SERIALISED FACEACHE STORIES – PART SEVEN: HOT AIR

Faceache story arch No. 7 by Ken Reid was called Hot Air and appeared in Buster and Monster Fun issues cover dated 27 January and 3 February 1979. It went like this:

Mr. Snipe asks Faceache to nip to the store room and bring him some ink, a ruler and some blotting paper for his next class. On his way back, Faceache finds the door to the room holding the school’s hot-air central heating system. 

He crawls down the vents planning to flip ink pellets and splat the teacher. Mr. Snipe tells his class how anyone of a rotten evil disposition will be singled-out and mercilessly smitten from above (it was a Bible class). Faceache’s ink lands on the teacher’s face. 

Hiding in the vents, Faceache hopes he’ll never be suspected. Meanwhile, hot-air heating system cleaners call to offer their services to the Headmaster…

Cleaners seal the vents and start cleaning the system. Faceache is forced to scrunge to streamline himself against the blast but looses control of his scrunge muscles. 

He crashes out of the system right into Mr. Snipe’s classroom. The teacher realises it was Faceache who fired the ink pallet and gives the scrunged Faceache a thrashing with Faceache’s upper body sticking from the vent in one room and his rear end from another five classrooms away…

Characters are © Rebellion Publishing Ltd

Click on the POWER PACK banner in the right-hand column and get your copy of the POWER PACK OF KEN REID - the deluxe two-volume set of Ken’s strips in WHAM!, SMASH! and POW! comics of the ‘60s. 

FUDGE AND SPECK STORIES BY KEN REID

An additional benefit of being the publisher of the Power Pack of Ken Reid is that people are contacting me with details of Reid-related items in their collections. Some time ago I received an email from Patrick Herman who found photocopies of a few complete Fudge and Speck stories printed in the Manchester Evening News.

I have all the Fudge annuals published in the ‘40s and ‘50s by University of London Press as well as both Savoy reprint books published in 1981. The stories that Patrick has found while cleaning his attic are Fudge and the Micromen, Speck’s Inventions, Fudge and the Enchanted Island, Speck’s Fossil Hunt, plus two untitled adventures of Fudge, and none are included in the collected editions, so it’s great to see those forgotten fantasy tales from the early years of Ken’s career that appear to have been hugely popular back in the day.

Below are images of four beautiful covers of the annuals from University of London Press, followed by scans of a few pages with clippings of Fudge and the Micromen that Patrick has posted to me. 

Click on the POWER PACK banner in the right-hand column and get your copy of the POWER PACK OF KEN REID - the deluxe two-volume set of Ken’s strips in WHAM!, SMASH! and POW! comics of the ‘60s. 

Remember that all buyers who order their books by the end of 2018 will receive free prints of Ken’s original Frankie Stein artwork – 2 prints (one complete episode) per book, or 4 prints (2 complete episodes) per two-volume set.

SERIALISED FACEACHE STORIES – PART SIX: THRASHBOTTOM TAKES ACTION TO PROTECT HIS CAREER

Faceache story arch No. 6 can be found in BUSTER issues cover-dated 25 November and 2 December, 1978, so it is almost exactly 40 years old today. Faceache doesn’t get to do much scrunging in this story, and it goes like this:

Late at night Faceache is practicing some leg-and-foot scrunges in the school grounds… 

Mr. Snipe discovers monstrous footprints in the morning and devises a plan of dispensing with the mysterious brute. He puts Faceache in charge of shooting the monster down when it falls into the old school well and shoots up on the coiled spring that Mr. Snipe has installed at the bottom. The Teach pompously shares his plan with the Headmaster:

Anxious that Mr. Snipe’s ambition might be to get him fired and steal his job, Albert Thrashbottom gets filled with hate and resentment...

On guard out in the school grounds, Faceache hears something inhuman approaching…

Headmaster is determined to nab the fiend first and steal Mr. Snipe’s glory. Faceache tries to warn the fool of the danger but Headmaster ignores the kid and walks straight into the trap. Upon seeing something zoom out of the well, Mr. Snipe commands Faceache’s to shoot it, with predictable consequences:

Characters are © Rebellion Publishing Ltd

Click on the POWER PACK banner in the right-hand column and get your copy of the POWER PACK OF KEN REID - the deluxe two-volume set of Ken’s strips in WHAM!, SMASH! and POW! comics of the ‘60s. 

Remember that all buyers who order their books by the end of 2018 will receive free prints of Ken’s original Frankie Stein artwork – 2 prints (one complete episode) per book, or 4 prints (2 complete episodes) per two-volume set.

SERIALISED FACEACHE STORIES – PART FIVE: INITIATIVE TEST

The Flying Floogle of Frogmorton

Faceache goes on a scrunging spree in this next two-part story printed in BUSTER issues cover-dated 7th and 14th October 1978.

Mr. Snipe tells his pupils that they will have to take an initiative test:

Faceache decides to scrunge his way to Boggartsville. Police officers take a series of phone call reports from terrified villagers about fiends and unearthly atrocities as Faceache tries to reach his destination scrunged into the Fangy-Faced Freak from Frodham, then the Speedy-Swimming Frumpton Froggiefish and then the Flying Floogle of Frogmorton:

Terrified, police Sergeant telephones the nearest army bases…

The Army take action, believing Faceache is an invading alien from outer space…

Back at Belmonte school, Faceache chases Mr. Snipe for arranging the “rousing reception” at Boggartsville…

Characters are © Rebellion Publishing Ltd

Click on the POWER PACK banner in the right-hand column and get your copy of the POWER PACK OF KEN REID - the deluxe two-volume set of Ken’s strips in WHAM!, SMASH! and POW! comics of the ‘60s. 

Remember that all buyers who order their books by the end of 2018 will receive free prints of Ken’s original Frankie Stein artwork – 2 prints (one complete episode) per book, or 4 prints (2 complete episodes) per two-volume set.