''Spaceship Away'' is an illustrated full color fanzine initially based on the British comics space hero

Dan Dare Dan Dare is a British science fiction comic hero, created by illustrator Frank Hampson who also wrote the first stories. Dare appeared in the ''Eagle'' comic series ''Dan Dare, Pilot of the Future'' from 1950 to 1967 (and subsequently in ...

and now also covering similar British

pop culture Popular culture (also called pop culture or mass culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as popular art pop_art.html" ;"title="f. pop art">f. pop artor mass art, some ...

Origins and history

The publication was inspired by ''

Eagle Eagle is the common name for the golden eagle, bald eagle, and other birds of prey in the family of the Accipitridae. Eagles belong to several groups of Genus, genera, some of which are closely related. True eagles comprise the genus ''Aquila ( ...

'', a boys' illustrated magazine, published in the UK and running from 1950 to 1966. The character of Dan Dare originally appeared here. ''Spaceship Away'' features original stories written and drawn in the style of series creator

Frank Hampson Frank Hampson (21 December 1918 – 8 July 1985) was a British illustrator. He is best known as the creator and artist of Dan Dare and other characters in the boys' comic, the ''Eagle'', to which he contributed from 1950 to 1961. Biograp ...

. ''Spaceship Away'' was created by Rod Barzilay as an attempt to revive the original Dan Dare of the 1950s and early 1960s. It was born after Rod's efforts to arrange publication of "The Phoenix Mission", a story he had written, and persuaded an original Dan Dare artist Keith Watson to illustrate in

pastiche A pastiche () is a work of visual art, literature, theatre, music, or architecture that imitates the style or character of the work of one or more other artists. Unlike parody, pastiche pays homage to the work it imitates, rather than mocking ...

style. This ran up against commercial lack of interest. Barzilay commenced publication of it in 2003 as a vehicle for his story. Other artists and writers with an interest in Dan Dare came on board. Following Watson's death, "The Phoenix Mission" was taken over from the second issue onwards by the legendary original Dan Dare artist Don Harley (who had often shared credit with Hampson himself in the 1950s). There was later help from Tim Booth. Currently, ''Spaceship Away'' now includes "other sci-fi like Charles Chilton's ''Journey into Space'', and Sydney Jordan's 'Hal Starr'",''Spaceship Away'' home page
/ref> and (as of July 2024) is still a going concern. Other regular contributors include Tim Booth, who now co-draws the lead "The Green Nemesis" (the sequel to "The Phoenix Mission" strip), also written by Rod Barzilay; and Keith Page, who drew several revived Dan Dare strips in New Eagle.

Features

"The Green Nemesis" takes place in 2012 in the Sargasso Sea of Space introduced in Hampson's "Reign of the Robots". Keith Page writes and draws "Rocket Pilot" which is set just before Dan's first trip to Venus in 1994, prior to the "Kingfisher" expedition. Tim Booth both writes and draws "The Gates of Eden" which is placed in 1998 at the commencement of the first Treen/Theron food shipments to Earth. ''Spaceship Away'' also runs one-page Dan Dare spoofs such as "Mekki" and "Our Bertie" by Ray Aspden, Eric MacKenzie's "Dan Dire" and "Dan Bear" by Andy Boyce. It also features new Dan Dare text stories by Denis Steeper set in the period immediately after the Eagle's original strips. Here Dan, now called Sir Daniel, has been elevated to Controller-in-Chief of Space Fleet.

References

External links

Spaceship Away official website

{{Dan Dare Dan Dare British comics Science fiction comics