Air Pirate Press News

The Harrison Ford Story

A book out of print for 25 years has been completely revised and updated by former Starburst and 2000AD editor Alan McKenzie

Dateline: 21st Octor 2011 The publication date for The Harrison Ford Story has been set for 31st October 2011. The book was first published in 1984 by Zomba Books and sold a respectable 25,000 copies on two sides of the Atlantic. Now the original author Alan McKenzie has completely re-drafted the original nine chapters and add a further six chapters to cover Ford's projects from Witness to Cowboys & Aliens.

By the time Harrison Ford appeared in George Lucas' American Graffiti (1973), he'd already been in the film business for seven years, without making much of a mark. From there he went on to appear in the first Star Wars movie (1977) and after that, Ford's rise and success in Hollywood was unstoppable.But is was his almost iconic portrayal of George Lucas' sometime archeological adventurer Indiana Jones in Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) that cemented Ford's name as Hollywood royalty.

The book marks the sophomore publishing project for fledgling "virtual" publishing company Air Pirate Press, a channel to allow a collective of former and working publishing professionals to get their pet projects into print without having to compromise their ideas in the name of commercialism.

The Art of Brett Ewins

A biography of the former 2000AD artist Brett Ewins, creator of Bad Company, Skreemer and Johnny Nemo and former editor of Deadline magazine

Dateline: 4th July 2011 Brett Ewins crashed into 2000AD, along with drawing partner Brendan McCarthy, in 1977 and was one of the first of the new-wave British comics artists who revolutionised the style of the "papers" published by industry giant IPC. While other British comics were using Spanish artists and safe veteran English and Scottish draftsmen, 2000AD broke the mold and began to nurture homegrown artists.

Ewins pretty quickly graduated from Future Shocks into drawing fill-in Judge Dredd stories. Ewins' first regular series work was on Rogue Trooper, on which he followed Dave Gibbons and alternated with Cam Kennedy. From the battlefields of Nu-Earth, Ewins returned to Mega-City 1 and took over the artistic reins of Psi Judge Anderson.

The Ewins began work on what was his very own Bad Company, along with long-time collaborator Pete Milligan. The artwork took over two years to draw, then it ran in 2000AD once it was all drawn up. It was around this time that Brett began work on his own magazine Deadline. But between the pressures of creating artwork for 2000AD and DC Comics and the crushing monthly routine of Deadline magazine, Brett's health began to suffer. and before too long, Ewins was too unwell to carry on working and he was forced to stop drawing.

The Art of Brett Ewins chronicles the ups and downs of Brett's life in comics and beyond, in which he speaks frankly of the illness that effectively put a stop to a distinguishedprofessional career, a presents pages of Brett's artwork some unpublished, many scanned from the original artwork.