CREATOR EXCLUSIVE
Rebellion’s Treasury Of British Comics Annual revives retro festivities
FROM WHOOPEE! TO 2000 AD and Battle, many children down the years have looked forward to receiving an annual in their Christmas stocking. Now Rebellion are reviving the tradition with the first Treasury Of British Comics Annual, which combines new stories with vintage strips such as a Brian Bolland-drawn Spinball episode from the 1979 Action Annual and the Dave Gibbonsillustrated “The Ghost Pilot” from 1975’s The Buster Book Of Scary Stories.
“UK annuals were always a big part of my formative Christmases,” recalls Simon Furman, who has written a special eight-pager featuring the first meeting between the Leopard From Lime Street and the Spider. “They were a mix of humour and action/ adventure titles like Buster, Whizzer & Chips, Lion, Valiant and Smash! I was utterly immersed in the worlds of the Spider, Adam Eterno, the Steel Claw, Janus Stark and many more, so to contribute to The Treasury Of British Comics Annual is another big career bucket-list tick.”
The teenage Leopard From Lime Street, who originally graced the pages of Buster from 1975 to 1986, may not appear to be in the same league as evil super-genius the Spider, who was a mainstay in Lion throughout the late ’60s.
“It’s maybe not the most obvious match-up, but in his own recent strip in Monster Fun we’ve been trying to pit Billy against proper, super-powered villains instead of just crooks in a costume so as to give him a proper rogues’ gallery,” says Furman. “With this in mind, we wanted to bring him together with one of British comics’ premiere anti-heroes and make him part of a pantheon of classic characters. For various reasons, the Spider was a good fit, playing – in a tongue-in-cheek way – into
