SCREAM INN IN... THE DANDY!

 

The year was 1989, around Halloween. 12 years had passed since Brian Walker’s last episode of Scream Inn in WHOOPEE! comic. But then out of the blue Innkeeper and his crew made a surprise appearance in THE DANDY cover-dated 4th November 1989 published, of course, by IPC’s competition – DC Thomson! 

A few things had changed since the haunted establishment was last seen more than a decade ago: the sign above the door was gone, and the grand prize of a million pound had shrunk to a mere tenner. Resident spooks had lost their haunting zeal and Smasher easily claimed the prize but Brian Walker clearly had fun going down the memory lane. The pair of spiders was there, as was the centipede and the mysterious evil eyes in the dark corners. Smasher’s snail cheekily commented in the last panel – “Do you ever get the feeling 'I’ve been here before?'...” For some reason, the artist didn’t sign the page with his full name…

 

BRIAN WALKER'S SCREAM INN IN WHOOPEE! - PART THREE (YEAR 1977)

 

Here comes the third - and final - part of Scream Inn guestbook, documenting who and when called at the spooky establishment in 1977 in a bid to win the prize of a million quid.

January 1, 1977         · Sleeping Beauty

January 8, 1977         · Tortoise

January 15, 1977       · Blacksmith

January 22, 1977       · Attila the Hun

 

January 29, 1977       · Red Indian Chief – situation appears to be desperate so the Innkeeper calls his dear old buddy Jack Frost for help 

February 5, 1977       · Lumberjack

February 12, 1977     · A Beautiful Lady Ghost

February 19, 1977     · The Pied Piper

February 26, 1977     · Sidney the Spider – a reader nominates one of the in-house spiders as candidate for the grand prize:

March 5, 1977            · Henry the Eighth – King's treasury is a bit low and he needs the million, but the ghosts of his nagging wives scare him away. 

March 12, 1977          · Road Mender

March 19, 1977          · William Shakespeare – the greatest playwright of all time ends up writing for WHOOPEE! The episode has the last invitation card for readers to suggest a character to spend a night in the haunted bedroom. I like the frame of the card, with the portraits of the Scream Inn Gang. I don't think I've come across the name of the Union-Jack centipede anywhere else - turns out he went by Longfellow (see the bottom of the frame): 

March 26, 1977          · A Speaking Grandfather Clock– this was one of the most unusual characters to call at the Inn… The Scream Inn’s own grandfather clock offers his advice how to get rid of the old tick-tock. 

April 2, 1977              · Psychiatrist. The first panel below shows the Innkeeper as a young lad:

April 9, 1977              · Film Star Berk Reynolds

April 16, 1977            · Thumpty Dumpty. In this Easter episode Humpty Dumpty’s descendant meets his very old ancestor and glues himself inside the broken nutshell in the process of putting it together.  

April 23, 1977            · Professor Nuttymug, builder of the ghost exterminating machine. Scream Inn’s own Iron Maiden Irma (who was known as Old Agata in the SHIVER AND SHAKE run) saves the day. In the first panel below Bertie calls the contraption ‘box of tricks’. Brian Walker’s fans will know Boxatricks – a strip that he illustrated in BUSTER comic, but it didn’t start before August 1979.

April 30, 1977            · R.A.F. Helicopter Pilot

May 7, 1977               · Cowboy

May 14, 1977             · Potter

May 21, 1977             · Caveman

May 28, 1977             · Ghost Train Driver – I hoped it was going to be the vampire from Brian Walker’s old strip in WHOOPEE!, but it looks like it was someone else: 

June 4, 1977               · Clown. The episode features one of Cooky’s pets. The octopus went by Okky in the SHIVER AND SHAKE run though: 

June 11, 1977             · Strong Ghost

June 18, 1977             · James Bond Junior - Agent 003 1/2

June 25, 1977             · Paddy McGinty's Goat 

July 2, 1977                · Smiler – The only guest appearance of a fellow WHOOPEE! character in 1977 – see the full episode HERE.

July 9, 1977                · Ice Cream Man

July 16, 1977              · Jake the Peg - With an Extra Leg. Luckily for the Innkeeper, Cooky’s pet octopus Olly has even more legs. 

July 23, 1977              · The Invisible Man

July 30, 1977              · Big Game Hunter

August 6, 1977           · Famous American Cop

August 13, 1977         · Laughing Policeman

August 20, 1977         · Gymnast 

August 27, 1977         · Company Sergeant Major

September 3, 1977     · Lad Who Bends Things and Makes Them Move Just by Concentrating

September 10, 1977   · Poet Called Lear Who's Got Nothing to Fear

September 17, 1977   · Robert the Bruce

September 24, 1977   · Giant Snail - a heavily-armed man-operated Mechanical Job. It reminds me of one of the monsters in Major Jump Horror Hunter strip in MONSTER FUN COMIC… 

October 1, 1977         · The Innkeeper wins one million pounds. It was the last of the 153 weekly two-pagers in WHOOPEE! comic. Scream Inn gang returned a week later in a new strip called Spooktacular 7 that lasted 42 episodes, till WHOOPEE! cover-dated 22nd July, 1978. Most of the original magic had gone but Brian Walker’s brilliant artwork still made Spooktacular 7 shine, and I plan to cover it in my next blogpost, which hopefully won't take me long to compose. In the meantime, here’s the last episode of Scream Inn: 

Characters are © Rebellion Publishing Ltd

BRIAN WALKER'S SCREAM INN IN WHOOPEE! - PART TWO (YEAR 1976)

Here’s the Scream Inn guestbook for 1976, documenting who called and when. All 52 weekly episodes in WHOOPEE! comic were by the regular artist Brian Walker.

