Thanks to Charlie Horse 47 and Killdumpster for their sponsorship of this post, via the magic of Patreon.
***
October 1983 was a case of pressing your foot down on the accelerator, as British entrepreneur Richard Noble set a new land speed record of 633.468 mph by driving Thrust2 in a straight line, at the Black Rock Desert, Nevada.
Noble may have been fast but he was a positive slow coach compared to light.
And, at last, we could be certain of that because it was also the month in which the 17th General Conference on Weights and Measures decreed that, from now on, the metre would be defined entirely by its relationship to the speed of light. Thus it is that we now know a metre is the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second.
I just feel sorry for the man with the stopwatch who has to time it.
Elsewhere, the US military was moving pretty quickly too, as it carried out an epic invasion of Grenada, at the behest of Eugenia Charles of Dominica, a member of the Organization of American States.
Back in Britain, things were progressing well for Culture Club's Karma Chameleon which held the singles chart's top spot for almost the whole month. The exception being its final week, when Billy Joel's Uptown Girl snatched the crown.
Things were slightly more volatile on the British album chart, with three LPs hitting Number One that October. They were, in this order; No Parlez by Paul Young, Genesis by Genesis, and Culture Club's Colour by Numbers.
The cinemas of the world, meanwhile, saw the unleashing of a whole clutch of memorable movies. Among them were Never Say Never Again, The Dead Zone, The Right Stuff, Rumble Fish and The Wicked Lady.
And I've just realised I've never seen any of them.
I did once try to watch Never Say Never Again but James Bond was playing a computer game and the wrongness of such a thing demotivated me from watching the rest of the film.
But what of the galaxy's greatest comic? Was it proving to be as thrilling as the real-world events that were then transpiring?
I don't have a clue, as I don't recall the contents of any of the relevant issues but I do know they involved Judge Dredd, Sláine, Nemesis the Warlock, Strontium Dog and Rogue Trooper.
But what's this?
It looks like someone had better ring for Conan because, in most of these issues, Sláine is tackling The Bride of Crom.
How positively uncromulent.
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54 comments:
You don't need a stopwatch to measure the speed of light, Steve. Just multiply together the wavelength and frequency of any form of electromagnetic radiation and you get the answer.
Two ways to do this:
First way. Get an old radio with the tuner marked in metres and a new one marked in Hertz. Find the same radio station on both and multiplly them together. For example BBC Radio 4 is on 1,500 on the old radio and 198kHz on the other, so multiply 1,500 by 198,000
Second way. I've never tried this. You need a microwave oven and a big bar of chocolate. Take out the spinning plate and put the chocolate on a couple of supports so it doesn't rotate. If you microwave it long enough, you'll find the chocolate melts in stripes at the peaks of the standing waves inside the oven. Wavelength of the microwaves is double the distance between adjacent stripes, frequency of microwaves is probably on the back off the oven. Convert these to metres and Hertz and multiply them together.
Danger Mash is the distance of the waves in microwaves why you cant use it to kill bacteria or viruses then?
I suspect not Charlie. You only get the stripy effect in a microwave if the thing you're warming sits still. If it's rotating then it gets warmed up all over, so if it's not killing bacteria, there must be some other reason.
Colour by Numbers…
It seems Karma Chameleon still has a high level of popularity in the USA being used in commercials and actually I've heard it 3-4 times in grocery stores or FM lately.
That said Charlie much preferred Church of the Poison Mind, Miss Me, and It’s a Miracle to Karma C.
In context of yesterday’s discussion on Queen, clearly CC’s sexual orientation did not seem to affect there popularity? And given between Culture Club overlaps the Queen song Ive Got To Break Free, I'm doubtful the USA had it in for Queen but not CC due to sexual orientation. Just a piece of data to consider.
Sean’s correct- much reporting in music is rather superficial…
Crom's testicles, Steve - you've done it again! Just like last month you've failed to show all of the two wraparound covers, and this time the Slaine one is by the mighty Mike McMahon.
It can be seen in its complete form at -
www.comicartfans.com/gallerypiece.asp?piece=1580508
Where if you have a spare £10,000 you can buy the original!
(Hey DW, how are you for cash? Fancy going halves? Obviously with you being on the other side of the world it'd have to stay with me, but don't worry - I'd take good care of it...)
That full Kevin O'Neill Nemesis cover is at -
https://twitter.com/2000ad/status/1097556712561786880
And whats with bringing up Conan, Steve?
