In our latest podcast we talk to Dietmar Lederwasch of "99.94 Editions" and the 2014-2017 Phantom Art Gallery fame. Dietmar is a super phan who has lived majority of every phans dreams by producing their own licensed Phantom products. In this podcast Dietmar goes into great detail of the "The Phantom Portrait Gallery" as well as the two "Masterworks" collections he produced in the late 1990's and early 2000's. He then shows us around his house which is covered in original Phantom and fine art of the Phantom. We recommend watching via YouTube as you will get a better representation of what he has around his house. We did experience some recording issues but please bare with us, you wont be disappointed. If you would like to purchase any of the prints for yourself, please contact Dietmar at solanderboxes@hotmail.com Below is a preview of the seven "The Phantom Portrait Gallery" prints. The 14th Phantom by Birgitte Hansen The 5th Phantom by Barry Dean The 6th Phantom by Sy Barry The 22nd Phantom by Paul Newton The 15th Phantom by Rosemary Valadon The 2nd Phantom by Fred Fredericks The 20th Phantom by Frantz Kantor Along with the seven "The Phantom Portrait Gallery" prints, Dietmar also released two Masterworks series, again printed to be the best on top quality paper. Masterworks 1 features art by Sy Barry, Fred Fredericks, Glenn Lumsdem & Paul McCall. Masterworks 2 features art by Antonio Lemos. We have again included a gallery of the prints. If you would like to purchase any of the prints for yourself, please contact Dietmar at solanderboxes@hotmail.com

We review the latest installment of the 22nd Phantom saga which see's Kit and Heloise the children of our Phantom the 21st and Diana take over the role of the Phantom. For those who have come in late, read on below as we do a tale of the tape outlining the whole situation. In our review of the four stories as a whole, we get reviews by Gus Fraser and several phans who left their feedback on our social media platforms. It is then left to the three of us as we discuss everything from what we love and hate about the series. Not surprisingly the elephant in the room of the introduction of Nadir in the story, the proposed illegitimate son of Sandal Singh and the Phantom takes center stage. We discuss that in full. We then "play-nostradamus" as we predict what we would like to see with this 22nd Phantom saga. We would love to hear your views and opinions on Nadir and the ongoing saga but also our review on the podcast. You can leave your comments on our various social media platforms. It is important to take note of the following "Tale of the Tape" The story is set a "few years" into the future, imagines a dismal and dystopian future for the Phantom universe. An earthquake and tsunami has devastated Bangalla, wiped out Morristown, General Bababu is in tenuous charge of Bengalla, threatened by growing gang power and under pressure from international arms dealers. Sandal Singh is under threat as leader of the Singh pirates, with a coup planned by her cousin Rulah Singh. Bengalla in chaos... Meanwhile... The 21st Phantom has been missing for over a year. Hero was found in the first part of the story arc but Devil is still missing. Diana and the Phantom have split up over the possibility that The Phantom fathered Sandal Singh’s son (first appeared in 2015 Rodiagate [part 2 of Singh War - link to Phantomwiki] after apparently being conceived in 2011 Fateful Meeting - link to Phantomwiki). Has been named in pt 1 of this 4 part series - Nadir. Kit and Heloise initially struggled to work together but coming together now. During the Fight Against Singh story they split up, Kit to rescue father, Heloise to protect mother If you want to read the stories, you need to read the following stories. We have included a gallery of the Fantomen and Frew covers. Fantomen: 5/2019 6-7/2019 17/2019 22-23/2019 Frew: 1864 1866 1867 1868

The weekend of 19-21 June was originally going to be the annual Supanova Sydney weekend were a few dozen Phantom phans would usually gather from around the world to chat, catch up and do plenty of Phantom. Including in the weekend are usually a few catch ups with other phans. Unfortunately COVID-19 has put a stop on that for now. To hopefully ease the pain, we have put together an online Phantom catch up on Friday 19 June at 9pm AEST. Bring your beverage of your choice, your device and let us try and capture the phun that usually happens. The beauty about this form of catching up is you will not need to be on location to join in. This is open to anyone. Anyone from anywhere from India, Sweden, New Zealand, Australia, Norway, the USA, South America are invited and you can join in with the phun. To join all you will need to do is have Zoom (click to download the program on your device) and click on this link on Friday the 19 of June 2020. Attached below is an image showing the times around the world, if you want to add your own time zone that is maybe not on the list, click here. It could be wild, it could be phun, it could be awesome. See you then!

