Preview: ‘Robot Archie And The Time Machine’ — More Classic Brit Comics Reprinted

by Richard Bruton

Coming out on 28th May, The Treasury of British Comics presents the first collection of one of British comics’ most famous and beloved characters – Robot Archie.

Many of you will have seen Robot Archie in Grant Morrison and Steve Yeowell’s Zenith, I know I did, or perhaps in the Alan Moore, Leah Moore, John Reppion, Shane Oakley, and George Freeman’s Albion series – but the character’s long history in Brit comics goes back to his creation in 1952 by Edward George Cowan, otherwise known as Ted Cowan. Although he debuted in Lion in 1952 with his first series drawn by artist Alan Philpott, this first Treasury collection brings together Cowan and artist Ted Kearon’s ‘Robot Archie and The Time Machine’ story from 1968 – the first book in the ‘time travel saga’, which sees Archie travel across the eons on new and exciting adventures!

Robot Archie the character was originally built by Professor C.R. Ritchie and sent out to battle injustices around the world. But in ‘Robot Archie and the Time Machine’, Archie works with his creator to create ‘The Castle’ – a fully-functioning time machine!

Together with the Professor’s nephew, Ted Ritchie and his best friend Ken Dale, Archie is ready to embark on a journey through time that will bring him into conflicts with medieval knights and a terrifying, dystopian future where aliens have conquered the Earth!

Coming out in paperback on 23 May, this collection includes the time travelling adventures of Britain’s first all-robo adventurer – ‘Robot Archie’s Time Machine’, ‘Robot Archie and the Superons’, and ‘Robot Archie – Time Traveller’. It will also be available in a hardcover edition exclusive to the Treasury of British Comics and 2000 AD webshops, featuring an infographic showing a cross-section of Robot Archie.