Slaine is Irish, from before the Romano-Briton St Patrick filled peoples' heads with all that Christianity nonsense (softening us up for British colonial expansion), so of course he was familiar with Crom Cruaich, also known as Crom Dubh the dark one.
-sean
You're right Charlie, I am correct.
-sean
Crom Cruaich
c.f 'Robin of Sherwood':
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0687652/?ref_=ttep_ep7
Phillip
From the plot summary it seems like Robin of Sherwood just used the name for a dodgy place Philip. Probably because of associations created by Christian propaganda (the pagan Celts kill their babies donchya know).
Btw, it was a busy time for Thard's droids back then. Also on sale in Oct '83 -
Swamp Thing #20, the first issue written by Alan Moore
Green Lantern #172, the debut of Dave Gibbons on the main series (after doing a few semi-regular GL Corps back ups)
Vanguard Illustrated #2, a Pacific Comics anthology title that included 'Freakwave' by Peter Milligan and Brendan McCarthy. Which started in #1, so I should really have mentioned that last month.
Along with Camelot 3000 #9, drawn by Brian Bolland.
Wow - who remembers that Peter Milligan's work appeared in American comics before Alan Moore's? Not me (til tonight).
-sean
*Tharg's
Obviously. Duh.
-sean
Phillip, thanks for the Robin of Sherwood link. But now that raises the obvious question. Who was the best Robin of Sherwood? Jason Connery or Michael Praed?
Sean, I can only apologise for my double wraparound failure.
Dangermash, thanks for the explanation. I shall get cracking with the task of measuring the speed of light, immediately.
Charlie, I'm with Dangermash, I'm pretty sure microwave ovens can kill bacteria. I'm not so sure about viruses. I'm not sure if viruses are, technically, alive.
Steve - In the past, I'd have said Michael Praed.
Michael Praed's standout episode's 'The King's Fool', which John Rhys Davies as Richard the Lion Heart.
However, watching more recently, some truly excellent episodes were in the Jason Connery era, too.
For example, that episode in which Gisburne started rebelling against the Sheriff, and answering back, saying things like, "Robin Hood, Robin Hood; it's always Robin Hood - you're like two different sides of the same coin!"
The one with Nasir vs Sarak ("The Sheriff of Nottingham")is also a memorable episode, with that surreal desert-set hashish taking scene, whereby Sarak is scarred, and Nasir escapes with his life. Not to mention Bodie is the villain!
Incidentally, Blake's 7 is basically Robin Hood in space.
Phillip
I'd say the best Robin Hood was John Cleese.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=irxf3MjDwSs
-sean
I don't know about a striped chocolate effect, but a failing wall outlet sure messes up your microwave! Found this out quite vividly last weekend. First a trip to the hardware store for a new outlet, then off to buy a new microwave.
I'm with Charlie, I preferred "Miss Me Blind" to "Karma Chameleon ". Sure got plenty of airplay over here, though...
Sean
I'll definitely put that cover on my list once I've won several million on the lotto. Happy to store with you as it would only melt or catch fire in Brisbane.
I don't think I read any of these at the time. It appears that Warrior #14 came out this month which was then still going strong. I know you're reluctant to feature Warrior, Steve, and so hope its ok to bring it up in the comments (as I seem to continually go off topic at the moment...). Marvel UK published Daredevils #10, this month, which was an absolutely brilliant issue (the very one-sided Fury versus Special Executive confrontation) which I'll wait to gush over, when the UK posts catch up.
Interesting that Never Say Never Again deliberately made a deal of Sean Connery then being 52, which is the same age as Daniel Craig would have been had No Time to Die come out as originally scheduled.
DW
Jesus, Dangermash. Do you got a secret life as a mad scientist that you haven't told us about? Did you make a battery out of a potato (that's a real thing)? Have you been trying to square the circle? You got some secret experiment in your basement where you're trying to replicate life?
I hope not. That endeavor always seems to end in tears.
Personally, I never got much farther than 5th grade math, but check out Dr. Sivana over here.
I know when I'm out of my depth.
M.P.
Don't worry about being on topic DW - no-one else around here does!
I think Warrior #14 means another half dozen or so issues before the Marveldog cliffhanger...? Which sounds about right.
The thing that surprised me about the context in retrospect though is how long Moore worked for 2000AD after starting on Swamp Thing.
