Welcome to the Cheeky Weekly blog!


Welcome to the Cheeky Weekly blog!
Cheeky Weekly ™ REBELLION PUBLISHING LTD, COPYRIGHT ©  REBELLION PUBLISHING LTD, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED was a British children's comic with cover dates spanning 22 October 1977 to 02 February 1980.

Quick links...
Basic Stats
Cheeky Weekly Index - Cheeky Annuals and Specials Index
Cheeky Weekly Artist Index
Features by Number of Appearances
Cheeky Weekly Timeline
Major Characters from the Cheeky pages
Features Ordered by Date of Commencement

*** ALL IMAGES COPYRIGHT ©  REBELLION PUBLISHING LTD, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. Used with permission. ***
*** CHEEKY WEEKLY, KRAZY, WHOOPEE!, WHOOPEE, WOW!, WHIZZER AND CHIPS and BUSTER ARE ™ REBELLION PUBLISHING LTD, COPYRIGHT ©  REBELLION PUBLISHING LTD, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. ***
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Tuesday 28 April 2015

Whizzer and Chips - The Cheeky Raids part 9

New readers start here... 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'.

Two weeks after the previous raid involving an ex-Cheeky Weekly character, Mustapha Million's adventure (in which we meet his cousin Ahmed) was intruded upon by a rotten raider. Can you spot the infiltrator? Scroll down for the answer.

Whizzer and Chips 27 July 1985
Art: Joe McCaffrey












It's that pesky Whizz-Kid prankster, Joker.

The Mustapha story above reminds me of a joke that was often heard in the 1970s and directed at a UK car manufacturer that underwent a series of misfortunes during that troubled decade...

1st Man: I'm getting my little boy a cowboy outfit for Christmas.

2nd Man: Really?

1st Man: Yes, I'm buying him British Leyland.

For the benefit of any mystified overseas readers, the joke plays on an alternate, informal use of  'cowboy', meaning incompetent, inefficient, dishonest.

No doubt there were other versions of the joke aimed at British Rail, The Post Office etc. 'Mickey Mouse outfit' was also often substituted.


This was the second time that Mustapha had been raided, but he had been a raider on two previous occasions. Ex-Cheeky Weekly characters had by this time perpetrated just 3 raids while suffering 7.

More raiding fun soon!

Whizzer and Chips Cover Date Raider Raided
06 April 1985Mustapha MillionSuper Steve
04 May 1985Bloggs (Store Wars)Mustapha Million
11 May 1985JokerThe Krazy Gang (Cheeky)
18 May 1985Calculator Kid & CalcOdd-Ball
01 June 1985
Animalad
Mustapha Million
The Krazy Gang (Cheeky)
Boy Boss
08 June 1985Odd-BallCalculator Kid
06 July 1985Toy BoyCalculator Kid
13 July 1985Pa BumpkinThe Krazy Gang (Cheeky)
27 July 1985JokerMustapha Million

Tuesday 21 April 2015

The Rejects – Big Strong Sam\Steve

In previous instalments of this series of 'The Rejects' posts, I've examined supporting characters from the 'Ello, it's Cheeky\'Ello I'm Cheeky pages of Krazy who, despite being given a name, didn't accompany the toothy funster into the pages of his own comic. However, the character coming under the spotlight today failed to make the break into Cheeky Weekly even though he was given two names.

Scrap yard worker Big Strong Sam made his debut in Krazy issue 2, dated 23 October 1976. All the artwork below is by Frank McDiarmid.

Krazy 23 October 1976
This page also saw the debut of
Manhole Man

A week later the Big Strong one returned, but now called Steve and seemingly the sibling of a Cheeky Weekly stalwart who made his debut on this page. This time Cheeky's muscular mate featured across a whole page, so at this point it looked as though he may become one of the regular cast of Cheeky's pals (if only the scriptwriter could sort his name out).

Krazy 30 October 1976

Sam\Steve was back in Krazy dated 27 November 1976 where he was unnamed among the Krazy Town FC 'supporters' at Saturday's match.

Krazy 27 November 1976

In the 04 December 1976 issue the mighty metal merchant reverted to his original name...

Krazy 04 December 1976

...but by the time of his next appearance in Krazy dated 26 February 1977 his name had changed back again...

