In today's strip (Tuesday 22 April 2025) in the Daily newspaper story " The Spark " by Tony DePaul and Mike Manley , they have shown a scene with Diana and The Phantom talking while bathing. It may be a bit of surprise to some but did you know that the Skull Cave has had a bathroom since the 1970's and was first introduced by Sy Barry and Lee Falk ? In the 1942 Daily newspaper story " The Inexorables " or " The Phantom Goes to War " by Lee Falk , Ray Moore and Wilson McCoy , Diana was shown showering in the Deep Woods. The waterfall was not shown inside the Skull Cave. Interestingly, Diana was not happy with the lack of hot water which has now been corrected. In 1970 in the Sunday story " Alexander's Diamond Cup " and again in 1981 in the Sunday story " Kit and the Little People " by both Sy Barry and Lee Falk , the shower was shown again but this time inside the Skull Cave for the first time. Again, Diana has complained that the water was cold. The bathroom was reshown again In 2016 in the Daily newspaper story, " The Baronkhan Sedition " by Tony DePaul and Paul Ryan but this time a heated bath was shown. After decades of complaining, it is good to see The Phantom finally listening and solving the problem with the geothermal installation. Interestingly, this is not the first time the bath has been shown. From what we understand the first time was it being included in the Team Fantomen story " Mystery of the Golden Rune, Part 5: Solomon's Mines " written by Norman Worker , with art by Hans Lindahl . This story was last published by Frew in issue #1734 (2015), Fantomen 19/1988 and by Brazillian publisher Globo in Fantasma Especial #36 (1989). Have we missed any references of the bathroom also being shown in other Phantom stories? if we have, please let us know.

Irish publisher Lightning Strike in collaboration with the comic school TASQ Art has released some exciting news on their social media accounts on top of their digital comic series and the comics in ' The Echo ' Irish newspaper. Starting with Free Comic Day on 3 May 2025 will be some supplements featuring comic stories from the King Features Syndicate catalogue of The Phantom, Flash Gordon and Popeye. These will obviously only be available in participating comic stores in Dublin, Ireland. You can pre order your magazine here We have been informed that Frew (Australian publisher), will be stocking some of these magazines on their webstore. We assume the comic stores will also carry the Free Comic Day  Phantom comic released by Mad Cave Studios . On top of this in June 2025,  publisher Lightning Strike  in collaboration with the comic school TASQ Art  will be releasing a Phantom magazine. It will contain the origin strip as featured in the current 2025 story " The Spark " that was printed in newspapers and Comics Kingdom between January 27, 2025 and February 2, 2025. This magazine will also feature information on the character which will serve as a perfect jumping on magazine for their journey to become a phan. From what we understand, this ongoing magazine will printed and released every quarter and will be on sale on their website for €5 ($10AUD, $5USD, 55 sek/nok & 490INR). We have been informed that their desire is to be able to ship this magazine internationally to all the phans in USA, Australia, Europe and India but with some uncertainty in the world market, there may be some delays or restrictions that will be beyond their control. The Cover Art is by Joel Folda and was first used on the digital comic Tasq Force #6 .

