Member Reviews

My thanks to Rebellion Publishing Treasury of British Comics for a review copy via NetGalley of ‘The House of Dolmann’ written by Tom Tully and illustrated by Eric Bradbury in exchange for an honest review.

This collection is taken from a comic strip that was serialised in ‘Valiant’, a popular 1960-70s boys’ adventure comic anthology. The dates these particular adventures appeared was from 8th October 1966 to 6th May 1967.

Eric Dolmann is a reclusive genius who has created a group of robotic puppets that he utilises to help the forces of law and order fight back against crime. From behind the scenes he directs his fighter puppets: Raider, Elasto, Mole, Micro, Togo and Giggler into action!

In order to create a sense of the puppets’ autonomy Dolmann, an expert ventriloquist, throws his voice into them. However, this gets more than a little unsettling when the puppets are seen to hold conversations and at times bicker among themselves even when they are not fighting baddies. Also, they address him as ‘Master’ while he calls them ‘My Children’. (Puppets, especially of the ventriloquist type, give me the wiggins.)

Dolmann clearly has issues and perhaps some sort of personality disorder. In another setting Dolmann with his squad of chatty puppets could easily be the baddies.

With respect to Bradbury’s artwork it was dynamic with each panel packed full of action. There is an element of the grotesque about many of the characters. The urban settings are rendered as very bleak as if lifted from 1960s kitchen sink dramas.

At first I was not particularly engaged though after reading a few of the adventures I got more into the spirit and began to appreciate their pulp fiction/noir ambiance. Definitely cheesy but fun.

Overall, ‘The House of Dolmann’ is a comic very much in the spirit of the 1960s and while I am not in its target demographic, I was still able to appreciate its nostalgic appeal.

I found the cover art with its octopus attack just brilliant.

3.5 stars rounded up to 4.

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In this marvelous collection of short comic adventures, we get a peek into the past of its medium.

Dolmann, the puppeteer, as he is repeatedly mentioned over this volume, is the head of a troupe of avenging puppets, each with a very defined personality and ability set. This starting point works perfectly as the set up of every issue in which the punchline is a fun, quick read.
I read this collection over the course of a few days and would advise anyone who picks this up to to the same. This way, the inevitable repetition of plot points, conflicts and resolutions in its various stand alone stories doesn’t grate on the reader as much.
This edition does a great job in not only presenting the comics with great visual treatment and crisp illustrations, but also provides a short introduction and extras at the end that largely add to it’s value. There’s also a little footnote telling the reader that the comics are presented faithfully and so, they might be uncomfortable regarding its outdated handling of gender, class and race politics, which is always very appreciated.
Overall, fun!

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At a guess there will be four or five of these archive editions of the House of Dolmann, based on how many weeks the "Valiant" comic from the '70s carried these four-page action adventures. This is not too bad a place for the newcomer to start, as the book gives us the low-down on the main House occupants, and then lets us rip with the first few months of the stories, plus one from a special a few years later on. Each week the format was basically the same, with a crime on the first page, Eric Dolmann being engaged on the second, his oddball selection of robotic puppets (all voiced by himself, just because) get to work on the third, and the goons get duffed up on the fourth. That said, it wasn't too many months before it felt bold enough to have an eight-pager, over two weeks.

So no, nothing is really taxing or innovative, but the variety is there, and the dynamic art flows nicely. It likes to tweak the size of panels so that they are in a three or four rows per page arrangement but without the regularity of a standard grid layout. So why is this of note? Well, it must boil down to what the brief introduction calls the "disequilibrium" of Dolmann's modus operandi. There's no reason for him to speak to his puppet tools, and there's no reason for him to throw his voice so they talk back to him. Quite how their sensors work and how much operating of them he has to do is never really clear, so why they're not autonomous enough to have a voice box of their own is again left in the air. The unnecessary dialogue doesn't make the pieces too wordy, it has to be said, which is a good thing – so if you want to see someone pretend he and a crime-busting puppet are talking about another puppet behind its back, this is the place to turn.

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A story rendered much more interesting by one puzzling creative choice. Like many comics characters, Eric Dolmann is a monument to nominative determinism, having created a squad of mechanical 'dolls' with various abilities (and, in the case of the team's sumo-styled brute force specialist, deeply problematic features) which he uses to fight the schemes of terrorist organisation DART*. Now, there's pretty much nothing in the set-up which would have precluded them being independent entities, much like DC's Metal Men – but they're not. Their enormous range of action is all somehow controlled by Dolmann fiddling with his belt. Despite which, they're all forever bickering with each other, because as well as being an ace inventor Dolmann is an expert ventriloquist – and also, apparently, a man who thinks arguing with himself in crisis situations, or even when oxygen is running out, is a sensible way of going about his life. It's clearly due a revival from someone prepared to dig into the full Legion-esque possibilities of this. In the meantime, it's intriguing in part because of how the tone hovers oddly between other possibilities. At one pole, these characters could easily slot into a superhero universe, if you shined them up a bit (the street where Dolmann is based is always described as "dingy", and boy does it look it; even the fancier crime scenes have that distinctive drabness of postwar urban Britain). Equally, even in a British comic of the era, they could easily have been played and drawn as an outright comedy, the sort of thing that inspired Viz' Tinribs, and been perfectly at home in Buster, especially when they're up against the likes of the Wildcat, a cat burglar who dresses in a cat costume which looks more pantomime than slinky. Instead, though you catch glimpses of those alternatives, it ends up as an oddball cousin to that distinctly manky British vein of spy-fi, like the early Avengers episodes before the show had quite found its sense of fun and pop glamour. Yet at the same time there does remain a weird sense of dream to the whole thing, where you're never quite sure whether the story remembers that the puppets aren't meant to have independent thought or motion, and other laws of physics seem to apply or not almost on a whim. Laws of basic narrative coherence, too; sometimes Dolmann wears a mask to protect his identity while out in the field, while other times he doesn't bother; one week he has an alias and his being identified could doom his mission, but other times it says 'House of Dolmann' on the front of his shop and nobody seems to care. I'm making it sound terrible, but the weird thing is that even as it seems random in so many of its choices, the mood somehow holds solid enough that it keeps the attention.

