'GLOW IN THE DARK STICKER'

I had this monster glow-in-the-dark sticker sent to me via email, they are not sure where they actually got it from. He said that it may have been something from 'Horror Bags' and that there were quite a few others in the set. Can anyone shed any light on this or maybe you have some yourself that you could send to The Cobbwebbed room.

Thanks to Steven for the scan.

'CREEPY COMIX' - Creepy Sleepy tales/Fangs of fear

'Creepy Sleepy Tales' from

'Cheeky' [15th July 1978]

'Cheeky' strip by Belardinelli

Cheeky [The character] whenever babysitting the Sweeny Toddler like baby 'Baby Burpo' would take along his copy of 'Creepy Sleepy Tales', although Cheeky ended up giving himself the creeps while walking back home after reading the tale. 'Creepy Sleepy tales' were clearly based on 'Badtime Bedtime Books' that appeared in issues of Fleetway's 'Monster Fun' [see pic]. Other forms of the Creepy Sleepy Tales were presented by the editor as TV shows, chapters in books, a trip to the cinema etc, so to avoid any monotomy of the format.

The reader would get a peek into that weeks tale, the strip below is from the 15th July 1978 issue.

The other strip featured is from a thriller that Cheeky would dip into after receiving a tap off the bookshop owner. This paticuliar strip is called 'Fangs of Fear' and was illustrated by Belardinelli who went on to great things at 2000ad. I think this strip just ooozes atmosphere and reminds me of some of the strips that appeared in particuliar American horror comics such as 'Creepy', 'Eerie', 'Psycho', 'Nightmare' etc and also some strips that would appear in issues of the British 'Scream' comic as well as issues of 'Misty'. Belardinelli's artwork apperance in 'Cheeky' is a total contrast to the regular strips that would appear every week.

Thanks to John.

TV tie-in - 'SHADOWS'

This long running Thames TV show was aimed at children ran from 3rd September 1975 to 1st November 1978. Essentially a supernatural anthology series, in later series the theme would switch to more fantasy style stories. A total of 20 episodes were shown over 3 series. Episodes would cover themes such as an haunted railway station ['The Waiting room'], Witchcraft ['The Witch's bottle'], Strange powers ['After school'], Evil criminals ['Dutch Schitz's shoes'], Magicians ['And now for my next trick'], Curses ['The Rose of Puddle Fratrum'] etc. A character from the episode 'Dutch Schitz's shoes' first appeared in the cult TV series 'Ace of wands', with the gruesome name of Mr.Stabs, the character would also appear in an episode of 'Dramarama Spooky' entitled 'Mr.Stabs'. The episode from Shadows is highly recommended viewing, Mr.Stabs and his sidekick Luko are a great double act playing off each other with sinister wit. Both episodes from Shadows and Dramarama are included as extras on the Ace of Wands dvd boxset.

The TV tie-in 'The Best of Shadows' would only contain 7 of the 20 shadows stories. Published by Carousel books in 1979 and illustrated by Les Matthews, with stories by Joan Aiken, Josephine Poole, Ewart Alexander and 2 stories adapted by Peter Eldin.

Episodes covered in this book are: 'The Dark streets of Kimball's Green', 'The Inheritance', 'Eleven O'clock', 'And now for my next trick', 'The Rose of Puddle Fratrum', 'The Eye', and 'The Man who hated children'. I am not sure if another 'Shadows' tie-in was ever published, this is the only one I have seen.

Here is all the 'Shadows' episodes in order of broadcast:

Series 1

'The Future Ghost'

'After School'

'The Witch's bottle'

'The Waiting room'

'Optical Illusion'

Dutch Schlitz's shoes'

'The Other window'

Series 2

'The Dark streets of Kimball's Green'

'Time out of mind'

'The Inheritance'

'Dark Encounter'

'Peronik'

'The Eye'

Series 3

'Eleven o'clock'

'The Rose of Puddle Fratrum'

'And now for my next trick'

'The boy Merlin'

'The man who hated children'

'The Silver apple'

'HoneyAnn'

I am not sure if 'Shadows' will ever be released onto dvd, lets just hope so.