RIP Jim Petrie

Sad news here about the passing of the great Jim Petrie. Probably best known for his marathon stint on Minnie the Minx in the Beano, Jim also did a few bits of Cheeky work, which I thought his style particularly suited. Pity he didn't do more. Thanks for all the laughs, Jim.

Cheeky Weekly Star Guests in Whoopee! (part 6)

Examining week 12 of IPC's 1979 Star Guest series means attention again turns to Whoopee! since that's where the Cheeky Weekly character visits occurred on the promotion's even-numbered weeks. Representing the toothy funster's title in Whoopee! dated 16 June 1979 was none other than our grinning pal himself, making a return after his foray into said comic's pages 2 weeks earlier.

Cheeky's first Whoopee! visit introduced readers to Bump-Bump Bernie, Granny Gumdrop, Yikky-Boo and Six-Gun Sam. In his second promotional excursion into Whoopee!, the toothy funster met a further selection of characters from the Cheeky's Week supporting cast.

Whoopee! 16 June 1979
Art: Barrie Appleby
Many thanks to Irmantas for this scan

Barrie Appleby did his usual excellent work on the strip, but it's a pity that Whoopee! readers weren't able to enjoy the full glory of a Frank McDiarmid Cheeky page. Presumably Frank was unavailable due to his other commitments - despite having drawn only one page in the concurrent edition of our toothy pal's comic, the mighty Mr M had no doubt been busily creating artwork for upcoming issues at the time this Star Guest was requisitioned.

Any readers sufficiently impressed by this page of Cheeky cheeriness to set up a regular order for the toothy funster's title could have enjoyed a run of 34 issues of Cheeky Weekly before it folded and rather ironically its star sought refuge in Whoopee!

Cheeky Weekly cover date 16 June 1979

Art: Mike Lacey

It's a while since we had a special, themed Cheeky Weekly (the most recent was 31 March 1979's Jersey edition) but as promised last week, this issue is the disco special. The cover's title background is adorned with suitably festive stars and there's a star of a different kind in the cover strip as Mick Jagger drops in to enjoy a joke with Cheeky and affable agriculturalist Farmer Giles. Mick is notably silent, probably because they would have had to pay him more money had he been given dialogue.

This is the final time that Mike Lacey will draw a Cheeky's Week cover strip.

On page 2 it soon becomes clear that, as we go through the week in anticipation of Saturday's disco, there'll be a plethora of poptastic puns and a deal of disco drollery.

Art: Mike Lacey

Sadly, 6 Million Dollar Gran is too preoccupied with entering a cross-Channel flying race to participate in the top ten tomfoolery.

Calculator Kid is in festive mood, but his destination is not the disco; he's been invited to a fancy dress party. Silicon-chipped sidekick Calc advises Charlie to take an unlikely route, involving much mud and brambles, to the celebrations. Arriving in a tattered and grimy state, Charlie of course wins a box of chocs for his 'tramp outfit'. This is one of those rare occasions when the outcome of Calc's microchip machinations is less than optimal...

Art: Terry Bave

What's New Kids makes a surprise return on page 8 – readers probably assumed that the advertising feature had been dropped as it last appeared in the 10 February 1979 edition.

The toothy funster has no trouble tracking down a copy of the current Mystery Comic, as it seems the perplexing publication has been posted on billboards across Krazy Town this week.

Art: Mike Lacey, who is careful not to show
any detail of the Mystery Comic's
front cover

Elephant on the Run is reduced to a single page for the first time, but it's a typically fun episode in which our pachyderm pal employs his ventriloquial and trunk manipulation skills to evade his dogged pursuer (although it's unclear how the doll becomes larger when on the bus than it had been on stage).

Art: Robert Nixon

The latest Star Guest instalment fetches up within the Mystery Comic for the 6^th (and final) time. On this occasion the comic-within-a-comic is host to Whoopee's 2-Ronnies-inspired Sheerluck and Son.

