welcome and enjoy!

Hi and welcome to my blog about comics from other people’s childhood! It is dedicated primarily to British humour comics of the 60s and 70s. The reason they are not from my childhood is simply because I didn’t live in the UK back then (nor do I live there now). I knew next to nothing about them until fairly recently but since then I’ve developed a strong liking for the medium and amassed a large collection, including a number of complete or near complete sets. My intention is to use this blog as a channel for sharing my humble knowledge about different titles, favourite characters and creators as I slowly research my collection.

QUICK TIP: this blog is a sequence of posts covering one particular comic at a time. The sequence follows a certain logic, so for maximum results it is recommended that the blog is read from the oldest post up.

Copyright of all images and quotations used here is with their respective owners. Any such copyrighted material is used exclusively for educational purposes and will be removed at first notice. All other text copyright Irmantas P.



Saturday, March 16, 2013

MORE FRANKIE STEIN BY ROBERT NIXON



Robert Nixon did so many excellent Frankie Stein sets in SHIVER AND SHAKE that I found it difficult to decide which ones to include in my two previous posts dedicated to the friendly monster. As a consequence, there are several episodes which I scanned but didn’t use. Here are two to celebrate the madness of Frankie Stein and the beauty of Mr. Nixon’s art:

From SHIVER AND SHAKE No. 40 cover dated December 8th, 1973


From SHIVER AND SHAKE No. 51 cover dated February 23rd, 1974:


I have saved two more for later...

6 comments:

  1. Its great to see these...it shows Robert Nixon also did a good job on Frankie...Robert was always saying he enjoyed drawing it with Kid Kong...

    Well done Robert..

    Peter Gray

    ReplyDelete
  2. Brilliant. I always tend to go more for Reid's version and skip past Nixon's work. Clearly a mistake as your post shows some excellent Nixon work. I have a full run of S and S and so will be digging these stories out to have another look.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Whizzer & Chips dated 16/3/74 featured a guest Frankie Strip from Wham (as evidenced by Reid's unmistakeable artwork and the size of the strip), and has Micky in it not redacted for a change. If you'd like anything looked up in Colindale Newspaper Library I'm more than open to requests!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Stephen, the episode in Whizzer and Chips dated 16/3/74 is indeed a reprint from WHAM! No. 69 dated 9th Oct., 1965. Not only was Micky not removed but nearly all of the original text was left intact, except for the last speech baloon from Micky. The original reads like this: "Hee-Hee! If the frog whose brain Frankie's got hadn't snuffed it, I reckon it would have become the next Prime Minister." The Whizzer and Chips version is entirely different: "You gotta hand it to Frankie - he really gives you food for thought! Snigger!"

      Thanks for your kind offer to look things up in Colindale Newspaper Library. Do you possibly have Irish edition of Sunday Express for which Ken Reid drew competitions in the 60s? I would very much like to see what they were about.

      Delete
  4. Hi,

    In the sense you mean I’m not a collector but I am passionate about the promotion of classic British comics. This coming from someone with no PC and only Colindale for access to happy memories! People want to know, I believe, things like: who came first Sheerluck and Son or their lookalikes Piggy Malone and Charley Farley? Metcalfe’s creations were first seen 29/7/78 nearly six years after Piggy and Charley had been televised. It’s a massive bugbear of mine that, for instance, fans of Messrs Corbett and Barker can look up broadcast dates whenever they like, but can it be so readily determined that The Slimms made the move to Whizzer & Chips on 29/6/74? No. And that’s wrong. Pat Mills and Kevin O’Neill mightn’t remember IPC’s juvenile output very fondly, and Viz might well mock a kid catching a crook and ending up with a bundle of cash (admittedly a recurring theme), but these titles are a part of our heritage and shouldn’t be forgotten.

    I’m glad your website and others one exist to redress the balance and I’m happy to help within my limitations. As for looking up Ken Reid in the Irish Times I’m willing to try but not sure where to start!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I misread your first message and thought perhaps you were an employee of Colindale Libraray :)
      I completely understand what you mean and agree that classic British comics are seriously underpromoted and deserve more attention than they are getting. Fortunately, things are slowly changing for the better - when I started collectig some five+ years ago, information on the web was scarce. Now one can find quite a few good sources. And I am sure more will emerge in the course of time.
      As for the Irish edition of Sunday Express, I am not sure where to start either. Perhaps ask a Colindale librarian if they have collected editions of the publication and go from there?

      Delete