Ok, it would make sense for a freelance writer to hang onto regular work for a little while - its not as if scripting Marvelman and Captain Brexit stories that he'd already plotted would be as labour intensive as, say, continuing to draw Rogue Trooper or Dr Who would have been for Dave Gibbons - but even so, this feature hasn't even got to the DR & Quinch series yet, let alone the first episode of Halo Jones.
-sean
M.P., careful what you write about dangermash.
Never risk pissing off someone who might be plotting world domination in a secret laboratory.
Because you never know... what if they succeed? Then where will you be?
Personally, I believe in welcoming our new actuarial overlord.
(Just so you know, for future refence dm)
-sean
Steve:
Out of those movie choices, I’d recommend THE DEAD ZONE, easily one of the best Stephen King movie adaptations (I’d rank it just below CARRIE). I liked RUMBLE FISH a lot back in the day too but I have this strange feeling that it might not have aged all that well. Effing great cast tho : Mickey Rourke, Tom Waits, Diane Lane, the great William Smith, etc. THE RIGHT STUFF I’ve always been luke-warm about — it’s pretty good but the book is just SO much better.
b.t.
Sean, if Dangermash does indeed have schemes for world domination, (I think it's obvious that he does) I'd like to throw my proverbial hat in the ring as a potential minion.
I'm willing to start the bottom, but given my utter ruthlessness, I'm sure I could rise to the rank of henchman or even lackey in no time.
By the way, D.M., might I suggest a hollowed-out volcano as a secret lair?
Make sure it's got wi-fi.
I don't wanna miss my shows, whilst I am mercilessly carrying out your diabolical commands.
M.P.
I reckon Moore was ahead with his Warrior scripts, as the frequency started to slip, and Captain Britain was probably wrapped up before DR and Quinch kicked off, but Halo Jones was certainly a major commitment (planned for seven books) during a period where he was probably earning considerably more for knocking out DC back-ups. It's a shame IPC soured this over the Titan reprint fees as Moore genuinely seemed to enjoy creating Uk original material.
On topic, the music mentioned over the previous few posts had generally been really good, but this lot leave me cold. Karma Chameleon was ok but got played to death and became one of those songs.
Dangermash's post reminds me how much of my A level physics I've forgotten.
DW
Apropos of nothing, but I just read that Michael Keaton is gonna reprise his role as Abe Toomes/The Vulture in this new Marvel movie Morbius.
That sounds kinda interesting. Keaton was a pretty good Vulture.
M.P.
Like M.P., my participation here is limited. However, I agree with b.t., as 'The Dead Zone' & 'Rumble Fish' are both particular favourites of my youth. In 'Rumble Fish', when the Motorcycle boy's dad says, "An acute perception doesn't mean you're mad; but an acute perception can drive you mad...", at the time, I didn't realize this was lifted from 'Notes From the Underground'.
Phillip
That's a good quote, Phil.
I forgot how good S.E. Hinton was! That's from way back.
M.P.
Dostoevsky is almost as good a source of quotes as Stalin, Philip.
-sean
Ha! With A Level Physics I can do anything! Anything!
M.P and Sean will be my trusted lieutenants. Can either of you fly a helicopter?
First job on the list to consolidate my position. Eliminate all potential rivals. That means anyone else with A level physics. Better get burning those certificates DW.
Sean - With our limited participation, M.P. & myself are 'superfluous men', in today's discussion (hits cymbals/high hat!)
Phillip
Never mind, Philip - in tsarist Russia Stalin was a superfluous man, and it obviously didn't hold him back at all.
I doubt he even had A-level physics...
-sean
'Karma Chameleon' prevented Tracey Ullman's 'They Don't Know' from reaching #1 so I'll never forgive Culture Club for that!
In the previous post Paul (McScotty) said that everyone knew Freddie Mercury and George Michael were gay. Really? The Freddie Mercury documentary last Saturday addressed this very issue and said that most people DIDN'T know Freddie Mercury was gay at the time even though it may seem obvious nowadays. And as for George Michael, I didn't know he was gay and neither did my sister - she loved Wham! and she thought George Michael was gorgeous.
And nobody knew that Freddie Mercury was an Indian from Zanzibar either, Sean.
Steve, did you know there's a physical albums chart published every week as well as the standard one? It ignores all the streaming and "album equivalent unit" cobblers and just counts actual sales on CD, vinyl etc. The physical albums Top 100 differs quite a lot from the official Top 100 and no album has spent 1,000 weeks on it but ABBA Gold is at 934 weeks, Bob Marley's 'Legend' at 663 weeks and Queen's Greatest Hits at 555 weeks.
