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Electric Soup

Comic book series published from 1989 to 1992

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 20, 2026
Entity authorityQ5357504
Source-derived summary

Electric Soup is the title of a Scottish underground comic book series which was first published in 1989, and ran until 1992.

The title was an anthology title with its most notable strip being The Greens, (a parody of The Broons strip published by D.C Thomson) which was written and drawn by Frank Quitely. Other stories were written and drawn by Shug, Dave Alexander, (whose creations The MacBam brothers proved a popular feature) Tommy Somme, Gerbil and others.

Electric Soup was independently published and distributed round the Glasgow area to start with, but it received distribution though comic books shops before being snapped up by John Brown Publishing for UK distribution.

The humour was very Glaswegian in its strips, very akin to how Viz is full of geordie humour in many of its comic strips. The title was moderately successful but it was eventually cancelled after 17 issues.

The MacBams storyline was continued in their own title, which lasted for one issue.

A one-off Electric Soup 10th anniversary 18th edition was published in 1999, reuniting all of the original contributors.

The last Greens strip from this one-off special was later reprinted in colour in Northern Lightz, another Scottish underground comic book, which carried further adventures of Alexanders MacBams and Shug's Wildebeest characters.

Shug now known as Shug 90 now has his" Electric soup" characters"Rex and Tom/Polis Story and The Wildebeests" published in small press publication Khaki Shorts by Rob Miller.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Electric Soup” as comic book series published from 1989 to 1992. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Electric, Soup and Comic.

Editorial reviewA useful identification and reception guide that helps separate the work itself from editions, performances, ownership and later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1989, 1992, 1999—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Electric, Soup and Comic providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Electric Soup”, the useful work is to connect “comic book series published from 1989 to 1992” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 20, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5357504. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1989, 1992 and 1999.

Critical limits

Titles can refer to several editions, objects or performances, making precise identification essential before interpretation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Electric Soup”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Electric Soup primary sources, Electric Soup archive and Electric research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Electric Soup”?
  2. Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
  3. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Electric Soup” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.