Free comics in The Guardian

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Lew Stringer
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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by Lew Stringer »

Digifiend wrote:If you're right, it's similar to Beano using Every Thursday when it actually comes out on Wednesdays (something only fixed last year), as W&C was Every Monday, not Every Saturday.
We covered this only last week I think Digi. All the comics that had "Every Monday" on their covers came out on the previous Saturday. (Some areas even got them on Friday.)

Comics always came out a day before their designated cover day. The reason that day was on the cover was that a few areas didn't actually get them until that day, but this became increasingly rare as distribution improved. However publishers still continued the practice until recent years.

The cover dates were always for the following Saturday for some reason. Some say it's to let newsagents know when the next issue is due, but that doesn't make sense in the case of comics which came out mid-week (eg: Beano, Battle, TV21) as they also had Saturday's date on the covers even though they'd still be on sale for a few days after that date.

What's bemusing is all of those books that use the cover date of a comic as date of issue, and tell you of other significant happenings on that date, are completely wrong. So, for example, the upcoming 40th anniversary of Whizzer and Chips No.1 isn't October 18th (its cover date), it's October 11th.

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Digifiend
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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by Digifiend »

Just like The Beano's birthday being July 26th, not July 30th. My local paper said it was July 29th last year, which shows that people don't always do proper research.

I see no-one responded to my question about the two Whizz-Kids which invaded Chips, so I'll give a clue - they're on the same double page spread. I don't suppose a Chip-ite or two invaded Whizzer the following week? This was a regular occurance wasn't it?

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

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Digifiend wrote:Just like The Beano's birthday being July 26th, not July 30th. My local paper said it was July 29th last year, which shows that people don't always do proper research.

I see no-one responded to my question about the two Whizz-Kids which invaded Chips, so I'll give a clue - they're on the same double page spread. I don't suppose a Chip-ite or two invaded Whizzer the following week? This was a regular occurance wasn't it?

Well, it's Joker in Theo's Thinking Cap and Greedy Greg in Hover Boots, but these aren't typical 'invasions' as the characters are actually part of the stories. Normally, one of the characters would tend to sneakily slip into the background of one the rival paper's stories (sometimes they'd participate and try to sabotage the story from the bush they were hiding behind), and you'd get a tip off on the editorial message page. Or they might leave graffiti, steal a trophy, or be caught in the act and appear behind bars on the editorial message page of the comic they were sneaking into.

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by Raven »

Oh, that Wear 'Em Out Wilf is a reprint from an early Whizzer and Chips, too. The artist had changed and Wilf had become taller for quite some time before they started reprinting those early pages.

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by Digifiend »

Raven wrote:Well, it's Joker in Theo's Thinking Cap and Greedy Greg in Hover Boots, but these aren't typical 'invasions' as the characters are actually part of the stories. Normally, one of the characters would tend to sneakily slip into the background of one the rival paper's stories (sometimes they'd participate and try to sabotage the story from the bush they were hiding behind), and you'd get a tip off on the editorial message page. Or they might leave graffiti, steal a trophy, or be caught in the act and appear behind bars on the editorial message page of the comic they were sneaking into.
Greg was doing in Hover Boots what he normally does in Sweet Tooth (specifically, trying to steal Easter eggs), and he got his comeuppance. Joker ends up getting smacked, so both characters came off worse. Maybe the sneakiness came in in the final decade?

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

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Digifiend wrote:Greg was doing in Hover Boots what he normally does in Sweet Tooth (specifically, trying to steal Easter eggs), and he got his comeuppance. Joker ends up getting smacked, so both characters came off worse. Maybe the sneakiness came in in the final decade?


It was the early issues when they really went for broke with all that. I just got about 18 from 1971 - many consecutive so a real treat with 4 good adventure serials per issue - and there are lots of sneaky raids. As well as the slipping into stories stuff there are some good variations; one where the Chips characters have taken over Sid's page in a mass raid having found it empty and unguarded. Empty because the Whizzer characters have done a mass raid on Chips at the same time and are on Shiner's page. Har!

In another week Sid reaches through the comic to grab Shiner. Turn to Shiner's page and you see his arm round Shiner's collar. Next week Shiner's tied up on Sid's page, to be rescued by ghost Harry the week after, after Sid was distracted by another character slipping into the background of one of his stories.

It got quite ambitious!

