Shiver and Shake Annual 1986

Today I thought I’d share a few pages from the 1986 Shiver and Shake annual. Other than being the last S+S annual to hit the shelves, there’s nothing particularly significant about it. But I thought I’d share some pages because it is simply a fantastic and beautiful comic, really showcasing the talent of the day. Artists inside included Martin Baxendale, Tom Paterson, Terry Bave, Sid Burgon, Jack Edward Oliver — I could go on.

The full colour pages were also stunning, and among the best full colour I’ve ever seen in a Fleetway comic. Here are the front and rear endpapers, illustrated by Roy Mitchell who signed his pages as ‘Mitch’. 

For a comic from 1986, quite a few pages were printed in full colour. For their £2.50, readers were given 96 pages (counting the covers), 16 of which were in full colour. A good number more had either blue or red ink.

One of the more bizarre inside pages was this Jumbo Jesters page, featuring various photos of an elephant — elephants of course being the ‘Shake’ part of the comic. I have so many questions. Is it a real elephant? Where did they get a real elephant? How did they get a real elephant on a bus?

Another good page is this Desert Fox puzzle board game. Elsewhere in the book the Desert Fox strip is illustrated by Terry Bave, but this spread is instead by Jack Edward Oliver.

Trevor Metcalfe also had a few pages. Here’s a nice Ghoul Getters Ltd strip. Metcalfe was an expert at motion - just look at the slamming doors or the man spinning around at top speed! It makes me dizzy just looking…

As I said, there’s no shortage of great pages to share and I could easily go on, but I’ll wrap things up with this Lolly Pop strip by Sid Burgon. The Fleetway annuals from this time are relatively common and usually pretty cheap, so I would definitely recommend picking them up if you come across any.

The Last Ever Buster (2000)

 

I can't believe I've never made a post about surely one of the most significant issues of a British comic - the final issue of Buster. Buster was the last survivor of a Fleetway comic, and for me this final issue is a sad marker for the end of an era. 

For 32 pages for £1.10, it was probably the price that killed it to be honest. It was more than twice the price of The Beano (which cost 52p) at this point, and the quality simply wasn't as good.

Credit where credit is due, I do like this front cover. The main Buster strip is a reprint by Jimmy Hansen, but that bar on the left showing Buster's different styles through the years is by Jack Edward Oliver. Oliver was the sole artist held on at Buster after the comic went full reprint. Mostly, he was responsible for lettering and adding drawings to things that couldn't be done with reprints. I think it would be fair to say that he was largely influential for Buster's unique feel over those final years.

As mentioned, the contents was full of reprints but out of interest and the fact that they're still fun comic strips, I'll show some of it anyway. Perhaps of most interest would be this Specky Hector Comics Collector page, illustrated by Lew Stringer. This was obviously chosen for this last issue as it discusses the launch of Buster back in 1960.

Here's an oddly interesting page - a competition with a whole range of Meccano sets were up for grabs. I say this is odd because it seems strange to me that you would have a competition in the final issue, especially so when there's no other comic they were trying to drive readers to. Perhaps there was simply a pile of Meccano sitting around the office that they needed to get rid of.

Moving on to this Sweeny Toddler strip, illustrated by Tom Paterson. I wanted to share this page to highlight the colouring style that was so prevalent in Buster throughout the 1990s. This strange block colouring was far from the prettiest colouring ever done, but it did give the comic a unique feel and allowed them to brand it as full colour.

Here's an example of a perhaps more well-coloured spread. Bobby's Ghoul is illustrated by Anthony Hutchings, and Watford Gapp by Tom Paterson in a completely different style. I interviewed Tom for issue three of Atomic Comic a few years ago and asked him about this style, this is what he said:

"Bob Paynter, the managing editor at Fleetway, asked me to come up with a few ideas for some strange, slightly weird strips, one of which was Watford Gapp, and I just thought that it needed an alternative style to give it a different, darker look from my other strips which were running at the same time. I've worked in a number of styles over the years, but I enjoyed the Sweeny Toddler/ Calamity James style, which was of course inspired by the legendary comic genius Leo Baxendale - and the Watford Gapp one, which was influenced by the amazing Robert Crumb."

And finally, it is of course the back cover that everybody remembers from this issue. Illustrated by Jack Edward Oliver, it's a wonderfully unique piece that wraps up all the remaining characters in a comedic fashion. Sad as it may be, it was a fantastic way to wrap up the comic.

Buster Enters 1982

Firstly, my apologies for not having blogged for a while but the reason for that was because I was moving house. But I'm back now and let's kick-start things again with a celebratory New Year's special Buster comic, celebrating the transition from 1981 to 1982.

