Reg Parlett's Last Christmas Buster!

What you are looking at is the very last Christmas Buster that was illustrated by Reg Parlett, who's first christmas edition had appeared ten years earlier in 1974! Buster's story, which has a very festive border, started on the back cover and ends with a great slap up feed!

Buster isn't the only person to enjoy the classic slap-up feed at the end of a story however, as there are five other strips which also have this classic ending! The first is Sid Burgon's Ivor Lott and Tony Broke, a strip which was always funny  week after week!

Dave Follows' Wonder Wellies is a weird one this week, as it involves a flying snowman (okay, it may have been down to a magic pair of wellies, but still...)! Written by Roy Davis, Wonder Wellies was a special strip because it won one the prize for 'Most Humorous Strip Of The Year' in 1983! This episode proves that it deserved that prize!

School Fun folded into Buster earlier in 1984, and when they merged the comic split into two parts, having a School Fun section in the middle of the comic (a bit like Whizzer and Chips, with a Whizzer section and a Chips section). The first page of this section was designed like a front cover, with a date and snow on the logo! The 'front cover' strip was School Team, the team who would try to win a trophy in any competition, illustrated by Doug Goodwin!

The centre pages were taken up with a superb Cliff Hanger board game illustrated by the brilliant Jack Edward Oliver! I've scanned the instructions so you can read them in order to be able to play!

Ken Reid did some amazing artwork over the years, and I'm a personal fan of his 80's version of Faceache. The style was so simple but yet so detailed! Only Ken could pull off something like this!

Does anybody else find that scrunge in panel three really funny?