Krazy 22 February 1977

And Steve it remained for his next Krazy outing...

Krazy 26 March 1977

Sam\Steve was then absent from Krazy until his final appearance, a silent and unnamed cameo in the first birthday issue dated 08 October 1977...

Krazy 08 October 1977

So despite a promising start, Cheeky's scrapyard stooge eventually fell into obscurity. Maybe the scriptwriter couldn't think of many 'strong' jokes. If Sam\Steve had transferred into Cheeky Weekly there would have been the opportunity to develop him into Ursula's boyfriend.

Tuesday 14 April 2015

Features Ordered by Date of Commencement

This is something that I should have posted a long time ago, but only started thinking about recently as I began looking at the latter few months of Cheeky Weekly in my series of issue summaries.

Here's a list of all the features to have appeared in Cheeky Weekly, ordered by the issue date in which they commenced (and in the case of multiple features commencing in the same issue, further sorted by the page number on which they made their debut within that edition). The feature's end date is also shown, as is its original source(s) in the case of reprints. The first column shows the feature's position in the sequence. A link to the the appropriate blog post (where available) is also provided.

Most recent update - 25 October 2020: Added blog links for Giant Cheeky Poster and Top Ten Poster.

Update - 13 October 2017: I had previously named the feature in the 21 April 1979 issue which gave assembly details for the Top Ten poster as 'Poster instructions', whereas all the other 3 appearances of the same feature I had named 'Top Ten poster instructions'. Changed the name of the 21 April 1979 instance to match the others.

Update 29 September 2017: I had previously individually named each of the joke booklets which commenced in Cheeky Weekly dated 17 November 1979. For example 'Farmer Giles booklet', 'Knock-Knock booklet' etc. I have now given them all the name Cheeky's Cut-Out Comedy Catalogue, since that's the name under which they appeared.