Buster's story appeared just inside the front cover with terrific artwork as always by Reg Parlett.

The next page is home to Deadly Headly, who celebrates his New Year by going undercover at the circus! Artwork by Martin Baxendale.

Billy Blow was an interesting strip about a boy with the most incredible lungs in the world. Artwork here is by Rob Lee.

Next up is Master Mind, a fantastic strip by Jack Edward Oliver. I believe this is Jack's personal favourite strip, and it's not hard to see why - it's fun and interactive alongside good quality scripts.

And finally, here's the two-page S.O.S. Squad from this issue, with absolutely fantastic artwork coming from the pen of Mike Lacey.

That wraps up the look at this comic and probably also Wacky Comics for the year, seeing as we've only one full day of 2013 left. So I wish all of the readers of my blog a very happy New Year and I'll see you all again when normal blogging service resumes in 2014!

Another Halloween Buster (1987)

Looking through my collection to find Halloween themed issues I was surprised to see how few I had. Halloween (in comics at least) hasn't really become common until quite recently when it started to slowly replace the fireworks issues. They don't begin until the late 1980's (although The Beano did have a few before this date, and possibly also The Dandy), I can't say for certain why the fireworks issues slowly decreased but I suspect it was due to the fact that they are considered too dangerous or something, but after the late 1980's fireworks only appeared in the backgrounds, or at "safe distances" from the characters. 

One Halloween comic I did find is this 1987 Buster and Nipper issue. At this point Buster himself was illustrated by Tom Paterson, and it must be said he did a cracking job with this story. It would be really nice to see the whole strip in full colour, but oh well - we can't have everything!

The actual number of Halloween themed strips is bitterly disappointing. In fact, there are only two strips especially themed for the occasion, another couple that always have "scary" theme (Beastenders and Dracula Dobbs, and possibly also Faceache) and the advertised pull-out mask. The other themed strip was, as could be guessed at, by Jack Edward Oliver, and it was his Vid Kid strip. Again, this would look nicer in full-colour, but it would be several years before it obtained that, and even then it was only very cheap block colouring.

And finally, here's something that is full colour - the mask on the centre spread! Feel free to print it out and wear it - if you dare!!! Art looks to be by Tom Paterson, and you may also notice that this is the mask Buster is wearing in his own strip. Look again if you don't believe me!

And that brings us to the end of the Halloween themed posts that this blog has to offer for the year. But don't fret - we only have a few days to wait until the much loved fireworks night which means, of course, fireworks comics! Keep checking back for more!

Whoopee #500!

Not too long ago I chanced upon no other than issue #500 of Whoopee, a landmark issue for a comic that sadly by this point was slowly drifting towards its untimely demise. Number 500, which doubled up as the fireworks issue, came out dated 5th November 1983 and, as you can see on the image above, cleverly used the number '500' in its logo. The strapline 'Whoopee Celebrates' may have been slightly exaggerated though, as you will soon see.

Moving on inside, and the first mention that this is even a special issue doesn't appear until page nine, where Frankie Stein announces it as part of a competition to win, you guessed it, 500 prizes!

The achievement was mentioned just once more, on the letters page where the solution to the 500-clue crossword that had appeared over the previous four issues took up the bottom half of the page.

But fear not, for I shall not be ending this post without a couple of comic strips, even if they weren't celebrating or even mentioning this landmark issue or, as a matter of fact, fireworks (the only fireworks related things were the mask on the centre spread and the fireworks safety code on the letters page). First up, is Calculator Kid, which I am showing simply because the Charlie's Dad has got to be the owner of the finest moustache in comics! As always Terry Bave illustrates it, and it is followed by Calculator Corner by Jack Edward Oliver.

And finally, I leave you with this - a nice two-page Bumpkin Billionaires strip neatly illustrated by Mike Lacey.

Junior Rotter Holiday Special (1986)

A fantastic, bright, well-drawn, attention grabbing cover!

The time has come to take another look at a holiday special. This one has a lengthy title: Whizzer and Chips Presents Junior Rotter Holiday Special, and it went on sale in the summer of 1986 for 65p. For sixty-five of your pennies you got 64 pages of comics, puzzles and posters and eight of those pages were in full colour. The paper is also of a much higher quality than other specials, printed entirely on smooth glossy paper throughout, similar to the type the Beano is printed on now (although I've forgotten what it's called).

