New@FREW



Frew #1472
 
#1472 - 1500th Issue
(this edition is the 1500th actually issued)

Release Date: 30 March 2007

  • Pages: 180 + 76 pages for The Phantom Encyclopedia
  • Price: $11.00 inc. GST
  • Cover: N/A
  • No Phantom Forum in this issue

The Phantom Encyclopedia
 

  • The Singh Brotherhood
    • Script: Lee Falk
    • Art: Lee Falk & Ray Moore
    • 1st daily newspaper story; 17 Feb 1936 - 7 Nov 1936.
    • Previous Frew appearances: #6 (1949 and replica in 1997), #97 (1956), #184 (1961), #292 (1965), #439 (1971), #609 (1977), #816 (1984), #918A (1988), #1128 (1996).

  • The League of Lost Men
    • Script: Lee Falk
    • Art: Ray Moore
    • 1st Sunday newspaper story; 28 May 1939 - 15 Oct 1939.
    • Previous Frew appearances: #43 (1952), Giant Size #11 (1958), #939A (1989).

  • Message from the Publisher:
    Frew Publications is proud to present its 1500th edition of The Phantom.
    It is not only a world record for any international publisher of Lee Falk's famous comics creation, but a huge milestone in Australian publishing. No other comic book title in Australian history has even approached such a number of editions!
    Frew's total of 1500 issues of The Phantom spans almost 59 years (Sep 1948 - Mar 2007). During that time, the company also published two other comic book titles (Super Yank and Giant Size Phantom, originally launched as Giant Size Phantom Comic and then Giant Size Comic with The Phantom, before the publishers settled on Giant Size Phantom), and these carried a total of 42 Phantom adventures mixed in with other stories. Because neither were comic books exclusively dedicated to The Phantom, they have never been considered part of Frew's traditional Phantom comic book publishing history.
    In this issue you will find (because nothing else would be more fitting) Lee Falk's first daily and Sunday stories, from 1936 and 1939 respectively. To celebrate the release of our 1500th edition, we have also included a very special bonus - the world's first Phantom Encyclopedia! The Encyclopedia is based entirely on Phantom daily and Sunday newspaper adventures written by Lee Falk and the authors who took over following Lee's death on March 13, 1999. Only the syndicated newspaper strips, which commenced on February 17, 1936, can be regarded as official Phantom history. There are, as you about to discover, more than a few contradictions and unexplained mysteries contained in Lee's 'official' history.
    As so many other Phantom stories have been created by licensed comic book publishers who were prone to not only bending Lee's official history, but completely re-writing it, there was no option but to base this Encyclopedia on Lee's chronology of stories spanning 1936-1999 and the newspaper strip adventures which followed. There are, of necessity, many references in the Encyclopedia which relate to The Phantom away from the newspaper strips. For example, The Phantom feature motion picture released in 1996, movie and television serials, most international comic book publishing companies, book publications and a wide array of writers and artists who have contributed so much over so many years. The Encyclopedia however, has deliberately steered clear of attempting to catalogue general merchandise related to The Phantom. The accent is on the creative process of story-telling!
    Listing everything and everybody of serious importance was the easy part in the compilation of the Encyclopedia! What presented the biggest challenge for co-author Barry Stubbersfield and myself was checking and re-checking every entry to ensure no errors slipped under our guard. We are as satisfied as any two mentally exhausted researchers can be, that errors have been restricted to a few excusable oversights! We naturally had to cull our original list of possible entries and generally followed the concept that it would be almost meaningless to include a reference to every character who ever made a single, fleeting appearance.

Jim Shepherd
Publisher


Future issues planned as of 30th March 2007 (subject to change without notice):

Check the New@Egmont and The Missing Semic Stories pages for details of other upcoming stories.

My thanks to the staff of Frew Publications for providing this information.


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Bryan Shedden / guran@deepwoods.org
Last updated 31 March 2007