Review: THE DANDY SUMMER SPECIAL 2019

This has been out for a few weeks now but I only bought mine the other day when I was on holiday in Blackpool. You see, having The Dandy Summer Special in Blackpool was a tradition when I was a child so I thought I'd wait until I got there this year too. 

Sadly they're not as plentiful in Blackpool as they were in the 1960s when you'd find them everywhere from temporary bookstalls to numerous newsagents. Now, only the town's WH Smiths stock it, and they only have one copy left after I bought mine. 

Like this very post, this year's Dandy Summer Special is a nostalgic journey through Summer Specials of the past. Editor John Anderson has selected various stories from the 1960s to the early part of this Century, accompanied with some brief background to the history of the publication and galleries of six covers from each decade. (Yes, even the 1968 cover is shown, showing Korky smoking an "El Pongo" cigar.)

It's a very good selection of strips, and works better than last year's which limited itself to seven characters. This time we get a lot more characters unearthed from the vaults, including some forgotten ones such as Bodger the Bookworm, Robin Hood's Schooldays, and Izzy Skint. 

The standard favourites are here too of course, including Korky the Cat, Desperate Dan, Cuddles and Dimples, and more. 

The pages are all scanned from the old specials, with thankfully no digital recolouring or bodged redrawing. I like the look of it, as we can even see the paper grain in places which adds to the authenticity. I'm a little disappointed that a few pages from the squatter-sized 1980s/90s Specials were stretched to fit the A4 dimensions of this Special but that might be something only artists will be bothered by, not the target readership. 

The front cover is by Ken H. Harrison, inspired by a 1960s illustration by Dudley Watkins. The back cover is by Nigel Parkinson. The Dandy Summer Special 2019 is squarebound, with 68 pages for £6.99. 
https://www.dcthomsonshop.co.uk/dandy-summer-special-2019

This year's Dandy and Beano Summer Special covers revealed

D.C. Thomson have revealed the cover artwork for this year's Dandy Summer Special and Beano Summer Activity Special in two small images on their web shop. Cover artwork on Dandy is by Ken H. Harrison, whilst the Beano cover is handled by Nigel Parkinson. Both will be in the bookazine format they've used over the past few years.

The Beano special contains new material, and the Dandy special will feature selected reprints from its archives. 

They'll be in the shops this summer (naturally) but you can pre-order them from the publisher here:
https://www.dcthomsonshop.co.uk/books

By the way, I've written a brief article about the history of Summer Specials for issue 5 of Comic Scene which will also be out this summer! Support and subscribe to the mag here:
https://getmycomics.com/ComicScene

Review: The Dandy Summer Special 2018

I always associate Summer Specials with Blackpool, as that's where my parents used to treat me to them when I was a child. It was, therefore, a pleasant surprise to find this year's Dandy Summer Special had been published a few days early when I was up in Blackpool last Monday. Naturally, I didn't hesitate to buy it, although the £6.99 cover price is significantly higher than the 1/6d (7 and a half pence) it used to cost 50 years ago. 

These days, the format of the D.C. Thomson Summer Specials is a 68 page A4 sized 'bookazine' with card covers, so twice as thick as the old specials, albeit smaller in dimensions. Apart from the excellent cover by Ken Harrison, the contents are entirely reprint. Good quality reprints though, with classic artwork from Dudley Watkins, Charlie Grigg, Eric Roberts, Bill Holroyd, Robert Nixon, Steve Bright, and more.

Most of the reprints are from old Dandy Summer Specials and Annuals, with a handful of weekly pages too. Unfortunately, a few of them have been stretched vertically slightly to suit the A4 proportions. It's distracting, unnecessary, and makes the characters look wonky. (The worst affected being a Terry Bave Winker Watson strip with a round sun turned into an ellipse!)  Other than that, this is indeed a special collection. I was pleased to see it includes a Desperate Dan story about an aquarium that was one of my favourites from the 1968 special. Genuinely funny stuff and worth the price of the comic in itself.