Ordinal Feature Start End Reprinted From
1Cover Feature22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
2What a Cheek22-Oct-197723-Sep-1978
3Hiya I'm Cheeky22-Oct-197722-Oct-1977
4Sunday22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
5Skateboard Squad22-Oct-197712-May-1979
6Sunday evening22-Oct-197723-Sep-1978
7James Bold22-Oct-197705-Aug-1978
8Monday22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
96 Million Dollar Gran22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
10Tuesday22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
11Doug's Doodle22-Oct-197714-Jan-1978
12What's New, Kids22-Oct-197717-Nov-1979
13Pin-up pal22-Oct-197731-Mar-1979
14Wednesday22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
15Creepy Sleepy Tale22-Oct-197726-Aug-1978Monster Fun
16Wednesday (conclusion)22-Oct-197726-Aug-1978
17Thursday22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
18Home Movie22-Oct-197710-Jun-1978
19Friday22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
20Mustapha Million22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
21Saturday22-Oct-197702-Feb-1980
22Wile E Coyote22-Oct-197707-Jan-1978
23Interval22-Oct-197702-Dec-1978
24Space Family Robinson22-Oct-197724-Jun-1978
25Hello again29-Oct-197729-Oct-1977
26Old Comic29-Oct-197726-Aug-1978Chips,Comet,Film Fun,Jingles,Radio Fun,School Friend,Sun Weekly,Swift,TV Fun,The Jester,Tiger,Tip Top,Whizzer and Chips,Wonder
27Bam Splat and Blooie29-Oct-197717-Jun-1978Buster
28Cocky Doodle29-Oct-197704-Mar-1978Buster
29Skateboard booklet05-Nov-197726-Nov-1977
30More joke strips12-Nov-197712-Nov-1977
31Friends of Cheeky competition26-Nov-197726-Nov-1977
32Henery Hawk26-Nov-197704-Feb-1978
33Diary03-Dec-197724-Dec-1977
34Joke-Box Jury10-Dec-197702-Feb-1980
35Daffy Duck24-Dec-197711-Mar-1978
36Christmas Morning31-Dec-197731-Dec-1977
37Christmas Dinner31-Dec-197731-Dec-1977
38Christmas Day31-Dec-197731-Dec-1977
39Boxing Day31-Dec-197731-Dec-1977
40Creepy Pantomime31-Dec-197731-Dec-1977
41New Year's Eve31-Dec-197707-Jan-1978
42Suddenly07-Jan-197824-Jun-1978
43The Cheeky Spotter Book of Fun07-Jan-197828-Jan-1978
44Tweety14-Jan-197814-Jan-1978
45Tweety and Sylvester21-Jan-197802-Dec-1978
464 Comics competition28-Jan-197828-Jan-1978
47Skateboard Snap04-Feb-197804-Feb-1978
48Chimp on a skateboard photo04-Feb-197804-Feb-1978
49Oi! What is My Name?11-Feb-197811-Feb-1978
50Road Runner18-Feb-197803-Jun-1978
51Basil Brush competition11-Mar-197811-Mar-1978
52500 T-Shirt Winners11-Mar-197811-Mar-1978
53Easter Sunday01-Apr-197801-Apr-1978
54Easter Monday01-Apr-197821-Apr-1979
55Saturday - April Fool's Day01-Apr-197801-Apr-1978
56Name the Snail results22-Apr-197822-Apr-1978
57Skateboard competition29-Apr-197829-Apr-1978
58Send a Father's Day message29-Apr-197829-Apr-1978
59Kite Competition winners13-May-197813-May-1978
60Hid Kid what does he look like27-May-197827-May-1978
61Basil Brush competition winners03-Jun-197803-Jun-1978
62Father's Day Messages17-Jun-197817-Jun-1978
63Skateboard Competition17-Jun-197817-Jun-1978
64Tennis Competition24-Jun-197824-Jun-1978
65Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?24-Jun-197830-Sep-1978Cor!!
66Whizzer and Chips mini comic01-Jul-197801-Jul-1978
67Calculator Kid01-Jul-197802-Feb-1980
68Buster mini comic08-Jul-197808-Jul-1978
69Paddywack08-Jul-197826-Jan-1980
70Whoopee mini comic15-Jul-197815-Jul-1978
715 Papers Competition22-Jul-197822-Jul-1978
72Mickey Mouse Mini Comic22-Jul-197822-Jul-1978
73Draw Hid Kid winners05-Aug-197805-Aug-1978
74Archie's Angels12-Aug-197816-Sep-1978Whizzer and Chips
75Teacher's Teasers26-Aug-197823-Sep-1978
76Silly Snaps02-Sep-197820-Oct-1979
77Crack-A-Joke Game02-Sep-197823-Sep-1978
78Readers poll09-Sep-197809-Sep-1978
79Smurfs competition09-Sep-197809-Dec-1978
80Marx Toys Competition16-Sep-197816-Sep-1978
81Hickory Dickory Doc16-Sep-197816-Sep-1978Cor!!
82Sonny Storm23-Sep-197823-Sep-1978Cor!!
83Cheeky's Week30-Sep-197830-Jun-1979
84Hoi! What do you get up to all week?30-Sep-197830-Sep-1978
85Tub30-Sep-197802-Feb-1980
86Why, Dad, Why?30-Sep-197802-Feb-1980
87Mystery Boy30-Sep-197813-Oct-1979Whizzer and Chips
88Elephant On The Run30-Sep-197802-Feb-1980
89Disaster Des30-Sep-197802-Feb-1980
90Cheeky's Pal Puzzle30-Sep-197802-Dec-1978
91Laugh and Learn07-Oct-197809-Dec-1978
92The Terrible Trail to Taggart's Treasure07-Oct-197802-Dec-1978Shiver and Shake
93Ghouldilocks14-Oct-197814-Oct-1978Jag
94Hey Presto! Magic Show21-Oct-197821-Oct-1978
95Winners of Skateboard and Tennis competitions28-Oct-197828-Oct-1978
96Who's your Super-Star?18-Nov-197818-Nov-1978
97Feature Omitted02-Dec-197802-Dec-1978
98Big Four Saint Competition02-Dec-197802-Dec-1978
99Chit-Chat09-Dec-197802-Feb-1980
100The Burpo Special09-Dec-197830-Jun-1979
101Chutes Away competition winners06-Jan-197906-Jan-1979
102Eagle Eye06-Jan-197924-Feb-1979Shiver and Shake
103Friends of Cheeky Snap Game13-Jan-197903-Feb-1979
104Goonburger Maze20-Jan-197920-Jan-1979
105Your chance to vote27-Jan-197917-Feb-1979
106Spaghetti Junction maze27-Jan-197927-Jan-1979
107Train Track Maze03-Feb-197903-Feb-1979
108Tease Break17-Feb-197903-Nov-1979
109Shrove Tuesday03-Mar-197903-Mar-1979
110Ash Wednesday03-Mar-197903-Mar-1979
111Menace of the Alpha Man03-Mar-197930-Jun-1979Shiver and Shake
112Disaster Des spot the difference17-Mar-197917-Mar-1979
113Saint competition results24-Mar-197924-Mar-1979
114Smurfs competition results24-Mar-197924-Mar-1979
115Cheeky's Jersey Pattern31-Mar-197931-Mar-1979
116Star Guest31-Mar-197928-Jul-1979
117Top Ten Poster07-Apr-197928-Apr-1979
118Top Ten Poster instructions07-Apr-197928-Apr-1979
119Good Friday14-Apr-197914-Apr-1979
120Easter Saturday14-Apr-197914-Apr-1979
121Cheeky Spotter Book of Town and Around19-May-197909-Jun-1979
122Speed Squad26-May-197902-Feb-1980
123Cheeky Hustle16-Jun-197916-Jun-1979
124Who Is The Alpha Man?16-Jun-197916-Jun-1979
125The Gang07-Jul-197902-Feb-1980Whizzer and Chips
126Stage School07-Jul-197902-Feb-1980
127Snail of the Century14-Jul-197902-Feb-1980
128My favourite Cheeky pals (character/feature popularity poll)04-Aug-197904-Aug-1979
129Giant Cheeky Poster18-Aug-197908-Sep-1979
130Alpha Man competition results18-Aug-197918-Aug-1979
131Poster instructions08-Sep-197908-Sep-1979
132James Bond competition08-Sep-197908-Sep-1979
133Ringer Dinger06-Oct-197902-Feb-1980Whizzer and Chips
134Booklet instructions17-Nov-197917-Nov-1979
135Soggy the Sea Monster17-Nov-197902-Feb-1980Shiver and Shake
136Cheeky's Cut-Out Comedy Catalogue17-Nov-197926-Jan-1980
137Cheeky Chuckles15-Dec-197915-Dec-1979
138Junior Jet Club Competition22-Dec-197922-Dec-1979
139Christmas Card29-Dec-197929-Dec-1979
140Christmas Quiz29-Dec-197929-Dec-1979
1416 Million Dollar Gran Spot the Difference19-Jan-198019-Jan-1980
142Jogging Jeremy's Weakly Exercise Routine19-Jan-198019-Jan-1980

