Jack Frost

[dishes]

Brrrr! Here's one for those cowering under the covers, from the Topper Annual 1990





Is this unusual, for an "origin story" to appear in an annual, long after the strip ran in the weekly comic?

[Digifiend]

When did it originally appear in the weekly comic? That annual is the only place I've ever seen this character.

[dishes]

I was hoping someone with more Topper knowledge than me would chip in with that information Digifiend! I can't find my meagre collection of Toppers but I'm sure he appeared in the Topper some time in the 1980s. However I can't remember how I know that.
Given the timeless nature of the concept, I wondered if he in fact dated back to the story papers.

[Peter Gray]

Its by the great Ken Hunter..

nICE find..

[Phoenix]

I've had a reasonably careful look through Ray Moore's book Topper Tales but I can find no reference anywhere to a Jack Frost strip, apart from the one you posted, dishes. It would appear to have been a one-off filler for that 1990 annual.

[Digifiend]

There's actually a second episode in the same annual. Maybe it was planned to start in the weekly in 1990, but never did because all the adventure strips (i.e. Whizzers from Ozz) were dropped when it merged with Beezer? Winker Watson made his debut in an annual, so there is precedent for that scenario.

[Phoenix]

Maybe it was planned to start in the weekly in 1990, but never did because all the adventure strips (i.e. Whizzers from Ozz) were dropped when it merged with Beezer?

There is no mention either of a Jack Frost strip in Ray's The Book Of The Beezer, as far as I can see.

[dishes]

I was wrong then, sorry! Thanks for checking.

That's one thing I've been mistaken about since I first read it, because at the time I thought "I remember this character" But on reflection I was probably confusing it with something else, possibly even the Jack Frost character in Rupert. It explains everything if the two strips in this annual are the first and only appearance of the character.

There are two things I like about this strip:
Firstly, it's very economical, I mean it tells the story in just a few frames. Secondly,
it's very eerie and a little frightening for a DC Thomson juvenile comic of the time, reminiscent of the nightmares you get when you aren't warm enough.

I doubt if it is scientifically sound though!

By the second episode in the annual he has acquired some thermal gloves and uses his powers to teach bullies a lesson, and it is already a much more standard Peter Piper-style humour strip.