It's fast approaching Christmas, so I'll start off a series of Christmas themed posts with this festive Beano from 1982! David Sutherland of Bash Street fame drew Dennis the Menace at this period in the comics history, but the style is heavily influenced by Dennis' original artist Davy Law. Here's the second page.
Inside "Baby-Face" Finlayson gets up to his usual tricks, but unusally he comes out on top for once, acting as a toy and getting a free feed! Illustrated by Ron Spencer.
The use of slippers a a form of punishment in comics was beginning to die down a bit in the '80's, but Roger the Dodger still uses it, or he almost does anyway! Frank McDiarmid drew Roger at this point and although I liked Frank's work I don't like his version of Roger, as I don't think it really suits the strip.
Over the page however was Jim Petrie's version of Minnie the Minx, which is a style I do like! I really like Jim's action drawings, he can capture movement really well! He once stated that he often studied his children in the back garden, and took what they did into his drawings!
Lord Snooty had a good Christmas strip this week, with lots of snow and a good festive story! Also intresting on this page is the advertisement for overseas subscriptions, which is something we only usually see in small print.
Little Plum and Biffo the Bear usually share the same page, but Biffo missed out on the Christmas issue because he is replaced by an advert for three of that years annuals - The Beezer, Dennis the Menace and The Topper.
The Three Bears started out as background characters in Little Plum but were so popular that they got their very own strip (just like Dave the Squirrel) in 1959. The artist on the 80's version was Bob McGrath, and this strip ends with a great classic ending - the slap up feed!
I'll be taking a look at another Christmas comic soon, so stay tuned!