Wednesday 8 April 2015

Cheeky Weekly Star Guests in Whoopee! (part 8)

Even-numbered weeks of IPC's 1979 Star Guest promotion saw representatives of Cheeky Weekly visiting Whoopee! and as we've reached week 16 of the sales-boosting sallies into companion comics, the only question is who has been chosen from the ranks of CW superstars to promote their comic. Stepping forward to do his duty for the second consecutive week (the previous week in Whizzer and Chips) and his third time as a Whoopee! Star Guest is the toothy funster himself.

Whoopee! 14 July 1979
Art: Frank McDiarmid
Many thanks to Irmantas for this scan

Disco Kid's 'Leaf Carrot' joke mystifies me. Anyone? Update - Peter and Bruce have solved the riddle - see the comments below.

Like Cheeky's promotional outing in last week's Whizzer and Chips, this strip is actually a mash-up, re-using previously published Frank McDiarmid art to present some new gags. This time the majority of the art was originally seen in Cheeky Weekly dated 03 March 1979 (an issue in which the toothy funster sported a long scarf).


This page and those below are from
Cheeky Weekly 03 March 1979.
Art: Frank McDiarmid




Any Whoopee! readers who failed to be enticed by the toothy funster's visit would have enjoyed 29 further weeks untroubled by Cheeky's corny gags. No doubt those same Whoopee! readers would have been dismayed to learn in their comic dated 02 February 1980 that our grinning pal, and a retinue of fellow Cheeky Weekly survivors, would be seeking refuge in the pages of their comic of choice as of the following week.

Tuesday 7 April 2015

Sounds like a R.I.O.T.

I've been asked by performing arts company PanicLab to pass on some info regarding their upcoming show called R.I.O.T. which is about comic books.

Here's a link for more info, and here's a review. All the best to PanicLab for the show.