New look

[Lew Stringer]

Do you think Lew we should email Classics with our blogs or are we too old...

They already know about my blog. That's how I get the cover images in advance.

D.C. Thomson see all, Peter.

[Digifiend]

I assume the same goes for Down The Tubes then.

[AndyB]

Indeed, Tony will be very happy with page 28, and not because it's a letters page.

[Lew Stringer]

I assume the same goes for Down The Tubes then.

Yes, they send us jpegs of the covers and (usually) a bit of news on the content. Same goes for Commando.

My blog isn't really a news site like DTT but I'm happy to promote Classics and Commando because their distribution is so sporadic. I promote other new comics too when I have a spare moment but I can't devote too much time on it like the main comics news websites do.

Often I'll plug comics and books that I've bought, if I recommend them, but I don't have time to promote everything I receive a press release for. Blimey! is essentially a nostalgia blog for old British comics and news items are secondary. I know some people get narked by that but there are plenty of comics news sites out there to send their info to.

[tony ingram]

Indeed, Tony will be very happy with page 28, and not because it's a letters page.

I was. We try to promote Classics (and Commando) as much as we can over on the Crikey! forum because they deserve it, but it's nice to be appreciated.

[Kashgar]

I must say I prefer the new look as it more readily advertises what Classics is about.
Re the Biffo face colour business, none of the back cover strips where he is shown with a white face have been tweaked to give him a white face. If he is shown with a white face then the strip was originally published that way. In fact Biffo spent the first twelve years on the cover of the Beano with a white face with his first brown faced appearance not coming till Beano No 916 dated 6th Feb 1960. The change from white face to brown face being one of the first aesthetic changes that new Beano editor Harry Cramond instigated when he took over the post from George Moonie in the summer of 1959.
I haven't actually got my copy of the first new look issue yet but on Lew's blog the Ron Smith 'Space Kids' strip is shown as being from 1976 which in its shortened reprint form it was, but it had originally appeared in Oct 1964, when the comic had been boosted to 16pgs from 12 and it had been one of five new strips debuting in the same issue, the others being Little Mo, Young Sid the Copper's Kid, My Pal Ropey and Dr Q and the Jellymen. The original Space Kids strip having run to 101 issues compared to the 55 in the 1970's reprint.

[Digifiend]

Re the Biffo face colour business, none of the back cover strips where he is shown with a white face have been tweaked to give him a white face.

Wrong. This one's from 1960, had the brown face as you say - but it was white on the Classics reprint. http://petergraycartoonsandcomics.blogs ... -over.html

[Kashgar]

Apologies Digi. You are quite correct and I accept my wrongness with all the humility a guru of renown can muster. Mea culpa, I should have hauled out the Classics issues and checked more thoroughly. However the information in my previous post re other details is correct unless someone knows otherwise. And knowing my luck.

[Digifiend]

I'm not disputing the rest of the details, that's why I cropped the rest of your post out of the quote.

[Kashgar]

On checking I realise I was even more wrong than I had imagined. There is even a reprint from the Dave Sutherland era with a white face Biffo on one of the back covers.
I must admit that I like the white-faced Biffo just as much as the brown-faced one even though the latter is the one that I grew up with. I have more problems with white-faced Mickey the Monkey in the Topper. Watkins tended to add a little too much detail to Mickey's face for my liking and in close-up he could look a bit wrinkly and creepy. It comes to us all in the end I suppose.

[Kashgar]

I've just gotten my copy of the new Classics and feel constrained to point out a piece of misinformation.
The misinformation in question occurs in the editor's answer to reader Dave Bennet on the new letters page. Dave asks the editor when and where the character Hungry Horace first appeared and in what comic and, had the Ed stuck to answering this question and not chosen to embellish it, everything would have been fine. However after revealing the HH first appeared in very first Dandy in in Dec 1937 he then says the following 'and ran for almost forty years. He then appeared in the Sparky and Topper'.
Now to me this seems that the editor intends us to believe that Horace ran for almost forty years in the Dandy before he then appeared in Sparky and Topper. This is simply not the case and even if I'm reading him incorrectly, the 'nearly forty years' time-frame is wrong.
Hungry Horace was in the Dandy for the first 860 issues (1937-1958) and he then appeared throughout the run of Sparky (1965-1977) and further, when Sparky merged with Topper, as a character in that comic for a further 13 years (1977-1990).
This gives Horace a comic career run of 46 years or 53 years if you choose to ignore the hiatus between 1958 and 1965. In neither instance is the 'nearly forty years' time-frame correct.
Given that Horace was such an imporatant DCT character (he makes it into the Top Ten of DCT successful origin characters i.e those first issue characters that lasted longest without a break from their inception) it's a pity that the answer couldn't have been a bit more accurate.

[Kashgar]

Another point that I feel worth raising re the current issue of Classics is one connected with the Desperate Dan section.
Lew has already pointed out that the 1975 strip is actually a reprint of a one from the 1960's, No1351(14/10/67) to be precise and given that only 18 new Dan strips appeared in the Dandy comic throughout the decade, 17 by Chas Grigg and 1 by Bill Holroyd, we can forgive the fact that a reprint was chosen.
The same can't be said of the strip representing the 1960's however. This strip which appeared in Dandy No1251(13/11/65) was also a reprint, this time from the 1950's, of a strip that had first appeared in Dandy No673(16/10/54). This time though the editor really hit unlucky as this strip was only one of 3 strips published in the 1960's that had first appeared in the previous decade. For those who buy a copy of this Classics you'll notice that this strip is actually signed by Watkins (Watkins had ceased to sign his Dan strips on a regular basis in 1959 although he would sign the occasional one after that until Feb 1963) and, I think, does look 'old style' Watkins compared to his regular Desperate Dan work in the 1960's. But maybe I'm being a little bit too 'expert' here and a tad pedantic.
Also noticed a genuine 'white-faced' Biffo on the rear cover, and a rather early one by Classics' standards. It having first appeared in Beano No612(10/4/54).

[Peter Gray]

Thanks for all the extra information it is very interesting...
Hungry Horace sure had a long career..
Also great info on Desperate Dan..and Biffo..I'd thought the Biffo looked old..I really love the early drawings of Biffo also the old day objects in the strip suggested a earlier time..

[steelclaw]

Just picked up the latest retro CFTC, it really has a lot of different strips from the previous CFTC that haven't been seen for years, at last they're using some of their mass of resources.
It's a must for any comic fan to buy this.