BY THUNDER - IT'S ADAM ETERNO, THE MAN WHO CANNOT DIE!

Copyright REBELLION

Today I revisited the early '70s - or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that the early '70s revisited me - when my hardback copy of Adam Eterno from the pages of Thunder arrived at Castel Crivens.  Once again I was back in the living-room of my previous home, thrilling to the adventures of the man who could not die - unless struck a fatal blow from a weapon (or anything used as a weapon) made of solid gold.  And that's an important detail one should remember - it had to consist of what, under normal circumstances, would be a fatal blow, not a glancing blow, or a weakly administered blow, so merely touching or hitting him with a gold object wouldn't necessarily kill him.  Nor would throwing a gold-plated cigarette case at him from the other side of a room bring his demise should it strike his person.

Anyway, as usual with those wonderful chaps and chapesses at Rebellion's Treasury Of British Comics, this is a delightful book that is sure to rekindle warm memories of your youth if you were a reader of Thunder back in the day.  However, a few observations are in order or this wouldn't be a proper Criven's review.  I found the reproduction of some of the earlier strips not quite as sharp as is usual for TOBC's collected editions, so I assume that, as the contents are sourced from actual published comics, perhaps the pages used had 'bleed-through' and the process by which this was removed also resulted in some loss of fine detail.  Also, curiously, although the spot colour has been removed from the weekly strips and most of the Annual strips, it has been retained for a text story from the 1974 edition.  I think I would've preferred consistency throughout.

The book contains all 22 strips from Thunder's original run before it was merged with Lion, plus all the Eterno strips and text stories from the three Annuals for 1972-'74.  It also has an introduction by Colin Page, who was one of the artists on the stories reprinted within.  Officially released on May 26th, it can be obtained from Rebellion's webshop, and will doubtless be available in some better quality bookstores.

Posted in: Cartoons