Nipper goes large.

[stevezodiac]

I'm just puting the first five issues of Nipper comic on ebay. It was a pocket sized comic for the first five issues and then went normal size from no. 6. Here is the ad giving the news. Also some scans of a Tom Paterson strip in the comic, Felix the Pussycat. It was usually in black and white but the first issue had a three page colour story and a two page colour story in issue 4.

[stevezodiac]

Only three scans allowed per post so here are the other three:

[Peter Gray]

I love Tom's work.......thanks for those....they are very funny...

twisting the cat looked real..very black humour..also a funny punchline

Tom and Leo Baxendale are my favourite all time comic artists..

[stevezodiac]

That sort of humour, with little sight gags in each panel, is exactly what British comics are about. As good as other artists are very few of them add anything to the basic script.

[Lew Stringer]

I'm just puting the first five issues of Nipper comic on ebay. It was a pocket sized comic for the first five issues and then went normal size from no. 6.

Nipper was a bit of a disaster for IPC (or was it Fleetway again by then?). The reason it changed size was it was so small that the weight of the free gifts stuck to the cover folded the cover over so no one could see the logo. It just wasn't visible enough on the shelves. Plus kids would nick it as it was pocket sized.

I really don't know why they thought it would work.

By the time it went to A4 size the damage was done. Sales were poor and it was swiftly canned and merged into Buster (if I remember correctly).

Personally I wasn't a fan of Nipper. Some great artists on it but the tone of the comic was too tame IMHO. The publishers were being too cautious after the situation with OINK! and played it TOO safe, I felt. It's worth bidding for on eBay though folks as it was such a short-lived comic and, if memory serves me right, was IPC/Fleetway's final "traditional" comic title.

There was one Nipper Annual, which used up the inventory material (and probably used newly commissioned stuff too I imagine). The annual was standard sized.

Lew

[Muffy]

I guess the smaller Nipper size was to mirror the USA comics and fit in peoples pockets - though as you say it didn't work.

My favourite story out of the 3 issues I bought was 'Roys Toys' about a teenager trying to get rid of his old fluffy's / action man / puppets etc. Like you say it was quite Tame though.

As I understand though their was one other comic after Nipper / Oink - 'Scouse Mouse' this short-lived title merged with 'Whizzer and Chips' in 1989 (and think started in late 1988), but for some reason is overlooked from a historical point (it isn't on toonhound.com either).

[AndyB]

I don't even remember that one, and I read W&C continuously from 1977 or 1978 until it folded...

[NP]

Scouse Mouse (vol.2) ran from November 1988 to May 1989 and, in a similar way to OINK!, was published by Fleetway but packaged by a handful of Northerners on the make. (I was one of them!) It was merged into Whizzer and Chips in May 1989 and that years summer Special opens with a four page Scouse Mouse story.

Vol. 1 had been published by another publisher, run from Shoreditch, London, name of Modelbrisk.