Celebrating 50Years of the Prisoner
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THE MAGAZINE BEYOND YOUR IMAGINATION www.infinitymagazine.co.uk THE MAGAZINE BEYOND YOUR IMAGINATION 6 DOUBLE-SIDED POSTER INSIDE! “I AM NOT A NUMBER!” CELEBRATING 50 YEARS PLUS: OF THE PRISONER • CHRISTY MARIE - COSPLAY QUEEN • SPACECRAFT KITS • IAIN M. BANKS • THE VALLEY OF GWANGI • NEWS • SATURDAY MORNING SUPERHEROES • CHILDREN’S FILM FOUNDATION AND MUCH, MUCH MORE… FUTURE SHOCK! THE HISTORY OF 2000 AD AN ARRESTING CONCEPT - TAKE A TRIP IN ROBOCOP THE TIME TUNNEL WRITER INFINITY ISSUE 6 - £3.99 06 THE MAGAZINE BEYOND YOUR IMAGINATION www.infinitymagazine.co.uk 6 THE MAGAZINE BEYOND YOUR IMAGINATION DOUBLE-SIDED POSTER INSIDE! 8 14 “I AM NOT A 38 NUMBER!”50 YEARS CELEBRATING OF THE PRISONER • SPACECRAFT KITS PLUS: • NEWS • CHRISTY MARIE• THE - COSPLAY VALLEY QUEEN OF GWANGI• CHILDREN’S • IAIN M. BANKS • SATURDAY MORNING SUPERHEROES FILM FOUNDATION AND MUCH, MUCH MORE… FUTURE SHOCK! AN ARRESTING THE HISTORY OF CONCEPT - 2000 AD ROBOCOP WRITER TAKE A TRIP IN THE TIME TUNNEL INFINITY ISSUE 6 - £3.99 Prisoner cover art by Mark Maddox (www.maddoxplanet.com) 19 44 08: CONFESSIONS OF A CONVENTION QUEEN Pat Jankiewicz discovers how Star Wars FanGirl Christy Marie became a media phenomenon! 14: SATURDAY MORNING SUPER-HEROES Jon Abbott looks at Hanna-Barbera’s Super TV Heroes line of animated adventurers. 19: UNLOCKING THE PRISONER Don’t miss this amazing 11-page special feature on Patrick McGoohan’s cult favourite from the 1960s. 38: MODEL BEHAVIOUR Sci-fi & Fantasy Modeller’s Andy Pearson indulges his weakness for spacecraft kits… 40 40: FUTURE SHOCK! John Martin talks to Paul Goodwin, director of an acclaimed documentary on the history of 2000 AD. 48 52 44: REMEMBERING MR BANKS A look back at two great authors: Iain Banks and sci-fi author Iain M. Banks. Both were the same man. 48: AN ARRESTING CONCEPT Michael Miner, the man who co-penned the script to RoboCop, on the film’s legacy and influence. 52: INTO THE TIME TUNNEL Mark Phillips travels back in time to look at Irwin Allen’s cult TV sci-fi show, The Time Tunnel. 56 62 56: INTO THE VALLEY OF GWANGI Howard Hughes explores the great Ray Harryhausen dinosaur film that time forgot. 60: WHO IS ON THE EDGE OF THEIR SEAT? Some of Dr Who’s cliffhangers were more successful than others, as Eugene Smith reports… 62: CHILDREN’S FILM FOUNDATION Ian Millsted takes a look at the science-fiction films of the Children’s Film Foundation. Editor: Allan Bryce Web Master: [email protected] 06: INFINITY NEWS ROUND-UP Design & Production: Kevin Coward Website: ww.ininitymagazine.co.uk Advertisement and Subs Manager: Published by: Ghoulish Publishing Ltd, 12: YOUR LETTERS AND EMAILS Yannie Overton-Bryce 29 Cheyham Way, South Cheam, Surrey SM2 7HX. 18: THE DARK SIDE PROMO ULISH [email protected] 30: REVIEWS O Printed in the EU by Acorn, W. Yorkshire. Online publisher: Ghoulish Publishing Distribution: Intermedia, Unit 6 The Enterprise 47: SUBSCRIPTIONS ww.ininitymagazine.co.uk Centre, Kelvin Lane, Manor Royal, Crawley, West GH PUBLISHING 67: NEXT ISSUE PREVIEW Advertising enquiries: Sussex RH10 9PE [email protected] © Copyright 2017 Ghoulish Publishing Ltd. INFINITY 3 ‘I AM NOT A NUMBER, I AM A FREE MAN…’ s a child of the late 1950s and early 1960s time when revolution was in the air and the freedom I remember a highlight of a boring Sunday of the individual was being called into question. Aevening being The Saint or Danger Man on McGoohan himself never offered an explanation, but he the telly, in black and white on one of the two did say in a later interview that “the village” reflected channels we had to choose from back then - three the individual’s lack of freedom on many levels. “We channels when BBC2 launched in 1964. The latter was are all prisoners of this or that, many things, each in a particular favourite, chronicling the adventures of his own ‘Village’”. Top to bottom: Spaceways, The 4-Sided secret agent John Drake (Patrick McGoohan). I can still The village itself was of course Portmeirion in Triangle and Moon Zero Two are remember the opening narration: “Every government North Wales, designed by architect Bertram Clough just some of the Hammer Sci-Fi has its secret service branch. America, CIA; France, Williams-Ellis who began construction on his own movies you can read about in our new book. On Sale now! Deuxième Bureau; England, MI5. NATO also has its own. private peninsula on the coast of Snowdonia in 1925. A messy job? Well that’s when they usually call Today it is open to visitors and home to Festival on me or someone like me. Oh yes, my name No.6, which you can also read about in this is Drake, John Drake.” What I loved