Art: Jimmy Hansen

There's further intrusion upon the Mystery Comic as, in keeping with Cheeky Weekly's theme, the instructions for IPC's new dance craze, The Cheeky Hustle, make their appearance. Readers are invited to cut out the instructions which consist of a series of drawings depicting the toothy funster in various stages of terpsichorean frenzy. Rather than presenting a boring set of pics, I wanted to show an actual demonstration of the dance. However, having failed to interest Mick Jagger in the job, but at not inconsiderable expense (well, the cost of a plate of fish and chips), I have persuaded Cheeky himself to get down and strut his funky stuff...

Art: Jimmy Hansen

Here's an accompanying track for the full disco ambience...

After Cheeky's dancefloor exertions there's an opportunity to relax with this week's Mystery Boy episode before the Mystery Comic concludes with Disaster Des. The presence of Star Guest and the Hustle instructions means we're deprived of Mustapha Million this week.

The Cheeky Weekly section resumes with Joke-Box Jury's usual varied (and sometimes inappropriate from today's viewpoint) mix of gags, before Cheeky's Week reaches Thursday and the mounting anticipation of the forthcoming disco.

Of course there are no disco-related elements in the latest instalment of Menace of the Alpha Man (partly because it's a reprint but mainly because the titular antagonist is not given to displaying his dancefloor moves), following which readers are for the first time invited to submit their guesses as to the identity of the masked menace. Although the strip hasn't yet concluded, all the necessary clues have been provided and prizes of £2 are on offer to the senders of the first 50 coupons correctly naming the hooded villain - the answers will be opened on 26 June.

That leaves only the Chit-Chat page to be negotiated before we finally arrive at Saturday's disco.

Mike Lacey again

The toothy funster is a little premature in his assertion that 'That's all we have time for', because the comic rounds off with a Burpo Special in which the subject is Burpo himself. The Burpo Special is drawn by Frank McDiarmid, but all the other Cheeky's Week pages this week are by Mike Lacey, with Jimmy Hansen contributing the Cheeky Hustle booklet.

Cheeky's Week Artists Cover Date 16-Jun-1979

Artist	Elements
Mike Lacey	9
Frank McDiarmid	1

Cheeky Weekly	Cover Date: 16-Jun-1979, Issue 84 of 117
Page	Details
1	Cheeky's Week - Art Mike Lacey (final art on feature)
2	Sunday - Art Mike Lacey
3	6 Million Dollar Gran - Art Ian Knox
4	6 Million Dollar Gran - Art Ian Knox
5	6 Million Dollar Gran - Art Ian Knox
6	Monday - Art Mike Lacey
7	Calculator Kid - Art Terry Bave
8	What's New, Kids
9	Tuesday - Art Mike Lacey
10	Paddywack - Art Jack Clayton
11	Ad: The Stickits
12	Wednesday - Art Mike Lacey
13	Tub 'Mystery Comic' 32 of 34 - Art Nigel Edwards
14	Elephant On The Run 'Mystery Comic' 32 of 34 - Art Robert Nixon
15	Star Guest 'Sheerluck and Son' - Art Barry Glennard (first art on feature)
16	Why, Dad, Why? 'Mystery Comic' 26 of 28 - Art John K. Geering
17	Cheeky Hustle (single appearance) - Art Jimmy Hansen (single art on feature)
18	Cheeky Hustle (single appearance) - Art Jimmy Hansen (single art on feature)
19	Mystery Boy reprint from Whizzer and Chips 'Mystery Comic' 35 of 37 - Art John Richardson
20	Disaster Des 'Mystery Comic' 28 of 30 - Art Mike Lacey
21	Joke-Box Jury
22	Ad: IPC 'Buster Holiday Special' 3 of 3 Ad: 'Angler's Mail' 1 of 2
23	Thursday - Art Mike Lacey
24	Speed Squad - Art Jimmy Hansen
25	Friday - Art Mike Lacey
26	Menace of the Alpha Man reprint from Shiver and Shake - Art Eric Bradbury
27	Menace of the Alpha Man reprint from Shiver and Shake - Art Eric Bradbury
28	Who Is The Alpha Man? (single appearance)\Ad: Dunlop Playsport (first appearance) - Art Nick Baker (first art on feature)
29	Chit-Chat
30	Saturday - Art Mike Lacey
31	Saturday - Art Mike Lacey
32	The Burpo Special 'Baby Burpo' - Art Frank McDiarmid