Mythos Editorial has announced details of their new collection omnibus book collecting stories from George Olesen and Keith Williams that were originally published in the daily newspapers from the mid 1990's. You can pre order the book via their website The book has a retail price of 249.90 with a special discount price of 162.43 ($27USD & Eu, $40AU, 275 sek/nok and 2,400INR). That is 35% off the retail price. From what we understand, this volume will be including the first 7x stories which will be: Daily #183:" Buried Treasure ". Started: 19 Dec 1994 - Ended: 29 Apr 1995 Daily #184: " The Beasts of Phantom Head Peak ". Started: 1 May 1995 - Ended: 2 Sep 1995 Daily #185: " Raiders of the Eastern Dark ". Started: 4 Sep 1995 - Ended: 6 Jan 1996 Daily #186: " Mr Big ". Started: 8 Jan 1996 - Ended: 18 May 1996 Daily #187: " Drama on Eden ". Started: 20 May 1996 - Ended: 30 Nov 1996 Daily #188: " Prince Rex - Kidnapped ". Started: 2 Dec 1996 - Ended: 29 Mar 1997 Daily #189: " The Silks of Emira ". Started: 31 Mar 1997 - Ended: 26 Jul 1997 On their website, Mythos has shown preview images of the pages which shows on every page will feature a day and a half of newspaper strips. We have shown an example of the original first two days for the " Buried Treasure " below the three preview images. Will you be buying this book? Would you like to see more omnibus and collection volumes by your local Phantom publisher? Our thanks to Glaucio Cardoso for letting us know of this information. If you notice any new Phantom related news that we may have missed, please let us know. We are always on the lookout for new writers to join the Chronicle Chamber team. We can be contacted at ChronicleChamber@gmail.com .

Christian Moller  reviews the second issue from the newest magazine series from Zauberstern . The magazine was first released in shops on April 2025. The stories we review in this video are: " Die Kriegshetzer " (" The War Mongers ") by Claes Reimerthi and Graham Nolan " Die Aktentasche " (" The Briefcase ") by Claes Reimerthi and Graham Nolan " Die Insel der Schlangengöttin - Teil 1 " (" The Snake Goddess's Island Part 1 ") by Claes Reimerthi and Graham Nolan You can order your copy of this from the Zauberstern  website . They also sell their comics from shops throughout Germany. This issue only costs 7.99 Euro, is full colour and this issue is 64 pages. Spezial #3 will be out in May 2025 and will feature the second part pf the " The Snake Goddess's Island " story. This cover is by phan favourite Ertuğrul Edirne  and was repurposed with the original appearing on the Turkish Kızılmaske #11 comic published by Büyülü Çizgi Roman . The original cover featured a red Phantom and this has been edited to feature a purple Phantom. The print quality is great with thick glossy paper and the colours are very bright as per normal. This magazine do these stories justice. Included in this magazine is an editorial asking for feedback from the publishers - you can contact them at either tom@zauberstern-comics.de and simeon.hrissomallis@zauberstern-records.de . All Zauberstern  Phantom comics and other Phantom comics from Germany will be included in our monthly X-Band: The Phantom Podcasts. You can find out more at our website and or subscribe to our YouTube channel  for more videos. If you would like to join the team and review new comics being released around the world, please contact us.

The Nordsken culture festival has been held in Skellefteå, Sweden for over 10 years. Since the start, Andreas Eriksson has been one of the co-organizers. You may have heard of him before as he is a longtime Phantom fan, and today he is also the editor of Sweden's Fantomen magazine and a Phantom script writer for Egmont , Frew and Lightning Strikes . This year, Nordsken's theme will be super heroes, and whether you think that the Phantom is a super hero or not he will be a prominent part of the program. The poster is drawn by new Egmont Phantom artist Kasia Nie from Poland , and shows cosplayers dressed as various heroes - including the Phantom. Kasia will also be a guest at the event. Besides the Phantom, Kasia has also done work for Marvel and other American publishers. Henrik Jonsson will also be a guest. He has drawn several Phantom covers and poster, and a Phantom story for Egmont . He also created his own superhero The Norseman which was published as a back up in Egmont's Fantomen magazine, and Henrik is also the only Swedish artist to draw for DC Comics , where he did issues of Detective Comics and Suicide Squad . Also announced as guest is Sylvain Runberg , who is a major scriptwriter for the French comics market. He has written one Phantom story that was recently published by Frew ( Frew #1995 ). He is also working for DC Comics on projects with Superman and Wonder Woman . Nordsken is held on Thursday May 29 (which is a public holiday in Sweden) and the event is FREE for all visitors. That's a lot of Phantom content for one day and a free event, and a chance to see the midnight sun is included! Go to www.nordsken.se for more information in Swedish and English.

