More on Mike Lacey and Jimmy Hansen (plus a few treats)

Art: Mike Lacey

Following my earlier posts about Mike Lacey and Jimmy Hansen, I thought I'd post this page from Whizzer and Chips dated 30 May 1987 since, thanks to reader Matthew Blaken's enquiry on the Whizz-kids page we know (as if there was any doubt) that the cover story is drawn by Mike Lacey.

Although Sid doesn't mention it (possibly because the strip in question is located within rival comic Chips), Mike also drew Phil Fitt in that issue.

Jimmy Hansen was responsible for the artwork on Shiner...

...and the Bumpkin Billionaires...

..I like the security guard with club and slavering hound, and it's always good to see Miss Wobblethrope get a namecheck.

Referring back to the Whizz-kids letters page, you may be wondering what Sid's 'bigger and brighter' remarks referred to. Here's a clue from the same issue...

Yes, that same week IPC stablemate Buster had undergone a 'bigger-brighter' transformation. Now, I haven't got many copies of Buster and I certainly don't have the issue referred to above. However, if it's anything like the 13 June 1987 issue of Whizzer and Chips (the first supposedly bigger issue), I think IPC were flirting with a somewhat fluid interpretation of the word 'bigger' as, while the pages of the new-style issue were slightly taller than those which preceded them, they were also narrower. The number of pages remained the same at 32, and although there was more colour, not all of the colour pages were in full colour. The paper quality was slightly improved resulting in clearer printing.

Anyway, all this excitement lay in the future for readers of the 30 May 1987 edition of Whizzer and Chips, which was a nice issue with a number of interesting happenings (in addition to those I've posted above) which I thought I'd share with you.

I like Tom Paterson's choice of pseudonym on this Sweeny Toddler page...

...good to see Cheeky getting a mention even though it is just the punchline to a botty joke.

Here's Sweet-Tooth, including an artist self-portrait wherein Trevor Metcalfe is seen accepting a bribe!

Up next is some manure-based merriment with Winnie, drawn by Ian Knox. This must be the only IPC strip to depict a rectal examination...

Let's see what our pecunious pal Mustapha is up to, still going strong 7 years after Cheeky Weekly folded...

...I really like Barry Glennard's work on Mustapha, it livened the strip up nicely.

I'll round off with Lazy Bones, in colour on the back cover and drawn by Bob Hill, who had taken over artwork duties on the strip from Colin Whittock when Colin started drawing Whizzer and Chips' two-pages-a-week Mizz Marble...

As if having the Lacey/Hansen uncertainty to contend with wasn't enough, an old controversy that I thought had been resolved has just re-emerged - in this interview, Colin Whittock refers to the artist above as Len Hill! I thought we'd solved the riddle of 'Mr' Hill's surname back here. I'm sticking with calling him Bob!

UPDATE - For the definitive answer regarding Mr Hill's forename see here.