An Oddball View of Comic History

Comic publishers of the 1970s and 80s had a variety of mechanisms for publicising their titles. TV advertising was very expensive so was reserved for comic launches only. Having ensnared kids into regularly purchasing a comic, the publishers would include advertisements for other comics from their line in the hope of inculcating a weekly multi-comic habit. Cross-title promotions such as Mini-Comics or Star Guest were also employed.

However, there was another oft-used device whereby the comic strips themselves featured characters reading companion comics. It wasn't uncommon for a Buster character to be depicted enjoying a copy of Whoopee! or Whizzer and Chips and so forth.

This example is a little different. Rather than showing Odd-Ball and Nobby perusing copies of contemporary titles, Terry Bave chooses to show his protagonists delving into a pile of 'old comics'. The titles that our heroes select from among the yellowing piles of funny papers are Cor!! (which had ceased weekly publication in June 1974) and Krazy (the weekly expired in April 1978). Most readers of this 02 November 1985 issue of Whizzer and Chips wouldn't remember the weeklies, but some may have been aware of the titles from the annual versions which continued being published into the mid-1980s. Nice that Terry gave a nod to comics history, though.

Art: Terry Bave

Thanks for bearing with me as I went slightly off-topic. Will be firmly back on-topic with the next post.

Whizzer and Chips - The Cheeky Raids part 3

After Cheeky Weekly folded and was incorporated into Whoopee as of February 1980 six strips that had originated in the toothy funster's title survived the merge and continued to appear in the amalgamated comic. Whoopee itself foundered in March 1985 and was merged into Whizzer and Chips. Three of the surviving Cheeky Weekly strips successfully negotiated this second merge and went on to appear in the newly combined publication, rather inelegantly titled 'Whizzer and Chips now including Whoopee'. The survivors were Mustapha Million, Calculator Kid and (appearing only twice) Stage School. Cheeky continued to appear, but as a member of The Krazy Gang, who had moved into W&C when Krazy, the comic in which the Gang originated, expired in April 1978.

Whizzer and Chips had a long tradition of sending characters from the Chips section into Whizzer and vice versa. These cross-comic forays were known as 'raids'. In this series of posts I'm chronicling the raids involving the ex-Cheeky Weekly characters who made the transition into Whizzer and Chips, all of whom were allocated to the Chips section. For the purposes of this series, although this particular manifestation of the toothy funster didn't directly descend from Cheeky Weekly, I'm including Cheeky's Krazy Gang appearances as those of an 'ex-Cheeky Weekly character'.

The previous raid covered in this series occurred in Whizzer and Chips dated 04 May 1985. Just seven days later another raid was perpetrated upon an ex-Cheeky Weekly character. This time it was Cheeky (in his role as a member of The Krazy Gang) who was among the victims. Can you spot the sneaky Whizz-Kid infiltrator? Scroll down for the answer...

Whizzer and Chips 11 May 1985
Art: Bob Hill

...Whizzer's resident prankster, Joker.

The current score is therefore Ex-Cheeky Weekly Raiders 1, Whizzer Raiders 2

Whizzer and Chips Cover Date	Raider	Raided
06 April 1985	Mustapha Million	Super Steve
04 May 1985	Bloggs (Store Wars)	Mustapha Million
11 May 1985	Joker	The Krazy Gang (Cheeky)