Atomeka

Managed to get in at the last minute!

A1: Book 3 - back cover by MOEBIUS

Monsieur Mouche

A1 Book 4: Moebuis' Sketchbook

When I met Jean (Giraud/Moebius) he also had on him a couple of very small books, no more than three by four inches in size. They looked like sketchbooks, but surely not that small. Jean smiled and handed them to me. Yes, they were sketchbooks. I'd never seen his work like this before and he said these were just for himself.

I smiled at him as I asked if we could run some of these, at actual size and in a way that people seeing them could view them how I just had. He said that was fine and thought that no one would be interested. I looked at him and we both laughed.

Of course, people would want to see them.

The recreation of his sketchbook and the tones within were done by Garry Leach.

A1 Book 4: Please see my previous posts for the history behind this issue.

One of the additional stories Jean Giraud (Moebius) gave us for this issue is this one, "Moebius circa '74". In it, Jean starts by talking about his approach to BLUEBERRY and then gives us a tongue-in-cheek look back on his life and inspirations.

A gloriously fun autobiographical piece where he pokes fun at himself and at life in general.

Story and art by 'Moebius' (tones by me), translation by Randy and Jean-Marc L'Officier, with lettering by 'Super-Adaptoid' Woodrow Phoenix!

A1 Book 2: This volume featured a unique MISTER X feature by a host of wonderful creators.

This piece is by MICHAEL KALUTA...

More soon.

A1 Book 4: This didn't start out to be a MOEBIUS special, however, it quickly became one.

"In The Heart of the Impregnable Meta Bunker" was a new short story by JODOROWSKY and Moebius that tied into their ongoing Incal books featuring in this case the Metabarons.

I'd met Jean (Giraud) a couple of times and he'd said he was interested in doing something for A1. In one meeting he suggested this short story could be it, if we were interested...

There was no hesitation on my part.

We'd been talking to Simon Bisley about doing a cover so asked Jean if he minded that we ask Simon to do his interpretation of a key scene in the story. He happily obliged, eager to see what Simon might do.

As the book was going to press, we were alerted by Jean's agents Randy and Marc L'Officer that Heavy Metal had just run the story in color. This was over six months ahead of when it was agreed to.

Jean was incredibly embarrassed by the situation and we met to see what else we could do. As we had the cover from Simon, I wanted to still use the story, so Jean offered another short story as well, about himself, and a piece for the back cover.

He also had with him a couple of very small books, no more than three by four inches in size. They looked like sketchbooks, but shortly not that small. Jean smiled and handed them to me. Yes, they were sketchbooks. I'd never seen his work like this before and he said these were just for himself.

I smiled at him as I asked he we could run some of these, at actual size and in a way that people seeing them could view them how I had. He said that was fine and thought that no one would be interested. I looked at him and we both laughed. Of course, people would want to see them.

Here first is the short Metabarons story. I'll post the other two pieces shortly.

"In The Heart of the Impregnable Meta Bunker" by Jodorowsky and Moebius, with tones by me (Dave)

A1 Book 4: A SIMON BISLEY cover tied to a MOEBIUS story about the Meta-Baron and a back cover by Moebius featuring the Starwatcher.

The conversation on Sunday was about several things related to the sales of comic books today.

The conversation covered the content, marketing, production, distribution, creators, and the owners of the companies that own and control the properties.

Love to get some feedback and your thoughts on the topic of where we are.

International Comics Crusaders - Marvel, Where do they go from here? Pt 1 Hang out with Al and Dave for the return of ICC, (Chris we miss you) as they discuss the State of Comic Creative Independence! You defo want to tune in for ...

Tune in this weekend for another podcast from the International Comic Crusaders; Al Mega and Dave Elliott, for a chat about Marvel.

Live in three hours!

Come with a coffee or beer and listen to Al Mega and me talk comics.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVi38zjuhD4

Elsewhere in the multiverse...

Thunder Hunters
by Mark A. Nelson

Artist and adventurer J.V. Holbrook has traversed and recorded the natural history of an uncharted planet. Thunder Hunters is the unique, culminated cross-section of his sketches, journal entries, sequential stories, and portraits of inhabitants and the expansive Vermillion Sands region. It showcases his attention to detail and love of his newly explored alien domain, revealing a never before seen world of myth, culture, landscape, and wildlife.

