In the same week of 1979 that Cheeky was enjoying festive frolics in his own title, he was also of course appearing in his side hustle as a member of the Krazy Gang over in the Chrimbo edition of Whizzer and Chips.
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| Art: Sid Burgon |
Cheeky is among the comic celebrities gathered together on the front cover. I take it the front page reference to 'The Gang' is supposed to encompass all the assembled funny folk and not just the members of the Krazy crew, who are in fact under-represented as Sporty and Blue are absent. The incomplete Krazy Gang on the cover is probably to avoid the scene becoming cluttered with characters. As it is (if my counting is not at fault) there are 15 Chip-ites (I'm not counting the bat which I assume is accompanying Bewitched Belinda) and 14 Whizz-kids. Cast members of Whizzer's ensemble piece Happy Families are also missing (Mum, Dad and Grandad), as are The 12½p Buytonic Boy, Sweet-Tooth and Tiny Tycoon. We probably wouldn't expect to see characters from the adventure serials Island of Fear and Sheriff Starr. Sadly, seasonal goodwill does not extend to a mingling of comic stars, who resolutely stick to their own Whizz-kid and Chip-ite halves of the page.
Cover artist Sid Burgon seems to been inspired by Bob Hill's Krazy Gang title panel, which has this week been adorned with the traditional sprinkling of snow, when drawing his tongue-lolling depiction of Cheeky.
The Gang's erstwhile Krazy colleague, the existenchialist Pongo Snodgrass, is welcomed onto the cover, and other than Fuss-Pot's askance gaze, his Chip-ite chums are too polite to object to the niff. Pongo's adventure inside the comic concludes with a splat-up feed rather than the traditional slap-up meal. A similar scenario unfolded in the Why, Dad, Why? strip in that week's edition of Cheeky Weekly (see the link in the first paragraph above).
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| Art: Nigel Edwards |
Join me again in a few days when I'll be examining some more festive frolics from this issue of Whizzer and Chips.
Can't wait to see if you've tried to spot any strips that may've been reused from late 1978, as this was the period of the strike of course. That was a hint ;-)
ReplyDeleteActually, I hadn't considered that at all, so at the moment I haven't spotted any. I haven't subjected Whizzer and Chips to the forensic intensity with which I've scrutinised Cheeky Weekly, so I'm probably not going to notice any such instances. I take it you have identified some? You don't need to tell me now if you want to test my powers of observation!
DeleteThanks for the compliment, but I’ve only seen a few at the beginning of ‘79, such as Sid’s "secret presents" or whatever they’re called in January. The eerie images of Slippy much later in the year we’ve discussed previously may’ve had a subconscious affect upon my not paying full attention. Or I was slacking off on the job. I DO recall trying to tell if the Slimms were a holdover from ‘78, as the last original strip was 29/9/79 and it was reprints thereafter. They just missed out on a slice on the 10th anniversary birthday cake! I’ll call it up again at BL next week.
ReplyDeleteYou're clearly much more familiar with W&C than I am, so I'll leave those investigations to you!
DeleteThe Slimms MAY have been held back from ’78: on 2/12/78 the strained scales logo was changed for the white letters on black background version, as seen here. This is by no means proof positive as the former logo does appear a few times in ’79 up till the final original story in September (wasn’t there then.) BTW they did get some birthday cake on 13/10/79, but had to endure being opposite the nightmarish Slippy images. Would’ve lost my appetite, personally...
ReplyDeleteI'm just about to post the second part of my look at the Christmas W&C of 1979 - you may be able to help me id some of the guest characters in Superstore.
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