Christmas Gift Ideas - Stocking Fillers

Six weeks till Christmas? Blimey.

Our Christmas window display went in this week, there's no denying the season is nearly upon us once more.

This year Proud Lion has a bunch of fun ideas for stocking fillers or Secret Santa gifts that I want to share with you.

Doctor Who fans should consider the simple TARDIS mug - blue and white with the Police Telephone sign on one side and the recently restored St John's Ambulance logo on the other. Unlike the square TARDIS mugs that I personally would struggle to drink out of, this is a straightforward round mug. Priced at £6.00.

We also have some awesome Doctor Who wallets priced a £12.50 each. These are plain black wallets with a retro Doctor Who logo on the front, but open them up and get a glorious technicolour montage of the Fourth Doctor, the TARDIS, K-9, a Dalek and a Cyberman.

If you like your entertainment a little less family, chance are you enjoyed Kick Ass. In which case, we also have some wonderfully offensive Kick Ass mugs priced at £8.00 each. Be warned some of these are probably Not Safe For Work! In addition, the In Your Pocket keychain range has added a Kick Ass one, with six phrases from the movie. The keychains are priced at £10.00 each.

Star Wars has always had some of the coolest merchandise in the world and this year is no exception. We have two new sets of Lightsaber Chopsticks in stock, each priced at £20.00. Both include some awesome red Darth Maul chopsticks that clip together! One set features purple Mace Windu chopsticks, the other features Luke's green Return Of The Jedi lightsaber.

Possibly even more exciting is the Star Wars Science Mini Lightsaber Tech Lab. This allows you to build a 20cm replica of Anakin's lightsaber - choosing either a red crystal or blue crystal plus the choice of light-up blade or one of two focusing lenses. An enclosed science leaflet is designed to teach younger fans about light and optics - making this one of the best edutainment toys I've ever seen. At £12.50, this is a great little present for a Star Wars fan - even if it is based on the CGI CLone Wars animated cartoon.

Beyond these lovely little gifts, there are also Hellboy keyrings (three different designs at £3.00 each); Watchmen badges (packs of four at £2.50 per pack); mini figure and book sets for Snoopy & Woodstock or Spy Vs Spy (£7.00 each); a Family Guy Freaking Sweet Crapola set filled with Drunken Clam beer coasters, drinks stirrers, Brian's martini guide, a Peter Vs Giant Chicken poster and a drink can snug (£13.00); Scott Pilgrim Vs The World plush toys of Scott or Ramona, based on Bryan Lee O'Malley's artwork (£15.00 each); Batman Cosbaby mini figures (£9.00 each); World Of Warcraft leather wallets for Alliance or Horde (£25.00 each); and Nightmare Before Christmas Kubrick twin packs (£18.00 each).

Don't forget we can order any graphic novel that is in print and have it with you within a week. The final cut off for graphic novel orders for Christmas is Monday 20th December, but I would recommend you don't leave it till the last minute!

New Arrivals - A Shepherd's Tale, Batman & Robin, Force Unleashed 2, USS Enterprise Manual and more!

We've had some eagerly awaited and very shiny new things arrive in store today.

First up is the new Serenity graphic novel, A Shepherd's Tale. You can finally find out the back story of the enigmatic preacher who was once part of the crew of a certain Firefly-class starship. This is sold out to pre-order, but we hope to have more next week. If you have pre-ordered one, please pop in promptly, as Proud Lion will only hold this order till the end of the month. Demand will be high on this one.

Next up is the second Batman And Robin graphic novel by Grant Morrison. Batman Vs Robin continues the tales of Dick Grayson and Damian Wayne as the new Dynamic Duo. This week also sees the release of Grant's final issue of the single issue Batman & Robin comic, as he departs to the new Batman, Inc. title. Proud Lion favourite Paul Cornell will be taking over for the subsequent three issues. Comic Book Resources catch up with the British writer about these upcoming issues here.

Star Trek fans will want to check out the latest addition to the Haynes Manual series as this one looks at the various starships to bear the name Enterprise. From the NX-01 to the NCC-1701-E, this book continues the wonderful tradition of books such as Mr Scott's Guide To The Enterprise and the Star Trek The Next Generation Technical Manual. Well worth a look and purists, rejoice! This book ignores the recent film.

Warping way from the final frontier and over to a galaxy, far, far away (I know, I'm sorry, it's been a long day), we have the tie-in novel for Star Wars The Force Unleashed 2. Once again written by the guy who wrote the game's plot, Haden Blackman, this second volume of Starkiller's adventures features art from Omar Francia (Mas Effect, Star Wars Legacy).

