For Toad and EvilEd

For Toad,

you're already in print!

For Evil Ed,

It's in the Trees!

I have seen this man..

and i can wholeheartedly encourage anyone visiting the TV21 con next week to seek him out - you wont find a more charming, warm and friendly person than the Lord of Sword himself, Mr Woodstock! whahey!

Just wish i was going myself now!

TV21 Con Approaches

Have You Seen This Man?

Well you may do if your'e at Fanderson's TV21 con in Bristol next weekend. It's me, Woodsy! I'll be wearing a SWORD badge to make it obvious. I'm hellishly excited to be going to my first convention, not to mention the prospect of meeting Messrs. Anderson, Shubrook, Trim, Rimmer et al all in the flesh! It'll be SWORDtastic! I'll be sure to take some snaps for the blog if I'm not shaking too much!

Anyone else going?

pigs in spaaaacee!

Following a quick visit to Tesco last night to get my tea, I found this neat little rocket among the xmas goodies on sale! Its a Peppa Pig jelly bean dispenser, but after picking off the stickers and feeding the sweets to the dog, it makes a delightfully retro spaceship! Reminds me of Lyons Maid Zoom! and all for three quid!

Vargo Statten

I love this sci fi mag cover from 1954. I've seen that purple rocket before but can't think were. I first thought it was Scandinavian but it's British. What is Vargo Statten?

Postscript: I remember what the rocket reminded me of - the purple one on the cover of Into Space with Ace Brave, a cool 1955 pop-up book I had in my collection years ago [below, top group right] illustrated by none other than Ron Turner! Front cover shown below. It's all tying up Steve!

You can see the book's contents on reader John Sisson's brilliant Dreams of Space blog.

Still In SHADO

For many years I've been delving into the treasures to be found in Dennis Nicholson's definitive Andersonalia bible, The Gerry Anderson Memorabilia Guide. One such gem is this unbranded SHADO submarine. It's the sort of design you think you've seen before and can never pin it down. Just that happened this week when I saw this Japanese Bullmark set below and thought, YES! But comparing the two it's a big NO! The search goes on.

Bullmark set seen on this Japanese ToyWorld site

Twenty Million Miles To Titan: A New SWORD Strip!

Inspired by Shaqui, Bill, Andy and Mike I thought I'd have a crack at some arty stuff too. Lacking any drawing or painting skills I have resorted to my trusty but basic 'paint' programme. As you will see I have paid homage to several old Fifties and Sixties pulp and space artists by shamelessly using their images in this B- 'story'. I hope they and you don't mind. Similarly I hope Toad, Wotan and EvilEd [ge] don't mind playing story parts too. Fritha is completely fictitious! A bit of Friday Night fun - at least for me! [once you click on the image you may need to magnify your screen size to read the words - then again I am using my miniscule laptop!]

Mev Counter

The Philosophic Toad has kindly given permission to post this page shown on the fab GACCH site. It's part of a SATURN PROBE feature in Issue 202 of TV21, April 5th 1969.  I love the artwork. The large craft is clearly the Zero-X MEV, here called ' SHINDIG 1' [it was the swinging Sixties!]. The space domes are very McCallesque and the tube-tyred diggers remind me of those seen in Project SWORD annual. The icing on the cake is another MEV descending the ramp. I've shown it in close-up below. It looks a lot like the Valigursky/Spacex MEV 2. Wunderbar!