which comic?

[spuggybridge]

Re: which comic?

does anyone remember the comic called "scream"???

I used to get scream when I was young, the only story I can remember was about someone ending up on the thirteenth floor of a hotel (which wasn't supposed to be there, I think) although with my memory I could be wrong

[Powdered toast man]

Re: which comic?

I never used to read comics as a young kid as there was just something about the characters that seemed out of place and anachronistic for the mid to late 1980s. Teachers wearing mortar-boards, monocles, stripey jumpers with brown boots, cars with running-boards and catapults in the back pocket etc. They always seemed to be stuck in the 1950s, especially the DC Thomson comics(which my parents bought for me and I hated). Then one day I picked up a copy of something called The Bog Paper which was crude, but appealed to my(even then) dark and twisted sense of humour.

[themilkman]

Re: which comic?

Whizzer & Chips

[shilton dipper]

Re: which comic?

as a child i had the twinkle comic.......i remember nurse nancy and molly and her dollies

[Beach Life]

Re: which comic?

Is the MAD comic still around? I remember reading my brother's copies and they always made me chuckle. For anyone that is interested there is a reprint of the first ever Whizzer & Chips (don't remember this) but I am sure a lot of you do.

[havasack]

Re: which comic?

Used to get a few comics every Sunday thanks to one of my old man's drinking pals working in a distribution place. Roy of the Rovers (late 70's 80's incarnation, not the original), Shoot!,Scoop! and Birds (ornithological....not what would intrest me later).

I remember stories from RotR first edition, Smith and son, The hard man,Tommy's troubles, The football and of course Roy of the Rovers. I think "T he boy who hated football" may have been in there, also "Millionaire Villa".......memories flooding back.

Scoop came a bit later, all I remember from that was Jon Stark, mercenary footballer.

[tony ingram]

Re: which comic?

I'm surprised to hear this criticism of Roger the dodger, sin ce the Roger strips are actually reprints from several years ago. As for the price, I used to work in magazine publishing and unfortunately, the production and distribution costs are so high these days that £1.50 is actually pretty cheap in comparison to most current comics, and is only kept that low by the fact that the Beano still has quite a high print run.

[Sly]

Re: which comic?

I was walking through WHSmiths today and spotted the Beano. The first thing that hit me was the price of it. £1.50. You have got to be kidding me. I had a quick flick through it and it appear that the stripes that used to be my favourites as a kid were now mere shadows of themselves. In some cases they looked like they were ripping off knock off versions of cartoon stripes trying to ape the originals. Billy Whiz looked awful. Ball Boy will similarly horrendous. Roger the Dodger looked messy too. Replacing strips I did like where the most character light rubbish I'd ever seen. I seem to remember that even the strips I didn't like has some sort of personality towards them, but in these strips all of that was totally void. Really really sad to see it in that state.

The only thing that was good in it was The Bash Street Kids. It looked slightly different, but it still had buckets of charm. I'm not sure where they are pulling the prices from though, they are printing on better paper now, but it seems very light compared to the ones I had a quick look at just before Christmas that are stored in the loft.

[darren]

Re: which comic?

i collected most of the comics such as the beano,the dandy etc.
Through the eighties id never have missed an issue when it was released.

[ncpcov]

Re: which comic?

I collected Transformers comics -religiously. Every saturday I would take my 35 or 45p to the papershop - sometimes when it opened at half 6 - and run back home to lie down on the floor and read it...
A few years ago I went to retrieve the complete collection of these - in perfect condition I may add - from my parents loft to find out to my utter dismay they had been binned...I would love to have had the chance to read them all again - then sell them onto someone else who could have enjoyed them also...

[Richard1978]

Re: which comic?

DC Thomson always seemed to have all new material in their annuals, at least in the mid 1980's to early 1990s.

[Pussywillow]

Re: which comic?

That's because a lot of the stories in the annuals were reprints, and the fact that IPC had a policy of not reprinting anything less than five years old meant they would often not have enough potential reprint material from the comic itself, so they'd choose stories from long defunct titles instead.

Well, never knew that. I just thought they were being mean or something, and now it appears there was some justification in that view.

[tony ingram]

Re: which comic?

I remember getting a comic called Robin when I was a young boy.

Later I recall having Lion and Valiant, The Victor and then Scorcher.

These comics kept merging all the time so your favourite stories/characters used to vanish.

When you got the Summer specials of these comics it would have characters that were never in the comic itself and the annual at Christmas would also have stories/characters that bore no relation to trhe comic at all !

That's because a lot of the stories in the annuals were reprints, and the fact that IPC had a policy of not reprinting anything less than five years old meant they would often not have enough potential reprint material from the comic itself, so they'd choose stories from long defunct titles instead.

[Pussywillow]

Re: which comic?

I remember getting a comic called Robin when I was a young boy.

Later I recall having Lion and Valiant, The Victor and then Scorcher.

These comics kept merging all the time so your favourite stories/characters used to vanish.

When you got the Summer specials of these comics it would have characters that were never in the comic itself and the annual at Christmas would also have stories/characters that bore no relation to trhe comic at all !

Re: which comic?

It was a little confusing that Action Force where known as GI Joe in the USA.

Different names of products is almost worth a thread to it's own.

I found it interesting as a child. Basically Palitoy invented Action Force. As mentioned before, when Palitoy was sold off, it became The Palitoy Company, then Kenner - Parker UK, they still retained the licence from Hasbro to make their own range of figures but then began selling those action-jointed G.I.JOE figures as Action Force, this still tied into the Battle Action Force Comic. By Summer 1986 Kenner-Parker was sold off and Palitoy ceased trading, the licence rescinded and by 1987 Hasbro UK exerted their hold onto Marvel and opted to go with them as the UK tie in to their version of Action Force toys. Basically, the UK market still identified with Action Force, whilst America and Canada had G.I.JOE since 1964-as a 12'' Doll and then by 1982 the 3 3/4 '' figures; Hasbro's Action Force toys and Marvel UK's comic turned G.I.JOE characters from predominantly American characters into a mix of European and English characterisations, I remember in the UK by 1987, A.F.'s Team Leader was Flint. His filecard bio had him down as an Englishman called David R Fairborne but in the USA, as a Joe he was Dashiell R Fairborne, born in Wichita, Kansas. Interestingly, even from the days of Palitoy/Kenner-Parkers figures ranging from Duke to Cobra Commander, the line was at least 2-3 years behind the US Hasbro range, even when Hasbro UK had Action Force, Flint for example was released as a figure in 1987 amongst others but had actually been released originally in 1986; I also remember that characters like Barbeque, a fire fighter was re-bioed in the UK as being Italian, born there too, but in the USA as a Joe he was an Italian-American, there were others like that too i.e. Airtight had been re-bioed in the UK as being West German having seen the US bio cards its interesting to see how things were changed to appeal to UK kids. It was only by 1988/89 they decided to slowly integrate the G.I.JOE U.S. branding onto the UK market as even in the E.U. they actually had G.I.JOE branding, first by renaming the team 'G.I.JOE-THE ACTION FORCE' with a story that the US had the Joes and we had A.F. and the two teams combined to fight the evil Cobra Organisation. This lasted at least 1 or 2 years and then 'THE ACTION FORCE' was dropped and the branding was simply G.I.JOE. In America, the brandind had been 'G.I.JOE - A REAL AMERICAN HERO' on all 3 3/4 branding for the toys and its due to that strapline itself one can see why we had Action Force, it sounded less American and more International-they where renamed 'INTERNATIONAL HEROES' when Hasbro UK sold them.

I digress....