It is a huge honour to be able to interview Brent Schoonover who worked on The Phantom for Dynamite Entertainment. Brent is very candid in his responses and we are sure you will feel his passion and love for the character and we really hope he will be back drawing more Phantom soon. Chronicle Chamber: First of all, thank you for your time. Can you start of by telling us a bit about yourself? What country and region are you from? Brent Schoonover: I am from the Midwestern part of the United States. A small town outside of Chicago called South Beloit. It was a town of about 4,000 people. CC: Did you Study art and if so where did you study art? BS: I did. I now live in Minneapolis and have for about 18 years. I came up here to go to art school and never left. There’s a great art school with a comic book art program called The Minneapolis College of Art & Design. I learned a lot from great artists like Peter Gross and Barb Schultz. CC: Is there anyone in particular who has inspired you and influenced your work? BS: I would put Jack Kirby, Bruce Timm, Darwyn Cooke, and Mike Allred as some very large influences on my work. As well as Goran Parlov, David Mazzucchelli, and Sean Phillips. CC: Oh wow! How special was it then that Darwyn Cooke was the cover artist for King - The Phantom #1, your first Phantom story? BS: It was really special to me. I wish I had gotten the chance to get a copy autographed from him before he had passed. CC: What made you want to be an artist? BS: I just really latched on to drawing at a very young age. I just lost myself in it. I would spend hours doing it even in like first grade. My parents knew early on that it was something I was good at and loved doing. I was lucky that they encouraged me from the start. CC: How would you explain your art style? BS: Oh geez, a constant work in progress. I am always trying to do a less is more approach. I strive to get to the Alex Toth level of only putting down the most necessary lines. I don’t succeed but it hasn’t stopped me from trying. I’ve also really gotten in to trying to make more jagged angular shapes as opposed to smooth lines. It may not even be noticeable to many, but I like this feeling of crudeness while also trying to use minimal amounts of lines. CC: Did you like working on the Phantom? Did you know of the Phantom before you started work on those stories? Did you ever read the character? BS: I was a huge fan of the Phantom since the movie came out when I was a kid. I always loved the appeal of the cave and the costume is cool. The time of the movie we had Dick Tracy, and The Shadow come out as well. I just loved discovering these old pulp characters was awesome. I would get anything I could that my comic shop had of them. So getting a chance to work on The Phantom was a huge honor. I will say my time on the book was not exactly fun. But it had nothing to do with the character or the writer. There was sadly some very poor communication from the Editor and some of the people in charge of the license [King Features Syndicate]. I would have to wait weeks for approval on script pages while the deadlines would not change. So the work suffered because of that. CC: We believe you originally pitched for the Flash Gordon gig and because of your tryout sketches, you got the Phantom gig. Is that right? Could you explain in more detail how you got the role of the Phantom for Dynamite Entertainment? BS: Yup. I was familiar with the editor who was in charge of the upcoming line of books. Flash Gordon, Phantom, Mandrake, Prince Valiant, and Jungle Jim. He thought I'd be a good fit for Flash Gordon but I think they had someone else in mind already [Lee Ferguson would go on to illustrate the Flash Gordon series - Ed.]. So when I did samples and we got talking I told him Phantom would be my first choice, he just had me do samples for that one as well. It worked out! CC: For those who came in late, you worked on the first two parts of the 2015 “King Phantom series”. Could you tell us why you only worked on two of the four parts of this series and who did what between yourself and Ryan Cody in part two? BS: When I was having issues getting approved script pages for me to work on (which was not the fault of the writer by the way) I just needed to find another way to make money and put food on the table. So Marvel had some work on Ant-Man for me. So I was trying to balance both The Phantom and Ant-Man at the same time. It was hard, and as communication was not going well on the Phantom, Marvel was really happy with my work on Ant-Man, and wanted me for more issues. I tried to get a schedule from editorial on the Phantom but they couldn’t guarantee when I would be able to work on it. I had to get Ryan Cody in and help me on some of it and then just take over completely. It was disappointing. Talking to many of the creative on the other books, they had similar issues. CC: That’s understandable. This series is famous (infamous in some phans opinions) for the Phantom’s role being taken over by Jen Harris and Lothar. This was an interesting