A LOOK AT SHIVER & SHAKE STRIPS: JAIL BIRDS

Jail Birds was another short-lived strip about a cat and two caged budgies, both of whom were named Bluey.  The cat kept the two birds hoping to fatten them up for his Christmas dinner. He made no effort to hide his plans from the budgies and jailbreak was the only way for them to avoid the fate. They tried everything but luck was always against them, no matter how sophisticated the escape plots were. 

Jail Birds started in the first edition of SHIVER AND SHAKE and continued until No. 36 missing 6 issues in between (Nos. 10, 18, 21, 23, 24, 28). The illustrator’s name is unknown to me.

I expected the series to end with a spectacular break into freedom at Christmas (or maybe with the cat and the budgies becoming buddies), but the story was put to rest quite abruptly 7 weeks before the Holidays when the cat decided he didn’t want to wait any more and declared that today was Xmas day on his calendar. Under the circumstances, any escape plan had to work or else the young reader would have been faced with a disturbing ending... Did the writer run out of jailbreak ideas or was the feature doing poorly in the popularity charts – we’ll never know for sure. Here is the last episode from SHIVER AND SHAKE No. 36 (November 1oth 1973): 

A LOOK AT SHIVER & SHAKE STRIPS: TOUGH NUTT AND SOFTY CENTRE

Tough Nutt was a tough kid who liked fried tree roots and nail sauce for breakfast; he was so tough he flew his kite on barbed wire and used a boat mast for a fishing rod. Softy Centre was a cissy who could throw a fit in front of his parents if his milk was half-a-degree too warm; he was so weak that his weight registered as 'nothing' on the scales and he preferred using a ping-pong ball when playing golf because he didn't have the strength to hit his golf ball off the tee.

Neither were appealing characters at first: Tough Nutt was a nasty bully and Softy Centre a weakling and a spoilt brat. Very soon, however, the disagreeable side of Softy’s character vanished and was replaced with some positive traits, including even the nerve to stand up against Tough Nutt. The showing-off ruffian that he was, Tough Nutt always tried to tease and push Softy Centre around in order to have some fun at his expense but Softy had more brains and was luckier than the bully so he usually came out on top and Tough Nutt always ended up as a looser. 

Illustrated by Norman Mansbridge, Tough Nutt and Softy Centre must have been popular with the readers of SHIVER AND SHAKE. This is confirmed by the fact that the feature didn’t miss a single week and continued as a two-pager after the pagecount reduction of 1974 and during the weeks when extra pages were allocated to Frankie Stein pull-out booklet and Whoopee! ads. Was it because readers liked to see a frail kid outsmarting a bully or standing up to him every week? Probably so.

Tough Nutt and Softy Centre was not considered good enough to make it to the combined WHOOPEE! AND SHIVER AND SHAKE. The pair met for the last time in the final issue of SHIVER AND SHAKE in which Tough Nutt suffered a concussion and lost his memory. Softy was quick to take advantage of the situation:

A LOOK AT SHIVER & SHAKE STRIPS: DAMSEL IN DISTRESS

Turning the page, we enter the zone of a few not-so-interesting strips that occupied the remaining pages of SHAKE section in the first issue of the magazine, and Damsel in Distress is first in line. There is nothing really wrong with them, it’s just that they are a little bit too traditional for my taste :) 

As the title suggests, the feature exploited the theme of a Fair Maiden imprisoned in a high tower surrounded by a deep moat, and her wannabe rescuer noble Sir Knight whose rescuing schemes always failed and sent him ‘back to ye drawing board’. The Knight’s nagging steed was the third recurring character who didn’t think much of his master’s ‘stupid efforts’ to save ‘that wailing woman’. 

Damsel in Distress started in SHIVER AND SHAKE No. 1 and continued until the first issue of 1974 (No. 44). The regular illustrator was Trevor Metcalfe who appears to have taken a few weeks’ break in the Autumn of 1973 when the strip was either not included at all or drawn by other artists who I think were Les Barton, Terry Bave and Robert Nixon. It is difficult to tell for sure because illustrations in the episodes are rather basic (mostly buildings, trees and a bloke in a coat of armour – nothing much to go by). The strip missed 7 weeks during its run and was not included in issues 21, 24, 29, 31, 33, 34 and 36.