The Special contains a nice range of stories from 1968 up to 2006, with a generous helping of 1960s/70s strips. Instead of having the usual mixture of characters, this year they've focused on just seven, with several examples of each. The stories are Desperate Dan, The Jocks and The Geordies, Korky the Cat, Beryl the Peril, Corporal Clott, Winker Watson, and Brassneck. 

If you're a fan of classic British humour comics, or you want a satisfying summer comic, The Dandy Summer Special 2018 is for you. Now on sale in branches of WH Smith, and hopefully, other shops too! 

Cover reveal: DANDY SUMMER SPECIAL 2018

Here's the cover to this year's Dandy Summer Special, as revealed on the D.C. Thomson website this week. It'll be published on June 13th but you can pre-order it from the publishers themselves:
https://www.dcthomsonshop.co.uk/our-brands/dandy/dandy-summer-special-2018.html

I understand the contents will be entirely all-reprint again, as they have been for the last few years, but it'll be interesting to see what selection of stories have been chosen. 

The cover, by Ken Harrison, is brand new, and in the fine tradition of Summer Specials of old.

The Beano Summer Special is already out, and contains all-new content. It can also be ordered from the publisher.

Charlie Grigg exhibition opens today

Dandy Summer Special 1967

One of the top comic artists the UK has produced is to be honoured in a new exhibition in the Midlands. The work of Sandwell-born cartoonist Charles (Chas) Grigg is to be featured at Wednesbury Museum and Art Gallery from 4th April until November, open on Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.

Dandy Book 1965 (pub.1964).

Charlie was a top artist at D.C. Thomson from the 1950s through to the early 1990s, drawing strips such as Korky the Cat, Charlie the Chimp, The Red Wrecker, The Umbrella Men and more for The Dandy, and Splodge, Foxy, and others for The Topper. He also illustrated many covers for Summer Specials and annuals. After leaving comics, he illustrated saucy seaside postcards, all with his usual high standard of cartooning. He passed away in 2013.

The Red Wrecker (Dandy Book 1965).

You can find out more about the exhibition here:
https://www.whatsonlive.co.uk/wolverhampton/news/charlie-grigg-exhibition-to-launch-at-wednesbury-museum-and-art-gallery/40666

Obituary of Charlie Grigg:
https://lewstringer.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/charles-grigg-1916-2013.html

The Dandy 80th Birthday Special

The Summer Specials for both The Dandy and Beano arrived in my local WH Smith yesterday, so they should be all over the UK. Here's my thoughts on The Dandy one, titled the 80th Birthday Special...

It was never going to be easy to comfortably cover 80 years of Dandy history into one 68 page comic and still please readers of all ages, but this special makes a good job of it. Personally I'd have liked to have seen more pages on the 1960s, as the decade is represented here solely by a couple of Winker Watson strips, but that's just me. 

In most cases, the special attempts to represent how Dandy characters have changed over the years, so we get examples of a (very early) Desperate Dan strip by Dudley Watkins, compared to ones by Ken Harrison and Jamie Smart. 

Desperate Dan's first cover strip is reprinted in full.

We also get several examples of Korky the Cat by various artists, but the character has undergone so many redesigns over the years that even that only cat-scratches the surface. A nice selection though!

With space being limited, it surprised me that ten pages are taken up with a five-part Jack Silver story from 1981. Artwork by Bill Holroyd is always welcome of course, but it's a shame so much of Jack Silver meant there was no room for memorable characters such as Corporal Clott, Black Bob, Brassneck, and more. No straight adventure strips are represented either, so there's no Umbrella Men, Iron Hands, or Crimson Ball. 

Jack Silver by Bill Holroyd.

Apart from Jamie Smart's Desperate Dan, none of the 2010 revamp is covered, but the 2004 redesign is, along with samples of Wayne Thompson's Jak. The back of the bookazine features a cover gallery of selected annuals and specials. (Sadly, one summer special cover is stretched to fit, giving Korky an odd shaped head.)

