Review Dan Dare

Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
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Dan Dare
Publication information
Publisher Hulton Press
First appearance Eagle #1 (April 14, 1950)
Created by Frank Hampson
In-story information
Full name Colonel Daniel McGregor Dare
Team affiliations Interplanet Space Fleet
Dan Dare is a British science fiction comic hero, created by illustrator Frank Hampson who also wrote the first stories.[1] Dare appeared in the Eagle comic story Dan Dare, Pilot of the Future from 1950 to 1967 (and subsequently in reprints), and dramatised seven times a week on Radio Luxembourg (1951–1956).

The stories were set in the late 1990s, but the dialogue and manner of the characters is reminiscent of British war films of the 1950s. Dan Dare has been described as "Biggles in Space" and as the British equivalent of Buck Rogers. Dan Dare was distinguished by its long, complex storylines, snappy dialogue and meticulously illustrated comic-strip artwork by Hampson and other artists, including Harold Johns, Don Harley, Bruce Cornwell, Greta Tomlinson, Frank Bellamy and Keith Watson.

Dan Dare returned in new strips in 2000 AD in 1977 until 1979 and in the relaunched Eagle in 1982 until 1994. The most recent mainstream story was a Dan Dare mini-series published by Virgin Comics in 2007 and 2008. It was written by Garth Ennis and illustrated by Gary Erskine and is a completely new and somewhat darker interpretation of Dan Dare. Since October 2003, however, Dare's adventures have also continued in Spaceship Away, a mail-order magazine created by Rod Barzilay. Its mission statement is to continue the original Dare's adventures where the original Eagle left off, in a style as close to that of the classic strip as possible. To that end, Barzilay originally hired former Eagle artist Keith Watson, and following Watson's death Don Harley, both of whom had drawn Dare in the 1960s, to work on the strips which are written very much in the style of the fifties stories.



 
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Doctor Omega

Member: Rank 10
"Is the Mekon Misunderstood?"


Produced to celebrate the launch of the new #audio adventures from B7 Media and Big Finish Productions, "Is the Mekon Misunderstood?" takes a fun look at Dan Dare's arch nemesis, The Mekon. Produced by Andrew Mark Sewell and directed by Daniel Fox for B7 Media/Chat Noir Productions Ltd.


 
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