*It stands for the Department of Arson, Revolution and Terror, which sounds like the sort of organisation Putin would deploy while still insisting he's the innocent victim. Not that they're the only adversaries, Dolmann also going up against the likes of the Hawk, who within the space of a month goes from being a standard hood shaking down amusement arcades to a hi-tech supercrook in a bird costume. But even at the end of this collection, he's still just as ready to deploy his 'children' against a really crap biker gang who are mildly bullying kids on the local playground.

(Netgalley ARC)

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My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Rebellion for an advanced copy of this graphic novel.

Early 1970's comics are a strange lot in both England and America. Lots of Kung Fu, horror, ducks, super heroes facing real issues, and drugs, which I think were being used by a lot of these comic creators. Into this writer Tom Tully and Eric Bradbury introduced one of the oddest crime fighting teams, a ventriloquist and his robot dolls in The House of Dolmann.

Eric Dolmann , a "genius" creator and expert ventriloquist creates a team o specialized small robot dolls, each with a particular set of skills. Raider is commando armed with a weapon that can fire a laser and tear gas projectiles. Mole can dig deep into the earth, Togo is a super strong robot, along with Elasto, Giggler and others. Dolmann uses a Dolmobile, a helicopter of his own design to keep up with criminals and his dolls. Their foes are minor criminals engaged in extortion or truck hijackers, to international espionage, hindering the efforts of D.A.R.T., which stands for The Department of Arson, Revolution and Terror.

The adventures are short, occasionally a two parter but pretty much all done in a few pages. The writing is good, the stories aren't long enough to make a reader go huh? too much. The art is very good, sort of like a Gene Colon- horror stories from the early 70's, black and white and highly detailed. The weirdest aspect of the story is that the dolls are all voiced by Dolmann, throwing his voice. So the dolls, whine and complain about what they are doing, call Dolmann Master, and he in turn calls them his children. I don't see how anyone would take this guy seriously let alone hire him and his dolls to fight an International terrorist group. But this is why I love comics.

Not for everyone. The stories were intended for children, and I don't know if any kids would get these stories today. However I really did enjoy them, the shortness was a good aspect, and I really did enjoy the art. Highly recommended for people who remember and enjoy old strips like these, or for people who like good art in comics and weird stories.

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This collection was pulpy and delightful, a definite throwback to comics from the 70s and on. It took me back to the spinner and magazine rack experience. Love the blend of science fiction and fantasy.

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Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

The House of Dolmann by Tom Tully and Eric Bradbury is a sci-fi graphic novel that seems to reprint a classic series. The story revolves around Eric Dolmann, a genius and ventriloquist who has created 5 robotic puppets who act as superheroes. According to the description, "occasionally they will question his judgement and bicker amongst one another – even though they aren’t capable of independent thought!"

Overall, The House of Dolmann is a collection of sci-fi comics that will appeal to fans of the newspaper run of The Phantom or The Metal Men. One highlight of this book is the retro comic art style. If you've ever read old newspaper comics, then you'll know what I'm talking about. I did take off 1 star, because the collection is printed in black and white, which didn't really appeal to me. I took off another star, because the story wasn't that interesting to me. If you're intrigued by the description or if you're a fan of retro comics, you can check out this book when it comes out in April!

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House of Dolmann must be one of the strangest British kids comics of its time.

Originally appearing in Valiant it follows the adventures of Eric Dolmann, puppet maker, robotics expert and skilled ventriloquist. Dolmann has a stable of robotic puppets that he controls using his belt. Each has a distinct tactical use and it's own personality.

Again and again the comic reminds us that he voices them using ventriloquism but it always looks like he's using speakers inside them? Go figure.

Besides Dolmann's apparent multiple personality disorder the strip itself can't decide whether he usually fights local gangsters and thugs or working at the behest of i International Security to bring down D.A.R.T.,
which stands for Department of Arson, Revolution and Terror. Of course it does.

Brilliant.

The art is economic and dynamic. Pretty representative of the style of boys comics of the time but definitely at the top end of the scale.

It works best when it's really out there. Luckily that's usually the case.

I've been wanting to read this since the character was featured in the Alan Moore plotted Albion, which is a sort of League is Extraordinarily Gentlemen for British children's comics.

The plots are pretty simple and probably hampered by the short format. It's probably churlish of me to complain about that when it's literally a children's comic but I can't imagine this collection ending up in many kids hands - unless pressed there by a nostalgic parent.

It's probably worth mentioning that some of this hasn't aged too well, too. Particularly Togo the sumo wrestling strongman puppet. Just another element that makes me think this might not suit it's original intended audience.

Ultimately this is probably only really worth it if you experienced it the first time around or are particularly into this era of comics.

That being said it's good to see it getting this collected edition as it's a pretty bonkers example of a field that was already inventive.

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