Newly collected in an exclusive oversized hardcover by writer/artist Mark A. Nelson. Plus a rare chance to own the original art!

"Mark makes the most beautiful and original creatures in the world, no matter how odd or ugly they might be. His work never ceases to amaze and enthrall."
- GEOF DARROW

Order your copy NOW!

https://zoop.gg/c/thunderhunters

JOCK!

The Panel Gallery in Northampton has an amazing art show of JOCK's original artwork from the first issue of his ONE DARK KNIGHT mini-series.

Copies of the collection of the series as well as THE ART OF JOCK are available as well.

Big thanks to Jock and Panel Gallery owner Jeff Chahal for a great opening night last night and signing today.

How time flies. It is already a year since we lost one of the greatest lights of British comics.

One year ago, Garry Leach passed away from a heart attack. The biggest heart in the UK industry stopped beating.

Garry never had the biggest volume of work behind him. He didn't have that fire that many others had to achieve some mystic status or make as much money as possible. Money wasn't a big motivator for him. He just loved comics and being part of it seemed like that was enough.

Garry spent more time with creators who needed his help or advice. He would spend hours and weeks helping someone get to the next stage, whether it was a story idea, a cover composition, color selection, an anatomy issue, a reference, production, design, or just life advice. Garry was there for so many people. He gave more than he ever received.

The hole he left in our lives is still there.

I think this was because Garry was a square peg in a round hole. He didn't fit all the norms of what we saw from other creators. While we were all inspired by comics to play a part in their creation, Garry still preferred reading and talking about comics.

If you wanted to find him, check out Orbital Comics or Gosh on new comics day. You'd find him talking to staff and customers about comics old and new until the doors closed and if you were willing to buy him a beer in the pub down the road, you'd get untold stories of pure comics history.

I'll be raising a Guinness or three to Garry today. I also have an extra pack of tissues if you need them. 🍻❤️

Another day, another death. This time it was the wonderful Raquel Welch, an early crush for many of us of a certain age.

I remember seeing her in One Million Years B.C., one of the few films my dad took me to see. 🤔😉

I think the comic adaptation by Steve Moore and John Bolton was when I first really took notice of John's amazing art. Steve Moore's genius can't be overlooked either when he continually managed to do entire film adaptations in 8 to 12 pages.

The color art on the cover is by the amazing Brian Lewis.

Only John Bolton is with us today, so let's celebrate them all.

The Atomic Guys!

It’s been a tough year for everyone in a period when everything seems to be sliding down the bowl like one of King Charle’s wet coffee e***a craps.

Every time I’ve tried summoning the wherewithal to gather my feelings and thoughts into sharing something, another of Charle’s wet craps came sliding down, so I ducked and covered and didn’t want to come out again.

Don’t get me completely wrong, a lot of good stuff happened this year for me, but when you lose things that are more important it doesn’t feel that great. It feels very empty.

If you go to my LinkedIn profile, you’ll see just about everything I’ve done over the past forty years (with the exception of what I’ve been doing the past four years) and running alongside everything you can see that I’m still down as working at ATOMEKA.

ATOMEKA is the company I founded with Garry Leach and was initially funded by Mike Lake. It was run out of two living rooms for several years and was truly the best education I got about the comic book industry. First off, I got to watch Garry draw. I got to see his process. And I got to work with him.

Those years were wonderful. We just did what we wanted to and made it work. We got artists that had never written before to take their first steps to creating their own worlds from their own ideas, a process I never tire of seeing.

Garry and I probably spent too much time together. You can tell when you start finish each other’s sentences and keep getting busy signals because you both get the idea to call the other at the same time. While we were very similar in many ways we were different enough to be able to work together and get this magical thing called publishing done.

Atomeka wasn’t making enough money to support us, and we weren’t able to work any faster on the books, so I balanced my income with working for Marvel and 2000AD as an inker. Garry was fortunate to get some real paying work doing art for cereal boxes and special promotional giveaways. Comics were Garry’s great love, but were way too much work for him for too little money.

But for me, Atomeka opened other doors. I got to meet great talents like Brett Ewins and Steve Dillon who had started a new magazine called DEADLINE. It was a similar set-up to Atomeka and like our publishing ventures, it wasn’t making enough money to live on, so Brett and Steve were still trying to draw comics full time while putting out a bi-monthly magazine. Mike Lake had been our benefactor and Tom Astor was Brett and Steve’s.

