The Iron eater...

[Peter Gray]

The Iron eater...

I liked this strip a lot in the annuals......did this have a series in the comics.......and what happened...what years...

love to see this in Classics...
more adventure strips please...

[Kashgar]

Hi Peter, Yes, the Iron Eaters did appear in the weekly comic. I'll sort out the full details for you and post them here anon.

[Peter Gray]

Something about this strip which was quite haunting tp me reading as a kid in an old Beezer annual. I think the fact it had no face or mouth but could absorb the metal causing destruction everywhere....the holes with nothiness....also the fact small iron eaters 'babies' came out of the creature.......

also reading a True Brit tale it featured a Jelly men..which could capture people in bubbles was that also in the comics...

Beezer sure did some good strange adventure stories..

[Kashgar]

Hi Peter, details of 'The Iron Eaters' as they appeared in the Beezer as follows -
1st series Nos 372 (2/3/63) - 444 (18/7/64) art Ken Hunter.
2nd series Nos 838 (5/2/72) - 939 (12/1/74) art Sandy Calder
Beezer Book strips 1966, 1973, 1974.
The second series was actually only an extended version of the original as it began and ended in exactly the same way. In the opening episode a VX1 satellite sent up into space by the British Rocketry Establishment returns to Earth with this cosmic weed on board which derives sustainance from devouring metal objects while in the process growing to giant size and spawning a new smaller generation of itself.
While in the final episode the last creature of its kind, a hybrid type that devours stone rather than metal is destroyed by fire as it tries to consume a factory chimney. The main human protagonists in both series are a father and son team named Prof Bill Masters and Ted in the first and Prof Jim Robertson and Tommy in the second.
Ken Hunter the wonderful artist on the original series was responsible for a number of 'Britain in peril' series in the early 1960's for as well as the Iron Eaters he also drew two series of 'The Jellymen', which you've mentioned, the doomsday tale 'The Survivors' and the menace of the living machines in 'The Year of Bedlam' all for Beezer, as well as providing the artwork for the fondly remembered Beano strip 'G for Giant'

[Peter Gray]

thanks for that...and useful to know the issues and year...I will buy in the right area when I go to London for comics...

When was the jelly men...and a bit more info...

the artist Hunter was great...I'll get the first series...
thanks again...

[Kashgar]

Info on Jellymen in Beezer as follows -
Series 1 Nos 212 (6/2/60) - 244 (17/9/60)
Series 2 Doctor Q and the Jellymen Nos 457 (17/10/64) - 501 (21/8/65)
Reprint of series 1 Nos 761 (15/8/70) - 793 (27/3/71)
The main hero in the Jellymen series was Prof 'Potassium' Roberts and he also turned up in 'The Year of Bedlam' Nos 270 (18/3/61) - 302 (28/10/61)
while the villain of the second series Doctor Q also made a belated reappearance in The Fearless Flints Nos 1466 (18/2/84) - 1497 (22/9/84) a strip also drawn by Ken Hunter.

[Peter Gray]

thank you...

anyone else enjoyed the iron eater and the jellymen..