Cuddles and Dimples by Nigel Parkinson.

If this comes across as a bit negative, don't be put off. These are just things that niggled me a little personally, but over all, the Special is a very nice selection of top quality strips and a reminder of just how great The Dandy was. It credits a lot of the artists too, which would have been unthinkable when some of these strips were first printed. A good sign of how things have changed for the better at D.C. Thomson. 

I felt it was a bit strange that there was no mention whatsoever that the weekly comic actually ended five years ago, but as the Dandy brand survives in the all-new annual every year, and a reprint special every summer, it still counts as celebrating its 80th birthday.

The Dandy 80th Birthday Special, 68 pages, bookazine format, out now for £6.99.

Here come the 2017 Summer Specials!

Summer Specials for both The Dandy and The Beano will be in the shops soon, but you can pre-order them separately or as a pack from the DC Thomson Shop right now:
https://www.dcthomsonshop.co.uk/our-brands/dandy/the-dandy-80th-birthday-special.html

As in recent years, the Summer Specials are in the 68 page card-cover softback format, rather than the 32 page glossy tabloid size of years ago. This makes sense, as regular comics are glossy these days so a similar-looking Special just wouldn't look very... special. 

The Dandy special features reprints taken from over the course of the comic's run, to celebrate the fact that 2017 marks the 80th anniversary since The Dandy first appeared. 

The Beano Summer Activity Special features new material and includes puzzles and activity pages too. 

Keep a look out for them both in WH Smith and selected shops around 14th June, or order them from the link above.

Charlie Grigg honoured at his old school

The late Charlie Grigg, who drew Korky the Cat for many years, has been honoured with a blue plaque at his old school in Oldbury. 

I never knew Charlie personally but, like many of us, I grew up entertained by his artwork for The Dandy on strips such as Korky the Cat, The Red Wrecker, and The Umbrella Men, and on The Topper with strips such as Foxy and Splodge. I'm very pleased for his family that they've achieved this honour for him.

You can read the full details over at John Freeman's Down the Tubes blog today:
http://downthetubes.net/?p=38189

The BBC's Midlands Today covered the news in its 21st May broadcast and at time of writing it's still available on iPlayer, 3 minutes in:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08r2wrc/midlands-today-weekend-news-21052017

©BBC

Dandy and Beano Summer Specials are here!

No doubt they'll be arriving in the shops soon but for now the 2016 Summer Specials for The Dandy and The Beano are available to order directly from the publishers at the D.C. Thomson Shop:
https://www.dcthomsonshop.co.uk/our-brands.html

As in recent years, the Summer Specials are now in the 68 page 'Bookazine' format as opposed to the big 32 page glossy tabloids they used to be decades ago. This makes sense. The weekly Beano is a 36 page glossy these days, so a 'Special' in the same format would hardly be significantly special. There's also the problem of retailers wanting a more uniform size of course. A bigger footprint on the stands would demand a separate display space, and we know how retail giants like to charge for those! 

As far as I know, The Dandy Summer Special will contain reprint again, but The Beano Summer Activity Special will feature new material. I don't have any material in either so your guess is as good as mine at this point. Both feature new covers by Nigel Parkinson.

Anyway, summer's here so make it special with these two comics!

Something really (summer) special

Copyright D.C. Thomson & Co. Ltd.

Over on the Phil-Comics Facebook page there's an item I'd never seen before. Presumably this is the original mock up of the cover to The Dandy Summer Special 1968 with art by Charlie Grigg. As you can see, it depicts a rather more unpleasant looking Korky the Cat than we're accustomed to! I'm surprised it even reached the completed stage. 

Perhaps considered inappropriate for the cover, it was never used and Charlie was asked to redraw it. Here's the published version. A definite improvement I think!

Copyright D.C. Thomson & Co. Ltd.

