This week we head back in the comic time machine to 1978, to pick up the third issue of Target comic, a poorly produced comic published by Polystyle Publications. It cost 10p, which wasn't cheap, but you did get five pages of (just-about) full colour, plus the strips were based on popular television shows, so the licence might have pushed up the price.
I've already covered an issue of Target before (which you can read here), so I'll try to show strips here that I didn't show last time. That means I'll start with the strip Hazell, which was a new television programme at the time of this comics release, but the strip is well drawn and written, much better than other strips in the comic.
I showed this last time, but I do like the artwork on Kojak so I'll show it again. Most strips in British comics were no longer than two pages long a week, and Kojak's strip is the longest in the comic, a grand four pages of him! The artist is Jon Davis.
Cannon In Danger Rig is the shortest strip in Target, at just two pages long it is quick compared to every other story in the comic. This was based on the television series Cannon, which had actually ended over two years earlier, but I suppose they must have seen it as a suitable programme to use, after all it did run for a good five years.
This comic ends with a two-page article about Kojak star Telly Savalas.
Target, not to be confused with the New English Library version of the early 1970's, was launched in April 1978 by Polystyle Publications, with the second issue coming out on the 21st. At 10p, it was two pence more than Fleetway's titles, but it did feature comic strips based around televisions most popular shows of the time (meaning that the publishers would have needed a licence, pushing up the price). Some of the most well known characters are mentioned on the front cover, stars such as Kojak, Charlie's Angels and Starsky and Hutch.
The first feature to appear inside (after a full page request to reserve a copy of Target each week) was a chance to win a 'Starsky and Hutch Electronic Walkie Talkie'. Unfortunatly, it's now a bit too late to enter.
The first actual comic strip has the same name comic it appeared in (which was actually named after a T.V. show starring Patrick Mower), and was in "full colour". It's not actually full colour, with different parts of the strip coloured using four main colours - red, yellow, green and purple. To be perfectly honest the colouring throughout the entire comic is awful, even on the front cover!
The centre pages are taken up by Kojak, a cop with a taste for lollipops! Going by the drug refrences in the story, it looks as though Target was aimed at a slightly older audience than other comics.
I generally like the high speed artwork of the strip. Although sketchy in places, I think Jon Davis has done a great job with his character!
The other full colour strip was Charlie's Angels. With poor artwork and awful colouring the strip becomes hard to follow, so is probably the worst story in the comic. Here is the first page.
The back page was taken up with an advertisment for Happy Faces biscuits which were giving away free skateboard stickers. This ad was clearly designed to be printed in full colour, but ended up looking awful in black and white.
With a bigger budget Target could have lasted on the market, but with poor colouring all through the comic the title didn't make twenty weeks, folding into TV Comic after just 19 issues.
