Dan Dare Mekon. The initial artist was Gerry Embleton, who drew Dan to resemble the original exactly, but he was quickly replaced by Ian Kennedy, who gave the hero a younger look and blond hair. The opening "Dan Dare" story was an epic, lasting 18 months, written by Pat Mills and John Wagner. It opened with a flashback to the unseen final defeat of the Mekon by the original Dan, after which he was sealed inside an artificial asteroid and exiled into space. Centuries later he was accidentally freed and returned to conquer Earth. A few years later the descendant of his
Frank S. Pepper Comet", as John Morion. For "The Children's Newspaper", he wrote the adventures of twins "Bill and Jill", starting in 1948. In 1952 AP launched "Lion", a weekly adventure comic designed to compete with Hulton Press' "Eagle", for which Pepper wrote the cover feature "Captain Condor", a space hero created to rival "Eagle"<nowiki>'</nowiki>s "Dan Dare", for twelve years. He also created the cover feature for AP's sports comic "Tiger", in 1953: editor Derek Birnage requested a more realistic football series than "Danny of the Dazzlers", and Pepper gave him "Roy of the Rovers", illustrated by Joe Colquhoun, who took over writing