Finally ... THE END IS NIGH #4!

The next issue of the THE END IS NIGH will launch at Impressions Gallery in Bradford this Sunday (1st November) at a fantastic free event!

Our first issue since 2006 sees writers Alan Moore and Iain Sinclair pay tribute to the post-apocalyptic genius of JG Ballard, we mark the forthcoming milestone of 1,000 days till the end of the world, we examine The Rise of the Machines, we ponder on which animal will unleash the next killer flu plague, we ask 'Is Obama the Antichrist?' ... and it all comes with a free game of END TRUMPS, where the fate of mankind truly is in your hands!

The whole thing is topped off with an amazingly apocalyptic cover by Defoe artist Leigh Gallagher! We also have contributions from writer John Reppion, along with 2000 AD boarders Ed Berridge and The Emperor!

Keep an eye on www.endisnigh.co.uk after this weekend for the chance to get your hands on a copy - stocks are limited!

Here is the blurb about this weekend's event:

From the Large Hadron Collider to the end of Mayan calendar in 2012, our fascination with potential apocalypse is ever present. Inspired by our exhibition The Last Things, Journalist Michael Molcher and editor of zine The End is Nigh, will take an informed yet satirical look at the speculation surrounding the end of the world in his free illustrated talk at 2pm. Join us and help predict the date the world will end!

Throughout the afternoon the award winning independent Comic Book Shop OK Comics, will be transporting their Drink and Draw event over to Impressions. Like-minded comic fans, budding artists and designers will be able to meet, exchange ideas, sup free hot tea and scribble away. Paper will be rolled over all the tables in the Studio and pens left everywhere, so come along and draw whatever you feel like. Everyone is welcome no matter what your artistic ability and pro comic book artist Leigh Gallagher will be on hand to trouble shoot your illustration irritations at his drop in surgery.

OK Comics will also be bringing a selection of apocalypse themed comic books, which you can browse over a wedge of cake, or yours to buy and take away.

Amble into the gallery and you’ll have a last chance to see our exhibition The Last Things by David Moore before it closes on 8 November 2009. Described by writer Iain Sinclair as a "photographer of secret spaces", Moore provides an exclusive glimpse of the Ministry of Defence’s secret crisis management centre beneath the streets of central London. This hidden space, only to be used in a major national emergency, hides a strictly controlled working environment continuously on stand-by in which a looming sense of threat is ever present.

More details of the venue here.

So do come along, meet the team, be the first to buy the new issue and hang out in a great venue!

THE END IS NIGH 4 is nigh!

The next issue of the THE END IS NIGH will launch at Impressions Gallery in Bradford on Sunday 1st November at a fantastic free event:

From the Large Hadron Collider to the end of Mayan calendar in 2012, our fascination with potential apocalypse is ever present. Inspired by our exhibition The Last Things, Journalist Michael Molcher and editor of zine The End is Nigh, will take an informed yet satirical look at the speculation surrounding the end of the world in his free illustrated talk at 2pm. Join us and help predict the date the world will end!

Throughout the afternoon the award winning independent Comic Book Shop OK Comics, will be transporting their Drink and Draw event over to Impressions. Like-minded comic fans, budding artists and designers will be able to meet, exchange ideas, sup free hot tea and scribble away. Paper will be rolled over all the tables in the Studio and pens left everywhere, so come along and draw whatever you feel like. Everyone is welcome no matter what your artistic ability and pro comic book artist Leigh Gallagher will be on hand to trouble shoot your illustration irritations at his drop in surgery.

OK Comics will also be bringing a selection of apocalypse themed comic books, which you can browse over a wedge of cake, or yours to buy and take away.

Amble into the gallery and you’ll have a last chance to see our exhibition The Last Things by David Moore before it closes on 8 November 2009. Described by writer Iain Sinclair as a "photographer of secret spaces", Moore provides an exclusive glimpse of the Ministry of Defence’s secret crisis management centre beneath the streets of central London. This hidden space, only to be used in a major national emergency, hides a strictly controlled working environment continuously on stand-by in which a looming sense of threat is ever present.

Come along and meet the team, be the first to buy the new issue and hang out in a great venue!

In the meantime, this just popped into our inbox ...

"Richard Heene, the man suspected of the alleged "balloon boy" hoax, was driven by a conviction that the world will come to a cataclysmic end in 2012, according to a friend."

With friends like these ...

First chickens tried to kill us all, then pigs, and now ...

