week to print one quarter of the poster which, when all were removed from the comic (yikes), and accurately aligned, could be used as a poster. 
 

Marvel UK would have just given away a glossy poster...

1985: BATTLE ACTION FORCE HOUSE AD (IPC)

This is a 1985 IPC House Ad for BATTLE ACTION FORCE, originally published on the back cover of EAGLE PICTURE LIBRARY.

ACTION FORCE, now in its G.I. JOE era, is clearly the main selling point with no mention of Battle's homegrown characters such as Johnny Red and Charley's War.

1984: BARON IRONBLOOD MASK HOUSE AD (IPC)

This is the IPC house ad, published in weeklies dated 6 October 1984, promoting the BARON IRONBLOOD cardboard mask giveaway in the following week's copies of EAGLE AND SCREAM!, TIGER and (of course) BATTLE ACTION FORCE.

I'm sure the giveaway was bankrolled by Palitoy as a way of drumming-up a bit of extra business for the toys in the crucial pre-Christmas sales period.

The mask, which (sadly) I no longer have (despite having at least two at the time: I was a regular reader of both Eagle and BAF), was a flimsy cardboard affair which, when elastic was added, made you look (a bit) like Action Force's bucket-headed villain.  Why anyone at Palitoy thought the Ned Kelly look was a good one is beyond me (although the mighty Hasbro made a similar blunder with G.I. JOE: Cobra Commander first appeared with a tea towel as a disguise).

The top of the page is a plug for the third of the (new) EAGLE ANNUALS.  Click here for a full rundown. It's weird to think that, by 1984, it had already become a Birthday/ Christmas tradition.  

1984: ACTION FORCE FIGURE FREE GIFT (IPC)

Was this the greatest gift ever?  At the time it certainly seemed like it!  Yup, in the summer of 1984 IPC and Palitoy paired-off to give away (surely surplus*) ACTION FORCE figures with copies of EAGLE, BATTLE ACTION FORCE (inevitably) and TIGER.

With the figures selling for between £1 and £1.50 each (I think), it certainly seemed a no-brainer to stock-up on multiple copies of the three weeklies, at 22p a time, to get as many different figures as possible.  Indeed, this was the only time I ever bought a copy of TIGER prior to its merger with the EAGLE.  I'm certain I didn't read any of it.

The figures were bagged (not carded) with each issue.  I seem to recall Palitoy's marketing mandarins also chucked in a glossy toy-flogging poster, or something similar, although I don't recall exactly what now.

I distinctly recall thinking it was a shame that Palitoy couldn't do a similar deal with Marvel UK to shift some Star Wars figures but - sadly - it was not to be.

* I recall a depressing abundance of Black Major figures.  Was that a regional thing or did they have an awful lot of 'em to shift?

1983: BATTLE BECOMES BATTLE ACTION FORCE (IPC)

At the same time that the EAGLE was rebooting as a traditional weekly, IPC were also revitalising BATTLE.  

The home of Charley's War, Johnny Red, Darkie's Mob and Major Easy had fallen on hard times by '83.  Despite rebooting as a general action-adventure weekly to broaden its appeal, British fanzines were already speculating that a merger with the Eagle was imminent.  Instead, the Kings Reach Tower mandarins pulled a licensing masterstroke which dodged cancellation (BATTLE did eventually fold into Eagle, but not until January 1988), boosted readership and slashed costs: turning over half the comic to strips based on Palitoy's ACTION FORCE toys, bankrolled by the Leicestershire company.

The weekly had already dabbled with a four-part Action Force strip earlier in the year, followed by five mini-comics inserted (on a fortnightly schedule) into IPC comics over the summer.  October saw the culmination of this collaboration: 50% of the comic turned over to the toy heroes in a deal that ran until November 1986.

It's worth noting that this wasn't a merger, there was no solo AF title prior to the relaunch (Palitoy and Marvel UK had planned something - announced in some early retailer briefings for the toys - but the project was abandoned for reasons unknown) although once the license transferred from IPC to Marvel UK, from early 1987, the Annex of Ideas published two ongoing Action Force comics (weekly and monthly) as well as spin-off specials and annuals.

In retrospect, IPC were pretty radical in their thinking (and deal-making) here.  Rival toy-based comics (like THE TRANSFORMERS and MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE) didn't become a common sight in British newsagents until sometime later

Below is the full-page announcement of the changes from Battle itself (note the clumsy use of the Action Force part of the new logo) and two house ads from Eagle.  I was interested to note that the cross-promotion didn't extend beyond the first two weeks of the relaunch (although certain key - usually ones with gifts - issues were promoted later).

I suspect there was also a TV spot for the relaunch but - truth be told - I remember nothing about the details and can't find anything on-line.

Copies of the first relaunched issue, with the original inside back page (pages from Charley Bourne's A-Z of World War I) substituted for a full-page advert for the AF toys and the cover copy slightly amended, were also handed out free in toy stores.

One other inconsistency that I never clocked at the time: The Eagle was 22p a week (a legacy from the photo-story era: IPC didn't cut the cover price when they switched formats) whilst Battle was only 20p for what was essentially the same offering (print quality, page count etc).  Kerching!

BATTLE

1 October 1983

EAGLE HOUSE AD

1 October 1983

EAGLE HOUSE AD

15 October 1983

1986: THE TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE UK PRINT ADVERT

Here's a print advert for the (brief) UK theatrical release of THE TRANSFORMERS: THE MOVIE, released (just in time for Christmas) on 12 December 1986.

The animated extravaganza (if you were a kid), or extended toy commercial (if you were a flummoxed adult dragged to the cinema against your better judgement), had been released stateside in August, giving devoted UK fans ample opportunity to snaffle up Marvel's three-issue US adaptation (published as a one-shot special in the UK) and be the first in the playground to know the plot.

Transformers lord Simon Furman used the new characters and timeframe introduced in the movie (Hasbro used the film's brutely high "death toll" to clear the decks of most of the original Transformers cast and advance the storyline two decades in one hit) to create his multi-part British TF epics, rightly still regarded by TF fandom as amongst

Marvel UK published a one-shot tie-in Poster Magazine which also used this artwork.

This advert, ironically, appeared in BATTLE ACTION FORCE (cover-dated 29 November 1986) which was, of course, largely comprised of strips based on rival toy brand ACTION FORCE (although, by this point it was well on the way to becoming a virtual clone of the US G.I. JOE range) alongside a few non-toy stragglers left over from BATTLE's glory days.