Who's tight-lipped like the T-1000 Terminator, more menacing than The Mummy (1959), slicker than Swamp Thing, more indestructible than The Blob (1958), immortal like Caltiki (1959) and obscure like X the Unknown (1956)? It's The Sludge from the pages of Lion (a British weekly boys' comic)!
1965. Radiological pollution contaminates a Sargassum... The Sludge is born!
The Sludge (a luminous, sentient jelly-like substance) covers and takes over a large commercial liner, everyone aboard abandons ship.
Reporter Bill Hanley (more macho than Clark Kent) and photojournalist Rick Slade (more experienced than Jimmy Olsen) of the Montreal (in the Canadian province of Quebec) Argus (an homage to the Argus camera company? To the Canadair CP-107 Argus built in Montreal?) newspaper are our investigating heroes.
The slimy, glowing vessel rams into the Port of Montreal, The Sludge oozes onto a pier, the liner disintegrates. The Sludge gives itself a spooky humanoid form.
Photojournalist Rick Slade touches The Sludge, The Sludge possesses Rick, then some barrels. The Sludge takes over an empty police car and drives away, the police shoot its tires, the car crashes and explodes.
The Sludge disintegrates the Île d'Orléans Bridge. The Sludge is spotted at an unnamed National Park, the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) blows up The Sludge... but some of its jelly splashes onto one of the fighter jets.
The Sludge takes over the fighter aircraft and crashes it on the helicopter that brought newspaper journalists Bill & Rick to the Park. The Sludge animates the forest.
The trees uproot themselves and destroy telephone poles. Newspapermen Bill & Rick fake their deaths, thinking them dead, The Sludge exits the trees and waits for a train to pass by.
The Sludge takes control of an express train, it scares everyone off the train. The Sludge crashes the rerouted train. Coated by firefighting foam, The Sludge is now visible.
Bill tries to electrocute The Sludge with extra high voltage overhead power lines, it starts to grow, absorbing the energy. The Sludge possesses two locomotive cranes, Bill & Rick wash The Sludge off the cranes, the hose comes alive and The Sludge slips away into the sewers.
The Sludge animates the concrete dinosaurs of Primeval Valley, a diplodocus tries to eat Rick and crush Bill. The cold air is slowing The Sludge down.
Liquid oxygen is sprayed on The Sludge, its frozen body is sent off to the cold room of an oil refinery to be examined. A small piece of The Sludge breaks off, the fragment comes alive and creates a power failure. The temperature-regulated space gets warmer, The Sludge thaws and decides to leave.
The Sludge smashes and lights up a petrol storage tank to kill Bill & Rick.
Bill & Rick flee aboard a launch (boat), The Sludge takes over a barge and follows. The Sludge smashes into a sawmill; the logs and a circular saw come alive.
The buzz saw blade that had Bill & Rick's name on it... disintegrates, ants appear, The Sludge escapes via the telephone wires.
The Sludge arrives in Alberta, it goes to a public library to bone up on the Canadian Badlands and Red Deer River Valley.
The Sludge sabotages the elevator of the library to kill Bill & Rick, it takes over a regional fair to create a diversion.
The Sludge uses a transport truck to reach the Calgary International Airport, it takes over a plane and takes off, the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) shoot down The Sludge, it crashes into the Canadian Badlands.
The Sludge tries to reach a nuclear reactor, it stops Bill & Rick from following it by animating rocks and mysteriously retreats.
Bill discovers that ants have spooked The Sludge once again. Why is the transparent, indestructible "Living Jelly" monster that steals the energy of anything it takes over, terrified of tiny ants?
This collection contains:
THE SLUDGE (in black-and-white)
Script: E George Cowan
Art: Bill Lacey
Originally published in LION 13th February – 12th June 1965
THE RETURN OF THE SLUDGE (in full colour)
Art: Bill Lacey
Originally published in LION ANNUAL 1967
ROBOT ARCHIE VS THE SLUDGE (in black-and-white)
Script: E. George Cowan
Art: Ernest Kearon
Originally published in LION 20th December 1969 – 31st January 1970
ROBOT ARCHIE – RETURN OF THE SLUDGE (in black-and-white)
Script: E. George Cowan
Art: Ernest Kearon
Originally published in LION 7th February 1970 – 16th May 1970
I give it an 11/10. Fun and fantastic with a blurb by Simon Furman (Hasbro's Transformers) on the cover! You'll fall in love with The Sludge (created by Edward George Cowan & Bill Lacey)! If you are a Montrealer/Quebecker or a Calgarian/Albertan, you'll get a kick out of the way our provinces are portrayed. A must get from Rebellion/Treasury of British Comics!