It has taken us a while to review these two coins from Perth Mint . I enjoyed the first set of coins but it is safe to say that these are the best two coins released by Perth Mint . They bring a freshness with their designs and the packaging to the full set. You can still buy these coins on the Perth Mint website along with other resellers and on the eBay style platforms. The Perth Mint links and details are: Antiqued 2oz colour coin . $278.99AUD ($175US/EU. 2000 sek/nok & 15,250INR) 2oz of 99.99% pure silver with coloured and antiqued surface treatments with a circular presentation case with light up feature. Silver 1oz minted mini coin . $158.99AUD ($100US/EU. 1100 sek/nok & 8,800INR) Character-shaped 1oz silver minted mini coin representing The Phantom with a s tand-up display case. Everything about these coins is top quality from the packaging, with the light and the antiqued coin gives a great contrast between the new and old Phantom styles on the coin but also on the circular presentation case. If you cannot afford to buy everything, our opinion would be to buy the mini coin but we do think the more expensive 2oz antiqued coin will become more collectable down the track. Have you brought these and the other Perth Mint coins?

Will the digital comic be the next major area of growth in the comics industry? The world wide digital comic book market size is forecast to increase by USD 1.65 billion at a compound annual growth rate of 5.5% between 2024 and 2029. In 2018, digital comic book sales in North America alone was only at 100 million. If you add the uncertainty of Diamond Comic Distributors and the increase of tariffs and postage rates, surely digital comics could become a more cost effective means for some fans? Fantomen  has now announced a new digital comic book series. The comic is available on both the Flipp and Readly   platforms. This is great news as Phantom publishers try and reach potential new and hopefully younger readers. At this stage Lightning Strikes has released a digital only Tasq Force magazine which includes The Phantom, Popeye and other characters. Mad Cave Studios , Fantomen , and Frew also currently released digital versions of their regular hard copy comic series. The first issue has a mixture of classic newspaper and classic Fantomen created stories in " Alexander's Cup " by Lee Falk and Wilson McCoy and " The Ghost Pirates " by Norman Worker and Jaime Vallvé . The Sunday story " Alexander's Cup " is printed in red, black and white and the Team Fantomen story " The Ghost Pirates " will be in colour as when it was last printed in Fantomen 1/2020 . From what we understand, King Features stories do not cost publishers extra in license fees so they are an obvious inclusion in this magazine. We expect there is a reason why specific Team Fantomen stories will be printed alongside them. At the time of publishing this article, Readly offers a digital subscription price of 149 sek ($24AUD, 15USD/Eu and 1,280INR) per month which gives you access to the two Fantomen titles ( Phantoms Treasure and regular ) plus 8,000 other digital magazines. Flipp is the digital platform service that you automatically get when you subscribe to the printed magazine. If your interested in the digital subscriptions only, the price is cheaper at 79 sek per month ($13AUD, 8USD/Eu and 680INR). We believe that this magazine will be made available for all subscribers of Flipp and Fantomen magazine subscribers. A huge thanks goes to Kristian Hellesund and other fans who have notified us of this information. Will you be buying a digital subscription? We are on the look out for someone to review Fantomen comics for the Chronicle Chamber platform, if you are interested in reviewing both magazines ongoing, please contact us.