January 3, 1976         · Sleeping Rip Van Winkle. A nice episode with Innkeeper giving a toast to 1976:

January 10, 1976       · Little Jack Horner, super-star of the nursery rhyme world

January 17, 1976       · Manmoon

January 24, 1976       · Abominable Snowman

January 31, 1976       · Berty Blubber - the fattest man in the World

February 7, 1976       · Figure-skating champion

February 14, 1976     · Wally the Woodworm

February 21, 1976     · Scarecrow

February 28, 1976     · Simple Simon. This episode is special because of two reasons: resident spooks often got desperate when the guest turned out to be indifferent to their best efforts, but it was the first - and the only - time that the whole crowd of WHOOPEE! characters showed up to help them. Secondly, the caller actually wins and collects the prize, but then returns it – the lad is really simple minded… 

March 6, 1976            · Innkeeper's Twin. I like this panel with the old mirror trick; note that the two pairs of eyes are also playing the mirror game in the background… 

March 13, 1976          · Dr. Livingstone

March 20, 1976          · Mysto the great mind-reader. The coffin-shaped TV set in the first panel is a nice example of cool industrial design :)

March 27, 1976          · Jack-Of-All-Trades

April 3, 1976              · Fireman. Check out the creepy-crawlies in the foreground:

April 10, 1976            · Rugby player

April 17, 1976            · Dancing bear

April 24, 1976            · Old King Neptune

May 1, 1976               · Cat-Man, American-type comic book super-hero. This one is really full of sound effects, and resident spooks put on their Comic-Con outfits:

May 8, 1976               · Blackbeard the Pirate

May 15, 1976             · Archaeologist

May 22, 1976             · Old King Cole

May 29, 1976             · Demolition Expert

June 5, 1976               · The Great Flyin' Fred - Trapeze Artiste Extraordinaire

June 12, 1976             · Golfer (Brigadier Bunkerton)

June 19, 1976             · Painter. From time to time the artist embellished the strip with nice page-wide panels. Page two of this episode had the first example of that:

June 26, 1976             · Der Red Baron - famous WWI Air Ace. This episode also had a page-wide panel:

July 3, 1976                · Clock maker

July 10, 1976              · A Whoopee! reader. I like the ending of this story and how it smoothly leads to call to action:

July 17, 1976              · Newspaper seller

July 24, 1976              · Cobbler

July 31, 1976              · Toffee-nosed kid. Here the spooks are desperate again, so they summon the ghosts from the mansion of the caller’s Dad:

 

August 7, 1976           · Coalman. Other WHOOPEE! stars made quite a few guest-appearances in the strip in the previous years, but this was only the second time when this happened in 1976 (the first one was in issue of 28th Feb.). Of course, the Bumpkin Billionaires were the least-likely candidates to call at Scream Inn to win some money because their greatest desire was to get rid of the cash they already owned. As could be expected, their scheme to waste a million in this episode didn’t work – see the full episode HERE. 

August 14, 1976         · Lolipop man

August 21, 1976         · Jockey

August 28, 1976         · Toy Boy – The only episode in 1976 when a fellow star from WHOOPEE! tried to win the prize at the suggestion of a reader. The episode also features characters of The Ghost Train – the strip that Brian Walker illustrated in WHOOPEE! before the arrival of Scream Inn. See the full episode HERE. 

September 4, 1976     · Cricketer

September 11, 1976   · Al Capone the notorious gangster:

September 18, 1976   · Queen's guard

September 25, 1976   · King Kong

October 2, 1976         · Little Miss Muffet

October 9, 1976         · Sheepdog

October 16, 1976       · Piglet. This episode was reprinted in full and received a couple of paragraphs in the book “Comics: Ideology, Power and the Critics” that I mentioned in the previous post: 

October 23, 1976       · Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland

October 30, 1976       · Million Dollar Man - a Bionic Bloke

November 6, 1976     · Auctioneer 

November 13, 1976   · Little Boy Blue

November 20, 1976   · Stuntman 

November 27, 1976   · Parachutist

December 4, 1976      · Boxing kangaroo

December 11, 1976    · Disc Jockey

December 18, 1976    · Doctor Doolittle

December 25, 1976    · Fairy – Xmas episode

 

Come back soon for the last part covering the year 1977...

Characters are © Rebellion Publishing Ltd