take from the Dynamite editors on the Phantom. As someone who knows the Phantom, did it make it special to work on a different take on the character? BS: While I’d have loved to have gotten to do my take on the Walker legacy, I did find this take to be a fun opportunity. And using a classic character like Lothar was a neat idea. And just the idea to redesign the Phantom with the Jen Harris version was fun (which I think got revised a bit from my own concept drawings). I knew it might not go over well with everyone but the entire line of books was spinning out of the King’s Watch series, which I enjoyed a lot. CC: Do you have an opinion on the role of the Phantom being taken over by Jen Harris and Lothar? BS: I knew King’s Watch was done to shake all the characters up a bit and try to bring some new attention to them. So I was fine with it. There were talks that if we can make it work we’d probably end up getting a new Walker into the suit. The hope was to try and get that journey to be a long one with multiple series. Sadly it didn’t work out. CC: We certainly appreciate your candour when describing your dissatisfaction with schedules, timelines on editorial decisions and approvals from the license holders. Did you have a sense that this was linked to all the direction that was being taken with the character and artistic license that we’ve just discussed? Should they have stuck to the Walker lineage? BS: I think that played a big part. Almost all the other characters that had a series at the time, those books were more of a basic reintroduction of the character to a new generation of fans who may not have read the comic strips or older comics. Phantom was the only one that felt like they were truly taking a bolder step with, and I just don’t know if everyone was on the same page or on board with that direction. CC: Who created the look of the Phantoms suits? Was it you or were you working on a style guide from DE? BS: The writer gave me a brief description of what he was thinking, and I did talk to my editor. I had seen a female Phantom in some older Harvey Hits comics I had, and to me, it felt a little too plain for the book we were doing. So I took a bit of the personality of Jen and wanted to mix it with the traditional look of The Phantom. I had seen that horrible SYFY channel pilot that just brought almost nothing from the original to it and I knew we couldn’t and shouldn’t push it that far. CC: There is a scene in part two of the King series where Lothar thanks past generations of the Phantoms after they helped him during a fight with the bad guys. In your opinion was it an illusion from Mandrake or the past generations actually helping during a crisis? BS: I felt it was an illusion. I just don’t know if Lothar would or should be one to see the ghosts. I feel like that should be something reserved for only Walkers. CC: What about Mandrake? Did you enjoy drawing him as well? BS: I did. I wish I could of done more with him. Part of the hold up on the book was that they needed to add him in more. That maybe it wasn't supposed to be a straight solo Phantom book. I left though and never got a full answer or explanation as to why. CC: In the second part, there is a poster of Mandrake and the pose looks very similar as a Fred Fredricks drawing that was published as the front cover for an Australian book in the 1990’s. Was that done by purpose? BS: Yup. I was a fan of that image and wanted to send a nod to it. CC: Do you prefer covers or interior story art and is there a difference in the way you work with a cover / interior story? BS: I love doing both. Covers are fun in that you should aim to sell the interior story in one image the best way you can. But doing interiors is a blast because it allows you to really get comfortable with these characters and experiment. If I had gotten to do the entire series I think i’d have wanted to make Lothar bigger and bulky. CC: Do you work traditionally using pencils, inks on paper or do you prefer working on the computer? BS: I work almost all digital now. I work in photoshop on a Wacom Cintiq. I love it and it helps speed my process up and allows me to move things around and switch them up. CC: You also drew a card for the (Australian) Frew Gallery trading card series. Can you tell us about that? BS: I did. I have never seen a card from it but I know I did it. I was excited cause they just wanted a traditional Phantom image. Not Lothar, or anything like that. So it was a blast to do an old school Phantom image. [Cards have now been sent to Brent - Ed] CC: In looking at your social media, you have drawn several Phantom commissions. Do you still accept commissions and how can they contact you? BS: I do, and I love drawing him, so hit me up! You can contact me via my website, brentschoonover.com. CC: Do you have a place where phans can see your work? BS: Yes. Twitter is @brentschoonover, Facebook is The Art of Brent Schoonover and instagram is @bschoonyart. CC: Make sure you check it out Phantom phans! Thank you for your time Brent. BS: Thanks!

