Arthur Ranson

In 2007, Prion Books reprinted a selection of material from Look-in, and included a three-part Sapphire & Steel story on pages 132-133, 136-137 and 140-141.

In 2007, Wagner wrote a fourth series, as well pursuing prospects for a big screen adaptation of the series.

Aside from his Look-in and (later) 2000AD comics work, Ranson also produced illustrations for Fiesta and some "[a]dvertising work through an agent, [including] some All-Bran adverts." He produced some assorted work for various other IPC magazines in addition to 2000AD, and was glad of the "more challenging" work to be found in comics, branding himself "too sensitive a plant to get on in advertising despite the high fees."

Having formed an imprint - Apocalypse Ltd - the publish the new anthology title, Pat Mills found himself de facto editor of the in-preparation title, now called Toxic!. Amid some turmoil, the initial five creators began to splinter, with Wagner in particular feeling that his "style, the way I write, had itself been deemed un-Toxic!" The strip he had spent some time working on was vetoed by Mills, who felt that it was "far too close to 2000 AD in style." It eventually fell to the new editor - Dan Abnett, head-hunted from Marvel UK - to inform Wagner. He recalls that "[b]y that stage Arthur Ranson had drawn an awful lot of it."

In 1997, Ranson provided the artwork for a one-shot prestige-format single issue for DC Comics, Batman/Phantom Stranger. Written by one of Ranson's frequent collaborators, Alan Grant (a mainstay at 2000 AD, and also a major contributor to the Batman mythos), the story saw the two characters team-up to "solve the mystery of a missing civilization." Grant and Ranson had previously produced "an outline of a Phantom Stranger story [Ranson] wanted to draw," but were rebuffed. Indeed, Ranson recalls that Grant was asked to write in Batman/Phantom Stranger a Stranger who "must do nothing spooky."

The first Button Man serial was collected in 1994 by Kitchen Sink Press, and again by Rebellion in 2003. Ranson remembers that he "[made] a small change to the end of Button Man," but praises Wagner's storytelling abilities, for being "self-contained. Complete in themselves, neat, compact and satisfying, solid." A second story followed in 1994, and the third made its debut "after an absence of six years" in 2001. Writer John Wagner candidly stated that he believes "My writing and Arthur's art were patchier on the third series, but I believe the plot was the best of the three."

In 1993, Grant and Ranson contributed the two-part story "Tao" to DC Comics' Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight series (issues #52-53).

In the spring of 1992, as part of a promotion called "the Mega-Blast," Button Man was resurrected and launched in Prog 780. Ultra-violent and one of the first non-science fictional strips to appear in the comic's 15-year history, Button Man was one of the very few creator-owned strips to appear in 2000 AD. Then-editor Steve MacManus sums it up by saying

The strip - called Button Man - was shelved half-finished. Toxic! was cancelled in October, 1991 after 31 issues.

In 1990, 2000 AD stalwarts Kevin O'Neill, Pat Mills, John Wagner, Alan Grant and Mike McMahon were invited by Geoff Fry to begin work on a publication for Neptune Distribution. Neptune had acquired premiere British fanzine Fantasy Advertiser in 1988, and sold-out an issue featuring Mills & O'Neill's Marshal Law, prompting the move towards creating a line of comics spearheaded by that character.

In 1989, Ranson followed in Bolland—and others'—footsteps, and moved to major British sci-fi comic 2000 AD, where he has remained ever since, with rare forays into the world of American comics, including Batman and the X-Men. He counts himself lucky that this career path has, in his decades-long comics career seen him work primarily with just three writers.

Ranson's first work for 2000 AD was a one-off Judge Dredd story "Dungeon Master" by John Wagner. It was followed by the ten-part Anderson: Psi Division - "Triad" storyline, which started in Prog #635 (15 July, 1989). David Bishop, in the 2000 AD history volume Thrill Power Overload says that Ranson's

Ranson also worked briefly for Marvel UK in the late 1980s, and even illustrated a couple of issues of the comics adventures of Dr. Who for Doctor Who Magazine in 1990.

Ranson's best-known work for Look-in consisted largely of adaptations of two strips based upon totally different British television programmes. The first of these was a strip based on P. J. Hammond's Sapphire & Steel, which Ranson was "the first and only one to draw" between 1979 and 1981. Scripted by Angus Allan (almost Look-ins sole writer, according to Ranson), Ranson barely recalls drawing the strip, but does remember that

Ranson also produced a series of comic-strip biographies of well-known music stars and bands, including ABBA (1977), Elvis Presley (1981), The Beatles (1981-2), Haircut One Hundred (1983) and The Sex Pistols (1983). Most biographical articles on Ranson date his Beatles work to "the 1960s," but Ranson himself dispels this myth by stating that the "first auto-biographical [sic] strip I did was ABBA." In fact that work was done in 1981.

Between 1977 and 1990, Ranson also produced strips based on such TV properties as Worzel Gummidge, Michael Bentine's Potty Time, Duckula (another Cosgrove Hall character whose comics adventures began in Look-in, but also spun off into its own title), The Bionic Woman and The A-Team, and others. He also produced comic strips based on the TV adaptations of Richmal Crompton's "Just William" novels, Buck Rogers and the film Logan's Run.

Ranson attended the South West Essex Technical College and School of Art in Walthamstow, Essex, where he studied painting and printmaking. Trained initially as an "apprentice stamp and banknote designer" in the 1960s, learning "to translate photographs into watercolour... [i]n stamp size." A "rare ability at the time," he would later use this skill as a "selling point" when pursuing a career "as an illustrator in advertising and publishing."

Arthur James Ranson (born 1939) is an English comic book illustrator, known for his work on Look-in, Anderson: Psi Division, Button Man and Mazeworld. His work on Cassandra Anderson has been called "photo-realistic".

Born in 1939, Ranson's childhood and formative years included access to the influences of art and artists in a mixture of British and American comics, including "[The] Beano, Knockout, [The] Dandy, Film Fun, Wizard, Hotspur..., The Eagle with Frank Hampson setting new standards. Wayne Boring's Superman, C.C. Beck's Captain Marvel," and others (including, "[l]ater, John Buscema's Silver Surfer and his Conan, Jack Kirby's Thor"). He says that Hampson in particular was an early influence, but that