DAN DARE - PILOT OF THE FUTURE

   UK sf COMIC-strip character, distinguished in appearance by his long chin and by the zigzag on the outer end of each eyebrow. DD was created by Frank HAMPSON for the weekly boys' comic Eagle, in which - with the sobriquet "Pilot of the Future" - he appeared with his Lancastrian batman Digby from 1950 until the comic's demise in 1969. Hampson supervised a team of writers, artists, model-makers and photographers to create a totally convincing scenario of the future, as governed by the United Nations Organization. Writers included Eric Eden, David Motton, Alan Stranks and Chad Varah; artists included Frank Bellamy, Bruce Cornwell, Eric Eden, Donald Harley, Harold Johns, Desmond Walduck and Keith Watson. DD stories generally dealt with the exploration of the Solar System, individual stories often centring on conflicts between DD and the Mekon, a green-skinned, dome-headed Venusian despot. Under Hampson's firm control, pictorial authenticity was achieved through the use of scale models, and characters were drawn from photographs of real people; stories were scrutinized for scientific accuracy (Arthur C. CLARKE was adviser for the first six months).After Hampson's departure in 1959 the writers extended their themes beyond the limitations of the original conception in a series of less convincing adventures across the Galaxy. Continuity became strained and, despite a period of revitalization at the hands of Keith Watson, the strip declined, no new material being published after Jan 1967. A DD newspaper strip of 7 frames per week was published in the UK Sunday newspaper The People 3 May-26 Nov 1964.Written by Tom Tulley and drawn at first by Massimo Belardinelli and subsequently by Dave GIBBONS, the character was revived in name only in 2,000 AD (from \#1, 26 Feb 1977). The voluble adverse reaction to this from fans of the original strip, along with news of plans for a nostalgic DD tv series (to be produced by Paul de Savary), persuaded IPC, Eagle's erstwhile publisher, to relaunch Eagle in 1982 as a weekly pulp comic with new DD stories featuring the "great grandson" of the original DD. At first top-line artists were used - Gerry Embleton (although he quickly became disillusioned by inconsistent editorial directives and left) and then Ian Kennedy (until 1984) - but the series failed to recreate the credibility of the original, and for a time IPC used less able artists on it until, for a six-week period in 1989, they returned once more to Hampson's original conception (with Keith Watson as artist). The new incarnation of Eagle failed to achieve significant sales and became a monthly, reprinting earlier strips alongside new DD stories written by Tom Tulley and drawn by David Pugh; it still (early 1992) survives.In 1982 de Savary's tv series was abandoned unfinished, although a different DD tv series is (early 1992) in the process of production by Zenith Films. There have been two RADIO adaptations: the first, starring Noel Johnson, ran continuously on Radio Luxembourg 2 July 1951-25 May 1956; the second, starring Nick Ward, adapted Eagle's original DD story and was broadcast by BBC Radio 4 in 1990. Book-length reprints of Hampson's DD stories have been published by Dragon's Dream - The Man from Nowhere (graph 1979), Rogue Planet (graph 1980) and Reign of the Robots (graph 1981) - and by Hawk Books - Pilot of the Future (graph 1987), Red Moon Mystery \& Marooned on Mercury (graph omni 1988), Operation Saturn (graph 1989), Prisoners of Space (graph 1990) and The Man from Nowhere (graph 1991). DD also starred in a political- SATIRE comic strip written by Grant Morrison and drawn by Rian Hughes, which appeared 1990-91 in Revolver and Crisis and was published in book form as Dare (graph 1991). A comic-strip parody of DD, lampooning contemporary UK politics, ran as Dan Dire - Pilot of the Future in 1991 in the satirical magazine Private Eye. There have also been two novels: Dan Dare on Mars * (1956) by Basil Dawson and Dan Dare - Pilot of the Future * (1977) by Angus Allen, the latter a novelization of the original Eagle story.For more on DD's creator read The Man who Drew Tomorrow (1985) by Alastair Crompton, and for more on the character read The Dan Dare Dossier (1990).

   RT/ABP/JE