Brett, Steve, and Tom asked me to take over Deadline until they could figure out what they wanted to do or find someone to dedicate themselves to it. It was a tricky balancing act doing A1 (our publication), Deadline, and inking, but it worked for a while.

It was working for Deadline and doing an issue with Clive Barker that I worked with Mark Cox for the first time. Mark was the art director at Titan Books (or head designer under Leigh Baulch, can’t remember exact title). Super talented designer, super sweet, and very collaborative. We met several times over the next year or two and got to know each other pretty well. Mark was also friends with Garry and we’d often go into Titan’s studio and rib Mark for being too qualified to work for such a company.

Around this time I was approached by Marvel/Epic to do a second series of A1 for them and in color this time. It would be four issues and in starting that I ended up doing a similar anthology series for them that highlighted their entire Epic line.

My original idea was to ask Garry to work with me on A1 and Mark on Epic. However, we still hadn’t finished work on our own series of A1 and while with our series of the title, we could take our own sweet time, Marvel was late getting me the contracts so had eaten up most of my lead-in time. Mark would end up taking over the design for both series for Marvel.

To add to the work load, I was asked by Kevin Eastman (co-creator of the Teenage Mutant Turtles, then president/publisher of Tundra Publishing) to start up a UK division (which ended up being called Atomeka as well but that’s a different story) and while I knew Garry couldn’t commit to it full time, Mark could. There was enough work that I could still do projects editorially with Garry, like Monster Massacre, but Mark could make them all come out on time and still look wonderful.

There’s no greater feeling than when a deadline is finished, the work shipped out, and we can all relax. Hanging out with Garry and Mark once a book or three had shipped out was wonderful. It was almost worth the stress of putting a month’s worth of books together for that few hours, usually including a few beers and a pizza.

It feels like a longer time than it actually was but it was good while it lasted. Unfortunately, Kevin had lost most of his money, so while we tried cutting back, it wasn’t enough and we had to shut shop. Fortunately, Mark jumped ship to Dark Horse Comics in Portland, Oregon, and spent many years there making guys like Frank Miller’s books look even better than they already did.

While Garry and I always found something to work on together, I lost track of Mark. I’d see him at American conventions from time to time until he moved to Chicago. When I co-founded Radical I wanted Mark to be my art director but as I got to know my new partners better I thought better of it. Mark was great at being collaborative with creative people to get the best out of each other, but ‘creative’ isn’t a word I’d use for my partners there.

I was fortunate over the years to be able to tell Garry how much he meant to me and what I had learnt from him, but I never felt I’d truly thanked Mark and what my time working with him meant to me.

When Lou Banks reached out to me about Mark’s condition, he wisely urged me to tell him what I thought now while I still could.

Both Garry and Mark left us this year. It’s been tough to even think about, let alone write anything. Working on anything where I used the Atomeka name was always with some involvement from Garry. I can’t imagine using that name again without his or Mark’s participation. So I think it’s time to finally close the book on Atomeka and move on. I’ll just remember the good times with good people.

~ Dave

If you're in or around London this Sunday, come down to Gosh Comics and look through some of the amazing collection of comics and books Garry Leach amassed over his lifetime.

Maybe see you there!

Today is Garry Leach's funeral. The cremation will take place at 3.15pm GMT.😢❤️

If you loved Garry Leach and his art, consider making a donation to the HERO Initiative in his memory. This wonderful image was produced by one of Garry's closest friends and colleagues, the amazing RUFUS DAYGLO!

Garry's funeral will be on May 11th. Please take a moment to think of him that day. If you were fortunate enough to have met him, tell us your story, if you loved his art, tell us the piece that you loved the most.

Garry had a huge heart and he'll be with us forever.

GARRY LEACH variant cover art for Steve Pugh's HOTWIRE!

GARRY LEACH cover art for DC Comics The SPECTRE!

GARRY LEACH pinup for WARRIOR magazine. Laser Eraser.

GARRY LEACH Simon and Kirby recreation of FIGHTING AMERICAN cover art!

GARRY LEACH and the woman of bronze, DOC DARE (for Penthouse Comix.