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

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Kashgar wrote:Paradoxically the only one that rang any real bells when it came to personal nostalgia was the Jackie as it reminded me that reading Cathy and Claire's page in your girlfriend's bedroom was a rite of passage not to have been missed.
Whenever I was in my then girlfriend's bedroom during my rite of passage, we weren't reading Cathy and Claire's page. What did we miss? :D

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by AndyB »

In the early 1980s, raids were once every couple of weeks, sometimes alternating between the comics - "They sent Joker to Sammy's page last week, look for our raider in Whizzer this week! Har-har!". By the mid-80s, it was "Spot our raider and their raider every week".

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by Digifiend »

Of course, Sid won in the end, because he transferred to Buster upon W&C's demise and Shiner didn't. Since Buster used a lot of reprints in it's dying days, I'm guessing they avoided using any strips involving a Whizz-kid/Chip-ite raid?

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

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Digifiend wrote:Of course, Sid won in the end, because he transferred to Buster upon W&C's demise and Shiner didn't. Since Buster used a lot of reprints in it's dying days, I'm guessing they avoided using any strips involving a Whizz-kid/Chip-ite raid?
If memory serves me right, before it merged into Buster, Whizzer and Chips actually merged into itself when it became a slimmed down 24 page comic, dropping the Chips section.

I also seem to recall Sid and Shiner becoming friends at that time, and dropping the rivalry. Therefore both sides won because they gave peace a chance. :wink:

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by Digifiend »

Thanks, didn't know that.

Raven
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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by Raven »

Digifiend wrote:Of course, Sid won in the end, because he transferred to Buster upon W&C's demise and Shiner didn't. Since Buster used a lot of reprints in it's dying days, I'm guessing they avoided using any strips involving a Whizz-kid/Chip-ite raid?


Even by 1979, Buster featured reprints of Ginger's Tum (retitled Ginger, losing a very good pun) and Minnie's Mixer from early Whizzer and Chips. I suppose there's every chance raiders could have appeared unless they remembered to remove them.

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by Gary »

Lew Stringer wrote:
Comics always came out a day before their designated cover day. The reason that day was on the cover was that a few areas didn't actually get them until that day, but this became increasingly rare as distribution improved. However publishers still continued the practice until recent years.
I must have been in one of those areas (Rotherham, South Yorkshire), as all of my comics were delivered with our newspaper on the correct cover day.

This was in the 1960s and early 70s. I had a comic delivered Mon, Tues, Thurs and Fri (lucky, I know) and I was never aware that they were available earlier than the day stated on the cover.

This is what has puzzled me about the 'My Comicy Saturday' feature in 'Crikey!'. Did everyone else but me get all their comics on a Saturday?

I recall TV ads in the 1960s for free gifts in comics and they always (if my memory serves correct) were usually broadcast the evening before the comic came out (sometimes just a one-shot ad). The next morning, there was always a queue of 6 or 7 of us outside the newsagents.

So the comics in that broadcast region (I think it was Granada that covered Yorkshire back then) must have come out on the stated day. Maybe it was a North/South thing? Or is my (admittedly well worn) memory at fault?

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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by AndyB »

Whizzer and Chips merged with itself in about 1987 or 1988 or so, either one week before or one week after Buster got its balloon design (I think!), and became more expensive per page than Buster (which stayed at 32 pages). Sid and Shiner were friends for only about one week, and Jimmy Hansen drew joint strips until the comic ended featuring the old rivalry on a far smaller scale.

Between the Whoopee merger and the self-merger, they moved from separate Whizzkid and Chipite pages in the respective sections to a two-page spread with everyone's jokes and the usual reminders to check for that week's raider. I remember Jack Oliver drew Sid and Shiner standing in front of their respective gang huts with the main (officially secondary, but inevitably more popular than Sid and certainly far more popular than Shiner!) characters in sight through the windows. They also reactivated the concept of Whizzkid v. Chipite quiz pages last seen before the WCK merger.

Lew Stringer
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Re: Free comics in The Guardian

Post by Lew Stringer »

Gary wrote: This is what has puzzled me about the 'My Comicy Saturday' feature in 'Crikey!'. Did everyone else but me get all their comics on a Saturday?
Seems like it. My newsagent was two minutes walk away so I never had comics delivered and they were always there on Saturday. Same for the shops in town. Perhaps it was only deliveries that waited until Monday?

By the way; I don't think it was a North/South thing as I live in the Midlands and comics always came out a day before cover day. (Not counting Sundays obviously in those days, when "Monday" comics came out on Saturday.)

Lew
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