Listeners of the X-Band: The Phantom Podcast have spoken asking for a creator interview from the very highly regarded DC Phantom Series from 1989-1990. We have listened and we present Mark Verheiden, the writer of the series. What follows is an in depth chat about the series, the stories and how well even today it stands up 30+ years later. We talk about why the Phantom doesn't always win, Mark's biggest fear writing this series and how it stands as a landmark moment in his career. Have you read the series? Did you enjoy it? If so, this podcast is not to be missed. Make sure you send us your questions or feedback of the podcast either via email and or our social media. If you have any other topics or creators for the podcast, let us know.

The sixth Fantomen Softcover book has been made available for pre order with another beautiful cover by Luca Erbetta. These softcover books are a relatively new tradition and actually started in Norway in 2014 but are now produced by the Swedish Fantomen editorial team. The last three covers have all been produced by Luca. You can pre order the book at the seriersant.se website for 165 kr ($25AU & $18US) plus shipping and is usually released to coincide with the Gotternberg Book Fair between Thursday 24 September and Sunday 27 September. The other method is to do a swap with a Swedish phan. The contents of the book has not yet been released but are generally unedited newspaper stories along with an article or two. Mikael Sol however has given us a hint about the contents of this book when we last spoke to him when talking about the 70th anniversary of Fantomen. The annual book will have new high resolution scans of old McCoy and Sy Barry stories that we are going to use from the old print proofs that KFS had and from Bulls Press. They will look really good in print with sharp lines and blacks that's not messed up. Keen eyed phans may remember a similar style cover. The first ever Fantomen comic that was published back in 1950 featured a cover by George Camitz of the Phantom punching. The 1,500th issue (Fantomen 16-17/2011) by Sal Velluto also features the Phantom punching. We love this tribute to the old covers which has happened a few times in Fantomen's 70th Anniversary year. Will you be getting one of these books to add to your collection?

In the last week or two a new Phantom bust has appeared in the Facebook feeds of many Phantom phans. The detailed life-like sculpture has certainly caught a few people's attention! We've been in touch with artist Fabio Collt, artist and operator of Collt Studios in Brazil, to ask a few questions about his history with the character, the piece he's created, and his future plans in this space. Like many readers of this website, Fabio has been a Phantom phan for as long as he can remember "via drawings, comics, movies and I've always been a fan". He is a professional sculptor based in Fortaleza, Brazil. When asked about the inspiration for this particular sculpture, Fabio tells us "I didn't see many cool statues of the character, so I decided to produce [one myself]". The lifelike rendition was originally sculpted in clay with resin casts made from the mold. Based on references Fabio has in his studio, it stands 26 cm tall and is available in purple or red, with the colour chosen by the customer. Each piece is individually hand-painted. Priced at $250USD and strictly limited to 50 pieces only, at the time of writing 10 have already sold, including both red and purple variants. Fabio is happy to post worldwide, with the bust and base packed securely in polystyrene foam packaging. While the sculpture is not licensed by King Features, Fabio tells us "I will consider this in the future". Those future plans include the production of two more statues. These are planned as dioramas in 1/6 and 1/4 scale. "One will be on the Skull Throne, and the other one I'm working on." For further details and to express interest in this remarkable sculpture, please contact Fabio Collt directly via Facebook.