This post is so far ranging that it borders on the surreal like when I saw the video of Kraftwerk doing the Hokey Pokey.
MP - I take it you want to play "Toad" to Dangermash's Magneto? I think you go to much going for you to take the name of an amphibian.
The Right Stuff - it was OK-ish. Yes the book was a lot better since you could dwell on things. Rumble Fish seemed kind of profound but at the age of 22 what isn't?
Cluture CLub - I still remember seeing their first album on sale, my borther picks it up and says, "I guess she isn't that bad looking." Little did we know...
Danger Mash, Steve - How come I don't get even heating on some of the things I microwave, then? My platter does rotate. And sometimes the bowl is like 100x hotter than the food. WHat's going on there???
I thought Churchill was the person full of quotes? I'm like 99% positive that I heard a presidential speech writer say that they would default to Churchill when looking for an important sounding quote by a sage man.
Steve this is Charlie as are the previous 3 comments. For some reason Charlie the Robot is being allowed to post without logging in or anything or confirming I am not a robot, android, bionic...
Please help!
But how the UK albums charts (both physical and standard ones) calculate the number of weeks is baffling at times - the Beatles 'Let It Be' has apparently spent a mere 5 weeks on the albums chart (???) and Charlie's favourite 'Tattoo You' has spent 4 weeks. I don't get it.
Charlie/Unknown - there are lots of things Churchill was supposed to have said but didn't. You Americans treat him like a god so that Presidential speechwriter probably did think Churchill had the wisdom of Solomon (which he didn't).
There was a lot of speculation that Freddie Mercury was gay, at the very least. Most of my male-type pals just assumed he was (and didn’t stop us from being Queen fans, not for a second). One of my ex-girlfriends had a big crush on him and refused to even consider the possibility. ‘I don’t know about Roger Taylor, though’ she once said and then changed the subject.
Also, Freddie was asked about it in an interview and he flat-out denied it. ‘Sorry to disappoint, I’m a mere heterosexual’, he replied (or something very like that) which fooled no one, but kept his ‘secret’ officially in the closet for a few more years.
b.t.
Charlie - During my schooldays, there was a book entitled "The Exam Secret". One of its many handy essay writing tips was that if you were stuck for a quotation to pad out your essay, fabricate one, then claim it was by Churchill (on the grounds that Churchill had written so much that no examiner would have the time to check & find out.) With modern computer text searching facilities, fabricating quotes by Churchill wouldn't pass muster. Needless to say, I didn't use this handy little tip, when writing my essays. There are enough quotes without making them up!
Phillip
In response to Charlie's questions, first the bowl being hotter than the food is something to do with the material the bowl's made out of. Don't know any more than that.
Then there's the uneven warming, even with the rotating platter. I'm going to have to take you through a thought experiment on this one.
Start with a zebra crossing. The Brotherhood Of Evil A Level Physicists (BOEALP) strap you down on it, so some bits of you are on white, some bits on black. Then they warm up the white stripes. You'll come out cooked in stripes like you've been on the barbie. That's the story with the non-rotating bar of chocolate.
To try to get around the stripes problem, BOEALP instead strap you down on a spinning, heat conducting plate. Let's say your belly button is right in the centre of the plate. We put this flat on the zebra crossing, set it rotating and warm up the white stripes again. Things improve a bit. You don't come out as stripy as before as most of the bits of your body spend some time over the white and some time over the black. But it's still not perfect as they don’t spend equal amounts of time over both, The most obvious example is your belly button, which stays in the same spot and ends up either really hot or stone cold, depending on whether the centre of the late is over a white or black stripe. If you were a bowl of soup, we'd still have to stir you to get the same temperature all over.
(Needless to say, in a microwave oven we'd be looking at blurred stripes with all shades of grey between black and white rather than the discrete black and white stripes on a zebra crossing)
Coppola’s two Hinton adaptations would make an interesting double feature. ‘The Outsiders’ is a solid, grounded, almost conventional (but well-made) ‘Coming Of Age’ story and ‘Rumble Fish’ is stylized and mock-mythic, filmed in gorgeous black and white, with a percussive jazz/synth score by Stewart Copeland. Of the two, I liked ‘Rumble Fish’ more, but I worry that I might find it pretentious and maybe a bit too ‘Long-form MTV’ now.
b.t.
Whether the British public knew Freddie Mercury was an Indian from Zanzibar is neither here nor there, Colin - it doesn't change the fact that he was an Indian immigrant from Zanzibar.