In something completely unconnected with our intended theme for the next issue, a previously unknown virus that killed four of the five people it struck in an outbreak in South Africa last year has been identified as part of a family of viruses humans can catch from rats.

The virus, named Lujo, is an arenavirus that over nine days caused rash, fever, muscle pain, diarrhoea, severe bleeding, vomiting, organ failure and death, said Nivesh Sewlall, who treated the first patient at Johannesburg's Morningside MediClinic Hospital.

Which, fast on the back of piggy sniffles, is a little worrying. Other animal-derived diseases such as Ebola have failed to spread widely because while it is extremely infectious and incredibly deadly, it has only so far affected isolated areas and presents symptoms and then kill its victims so quickly that outbreaks can be contained. SARS, similarly, only becomes a problem in certain conditions.

The high death rate for Lujo is worrying, though the conditions in which its victims became infected, and their medical histories may well be a significant factor - just as many of the deaths from swine flu have been from people with previous, though sometimes unidentified, medical issues.

Oops I did it again ...

It's apparently only a matter of time before our number's up if we don't change our ways, as scientist have warned that human-made crises are 'outrunning our ability to deal with them'.

The world faces a compounding series of crises driven by human activity, which existing governments and institutions are increasingly powerless to cope with, a group of eminent environmental scientists and economists has warned.

Writing in the journal Science, the researchers say that nations alone are unable to resolve the sorts of planet-wide challenges now arising.

Which makes you wonder quite how screwed we actually are, if you consider the inability to get international cooperation on climate change, fishing etc etc

Back on the shelf

But in some slightly-more-welcome news, President Barack Obama says the US has shelved plans for a missile defence system based in controversial bases in Poland and the Czech Republic.

The system, so beloved of former President George W Bush and Neo-Cons everywhere, was intended to blow a missile attack on the US out of the sky. They said it was to stop 'rogue states' such as Iran and North Korea from attacking. But since Russia is pretty much the only country that is a) not a mate of the US, b) has ICBM capability and c) is far nearer to Poland and the Czech Republic than, say, Iran, it's hard to refute Russian allegations that the system was aimed at them.

It's baaaaack ...

Doubled posting today, to make up for not doing so for ages.

And speaking of returns - swine flu looks to be on its way back, according to Sir Liam Donaldson, England's chief medical officer.

More worrying:

Meanwhile, the Health Protection Agency has reported one confirmed case and one possible case of resistance to the flu drug Tamiflu.

There has been less than 30 cases like this worldwide with experts monitoring them for signs that the virus is mutating.

Who's fool idea was this?!

Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez has announced that the country will soon take delivery of Russian missiles with a range of 300km.

Be prepared ...

Worried that you're not prepared? Concerned that you might be too far and too lightly-armed to make it back to your back-garden bolthole? Well worry no longer, as the latest in on-the-spot survivalist techniques makes it to your computer.

We are reassured that they can show you how to: "Get inside the mind of an angry mob of parents with hungry children so your family is the last one to be attacked and looted."

Or, more worryingly, an angry mob of pre-armed survivalists who believe they are preventing barbarism.

Turn on, tune in, fall out ...

Amazing what apocalyptia you find during a nice cliff-top walk in Cornwall ...

1,200 and counting ...

Since we're *just* 1,200 days away from 21st December 2012, it seems fitting to revisit this particular apocalyptic curio.

Since the year 2000 turned out to be such a disappointment, 21/12/12 has increasingly become the new focus point for the apocalyptic community, apparently all based on the idea that the Mayan civilisation's calendar 'predicts' either the end of the world or, at the very least, some major event in world history. Armed with this snippet of half-baked information, every preacher and New Age crystal therapist under the sun has their own prediction about what WILL UNDOUBTEDLY HAPPEN!!

But who to trust? Do you believe those who reckon we're due an alien invasion or that it's The True Dawning of the Age of Aquarius or that it's finally the Rapture?

So it is with some relief that 'NY Times Bestselling author' Gregg Braden's Fractal Time: The Secret of 2012 and a New World Age cuts through the crap and tells us what we need to know, by revealing this little 'fact':

"On December 21, 2012, Earth will be perfectly aligned with the galactic center for the first time in over 5000 years — and attuned to the source energy of the Milky Way. Gregg believes this heralds "a rare opportunity to come together as a family on this planet, and to learn from the mistakes of past civilizations."

So there you go.