Webcomics are everywhere these days and one of my favourites is xkcd. A volume zero collection of some of his best work has just been released and includes various bonus extras. This is published by a company that give the majority of the profit to the creator, then donate the rest to charity, so if you have every derived even a small amount of pleasure from the xkcd comics - this is a great way to give a little back to the man responsible.

Finally, we have softcover trade paperbacks of Siege, Battle For The Cowl and Green Lantern Agent Orange. Do pop in, our Christmas giftware range is starting to roll in too, including some freaking sweet Family Guy swag.

See you soon.

New Beginnings - 1 Month 2 Live

Occasionally, comic publishers like to do five week events in the longer months. A small miniseries, sometimes with a lasting impact.

These have often varied in quality, including Marvel's Maximum Security event in 2000 and the Amalgam crossover titles.

Marvel's newest offering concerns one Dennis Sykes – an ordinary man and a good husband; a man just trying to do his best with what life has dealt him with. He is struggling to be a father to his orphaned niece, is finding his job is making him the man that he never believed he would follow – his father.

I feel Dennis is a very suitable window into the world of Marvel, a guy that any one of us could know or even be. He wants to break out, make a change, and stand up for himself for all the times when he never did.

In doing so his life takes a rather dramatic change.

He is defended and taken into care by a few familiar faces, during which time our protagonist is told that he has terminal cancer and only 1 Month 2 Live!

Once again he makes a stand and decides to not allow this to stop him living his life and make the most of the time he has left. He quits his job and goes home to try and build on his relationship with his niece/new daughter, during which time he discovers that cancer was not the only thing that the ‘accident’ gave him!

With his new found powers he decides to amend a few injustices in his life and in doing so makes a few Spider-Man-like errors. These make him come to the conclusion that there are better ways for him to use his powers and time left.

The closing pages of this first issue show that nothing in life is straight forward and easy, you have to keep tending to wounds that run deep and build on bridges that you have already set upon.

It ends with a nice little teaser that indicates Dennis’s adventure is not over yet.

Stefan Harkins is also known as Harry Stamper. Amongst other things.

New Beginnings - Clint #1

Hrm.

Clint is a new comic from Mark Millar, the comics writer that you either love or hate. He has been successful for years but is now tying to parley that fame into Clint, the first new British comic aimed at the newsstand for years.

In one of his press interviews about it Millar talked about there being no Eagle or 2000AD for this generation. And he's right, in a way. Comics aren't exactly the easiest thing to buy in newsagents. You need to be lucky enough to have a local comic shop, if you want anything outside of the licenced kids comics.

To wax lyrical, when I was growing up I had the tail end of Battle, Eagle etc then 2000AD and the Marvel UK releases. Comics were cheap and plentiful.

This is part of my issue with Clint. It's supposed to be a way to sneak comics into peoples hands, so it has a fair bit of magazine content as well. And this is content is, frankly, sub par Nuts or Front. A couple of token articles that looked ripped from Wikipedia, an interview with Jimmy Car and even a wordseach.

I admit it may not be aimed at me. Millar has very vocally said he's going for the 16-24 age group which I am (ahem) slightly outside of. But I still read comics and a UK based magazine like this is very interesting to me. Not when it's done like this, however.

I also think the real gap in the Market is somewhere between the kids comics and Clint. The Marvel UK comics growing up were a perfect stepping stone into 'proper' comics. Clint feels like it's trying to bring in new people but will the content here achieve that? Kick Ass is popular but is eight pages enough? Plastering the movie Kick Ass on the front alongside Frankie Boyle is a good idea to hook people in but will it get them to come back?

Maybe I'm asking for too much. Maybe I was expecting something else. I'm not sure.

As for the comics themselves, here's quick summary. Kick Ass 2 is only eight pages so too short to properly judge; Turf is reprinted as a whole and I like it; Nemesis is also the whole first issue, not much depth but looks great; Rex Royd by Frankie Boyle is a complete and total mess; the short three page story at the end is interesting but doesn't have a decent twist like a Future Shock from 2000AD.

I'm going to be back for issue two but it needs to improve an awful lot if its going to succeed as much as it wants to.

Phil Doyle is one of the creators of abadeducation.com and co-host of the sonicsring.com podcast. His real job is in insurance which he hopes won't be forever. He also has a complete set of Marvel 2099 first issues, even Ravage 2099.