One of the things we like about collecting the Phantom is looking at everyone else's collection and finding items to be jealous about and then to add to my wants list - which for the record does not get smaller. With COVID-19 forcing many indoors, it is the perfect time to set up and clean your Phantom Cave. What we want is to create a page similar where phans can take video's and photos of their collection to share (and brag) to everyone. So if you want to share your collection please send your photos and videos to us. The team at Chronicle Chamber have done the same and below is the first video walk through of my collection. It does not matter if its the biggest or smallest, we all love to look through each others collections. To View All Collections

Between the time pressures brought about by the pandemic and the Bushfire Appeal Phundraiser book, it's been too long since we have updated our Phantom Preservation Project (P3). However, we're hoping to make up for it now with some absolute bumper and treasured Phantom content added to the P3 library. As you can see from the extensive list below, we have managed to add to our already extensive archive of Phantom media and multimedia from around the world. New this month: The Haunted Castle by Felmang (published by Frew in Phantom's World #11) - complete original artwork, uncensored and unedited The complete Swedish-language audio book Den beslöjade damen (The Veiled Lady) An unedited interview with Peter Kingston, from the recording for X-Band #47 29 newspaper articles spanning 1960 to present day and from all around the world: Australia, Brazil, Norway, Sweden, Spain and the USA Issues #1 and #2 of the Friends of the Phantom newsletters, completing the set! 16 Scandinavian advertisements, from Sweden and Finland A Nancy comic strip, which featured a Phantom cameo Behind the scenes of Chronicle Chamber: prelim sketches for our logo; also a raft of material from the Bushfire Appeal Phundraiser book - alternative covers, progress drafts and proofs. A highlight is a lovely four-minute chat with Sy Barry about the book and Australia's bushfire season, from which the grab was taken for this WIN News story. 3 Frew Publications files, including their 1990 Media Kit The magazine from the 1977 Art Exhibition Ghost Who Walks Can Never Die The 42-minute video The Phantom: Comic Strip Crusader (1996 A&E Biography) All this joins the remainder of the Major Treasure Room that is the P3 - the full Index is available here. This is starting to become a very serious collection of digitally archived The Phantom material. The link for access to the full library is available via our Patreon page for US$5 / month supporters. Become a Patron!

In a fun podcast, we are joined by Mikael Lyck, the creator and developer behind The Phantom: The Card Game. We discuss and review the stories that Mikael has used as inspiration for his card game that is currently on Kickstarter and already fully funded. The stories we review are The Story of Devil, Diana in the Jungle Patrol and The 21st Phantom. CLICK HERE TO GO TO THE KICKSTARTER CAMPAIGN Devil’s Story 1979 Team Fantomen story, written by Donne Avenell, with art by Georges Bess and has been published in 14 countries. One reviewer labelled this as the best Team Fantomen story ever! Sweden: published 5 times, first in Fantomen 23/1979, most recently Krönika 6/2007 Australia: 1992 (#1013), 1996 (#1125) and the 2017 Frew TPB For Those Who Came In Late Diana in the Jungle Patrol 1973 Team Fantomen story, written by Magnus Knutsson, with art by Jaime Vallvé. This adventure has almost exclusively published in Scandinavia. Incidentally, you can check out our interview with Magnus in X-Band: The Phantom Podcast Episode #119. Sweden: 3 times, first in Fantomen 5/1973 and most recently Krönika 2/2003 Australia: Once (only time outside Scandinavian nations) in 2018 (#1804) The 21st Phantom 2004 Team Fantomen story, written by Claes Reimerthi, with art by Paul Ryan. This was the first book in the Year One saga, a series of stories exploring Kit Walker's first year after swearing the oath and accepting the rings from his dying father, as he becomes The Phantom. Sweden: Fantomen 17/2004 (also rest of Scandinavia 2004) Australia: 2004 (#1390) We would love to hear your feedback and thoughts of these three stories. If you have other stories you would like to see based on a card game, let us know.

