Cult comic artist behind Ubu Bubu and Bear working on the new BBC mag
Comic artist Jamie Smart – creator of Ubu Bubo and Bear among other things – has revealed that there’s a brand new Doctor Who partwork magazine being launched in Spring 2011, and he’s going to be spending the whole of next year drawing it.
On his blog he says that the over a year ago, the BBC, “were looking for an artist to do a certain sort of picture feature for their new mag. I did a test piece, which went to a focus group along with a handful of other, rather impressive, artists. Then, just before Christmas I was called up to the BBC, given a hard drive filled with top secret images from the (as yet unscreened) new series, and sent away to work on six more pieces. The magazine was released in a test area of the country, and then for the most part of this year I sat and waited.
“Word came in a little while ago that it had gone well, they were to roll the magazine out across the UK, and would I consider carrying on?
“So I’m very excited to get stuck in. I’ll announce when the magazine is released, and hopefully get permission to show you then some of what I’m contributing. I’m putting my all into these pieces, and I hope it’ll show.”
…Oh, okay. The “test area” of the country he was going on about was the West Country where SFX is based, so we actually saw the sample mag (at least we assume it’s the same thing Smart was talking about, because there was some of his art in there). It was called Doctor Who Monster Invasion , and it was connected to a collectable card game – the idea being if you buy every issue you end up with the complete pack, presumably. One of the best things about the test issue was, indeed, Smart’s double-page Ood spread.
It’s aimed squarely at the Doctor Who Adventures age group, but if every issue has another gorgeous spread like that one from Smart, we know a few “adults” round here who’ll sneakily be buying copies.