January 2024 the Hermes Press Colouring in Book was announced and available for pre order. 15 months later the book is still showing on their website and other book websites available for pre order. Some phans have been wondering what is the latest on this book? From what we understand the pre orders so far for this book have been underwhelming and is a huge reason why the book has not yet gone to print. The sceptic in me wonders if the low pre orders are affected by the non-publication of the Art of the Phantom  book? But also if phans understand why publishers use pre orders. In todays market, many (if not all) pop culture publishers to minimalise possible risky ventures only go to print when they have a number of pre orders in place. Pre orders are very important for publishers and will possibly become even more important with the possible introduction of new tariff costs which sees their initial production costs increasing. Have you pre ordered? Will you pre order? Does this change your mind on pre orders? You can pre order here The Phantom Coloring Book is listed at $19.99US (Roughly $33AU, $20Eu, 210 sek/nok & 1700INR). It will consist of 80 pages of artwork drawn and modified for colouring-in. It will be in paperback format and sized 7" x 11". Phans may recognise the art used for the front cover which was originally a commission by phan Jaime Diaz . Hermes Press  has required permission to use it for their publication. Various credited Phantom artists such as Ray Moore and Sy Barry , and other artists will be included in the colouring-in book. The artwork will be designed to best allow colouring-in by children and adults alike.

Sad news with Italian Angelo Todaro unfortunately passing this week. Angelo Todaro has had a long history with comic art. he was born in 1945 and at the age of 19 started his career drawing comic stories. In 1967, he started drawing stories for the publisher Fratelli Spada Edition including drawing 6x stories of the Phantom (two have been published by Frew ). Most of his work for Fratelli Spada Edition  was drawing Mandrake the Magician . Like some other Fratelli Spada Edition  creators in Felmang and Ferri , he also drew stories for Frew . What is interesting is that he also has drawn a story for Bastei in 1981. From what we understand, he is the only creator to have drawn for those three publishers ( Fratelli Spada Edition , Bastei and Frew ) With the creation of the Phantoms World Frew series, we fans where re introduced to the art of Angelo Todaro with our Phantom stories. He drew 7x new stories for Frew under the Frew Crew banner including writing four of the stories himself. Two of these stories " The Yacht Thieves " and " The New Island of T " are sequel stories of past Lee Falk stories. Other artistic credits include " Rip Kirby ", " Turok, son of Stone ", " Gunsmoke ", " Buffalo Bill ", " Star Trek " for himself and under the Alberto Giolitti Studio. If you would like to learn more about Angelo Todaro , please go to his website . I was lucky enough to have purchased some art from Angelo Todaro  and spent many an hour talking about our love of the Phantom. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family, loved ones and friends during this sad time.

December 2024, we mentioned the high possibility of a soon to be released collector card series featuring the Phantom by Saturday Morning Cards . We have been informed that the series will be out soon with a date soon to be announced. Pending final King Features approval, we have seen four potential designs for the base card and they look simply amazing. Which design do you like best? I personally like the skull throne scene but I do have a soft spot for the Billy Zane Slam Evil film poster pose. Erick Marshall is the designer of these four designs and you can follow his work on his Instagram profile . He has worked on several other card lines for Saturday Morning Cards   Popeye and chase one of one sketch cards of Dick Tracy and Smokey the Bear . Wick Eric has recently posted this image on social media of a prototype card from a recent exhibition booth Saturday Morning Cards had which shows how they will look alongside their other collector card series. For the lay person, their Popeye collector card set consists of 1,000x cards that will be released. In this card series there are 1,000 cards. Including are 199x Matrix, 150x Silver, 100x Stars, 50x Ice, 25x Gold Ice, 10x Gold, 5x Black Gold and 1x Black card and the rest will be one of one original art sketch cards by artists and other non numbered cards. The cost for these Popeye sets are $30US and comes in an exclusive display box. We expect the price and ratios of sketch art cards and collector card of the new Phantom set to be similar. It will be interesting to see how the older Phantom fan base accept this 'new' style of card collecting which for many will be the first time they have seen this concept. From what we have been told, there are several USA and Canada distributors that will be selling the Phantom series and there is potential that there will be an Australian distributor which will allow the Aussie phans ease of access to add these to their collections. We are planning on having the owner of Saturday Morning Cards on a podcast soon but in the meantime, keep an eye on their social media profiles: Instagram , Facebook , TikTok and their website .

