Tuesday 23 August 2022

Blimey! It's SLIMER!

Back in what feels like a lifetime ago now (the 1980s) Marvel UK kept me busy doing comic strips for their range of titles mainly thanks to group editor Richard Starkings. I did Captain Wally and Snail-Man in Spider-Man, Robo-Capers in Transformers, Combat Colin in Action Force (and later Transformers), Macho Man in Secret Wars... and in 1988, Blimey! It's Slimer! in The Real Ghostbusters

I didn't draw many episodes of Slimer. I only did 11 in total before bailing out as I was so busy with other material (including my work for Fleetway on Buster). Bambos Georgiou took over the strip and did wonderful work on it. 

In 1989, Marvel UK published a collection of the Slimer strips in a nice A5 landscape format paperback with 68 pages. It was entitled, of course, Blimey! It's Slimer! (Richard Starkings had been inspired by my 1983 comic Blimey! It's Brickman when he came up with the title. It had a ring to it and helped cement the fact that these were British strips not American reprint.)

Over the years I've met some readers who assumed I'd drawn all the book. Far from it. I think the assumption has occurred because the only people credited in the book are writer John Carnell and me, on the first strip. (As you know, I usually write my own material but in the case of the Slimer strip I was only commissioned as an artist.) I always sign my work but in the case of Slimer the signatures were usually removed for some reason. Bambos isn't credited at all!

Anyway, having found the book amongst my stuff the other day (when looking for something else) I thought I'd put the record straight on which pages I did draw: pages 5, 20, 26, 32, 33, 38, 39, 45, 60, 61, and 66. The strips were not reprinted in the order they were originally published which is why it switches between mine and Bambos' strips throughout the book. (They're all self contained stories so it doesn't matter.) The cover was drawn by Brian Williamson.

I don't think John Carnell wrote all the strips. I'm pretty certain John Freeman wrote some too. Perhaps Bambos wrote his own pages but I'm not sure. Colouring was always done in-house by Marvel staff.

Here's a selection of some of the Slimer strips I did. Hope you like them. As always, click / tap on the images to see them full size...

 
  
 
 
Pretty sure I wrote this one. The Ghostbuster's face was redrawn by another artist.
 

COVER ART BY BRIAN WILLIAMSON.

 

6 comments:

Manic Man said...

^_^ good to see these.
Do you know who did the Masthead? well.. not really a masthead is it?.. erm.. Title bar?

Lew Stringer said...

Yes, I designed/drew it. Then Bambos did his own version for his strips and for the cover.

PhilEdBoyce said...

Ahahaha! That wrong side of the bed one was always my favourite lol! I collected the comic until just after issue 150 and that was always the best Blimey! It's Slimer. :D

Lew Stringer said...

Thanks Phil. I think that was the only one I wtote myself.

Gareth said...

The stories you write yourself are always the funniest and stick in the mind.

Lew Stringer said...

Thanks Gareth. I've worked with some goood writers though, but I must admit I prefer writing my own material.