Beano and Dandy summer specials out now!

[Lew Stringer]

Mistakes happen, especially at the short deadline that special was put together.

In the case of the Beano Special however, if the bound-in stickers aren't there it's the fault of the printers so DCT wouldn't even be aware of it.

I have let dc Thomson shop know about the faults and I'm awaiting a response.
As for being the printers fault that won't wash this product is produced by dc Thomson and it's there responsibility to sub contract reliable partners . Anyway are you really saying that no one from dc Thomson looked at the product before putting it on sale. Mistake's do happen but this is still poor quality control

Not every copy had missing stickers. They can't check every single copy of a print run of thousands. If they did, people would then complain their copies had been thumbed through.

[Digifiend]

Does the problem only affect copies ordered from DCT?

[judomole]

Mistakes happen, especially at the short deadline that special was put together.

In the case of the Beano Special however, if the bound-in stickers aren't there it's the fault of the printers so DCT wouldn't even be aware of it.

I have let dc Thomson shop know about the faults and I'm awaiting a response.
As for being the printers fault that won't wash this product is produced by dc Thomson and it's there responsibility to sub contract reliable partners . Anyway are you really saying that no one from dc Thomson looked at the product before putting it on sale. Mistake's do happen but this is still poor quality control

Not every copy had missing stickers. They can't check every single copy of a print run of thousands. If they did, people would then complain their copies had been thumbed through.

I was not asking for DC Thomson to check every issue also It's not the fact that the stickers are missing that's such a disappointment this can happen with any giveaway. It is more that the crossword in the Beano and the Dandy having page 38 also printed as page 39 thereby giving you only half a strip that is the let down. this is not the printers fault but poor proof reading. If this is due to tight deadlines as you claim then the deadline should have been extended to get the quality of the product right before asking people to give the nearly £10 of their hard-earned.

p.s two days after raising the issue with the DC Thomson shop by phone and e-mail I still have not received any answer about what happens next . this says to me that I'm not the only compliant they have had

[Mr McScotty]

Both specials arrived in W H Smiths in Glasgow on Thursday (17 July at 11am - I was in the shop at the time) both looked really nicely packaged to me and the Beano had the stickers when I thumbed through it - Only bought the Dandy as I am not a collector or reader of these books and my interest is only in the older stuff from my childhood - I would have preferred more older 60s / 70s reprints (Baxendale and Reid especially) but it had some nice Bill Holroyd (Brassneck) and "Winker Watson" strips which made the purchase for me worth it - shame to read there were some issues for some folk though.

[Raven]

Does the Dandy one have summer special stuff that's not familiar from 'Funshine and Laughter' or recent reprints, does anyone know?

[SID]

Well, just as my summer holiday starts, the post lady delivers The Dandy and The Beano summer specials.

I just managed to glance through The Dandy and it looks good.

[Digifiend]

Does the Dandy one have summer special stuff that's not familiar from 'Funshine and Laughter' or recent reprints, does anyone know?

I don't even need to check the book to confirm that. Some of the material is from the weekly Dandy, rather than the Summer Specials, and Funshine and Laughter only used Summer Special material, so yes, there's stuff that wouldn't be familiar from that book. The reprints range from Dudley Watkins era Desperate Dan, through to mini-strips from 2010-12. The material ranges from 1960s to 2010s.

[Raven]

Thanks for the reply.

[Lew Stringer]

The specials finally turned up at my local WH Smith. Also, Asda has the Beano one (but not the Dandy). I bought both. Considering the very tight deadline the two specials were produced under, you wouldn't know it. They look great! The stickers are in my copy, bound between pages 2 and 3.

Yes, the repeated Blinky page is a downside, and yes the letter 'K' being in the wrong box in the crossword is slightly irritating, but surely the good points far outweigh those two small negatives? With the speed that those errors were reported I sometimes get the feeling that the first thing people do when they buy a comic is play 'Spot the Mistake' rather than enjoying the stories and artwork.

I do appreciate though that, for young readers, if the stickers are missing it feels like a big deal so I hope the matter can be resolved to make everyone happy.

[meherenow]

The specials finally turned up at my local WH Smith. Also, Asda has the Beano one (but not the Dandy). I bought both. Considering the very tight deadline the two specials were produced under, you wouldn't know it. They look great! The stickers are in my copy, bound between pages 2 and 3.

Yes, the repeated Blinky page is a downside, and yes the letter 'K' being in the wrong box in the crossword is slightly irritating, but surely the good points far outweigh those two small negatives? With the speed that those errors were reported I sometimes get the feeling that the first thing people do when they buy a comic is play 'Spot the Mistake' rather than enjoying the stories and artwork.

I do appreciate though that, for young readers, if the stickers are missing it feels like a big deal so I hope the matter can be resolved to make everyone happy.

To be fair Lew, it was my (target audience) 8 year old son that spotted the mistake while he was enjoying doing the puzzle.

It did rather irritate him, he doesn't care about short deadlines.

He also just tutted when I showed him the double Blinky pages.

Also my double pack arrived, minus the stickers again so it would seem that the copies direct have them missing - still no sign of the original single Dandy issue I ordered though (that I have to send back along with the Beano to ensure I get the issues at the special price).

[Lew Stringer]

I do appreciate though that, for young readers, if the stickers are missing it feels like a big deal so I hope the matter can be resolved to make everyone happy.

To be fair Lew, it was my (target audience) 8 year old son that spotted the mistake while he was enjoying doing the puzzle.

It did rather irritate him, he doesn't care about short deadlines.

I know. That's why I said I appreciate it's a big deal for young readers.

[judomole]

Update: DC Thomson obviously do not think that their customers are just looking for faults rather than enjoying the comic. They have apologised for their errors and they have now sent me a brand new Beano with stickers by first class post which arrived today and will do the same when they have some correct Dandy's in stock all for no extra cost. So now i can enjoy the comics as they were meant to be
I hope that everyone else with problems gets the same result

[big bad bri]

My 2 just came & no stickers & damaged spines so DCt said they would send replacements,i don't really like phoning them though as my sub copy always comes damaged & bent & yes i have had a go at the lazy bad attituded postman so i will prob not renew my subscription & just start hunting for them again.

[judomole]

Update: DC Thomson obviously do not think that their customers are just looking for faults rather than enjoying the comic. They have apologised for their errors and they have now sent me a brand new Beano with stickers by first class post which arrived today and will do the same when they have some correct Dandy's in stock all for no extra cost. So now i can enjoy the comics as they were meant to be
I hope that everyone else with problems gets the same result

Update 2: I Have just been informed that there will be no new print run of the Dandy summer special so the options are its take it as it is or a return for refund . I will keep my copy but it is a shame this fault wasn't picked up plus now we will never know what happened to Blinky's swimming pool

[Lew Stringer]

When I was 14 I had the first Shiver and Shake Annual, which had 16 pages repeated in place of the 16 that should have been there. Although this wasn't the same in every book I never exchanged it and didn't let it affect my enjoyment of the rest of the book.

As for other mistakes, they used to happen in comics all the time. Usually so trivial that we hardly noticed. Odhams made a few boo-boos in their time, and even made fun of it by starting a 'Spot the Boob' feature in Fantastic where they'd make deliberate mistakes in the Marvel reprints for readers to spot. (Eg: removing Sub-Mariner's ankle wings in one panel.)

Everyone makes small mistakes in their jobs from time to time, due to any number of factors. If it's in a comic it's more public, but no one is perfect.

So, what did people think of the actual stories in the specials?