I've showed this before but for the benefit of newer readers, here it is again!
One of the enjoyable things about working for Oink! comic back in the 1980s was the opportunity to do numerous one-off or short run strips as well as regular characters. Monster Mash appeared in Oink! No.13, the Halloween issue for 1986, and was a collaboration between editor Mark Rogers and myself.
Mark had originally sent me an idea for a story called The School Dinner Monster and asked if I had any ideas to add to it. I added a few bits and bobs to the plot and dialogue, and thought the title Monster Mash was catchier. I gave the name 'Pigzilla' to the giant robot pig, although Mark changed that to the much more inspired Pigswilla.
As Oink! was printed on quality paper (as opposed to the newsprint of its companion comics Buster, Whizzer & Chips etc) I knew we could be a bit more adventurous with the rendering of the artwork so I thought a grey wash would give it more depth. I was really pleased with how the strip turned out and it remains one of my favourite pieces all these years later. The artwork is a bit rough in places but I'm still happy with it.
I felt that with Monster Mash and some of the other material that myself and other contributors did for Oink! that we were stepping outside the usual conventions of British humour comics and moving away from the standard schoolkid-with-gimmick that had dominated IPC's comics since 1969. And we were all having great fun doing it. This comedy-adventure, comic horror stuff was what comics should have been doing more of in my opinion.
As it turned out, it seemed most readers still preferred the more traditional schoolkid strips, and Oink! folded after just two and a half years. Then again, Whizzer & Chips folded a few years later, and that was the most traditional "safe" comic in IPC's stable. Perhaps it was just a sign that readers were being distracted by video games.
Happy Halloween!
Artwork now Copyright © 2018 Rebellion Publishing Limited.
Back in the days when Halloween wasn't such a big thing in the UK, this cover strip by Charlie Grigg was The Dandy's only mention of Halloween in the entire comic. And not a bat or spooky cosplayer in sight!
The Dandy No.2084 (1981).
The celebration of Halloween as a commercial venture is relatively new to the UK, only really taking hold over the last 20 years or so. These days you'll find a whole aisle in supermarkets taken up with Halloween merchandise. This wasn't the case years ago, and Halloween was a very low key affair. All you needed was a turnip and a piece of string.
Comics didn't celebrate Halloween at all back in the 1960s but there would sometimes be one or two strips at the end of October that would touch upon it. Here's the cover to The Beano No.1319 (October 28th 1967) by the great Dudley D. Watkins showing Biffo the Bear and his pals and their 'turnip lanterns'. Yes, in Britain it was the tradition for turnips to be carved out, not pumpkins! So, if you can't get hold of a pumpkin today, or the shops are charging too much, buy a cheap turnip instead and revive the old tradition.
(Yes, that's the actual copy I had 46 years ago. I had The Beano reserved at my newsagent every week, which is why he wrote my name on the top.)
The current issues of The Beano, The Dandy, and BeanoMax all feature a spooky theme to some of the stories to represent Halloween.
As any visit to a shop from Poundland to Asda will reveal, Halloween is big business for retailers these days with masks, toy skeletons, fake blood, witch costumes and all kind of horror-themed goodies for sale. Therefore it makes sense for children's comics to get a piece of supernatural action. Such 'Halloween Specials' were unknown 40 or 50 years ago, and over the last few decades have pretty much replaced the old traditional firework issues. (Although The Dandy and Beano did do a few firework strips last year.)
This week's Beano kicks off with a great cover by Nigel Parkinson and inside he's also drawn a three page Dennis the Menace strip featuring... Frankenswine! There's also Ratz by Hunt Emerson, Minnie the Minx by Laura Howell, Ball Boy by Dave Eastbury and lots more, including a one-off Horrornation Street puzzle page that I did.
Over in The Dandy, a nice eye-catching Desperate Dan cover by Jamie Smart opens the proceedings. Halloween strips inside include The Bogies and Corporal Clott by Nigel Auchterlounie, Bananaman by Wayne Thompson, and My Dad's A Doofus by Jamie Smart. (Remember to keep checking that Dandy countdown clock as we head towards the final print edition!)
BeanoMax No.70 has been out a few weeks now but also has a monster theme. Spooky stories include The Monster Invasion of Beanotown drawn by Nigel Parkinson, Cuthbert and the Rumpled Pumpkin by Dave Sutherland, and Gnasher's Bite by Barrie Appleby.
The Beano is priced £1.50, The Dandy is £1.99, and BeanoMax is £3.99 (the latter being bagged with toys). All are available now.
http://www.beano.com/
Yes it's the special Halloween issue of The Dandy this week! 32 pages crammed with comedy-horror and not a single reprint in sight. A fangtastic cover by Nigel Parkinson and three pages by him inside too, including Harry Hill, or Harry Chill as the strip's titled this issue. Plus Korky the Witch's Cat, My Little Zombie, and much more including Postman Prat visiting Crackpot Castle.
Sadly, in some areas copies of The Dandy are a rarer sight than ghosts these days. It was a struggle finding an issue this week, although it wasn't helped by my local newsagent receiving his copies soaking wet from the supplier! (Perhaps some religious nut had doused them in Holy Water to exorcise the supernatural elements of the Halloween theme?)
If you're having problems finding shops that stock The Dandy why not do as I've just done and subscribe? It's only £15 for 15 issues at present; a pound an issue! A substantial saving on buying it off the shelf.
http://www.dcthomsonshop.co.uk/Group-Dandy.aspx
Next issue: firework fun! (What? Firework strips in a comic in 2011? Yep! Wait and see.)
The 1980s still seem recent to me, and the 1990s feel like yesterday, but I know some of you were still at school back then so here's a nostalgic 1989 Buster cover for you. Drawn by the brilliant Tom Paterson and coloured by John Burns (the nephew of the artist John M. Burns) it's a marvelous depiction of comic horror on a par with some of Ken Reid's more gruesome pages. I'm still amazed that Fleetway got away with a cover showing an axe and knife embedded in the heads of the monsters, but presumably everyone took it in the spirit of fun as intended. (I don't recall any fuss being made at the time.)
Inside, two of the strips were by me. Here's The Vampire Brats. Although I was always the artist on the strip it was originally written by Mark Rogers but when Mark fell ill he asked me to write it as well. I think this was one of my scripts. (Roy Davis became the scriptwriter for it later on in the strip's run.) I remember being pleased with the exaggerated expressions in panels 4 and 5.
Further on in the comic was Tom Thug's Skooldayz, written and drawn by me as always and lettered by Mike Peters. I always felt the font Mike used was too large and obtrusive, but later the strip was hand lettered by Jack Potter who gave it a much more suitable look in my opinion.
Interestingly although the Brats and Tom occupy the same "Buster universe" we treated the supernatural as fiction in the more streetwise Tom Thug stories. That said, there was a Halloween team-up between Tom and the Brats a year or two later.
Adding a bit of toilet humour as a side gag before it was the norm in children's comics I drew Tom's Dad with his legs tightly crossed in the final panel, bursting to use the loo. Incidentally, I think this was the one and only appearance of The Spottyjumper Twins. Perhaps I should bring them back in Toxic!
Happy Halloween, Readers!