To celebrate our 300th X-Band: The Phantom Podcast , we had the chance to host a bunch of phans asking newspaper creators Jeff Weigel and Mike Manley questions. Due to the huge amount of questions we received on the night, Jeff and Mike were unable to answer them all. Attached are the extra questions that Jeff Weigel answered for you Due to Tony DePaul  having some health battles , he was unable to attend but he gave those phans a chance to ask specific questions to him which he answered here . Below is the video of the 300th podcast in case you want to watch that as well. How do you avoid repeating yourself when you’re required to draw the same characters (and often the same locations) again and again? Do you ever find yourself drawing a panel only to realise it’s almost an exact copy of something you (or another artist working on The Phantom) did in the past? (Question by MonoChromeMike on Reddit) Honestly, I occasionally cut and paste (remember, I work digitally) from old strips into new ones if I think it doesn’t disrupt the storytelling. Sometimes that actually enhances the storytelling, allowing for greater scene continuity. This is mostly a trick I use for backgrounds or specific props, not as much for figures. For figures, it’s more fun to try and find a new posture or angle on them, even if it’s the hundredth time I have to draw Phantom and Hero racing through the jungle. Copying and pasting that kind of stuff might save time, but it’s more fun to try to come up with something new — that’s the fulfilling part of the job. What is the process behind the creation? Do you receive a full script from Tony, send him the initial sketches etc? Or is it like when Sy Barry was the artist, when Falk essentially left the art to the artist? (Question by Ross) I get a full script from Tony. Along with dialog, he also loosely describes the action in each panel. He’s seldom so specific as to suggest a particular camera angle or composition — he leaves that to my discretion. Also, he's pretty flexible about giving me room to interpret a panel a bit differently than the script calls for if I think I have a good idea. Each week I lay out the strip in rough pencils with lettering added, then I send that layout to Tony for his approval. Once I get a thumbs-up from him to confirm we see eye-to-eye on the storytelling in a layout, I then proceed to digitally “ink” the strip and add color. I send the finished art to him for one more review. Once he signs off on it I send it along to King Features . A Sunday strip, from start to finish (pencils, inks lettering, and color) takes me sixteen hours, give or take a few hours depending on the complexities of any given week. How was it drawing the dailies for a period of time? Drawing the daily newspaper stories was an interesting experience for reasons I could never quite put my finger on, I found it easier than doing the Sunday strip. Not just because I didn’t have to add color, but somehow laying out a series of dailies felt less complicated than designing a three-tiered Sunday strip. I enjoyed the opportunity to step in for eight weeks (if I remember right), but since I’m semi-retired I was glad to get back to the lighter schedule of just doing the Sundays once my tour of duty on the dailies ended. Would you like a chance to spend extra time to expand on the origin? From memory in the last few years, you spent half a Sunday exploring the origin? Frankly, I divorce myself from any concerns about what kind of stories I’d like to see. I let Tony drive that part of the process and content myself with making the stories he chooses to tell look as good as possible. Tony does occasionally ask me what kind of story I’d like to work on next, but my opinions on that are driven more by what I think will be fun to draw, not so much on which aspect of the Phantom canon I’d like to deal with. For instance, I prefer stories that take place in organic settings (jungles, caves, etc) as opposed to urban settings full of buildings and cars. I also like opportunities for dramatic, shadowy lighting. Those sorts of consideration drive my enthusiasm for working on a story more than the chance to retell an origin or revisit an old character. What Phantom element would you like to explore? One aspect of the Phantom legend that does intrigue me is this: I wonder about transitions of the Phantom from one generation to the next. Do Phantoms always die young to then be replaced by a son, or has one ever aged out and gracefully retired to act as counselor and mentor for a son as he takes over the business? That’s a story I’d like to read, even if I didn’t draw it myself. Attached is the video of the 300th podcast in case you want to watch that as well. Thank you to Jeff Weigel for this extra round of answers he answered. It is valuable access to the newspaper creators that we have never seen before in the almost 90 years of The Phantom comic strip.