about issue. I would like to give particular thanks Danger Man was he didn’t mess about to the incredibly talented Mark Maddox with women. Young lads didn’t want to for his stunning cover art and all three of see any of that lovey-dovey stuff, and our writers who took it upon themselves neither did McGoohan - he turned down to chronicle The Prisoner’s history and the role of James Bond for precisely that modern day impact, namely Brian J. Robb, reason. Good on him, I say. Robert Fairclough and Prisoner historian Anyway, when McGoohan’s The Prisoner and researcher Rick Davy. Rick is the author made its TV debut 50 years ago, it did so with a of The Prisoner - The Essential Guide, a 36-page knockout opening sequence that effectively set up A5-sized guidebook packed with information about the rest of the show, packing an entire plot into just a the genesis, making, and legacy of the series. In full few frames. McGoohan was the mysterious Number colour throughout, it includes a full episode guide and Six, though me and my schoolmates reckoned he was many officially licensed and previously unpublished really still John Drake. We also loved the fact that photographs. Priced at only £2.99, it’s available in when he took time off to film the Hollywood thriller bookshops and online from www.theunmutual.co.uk. Ice Station Zebra he managed to slip in his famous And while we are plugging books, we also advise Prisoner catchphrase, “Be seeing you…” you not to miss our own latest spectacular volume The Prisoner ran for just seventeen episodes and entitled Hammer: The Haunted House of Horror. ended in such a surreal fashion that McGoohan, who Written by Hammer historian Denis Meikle it’s 180 was the brains behind it all, says he had to leave the pages of glossy full colour goodness for just £20 and THE DARK SIDE PROUDLY PRESENTS: country to avoid being lynched. I do recall being available right now. Okay, so Hammer didn’t do a lot of HAMMER disappointed at the time that the storyline hadn’t been sci-fi, and when you take a look at Moon Zero Two you THE HAUNTED HOUSE OF HORROR THE DEFINITIVE HISTORY OF HAMMER FILMS – BY DENIS MEIKLE neatly wrapped up, but of course in retrospect it is will realise why, but Infinity readers will still love this precisely that which has made the show timeless. Fans book, advertised elsewhere in this mag. I’ll leave you just love to get together and discuss it endlessly. It was to discover its many other hidden treasures and ‘Be certainly the perfect time to make a series like this, a seeing you’ next issue. Allan Bryce. HELP US KEEP UP TO DATE WITH WHAT YOU WANT We value every single reader and they value us, which is why we are flourishing at a time when print magazines everywhere are having a tough time. We want to encourage you all to send in your views on Infinity so we can get a lively letters section going, and if you have news of sci-fi-related conventions, movies, books etc, we will be happy to give you some publicity for them. Most importantly, THE MAGAZINE BEYOND YOUR IMAGINATION please tell us what we are doing right and (perish the thought) what we are doing www.infinitymagazine.co.uk wrong! You can reach us by via: WEB: www.infinitymagazine.co.uk EMAIL: [email protected] FACEBOOK: Infinity Magazine ADDRESS: INFINITY Magazine Ghoulish Publishing Ltd 29 Cheyham Way, South Cheam, Surrey, SM2 7HX 4 INFINITY HAMMERTHE DARK SIDE PROUDLY PRESENTS: THE HAUNTED HOUSE OF HORROR THE DEFINITIVE HISTORY OF HAMMER FILMS – BY DENIS MEIKLE ORDER YOUR COPY NOW! THE DARK SIDE PROUDLY PRESENTS: ammer - The Haunted House of Horror is our latest and possibly greatest ever Dark Side book and copies are available to buy HAMMER Hnow. You won’t want to miss this great companion volume to last THE HAUNTED HOUSE OF HORROR year’s best-selling volume, Amicus - The Friendly Face of Fear, because THE DEFINITIVE HISTORY OF HAMMER FILMS – BY DENIS MEIKLE we feel it is the deinitive history of Britain’s most famous purveyors of Gothic fantasies. Indeed it should be because it is written by Denis Meikle, a leading expert on Hammer and author of Vincent Price: The Art of Fear and Jack The Ripper: The Murders and the Movies. Exhaustively researched, this amazing book tells the full story of the rise and fall (and rise again) of Hammer, a tale that begins in 1934 when comedian and businessman William Hinds (who used the stage name Will Hammer) irst registered his company, Hammer Film Productions. A year later, Hinds teamed with Spanish émigré Enrique Carreras to form distribution company Exclusive Films, and though Hammer ceased trading in 1937 they returned from the grave in the 1950s to make a host of B-movie programmers, often based on British TV and radio shows.