The Beano Is For Life Not Just Christmas!
CHRISTMAS IS here! Traditionally a time to stock up on annuals if you're a comic fan in the UK. Sadly, few major publishers still produce them, there are some out there, notably The Beano!.
Join us as we peruse the contents of a few of those Dandy annuals produced in recent years... Because they're still worth reading, and sharing with young folk, and up and down the UK there are comic marts, conventions, car boot sales and school fairs you may be lucky to come across such treasure troves at reasonable prices...
The Beano Annual 2011
Such is life that the thing one treasured most on Christmas days of yesteryear takes over a month to getting round to being looked at properly in the modern age, but then many would say I’m too old to read these books… What, too old to laugh?
A good collection with work from great Midlands based cartoonists like Hunt Emerson, Laura Howell and Lew Stringer all on form, alongside other regulars such as Nigel Parkinson, Tom Patterson and Dave Eastbury, and the always exceptionally brilliant Ken H Harrison, plus a couple of more adventuresome strips courtesy of Nigel Dobbyn and Steve Beckett.
Lord Snooty has changed since I were a lad, fortunately Dennis the Menace remains constant (in print at least) as does Minnie the Minx (though curiously she’s becoming something of a Daddy’s girl); A Day in the Life of the Beano Office has a nice running gag but pales in comparison to the classic Sparky People (from The Sparky naturally), but here come the shockers...
In the Billy the Cat two-part saga-by-the-sea Katy kisses a boy! And you think that’s something? Wait until you hear about Teacher from The Bash Street Kids: he hands in his notice at the school!
Shocks but no horrors, instead some raised smiles along the way.
If Santa didn’t put a copy in your stocking you might still be able to get a copy from your local newsagent, or at books shops and department stores, or online at: www.beano.com
Local councils up and down the country might want to stop collecting your rubbish every week but you can still rest assured that The Beano can still be delivered to your door as part of your local newsagent’s paper round!
The Beano Annual 2012
Celebrating 60 years of mischief and mayhem, it’s slightly ironic that with The Beano the younger and usually more radical of D.C. Thomson’s perennial bestsellers it actually turns in a more traditional British annual than 2012’s Dandy.
That’s preferable to me in terms of its cartooning (albeit that the lack of an adventure strip like Billy the Cat is apparent), though I genuinely think this year’s Dandy delivered a higher percentage of quality gag scriptwriting.
Not that one need complain too much as Tom Patterson throws in countless visual asides in both Calamity James and a Dennis the Menace strip, while the plot of A Ratz Christmas Carol has some genuine creative touches that take it beyond the expected parody and Hunt Emerson looks like he had fun drawing the devilish antics of that little nutmeg.
Another Midlands-man, Lew Stringer weighs in offering snow, Santa and a feel-good story in Super School, and it’s noticeable how more veteran characters such as Minnie the Minx (exquisitely drawn by Ken Harrison) and the following pages’ Roger the Dodger continue that everyone-should-be-happy at Christmas attitude.
Billy Whizz and Winston the Bash Street cat have some fun moments, the Bash Street Kids themselves don't really get enough pages to play havoc across or express their individual characters though there's brain-bashing and more in Meebo & Zuky The Beano's version of rival The Dandy’s Puss & Boots. Honestly, this ain't a bad annual at all. I hope the weeklies are this good - kids deserve a laugh while their parents are worrying about the economy!
The Beano Annual 2013
Last year’s annual celebrated 60 years of mischief and mayhem and this one claims “75 years of laughter”? Me thinks someone’s marketing department is playing fast and loose with the truth somewhere. That or just like The Bash Street Kids they can’t add up properly.
And let’s make no bones about it, they can hype Dennis and Gnasher as much as they like - and wonderfully menaces they’ve been in their time but it’s The Bash Street Kids who really rule the roost – It’s just easier to adapt one bad lad to another medium (TV animation in this case) than half a dozen and they’re hyping that fact on the wraparound cover.
The cover itself is produced by artist Mark Bright and he himself gets a big thumbs-up for including classic characters like Little Plumb, Lord Snooty, The Three Bears, Pansy Potter, Billy the Cat (stealing a cake? Surely not) and even Big Eggo the ostrich who appeared on the front cover of the very first issue of The Beano looking suitably upset with wings folded as it looks across at the roast turkey on the dining table they’re all sitting at for a festive party.
Inside The Bash Street Kids, Dennis the Menace, Billy Whizz, and Rodger the Dodger hold up the reputation of the old guard as being some of the funniest characters created in British comics, and newer strips don’t do a bad job either by artists such as Hunt Emerson, Laura Howell and Nigel Parkinson, though it has to be said Ken Harrison’s art on the Minnie the Minx stands out visually and the final Dennis the Menace strip concludes the annual with a clever little plot turnabout that should leave a smile on your face as you close this book... And give it back to the children it was brought for!
The Beano Annual 2014
Someone ought to tell D.C. Thomson to stop playing fast and loose with the cover blurb on their Beano annual celebrations; last year there was “75 years of laughter”Tthis year it’s “75 years old”. Thank Gnasher the contents inside are worth the read. Mind you, I doubt the kids who received this annual for Christmas took that to devour its pages, whereas for this crusty old reader it was neatly stacked waiting for a spare five minutes here and there for a last week or so. Worth the wait. Pretty good cartooning throughout, all styles.
Hunt Emerson draws Ratz, and had me scratching myself thinking I’d got fleas, he also delivers a brilliant The Three Bears two pager. Continuing the Wild West theme, Laura Howell draws some fun, enchanting Little Plumb strips, though I’m less fond of the Meebo & Zuky strips, though only because I prefer those classic maniacs Puss & Boots as characters. Lew Stringer goes animalistic too drawing former cover star Biffo the Bear in a story where the character gets a job in a zoo, kind of post modern in its own way if that term’s not completely gone out with yesterday’s laundry – It’s a slightly different look at the character, as is a Billy Whiz one that questions the problems a super-speedster has – not quite as life threatening as Steve Skeates’ take on Lightning, the American Tower Comics character of the 60s, but a considered look all the same for those who care to go beyond the obvious jokes.
Dennis and Minnie have some good pages, drawn – at least mostly - by Nigel Parkinson, though they are less the naughty kids I grew up with and more teasers akin to Roger the Dodger. The Bash Street Kid strips were daft, in all the right ways, Pup Parade hilarious, and the end papers featured characters from long ago you yearned to read new strips about, but the new ones on show in this annual were worth finding time to read. My thanks, as ever, for wife and daughter for getting them for Christmas, and hopefully I will get then again this year!
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