As the name suggests, the comic is based around the popular Chips centre spread character Junior Rotter, who was illustrated by Trevor Metcalfe. Whereas most of the special is filled with reprints, there is some new stuff in there both from Trevor and Jack Edward Oliver. It starts of with a new strip by Trevor, revealing how J.R and his family went from rags to riches. As it turns out, it was all one of J.R's get-rich-quick schemes.

Now, for those of you who are unfamiliar with this character, Junior Rotter was a sort of American Roger the Dodger who appeared in the Chips section of Whizzer and Chips. J.R was based on the character J.R. Ewing from the television show Dallas, who also wore a big cowboy hat. Each week our J.R would try various schemes to get out of school, dodge work and win money in some crazy ways! He was a very popular character, appearing on the centre spread of Chips each week and even continuing in reprints through to the very last issue of Buster. He really was one of Fleetway's greatest characters, up there with Sweeny Toddler and Joker! Here are a couple of examples of his strips, reprinted in this holiday special.

One of the highlights in the comic is the centre spread, as it displays a wonderful full colour poster called "The Dreams Of J.R.", illustrated by Trevor Metcalfe. In a way, his first dream came true, as on the back page of the last Buster he turned good and became Prime Minister, although how that happened I don't know as he was born and lived in America. 

Jack Edward Oliver drew quite a few puzzles throughout the comic, but my favourite is this very attention grabbing board game, called J.R.'s Jet Race Game. It was very similar to most board games; the first player to get from the start to the finish wins; in this case a free ticket for a flight on Concorde (no, not really - just in the game!). It's very good fun and would definitely pass some time on holiday, which is what the special is designed to do!

This holiday special has always been one of my favourites and I've read it many times, and as a result it's beginning to fall apart, but that's really no surprise looking at the quality of the stuff that's inside.

Cliff Hanger Takes The Front Page

Following on from yesterday's post (which can be found here), the next character to take the front cover spot was Cliff Hanger, on issue dated 20th May 1994. The colours, particularly the fire and the shading, are excellent with this cover, and was coloured by the strips artist - Jack Edward Oliver. As far as I'm aware, this was the only time Cliff ever appeared on the front cover, and one of the only times he had two pages (there were a few other episodes). 

Now, before you continue, can you correctly guess the answer?

Other posts in this series:

Tom Thug

Chalky

X-Ray Specs

Captain Crucial

Spotlight On An Artist: Jack Edward Oliver

Jack Edward Oliver, or JEO as he called himself (and sometimes even just J. Edward Oliver), was the man behind brilliant cartoons such as Cliff Hanger, Vid Kid and Master Mind.

Jack was always intrested in comics and cartoons, and by the age of eight he was drawing his own comic books. His first published work however, wasn't until 1968 when he drew Instant Garbage, which was a full colour humour magazine published by himself. It cost 1/6 and was made up of lots of writing and drawings, ending up to be 16 pages long. It was because of this magazine that got him his coloum - The Instant Garbage Coloum - in Disc. I don't own a copy of Instant Garbage, but here's a scan from a JEO fan site, which I'll link at the bottom.

Disc was a music magazine, as was Music Echo, which he also drew for. In it he drew the hugely popular strip Fresco, which expanded to a full page when the magazine later became Record Mirror. Apart from drawing Fresco, he also started writing more, and had a few other comic strips in the publication, such as Toppo D' Popps.




Record Mirror folded in 1977, and that was when Jack took to comics! There was a massive choice to aim for in the late '70's, and in the end he was hired by IPC media. He took a shot at drawing The Champ - completely breaking away the Baxendale style Champ had been drawn in for so many years, and drew him in his own way. JEO's strips appeared in many different comics including Buster, Whoopee and Whizzer and Chips. Cliff Hanger was probably his most succesful, and some eagle-eyed readers noticed that the number of Cliff's shirt was the episode number! Obviously this failed when they started reprinting the strips in a random order!

Sadly, in 2007 he was diagnosed with cancer, and died in May that year. In 2010, a plaque was placed on his house in his memory. It read: "World Famous - Jack Edward Oliver - 1942 - 2007 - Lived Here - Underpaid Cartoonist".

Jack also has a fan site, which you can visit by following the link below:

http://www.jeoliver.co.uk/

UPDATE:


As mentioned in the comments, Peter Gray posted some of Jack's original Cliff Hanger work on his site. Here it is, with a puzzle to keep you going right from the first box! On the shaceship it reads 'SYADSEUT HSILOBA', which, as Niblet managed to work out, is 'ABOLISH TUESDAYS' backwards!

And if you wish to view the stamps we were talking about, head on over to http://www.philstampcovers.co.uk/ . All of Jack's are May 2007 and before.