- You may be looking for another thing named "countdown".
TV Action was the final title of a weekly comic published by Polystyle Publications, Ltd that began its run under the name, Countdown. Published in Britain between 1971 and 1973, the publication contained comic adaptations of various television programmes, including Doctor Who, but targeted a slightly older readership than its long-established sister publication, TV Comic. Under the Countdown title it also published a range of well-researched and surprisingly sophisticated space-related factual articles.
Overview[]
In the late 1960s, Polystyle Publications, Ltd was eager to start a weekly comic magazine that appealed to a slightly older audience than its de facto television adaptation flagship, TV Comic. Whereas that publication had debuted in 1951 with "funny animal" strips and adaptations of young children's shows like Muffin the Mule, the publisher now wanted something to compete with mid-1960s success TV Century 21, which had been replete with comic strips based on the numerous puppet series produced by Gerry and Sylvia Anderson.
When TV21 was finally "merged" into weekly comic Valiant – with only really the former's new Star Trek strip surviving – the license to print comic strips based on the numerous Supermarionation series became available. Polystyle seized on this opportunity, buying not just the rights to publish new strips but to also reprint (if only to help reduce costs) material from TV21. Since shows like Stingray, Thunderbirds, UFO and Fireball XL5 all had a kind of space-age theme, a natural title was Countdown. To reinforce the space age theme, Polystyle unusually numbered the pages backward, so that readers were "counting down" to page one as they progressed from the front cover to the back page.
To further widen the appeal of the new comic, its editor – Dennis Hooper – successfully persuaded his colleagues at TV Comic to let him take on Polystyle's ongoing licence to produce a Doctor Who comic strip, which had been appearing in TV Comic since November 1964. Despite – or perhaps because of – the largely Earth-based focus of the television series at the time, the Third Doctor's adventures ultimately proved to be the longest-running strip in Countdown/TV Action, missing fewer than six issues in total.
Unfortunately for Polystyle, the publication failed to find a sufficiently large readership to ensure its long-term survival. It didn't help that they had overestimated continuing public enthusiasm for the various Anderson properties, while his first full live-action series, UFO, had failed to be the big new success its makers had hoped. Dwindling sales figures quickly reflected the market's lack of appetite for a weekly comic – especially an expensively produced weekly comic – based mostly on shows that were no longer on the air. General interest in space travel and exploration had also faded following the initial success of Nasa's Apollo Moon Program.
Polystyle therefore attempted to re-orient their publication, introducing strips based on popular action/adventure shows either still in production or on air in the UK. As the Anderson-produced material gradually faded, so too did the Countdown name. From issue 59 – the first edition titled TV Action + Countdown – the pages were numbered in normal order. By the time the masthead had became solely TV Action, the comic had little to do with space or science fiction, with the emphasis instead on shows including The Persuaders!, Hawaii 5-0, Tightrope, Mission: Impossible, Alias Smith & Jones, and The Protectors. Unfortunately, these changes failed to put the comic on a sufficiently solid financial footing; the title folded after little more than two years.
Although Doctor Who failed to appear in the final edition of TV Action, it was one of three comic strips (the other two being Droopy and Dad's Army) which constituted TV Action's advertised "merger" into TV Comic (from issue 1133). However, it should be noted that these three strips had all first appeared in TV Comic before shifting to Countdown/TV Action.
Title[]
The oft-changing title of this publication has created confusion amongst some fans of Doctor Who, who are generally uninterested in the historical specifics of British weekly children's comics. Some have mistakenly believed that TV Action and Countdown were originally two – even contemporaneous – weekly comics which merged to create TV Action + Countdown. The change in title only appeared to be a merger; in fact it was a rebranding which was sufficiently gradual to ensure no bright dividing line between what was originally Countdown and what was finally TV Action. A plurality of issues were actually published under both names. Moreover, the numbering system for the title was preserved throughout, confirming they were a single publication.
Cover titles[]
Although the title on the cover changed every few months, it was stylistically similar throughout the first hundred issues. While the word Countdown appeared on the cover, the title was always placed in a red banner across the top sixth of the page. After the title became just TV Action, this practice was abandoned. On the final thirty-two issues, TV Action became merely a logo at the top of a full page of art.
- 1-18 Countdown
- 19-45 Countdown The Space-age Comic!
- 46-56 Countdown for TV Action!
- 57-58 TV Action in Countdown
- 59-100 TV Action + Countdown
- 101-132 TV Action
Indicia titles[]
The situation is even more confusing if one looks at the indicia, or legal, title:
- 1-45 Countdown
- 46-56 Countdown to TV Action
- 57-58 TV Action incorporating Countdown
- 59-100 TV Action & Countdown
- 101-132 TV Action
Legacy[]
Thanks to the perceived higher quality of the Doctor Who strips in Countdown/TV Action (a significant number of which were originally published in full colour), the comic was generally well-remembered by contemporary Doctor Who fans, particularly in comparison with the show's relatively poor "consigned towards the back" treatment in later issues of TV Comic.
By 1977 there were some reports in the DWAS fanzine TARDIS that Polystyle were considering launching a new TV title – aimed at a somewhat older demographic than TV Comic – which they suggested would become a new home for Doctor Who. However, when a new stablemate for TV Comic did finally arrive in April 1978, it was focused specifically on "current" police and crime dramas such as Kojak, Charlie's Angels, Hazell and titular show Target.
Thanks to generally poor production values and uninspiring front covers, Target – its masthead boldly describing itself as "Your TV Action Paper" – survived just 19 weeks before it was "merged" into TV Comic. Although most of its featured comic strips were new, several of the Cannon strips featured in later issues were reprinted from the latter issues of TV Action.
Stories by issue[]
Special issues[]
Holiday specials[]
- Countdown Holiday Special 1971
- TV Action + Countdown Holiday Special 1972
- TV Action Holiday Special 1973
Annuals[]
- Countdown Annual 1972
- Countdown for TV Action Annual 1973
- TV Action Annual 1974
External links[]
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