Jim (Batman 80 Page Giant) Alexander as I'm now known in Birds of Prey circles. The Giant in question is No. 2, 'The Luck of the Draw', 1999. Jordan Gorfinkel, editor at the time, gave me the chance to pitch for one of the stories to appear in the anthology and I came up with 'Gotham Roulette'. Goes a little like this. Two-Face has Batman tied to one chair and a rival mob boss tied to another. Two-Face then flicks his coin. It comes down scarred Two-Face pulls the trigger Russian Roulette style so aimed at the 'bad' mob boss. Coin comes down on its good side, the gun is aimed at the 'good' Batman. Pitch was accepted so long as I worked on how to finish the story. One of my pals God love him suggested Two-Face just shoot Batman dead, which certainly would have been unexpected...

So out the issue came and into Glasgow's Forbidden Planet went I. Gleefully I pulled down a copy from the shelves - only to quickly flick through and find my story wasn't in there! I was sweating now. Maybe the strip got pulled at the last minute, maybe I'd just imagined the whole thing while digesting some mushroom pizza... Took a couple of deep breaths and then decided to methodically turn each page, using the power of the mind to will the strip into the book. To discover that it was the opening story! Agony turning to as much ecstasy as one can muster fully clothed. I'd written a Batman story, it was official, and the world slept quiet and content in their beds that night.