Tops and Bottoms – 15th October 2025.

“Someone is knocking on the door with a duck!” – The Goons.

Morning.

I’m sat in a departure lounge with a flight to Washington in my near to middling future. I may have to dash off if they call the gate. I’ll write quickly. Excuse the smelling. 

Once a year I treat myself to a trip to a North American-based comics event. Past venues have included the NYCC, TCAF, Heroes, Huntingdon Beach and Baltimore. For North American readers they’ll understand and know what happens etc but for those UK-based it’s hard not to emphasise enough that the US are years ahead of us. To paraphrase Douglas Adams – ‘You may think it’s a big convention because Barry Cheesewick and Graham Handlebar VII are there, but that’s nothing to the US!’ Go take a look at the list this year for Baltimore!

Art Adams, John Beatty, Mark Buckingham, Howard Chaykin, Donny Cates, Frank Cho, Amy Chu, Chris Claremont, Becky Cloonan, Denys Cowan, Alan Davis, Garth Ennis, David Finch, Jose-Luis Garcia-Lopez, Mike Grell, Bob Hall, Klaus Jansen, Tom King, Adam Kubert, Jae Lee, Jeph Loeb, Kevin Maguire, Bob McLeod, Al Milgrom, Kevin Nowlan, Paul Pope, Amy Reeder, James Robinson, Jim Rugg, Bart Sears, Jeff Smith, Joe Staton, Brian K Vaughan, Mark Waid, Charles Vess, Lee Weeks, Ron Wilson, Louise and Walter Simonson…and on and on and on.

Genuinely. 

As well as vast seas of big names many of these events know who the builders of our medium are and they give them the space to chat and sketch. Within twenty minutes of my first ever NYCC I was chatting to Jim Starlin about an Avengers Annual. Likewise two years ago I strolled up to Howard Chaykin and got to chat to him about seeing Shakespeare performed in London. That same convention was a curated collection of ex-First Comics pioneers that included personal comics hero Mike Grell and their own original cat-herder Mike Gold. I got to meet, chat and have a photo with them all.  Then buy a specially prepared hardback annual they released alongside the event. Sure, there are geographical limitations in the UK but it doesn’t normally stop some festivals inviting the same people year in and year out. (Now…who wants a Business Class seat?).

And, this may be a surprise for those attending UK-based conventions, you can also buy back issues and original comic art. Sorely lacking at UK events are the actual items that got us into and hold us cupped warmly in this hobby. Unbelievably Thoughtbubble, the Lakes Comic Art Festival and (to a slightly lesser extent) MCM (The Holy Trinity of UK Comics Events) are seriously lacking in back issues and/or the art that made them available to be published. Lawless has some but look at virtually any other pop-culture or zine fair and you won’t find many, if any, available. 

Comic festivals should be more inclusive for the men and women who love the craft of the comics and those that have charted (and survived) the history of the medium. I’m not the only person who’d love to see more. Plus a Longbox is a fun thing to leaf through and often less expensive than the zines and ‘fat comics’ that stretch as far as the eye can see at (often) over-inflated prices.

Anyway, I’m getting called. 

Quickly then…

Back Issue Quest of the Week.

I finally gave in and got a paid version of the CLZ Comics app. Especially for this and similar trips. It’s going to take years to log the whole collection but it doesn’t normally stop work well for the smaller runs I am trying to collect/finish collecting. I’ve got a couple I’m looking for this time. One is a few issues to finish my modern Airboy run. Full of punch-ups, machine guns, sexy pulp gals, muck monsters and werewolves this is such a fun run. Chuck Dixon with artists like Paul Gulacy, Dave Stevens, Rick Veitch and Stan Woch brought us twice-monthly gold. (Yes, I know it’s on the Kindle – I have that too but it isn’t the same!)

Tops.

The New Marvel Knights imprint released ‘Punisher’ by Palmiotti and Panosian (not to be confused with the Red Band poly-bagged ‘Punisher’ comic that came out a few weeks ago) is pulpy propulsive OG Punisher goodness. It took the company a couple of years but they got there eventually, so well done (not you Jason Aaron and David Pepose – you can sit down again). 

Bottoms.

How far has the Uncanny X-Men fallen. It really breaks my heart that all we are left with is this nonsense run. Bad baby-talk dialogue and what appears to be badly constructed and rushed art.

What was once the flagship is now trash.

I’d better leg it. See you on the other side. Many thanks for reading. 

“Jump in to a dustbin.” – Spike Milligan.