Iris Wildthyme of Mars cover ready

The full cover design for Iris Wildthyme of Mars has now been finalised. Beautiful artwork by Paul Hanley and fantastic design by Cody Schell. Just beautiful stuff. Full images on editor Phil Purser-Hallard's blog.

HAMMERAMA: Demons of the Mind (1972)

Well, this is a peculiar one. A muddle of insanity, terror, murder and incest, it's a faintly sickening thriller. Directed by Peter Sykes in an erratic, free-form fashion, it's quite difficult to make sense of for much of its ninety minute runtime. At times I wondered if the revelation would be that all the characters were mad, which might well be true. It's all fairly hysterical, with every member of the cast overacting for maximum effect. Robert Hardy plays Count Zorn, a twisted landowner who keeps his two full-grown children imprisoned in his mansion home. His sister-in-law Hilda (Yvonne Mitchell) keeps the two youngsters under lock and key. Emil (Shane Briant) is a sickly, pale thing, yet still has the strength to repeatedly escape into the village and murder young women, while his sister, Elizabeth (Gillian Hills), with whom he has an incestuous relationship, manages a proper escape before being reapprehended and subjected to questionable medical treatment. 

The question of just who is insane and why the murders are being committed runs through the film. Patrick Magee gives his usual bizarrely mannered performance as Dr. Falkenberg, a theoretical psychologist who has developed a controversial treatment based on magnetic fields that supposedly permeate the universe. This Mesmer-inspired method seemingly allows him to probe into Zorn's disturbed psyche and reveal the truth of his madness. It's something of a flipside Fear in the Night, a psychological thriller posing as something supernatural. Demons of the Mind at first appears as a purely psychological case, but is revealed to have a supernormal element. 

There are some very striking moments in the film. The scattering of rose petals onto the bodies of the murdered girls is a striking motif, while various moments of female nudity aren't played for titillation the same way as in most Hammer films. Scenes of bloodletting the prone Elizabeth or watching the next victim get changed give an unpleasantly voyeuristic sensation. It makes the whole thing very disturbing. Overall, though, Sykes's direction is over the top and hard to follow. There's also a pretty unnecessary subplot with Michael Horden as a raving priest. It's a remarkable film, but ultimately too incoherent to really work.

It seems that, recently, a lot of people I admire have been dying. I guess it's part of growing older, that more and more people that mean something to you will go. And perhaps the loss of my grandfather in April has made me more aware of it. I'm not sure. In nay case, as well as the great Rik Mayall, so far this month we've lost several admirable people.

Sam Kelly. A very beloved English actor. Best known for his comedy roles in 'Allo 'Allo and Porridge, and his dramatic roles in Topsy-Turvy and Holding On. He was a fine jobbing actor who appeared in dozens of British film, television and radio roles. I have particularly fond memories of his regular role in the lesser-known sitcom On the Up, and his two excellent turns for Big Finish Doctor Who, including the critically acclaimed The Holy Terror with his college contemporary Colin Baker.

Francis Matthews: An English actor best remembered for his various roles for Hammer Films, including major roles in The Horror of Frankenstein and Rasputin, the Mad Monk. He was also Paul Temple for the BBC and the original voice of Captain Scarlet.

Eric Hill: Once a lowly cartoonist in an illustrating company, Eric Hill went on to write the legendary Spot the Dog books. Pretty much anyone in the western world will have encountered these as a child. Hill even invented, with his first Spot story, the lift-the-flap book. Very happy memories of childhood.

Marion Brandvold: A name unlikely to be recognised by many, Marion Brandvolt was a palaeontologist and geologist who discovered the first dinosaur nest. The nest of Maiasaura, which revolutionised our understanding of dinosaur parentage and care, had a major impact on the field. Brandvold was 102 when she died, having lived to see huge developments in the field.

In May, we lost a number of notable people, including:

Pom: The pen name of Josef van Hove, a great Flemish cartoonist whose work was published in Belgian newspapers throughout the late twentieth century. His work decorates many a cafe wall in Brussels and Bruges.

H.R. Giger: The Swiss artist whose nightmarish visions inspired many a writer and moviemaker. Most famous as the creator of the Alien, his portfolio was vast and disturbing.

Maya Angelou: Probably the most notable individual on this list, Maya Angelou's autobiographical novels gained not only widespread critical acclaim but moved thousands of readers. Her writing and activism have furthered understanding of the realities of life for women and African Americans. A truly influential woman, there are no shortage of tributes online.

While none of the above died young, it does not make their deaths any less saddening. The greatest respect to them all.

WHO REVIEW: The Elixir of Doom

With the Companion Chronicles coming to a close, it seems quite right that they should revisit some of their greatest successes, and so we finally catch up with Iris Wildthyme and Josephine Jones (nee Grant) following their meeting in the superlative 2010 release Find and Replace. Once again, Paul Magrs writes a wonderfully odd, funny adventure in which Katy Manning performs both lead roles. Manning is absolutely on fire here, jumping between Iris, Jo and several supporting characters with ease. As the sleeve notes state, most people would assume she records each characters separately, but in fact she jumps between them, reading the script chronologically. She makes it sound effortless, a testament to her skill as a vocal actor.


The plot is fairly slight, just enough to generate some intrigue and mystery for Iris, Jo and the Doctor. Ah yes, he's here too, although not in his third incarnation, in spite of the image on the CD cover (Jo being a third Doctor companion gets a third Doctor stamp). While I won't give away which incarnation is featured, because it's much more fun just to wait and find out yourself, I will say that it's probably not the one you're expecting. Manning gets him spot on, too.

Iris takes Jo to 1930s Hollywood, to a party where they encounter the brash starlet Vita (another wonderful vocal turn by Manning). Jo and the Doctor saved her from a vampire in the 1970s, which sounds a lot more fun than dithering about on Solos or joyriding hovercraft. It turns out that not only are vampires real, but that there are all manner of movie monsters present in Hollywood in the Thirties. Vita is filming Leopard-Boy Meets the Human Jelly, with real monsters. But she has stranger secrets than that...

This story is an absolute joy, with witty dialogue, excellent performances and sound design and an atmosphere of decadent fun. Derek Fowlds provides fine support as Vita's partner Claude and other male roles, but this release belongs to Katy Manning. Iris and Jo make a fantastic team. Not many actresses display such amazing chemistry with themselves.

IXS Enterprise

NASA scientist Dr. Harold White has unveiled his designs for a prototype warp ship. As I pointed out before, we're a long, long way from creating a practical warp field, if such a thing is even practically possible. Still, the ship is gorgeous. The ISX Enterprise IXS-110 takes its inspiration from an obvious source. White even got Trek designer Mike Okuda to do some design work on it. So we have another Enterprise to add to the lineage - I guess this will go between Virgin Galactic's Spaceship-Two class VSS Enterprise and the United Earth Space Probe Agency's Declaration-class USS Enterprise.

flickr link for more pictures.