By all accounts before he was well known he was regularly called a "P***" and the rest of it, just like any other south Asian. Once he was a rock star, if people didn't see he obviously wasn't a white English geezer like the other three in the band... well, that tells you a lot about how racist ignorance works imo.
Pop/rock music has long drawn from gay subculture, especially in Britain where camp has always been a part of popular entertainment even when (male) homosexuality was illegal. So I guess its easy to overlook.
-sean
Somewhat surprised you didn't ask Charlie about helicopters, dangermash.
b.t., I really like Rumble Fish, but I know what you mean about seeing it again.
Apparently Coppola started off by screening The Cabinet Of Dr Caligari for the cast and crew to give them an idea of what he was after...
-sean
Colin by the early to mid 1980s it was well known Freddy was gay ( or bi-sexual) he was in a relationship with a male record producer ( forgotten his name) a in the late 1970s and by 1985 he was in a relationship with his long term partner Jim Hutton ( the Irish lad). Freddy never officially came out and really why should he or anyone , it was just known without being official. As Roger Taylor said " we just noticed that all the women that used to come out of his bedroom were replaced by men" ( or summit like that) . George Michael was "outted" by Boy George without Boy George actually saying who it was but it was beyond obvious who he meant.
Sean,Colin, I certainly knew Freddy was and Indian from Zanzibar I don't recall it being a secret, maybe not in the 1970 s but certainly in the mid 1980s I was aware of that
Colin, I was indeed aware of the physical album chart. There's also a physical singles chart, which is a sight to behold. Https://www.officialcharts.com/charts/vinyl-singles-chart/
Great to see The Specials' Ghost Town in the Top 10 and the Captain Scarlet theme tune at Number 11.
I think the reason Let It Be is shown as only having spent a few weeks on the album chart is because it's a remixed version of the album, with new material added and is, therefore, being counted as a new release. I don't know enough about the current version of Tattoo You to say if the same applies to that.
Charlie, I'm with Dangermash when it comes to your cold food. It sounds like the bowl's absorbing the microwaves and preventing them reaching the food.
When it comes to Freddie Mercury, I don't remember it being publicly acknowledged he was gay until he announced he had AIDS and I don't remember George Michael admitting to it until after he left Wham. The past was a strange place in which blatantly gay performers would try to portray themselves as straight, even when their appeal was based on them being gay. I remember Liberace once suing a British newspaper for claiming he was gay - and winning his case!
I think the likes of Kenneth Williams, Larry Grayson and John Inman all refused to admit they were gay, at the height of their fame.
Bt, thanks for the film recommendation. :)
Charlie and Redartz, I've never heard of Culture Club's Miss Me Blind. I have a suspeicion it wasn't released as a single over here.
McScotty, Sorry for ignoring your comment in my reply. I was composing my comment when you posted it and, therefore, missed it.
Larry Grayson was gay??!
This must be a world record for comments on a 2000AD post.
Phillip
Yeah Paul, I think Mercury's background was fairly well known by the 80s. In the 70s there was less general coverage of rock music, but it was was still obvious he was different to the other three (I remember seeing Queen on tv as a kid and thinking he looked like our Gujerati neighbours).
On Wham... well, they looked pretty camp, which didn't necessarily mean much in popular music, but the surprise about George Michael coming out is that anyone was surprised.
Same with the fella from Judas Priest (metal strikes me as very camp and homo-erotic).
-sean
I do find it a bit weird replying under one of Steve's 2000AD posts to anyone other than DW, Philip.
-sean
By the way, Google sometimes wrongly marks people's comments as spam and prevents them appearing. The trouble is it doesn't tell me that it's done it. If anyone ever posts a comment and it doesn't appear, let me know and I'll see if I can get it to appear.
Dangermash
Being the 21st century I propose we settle any potential differences with an FTA and non-aggression pact. I'll take the southern hemisphere, you keep the north, and we'll agree to remain silent on fishing rights. If I need to let down my former ally Sean, I'll do it, classily, by text message.
DW
I remember my father saying that Larry Grayson probably wasn't gay (or "like that" as he put it) - it was all just part of his act.
Steve, that physical singles chart was fascinating - to me it's very surprising that physical singles are even still available!
Fortunately I have no class so have already made plans... without sending any texts at all!
Anyway DW, no-one cares about fishing rights anymore. Do keep up.
The real issue on everyone's mind now is - who gets Peppa Pig World?
-sean
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