Shiver and Shake arrived on
the newsstands nearly 40 years ago, the first issue had the cover date of 10th March,
1973. It joined the family of IPC children’s funnies of which there were four
until then – COR!!, WHIZZER AND CHIPS,
KNOCKOUT and BUSTER, the latter aimed
at a slightly older age group.
 |
| Front cover of the first issue |
Shiver and Shake was an
attempt to exploit two concepts that were going down well with the young buyer
of comics in the UK at that time: horror comedy was becoming increasingly
popular in IPC comics, and the Whizzer and Chips concept of two
comics in one was proving a big success. The new comic was a combination of the
two: it was a ‘two in one’ paper that had horror comedy as the dominant theme.
The name of
the new publication must have rung a few bells to readers of COR!! because a strip with the same
name appeared in the comic for half a year in 1972-73. You can read a review of
the strip in one of my COR!! posts
here. The review also attempts to explain the
complicated mutations that led to Shake the comic strip spook becoming Shiver
the cover star of the new paper and lending its original comic strip name to an
elephant, his cover co-star in SHIVER
AND SHAKE the comic. The section of SHIVER the spook represented the ‘main’
comic, while that of SHAKE the elephant was the ‘pull-out’ section. Unlike Sid
and Shiner in WHIZZER AND CHIPS,
both SHIVER AND SHAKE cover stars
got along nicely and there was hardly any rivalry between them, so the whole
two-comics-in-one gimmick was a bit fabricated.
Inside, the
new paper offered a strong roster of strips and characters. The editors saw the focus on horror comedy as
a good excuse to revive several monster characters from the bygone days. First
and foremost was Frankie Stein created by Ken Reid for WHAM! nearly a decade ago and last seen in 1967. The second was of
course Grimly Feendish – another Odhams old-timer from WHAM! and later SMASH! The best-forgotten of the ‘oldies’ was probably Ghouldilocks
that had enjoyed a brief appearance in the short-lived JAG comic in the late 6os. One great thing about the resurrections
was that they were all new episodes rather than reprints of old material (with the
odd exception). SHIVER AND SHAKE played
the horror theme for all it was worth with a whole array of new strips such as Horrornation
Street, The Duke’s Spook, The Hand and Soggy the Sea Monster. Two
of the new horror comedy strips deserve a special mention because they were so successful
that they continued elsewhere for years after SHIVER AND SHAKE folded. I am referring to The Scream Inn and Sweeny
Toddler. Ken Reid contributed Creepy
Creations on the back page, warming-up to do the long-running series
of World-Wide
Weirdies pinups in WHOOPEE! later on.
The ‘scary’
stuff was mostly in the Shiver section of the comic. The Shake pull-out section
was more in the traditional vein of IPC children’s funnies. Two of the strips stood
out as really good: Lolly Pop and Match of the Week, the latter
occupied the centre pages and was undoubtedly one of the highlights of the
paper. The package was spiced-up with mystery adventure serials in the Shiver
section, a total of 6 during the run of the comic.
Artwork was
contributed by IPC’s top talent: Robert Nixon (SHIVER AND SHAKE is my personal favourite period of his work), Mike
Lacey, Terry Bave, Sid Burgon, Tom
Paterson, Tom Williams, Ken Reid, Norman Mansbridge, Brian Walker and others.
All, in
all, the comic was full of excellent strips and reviewing them here will be
great fun. The comic may have been conceived as an imitation of Whizzer
and Chips, but it was a lot more than that. To me, it stands out
amongst its contemporaries because of the robust line-up of fresh characters. Whizzer
and Chips had a much longer life than Shiver and Shake but looking
at random issues of the two titles from 1973 or 1974, I can say that if I had
to choose, I’d have certainly supported the latter with my pocket money.
Here are the bare facts:
Published every Monday by IPC
Magazines Ltd., Fleetway House, Farrington Street, London EC4A 4AD
First issue: Monday 10th
March, 1973
Last issue: Monday 5th
October, 1974
The period
covers 83 weeks but only 79 issues were published: none appeared in July 1974 due
to strike action by certain printers that IPC were using at the time.
The issues
weren’t numbered on the front cover, but Creepy Creations on the back were.
Differently from the majority of other IPC comics, this offers the convenience
of referring to individual issues by the number rather than the date.
Format: 22 x 28
cms (traditional IPC comics size).
Priced 4p
Printed by Fleetway
Printers
Page count:
-
issue Nos. 1 to 43: 36 pages
-
issue Nos. 44 to 79: 32 pages
Free gifts and pull-outs:
Issue
No. 1 – 10th March, 1973: Free Practical Joke - which one will YOU
get? - Trick Stick of…Liquorice / Joke…Pencil / Joke Chocolate Biscuit /
Trick…Tea Spoon
Issue
No. 2 – 17th March, 1973: Super Spooky Screamer
Issue
No. 3 – 24th March, 1973: Free Glow Fun Stickers
Issue
No. 53 – 9th March, 1974: Frankie Stein's Mini Monster Comic Book
Pt. 1
Issue
No. 54 – 16th March, 1974: Frankie Stein's Mini Monster Comic Book
Pt. 2
Issue
No. 55 – 23rd March, 1974: Frankie Stein's Mini Monster Comic Book
Pt. 3
Issue
No. 56 – 30th March, 1974: Frankie Stein's Mini Monster Comic Book
Pt. 4
Annuals: 13
editions from 1974 till 1986
Holiday Specials: 8 editions
from 1973 till 1980
Merged into WHOOPEE! that became WHOOPEE! and SHIVER AND SHAKE on 12th
October, 1974. The last combined issue of WHOOPEE!
and SHIVER AND SHAKE had the cover date of 18th October, 1975 (No. 82).
