Daily Express strips In 1957, the
Daily Express, a newspaper owned by
Lord Beaverbrook, approached Ian Fleming about adapting his James Bond stories as comic strips. Fleming was then reluctant, because he felt the comic strips would lack the quality of his writing, potentially hurting his spy novel series while he was still writing. Fleming wrote:
Art by John McLusky Regardless, Fleming later agreed, and to aid the
Daily Express in illustrating James Bond, Fleming commissioned an artist to sketch whom he believed James Bond to look like. The assigned illustrator,
John McLusky, however, felt that Fleming's 007 appeared too "outdated" and "pre-war", and thus changed James Bond to a more rugged and masculine appearance. The first strip,
Casino Royale, was published in 1958. The story was adapted by
Anthony Hern, who previously had
serialised
Diamonds Are Forever and
From Russia with Love for the
Daily Express. The majority of the early comic strips were adapted by
Henry Gammidge (other than the
Dr. No adaptation, 1960, by
Peter O'Donnell, years before he launched his strip
Modesty Blaise). McLusky later would illustrate twelve more James Bond comic strips with partner Gammidge until 1966. In 1962 the
Daily Express abruptly cancelled their agreement with Ian Fleming when Lord Beaverbrook and Fleming disputed the rights to the James Bond short story "
The Living Daylights". Fleming had sold the rights to the
Sunday Times, a rival newspaper—upsetting Beaverbrook into terminating his business relationship with Fleming. The dispute abruptly ended the comic strip adaptation of
Thunderball. Additional panels were added later for its syndication to other newspapers, and to expand and conclude the story. Beaverbrook and Fleming later settled their differences, and the comic strip serial would continue in 1964 with ''
On Her Majesty's Secret Service''.
Art by Yaroslav Horak In 1966
Yaroslav Horak replaced John McLusky as the artist for the
Daily Express comic strip series and adapted six more Ian Fleming James Bond novels and short stories as well as
Kingsley Amis'
Colonel Sun with partner
Jim Lawrence.
The Living Daylights was also republished in the
Daily Express after first appearing in the first edition of the
Sunday Times magazine on 4 February 1962 and in the
American magazine
Argosy in June of the same year under the title
Berlin Escape. With the success of
The Man with the Golden Gun Horak and Lawrence subsequently went on to write and illustrate twenty original James Bond comic strips for the
Daily Express after being granted permission by Ian Fleming's Trust.
Other James Bond comic strips In 1977 the
Daily Express discontinued their series of Bond comic strips, although Horak and Lawrence went on to write and illustrate several other James Bond adventures for syndication abroad in
Europe, for the
Sunday Express (the Sunday edition of the
Daily Express), and the
Daily Star. Additionally, John McLusky returned to team up with
Jim Lawrence for five comic strips. One strip,
Doomcrack, featured artwork by
Harry North, who at the time worked for
MAD Magazine on its film parodies. The 1983 strip
Polestar was abruptly terminated by the
Daily Star midway through its run and was not completed, although the complete story did appear in non-UK newspapers and was followed by several more complete serials before the James Bond comic strip officially came to an end. ==Titan Books reprints==