It's worth noting that with changing tolerances of acceptability even that published cover wouldn't be used today. A children's character smoking? And a cat at that? Modern society would have a fit. The strip on the back cover did show Korky puffing on his cigar but with a much friendlier expression than in the rejected cover.

Copyright D.C. Thomson & Co. Ltd.

You can see more images of various old comics at the aforementioned Facebook page here:
https://www.facebook.com/pages/phil-comics-auctions/156116677784593  

You can also visit the Phil-Comics website to follow the latest comics auctions:
http://www.phil-comics.com/

Phil Shrimpton has written an article about his collecting over at the Rareburg site here:
https://www.rareburg.com/article/collecting-dandy-and-beano-comics

My thanks to Peter Gray for giving me the heads up on this rare Dandy artifact. You can visit Peter's blog on British comics here:
http://petergraycartoonsandcomics.blogspot.co.uk/

Here comes Summer!

Summer Specials for both The Dandy and The Beano should be arriving in the shops in June, or you could order them directly from the publisher DC Thomson. (Update: Available around June 16th.) 

Yes, although The Dandy sadly ended as a weekly in 2012 it still continues as a Summer Special and an Annual. I'm not sure how much of The Dandy Summer Special 2015 is new or how much is classic reprint, but I know some of its contents are new. (Nothing by me in there I'm afraid.)

According to the cover blurb, The Beano Summer Activity Special contains "All New Beanotown Adventures", but I haven't seen either Special yet so I don't have a clue as to the contents. Covers for both issues are by Nigel Parkinson.

I presume that, as with last year's editions, both publications will be in the squarebound 'bookazine' format with card covers. 

Summer has well and truly arrived!

D.C. Thomson have moved into merchandise quite a bit in recent years, with various items available using their comic brands. Amongst the items you can now buy are a Dennis the Menace long-sleeved stripey T-shirt, a box of 100 Beano postcards, and T-shirts featuring covers from Jackie comics magazine. Check out the DC Thomson Shop for more information.  

All images in this post are Copyright © D.C. Thomson and Co. Ltd.

Summer Specials 2014

The Summer Specials finally arrived at my local shops yesterday (although they've been in some parts of the country for a couple of weeks). These days they're no longer in the tabloid format they had years ago, but they're twice as thick and squarebound with sturdy card covers. 

The Dandy Summer Special 2014 has caused a little controversy in some fan circles because last year's edition promised to be the "Last Ever". Indeed, that was the intention, until WH Smith suggested to DC Thomson that as it sold so well it might be a good idea to continue it. This last minute decision to revive the title sadly meant that there was no time to commission new material (save for covers by Mike D) but what we have instead is a fine collection of reprints spanning the 1960s to 2010. Yes, as some have noted, one page of a Blinky story is printed twice by mistake (due to the short production time), but hopefully the other 66 pages in the comic will prove sufficiently rewarding. My opinion: focus on the positives. There's a lot of misery in life but a mistake in a comic isn't part of it.

I was particularly pleased to see one of my favourite Smasher strips by Hugh Morren from The Dandy Summer Special 1967, and a Dudley Watkins Desperate Dan from that year too. And look, - The Smasher strip features a teacher whacking him. It seems Political Correctness hasn't gone mad after all. 

There are also a couple of Winker Watson strips by Eric Roberts (from the 1970s I think) and a 1983 Brassneck strip by Bill Holroyd. For those of you with more recent nostalgia, there's a good selection of material from the 1980s and 1990s too.

The Beano Summer Activity Special 2014 contains a free gift of bound-in stickers, although a few people have reported these are not in their copies so check before you buy. 

The Beano one is all new, and features a good balance of comic strips and puzzle pages. Only the main Beano characters are included, so there's plenty of fun with Dennis, Minnie, Bash Street etc. but no appearances by Rasher, Tricky Dicky and suchlike. 

Both specials should now be available from WH Smith, Asda, and other retailers at £4.99 each for 68 pages.