In 2002 started the Fantomen year book series titled Fantomen - Den inbundna årgången (translated to "Fantomen - Year's issues in hardcover") which collected facsimile reprints of the Fantomen comic book series from 1950. It is very similar as the replica series released by Frew , except this series in presented in a hardcover format and includes articles about the history of the comic from that year and other important historical elements in and around Sweden. The series has gathered the comics as originally presented from 1950 to the first half of 1973 and has produced 80+ hardcover albums in total. In a letter to subscribers announcing the cancellation, Egmont has promised a new series that will be released towards the end of 2025 in November / December. The announcement of the series will be made likely around July / August 2025. It is all speculative at the moment but in talking to some phans and collectors of this series, it seems the interest in hardcover collections is still high. Some ideas are artist or creator collections or even a reproduction of newspaper stories in chronological order like what Hermes Press are famous for. Time will tell, we would love to hear your ideas and suggestions. Thanks goes to Mikael Lyck and Kristian Hellesund for the information on the cancellation of the series. When we know more, we will let everyone know.

Kjell Steen or Sjefen known to many sadly passed this week 10 March 2025. Kjell was from Norway and worked on the Fantomet magazine for almost 30 years. I personally dealt with him for a good 15 years and his knowledge on the Phantom and the magazine in his country was rivelled to none. He always had something interesting to say and was very generous with gifts to many a phan. Among his legacy on the Phantom included an official Norwegian Fantomet index that was published by Semic in 1989, various articles for Fantomet magazine and books and was an editor for the fan club of the magazine for decades. He also published many other non-Phantom comics titled Cyklon-Kid , Atlantis and Sabotage Gang . One of the last times Kjell made a public appearance was the Fantomet wake held in 2019 at the cancellation of the magazine . Attached is a photo from the event. We believe it is important to highlight these stalwarts of our hero from around the world who have been very important in bringing enjoyment to many generations. Our thanks go to Kristian Hellesund and Andreas Eriksson who highlighted this sad news to us. Kristian Hellesund  also wrote a touching obituary article on the Serienett website .

Comics Revue is a bi-monthly magazine exclusively devoted to reprints of newspaper comics strips including the Phantom and has been published by Manuscript Press ( Rick Norwood ) since 1984. Unfortunately due to health concerns with publisher Rick Norwood 's health, the February 2025 issue has been delayed and has not yet been released. When we know more, we will let you know. For those who have come in late. The first Phantom story appeared in Comics Revue #27 (May 1988). Issue #120 includes an interview with Felmang . The popular story " Prisoners of a Painting " written by Scarlatti and drawn by Felmang was first published in a comic in issue #120. It has since been published by Frew and Fantomen . You can find out more about this story here . Of the 350 odd magazines that have been published, nearly 50 have featured the Phantom on the cover. Felmang has drawn 6x Phantom themed covers for Comics Revue  over the years and Australian Jeremy Macpherson has drawn 5x Phantom themed covers. Other artists George Perez , Enrique Romero , Tom Yeates , Jim Keefe , Wendell Cavalcanti , Reno Maniquis , Joe Staton and Guy Possiant have also drawn the Phantom (and other characters) as cover artists for the magazine. You can follow the fortunes of the magazine at their Facebook page . If the magazine survives, if you are interested in getting your own copies, most local comic book stores can order them in.

In Linghed, Sweden which is north of Stockholm is the Galleri och butik Vita huset that will be hosting a Phantom related chat by Mikael Lyck who was the creator behind the popular Phantom Card Game . Along with talking about the design and process of the card game, he will also chat about his love of the character. The event will be held Saturday 8 March, 2025 at 2pm local time. You can find out more about the event via this Facebook link and or the Galleri Vita Huset website . Held at the same time will be a gallery by Ola Skogäng , who has some original artworks of comic characters including the Phantom. If you go, please take some photos and share it with us.