Shiver the
spook waited on the old Duke and they got along well until the Duke decided he
needed a new butler and hired Grimes, an experienced professional. The
toffee-nosed newcomer and the resident spook instantly became rivals and foes,
both eager to get into the Duke’s good books. Neither the spook nor the butler was
a model servant: Shiver was a lazy glutton, while Grimes never missed an
opportunity to make some money at the Duke’s expense.
Grimes was
mean towards Shiver and used different tricks to get rid of him but his schemes often backfired and landed Grimes in trouble with the Duke whose sympathies were
usually with the spook. A few months into the run the antagonism between Shiver
and Grimes acquired an extra dimension because Shiver became obsessed with
pinching food (just like his old self in COR!!), while Grimes concentrated on
making sure that the spook was kept well away from grub.
On a few
rare occasions the two rivals put their differences aside and joined forces for
a common cause:
As it was
already mentioned a few times in this series, Shiver had his roots in COR!!
comic that was still around during most of SHIVER AND SHAKE’s lifetime. It is
nice to see the artist plug the sister publication by putting it into the hands
of the former COR!! character in this set from issue SHIVER AND SHAKE No. 31
(6th October, 1973):
The b/w feature
was illustrated by Arthur Martin who was later replaced by another artist whose
name I don’t know. The Duke’s Spook didn’t miss a single issue but failed to
survive merger with WHOOPEE! in the autumn of 1974. The caption beneath the
last episode in Shiver and Shake
No. 79, however, announced that Shiver was to appear in WHOOPEE! AND SHIVER AND
SHAKE. After the merger the character starred on the front cover of SHIVER AND
SHAKE section of the new combined comic until it was dropped early in 1976.
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