In Episode 89 of X-Band: The Phantom Podcast, Steve, Dan and Jermayn have a short chat about the last three comics to come out from Frew - #1801 The Emperor's Treasure, #1802 The Phantom Goes West (2018 Annual) and Kid Phantom #3. After these reviews we're joined by Dale Maccanti, co-designer of the upcoming Phantom board game. Following on from our conversation with his partner-in-crime Alex Wynnter in Episode 86, Dale fills us in on a few more details about the game-play, and drops a major announcement about a Kickstarter bonus that will be put together by Frew Publications and available to all investors in the campaign. You will want to know about this! Make sure you're staying in touch with all the Phantom board game news through White Cat Press and Games by Alex Wynnter. In the meantime ... Happy Phantoming! #XBand #Podcast #Frew #Gaslight #Giantsize #GermanoFerri #PhantomsWorld #GlennFord #Games

Lightning Strike Comic Books may be a small Indi publisher in the scheme of things, but they have grand plans for our favourite purple comic book hero! In this episode, Dan and Jermayn speak to Eoin McCauly, one half of the Lightning Strike brains trust. He tells a little more about his company and it's place in Irish comic publishing history. Eoin clears the air about the ill-fated Australian delivery of their second Phantom book Scarlet Sapphire, as well as some of the stories behind their first foray into the Deep Woods, Tales of the Ghost Who Walks. Then in big news, Eoin shares a lot of information about Lightning Strike's plans for 2018 - and we guarantee this will have you salivating. Happy Phantoming! #XBand #Podcast #KidPhantom #ReneWhite #KingFeaturesSyndicate #DrPaulMason #Egmont #LightningStrikeComics

In a very special X-Band, recorded on the 82nd anniversary of the debut of the newspaper strip, the phellas are lucky enough to talk to current The Phantom Daily artist, Mike Manley. Mike has worked on the Phantom for almost two years, and on Judge Parker for eight years, so he has a wealth of experience when it comes to the schedules and deadlines that face a comic strip artist in 2018. Mike tells us about his history as a comic book artist, animator and teacher. We discuss his process in drawing the strip and the balance of digital vs pen and paper, as well as using assistants. Mike responds to some of the online criticism that every artist seems to receive, and also shares his thoughts about the future of the Phantom character and the strip in general. It's a fascinating chat with a fascinating man - we know you'll enjoy it! Happy Phantoming. #XBand #Podcast #TonyDePaul #KingFeaturesSyndicate #MikeManley

Shane Foley is a relatively newly published Phantom artist, illustrating Frew covers for issues #1754, #1757, #1768 and #1788. However he has been drawing comics, including Phantom, and submitting ideas for almost 30 years! This podcast is a fascinating story of an aspiring artist who proves that it is never too late to chase your dreams, and that opportunity can knock when you least expect it. Most recently, Shane has also been very busy drawing new stories for Frew's Giantsize Phantom, be it Phantom Ranger, Sir Falcon or most recently Planetman. Delightfully, all of these stories have featured a little cameo from our favourite purple comic strip hero. Check out his work at http://shanefoley.net/ or http://www.indyplanet.us/comics/3340/ Happy Phantoming! #XBand #Podcast #Frew #ShaneFoley #Giantsize

Steve, Dan and Jermayn review the latest comics from Frew (1803-1805 & GS4) and chat about all the latest news in the world of the Phantom, including: A new Phantom clothing line by Finnish company Billebeino, how to buy Frews if you live in Europe, latest 'Con' and publisher news. Also, there may have been a new discovery regarding languages that the Phantom has been published in. Happy Phantoming! #Frew #JeffWeigel #SyBarry #Billebeino #Clothing