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Thursday, August 21, 2008

Nostalgia Trip: Comics of the 70's (Part 1)

Here are some comics I remember from the 1970's.

"Look out for Look-In!"
I mainly remember Look -In because it was the magazine my sister got every week. It had something for everyone - pin up posters of Barry Sheene and David Essex for the girls, comic strips of Space 1999, Sapphire & Steel and The Six Million Dollar Man for the boys. Lots of TV shows. Movies. Sport. Music. A bit of everything. I remember looking at the TV listings which were quite complicated because many different regional networks showed different shows - for example, everyone raved about Tiswas but we never got to see it. There was Grampian, Thames, Anglia and our local channel, Channel TV. There are two websites devoted to the magazine - John's Look-Out [now defunct] (which has a large selection of covers and other info) and the Look-In Picture Strip Archive.

Similarly titled, but quite different, was Look And Learn. This was a comic I would read while visiting the dentist or find at a jumble sale. The magazine had quite an old-fashioned, 1950's look. There were a lot of historical stories, which I don't really remember (I wasn't much of history fan back then) but there was also The Trigan Empire, a very ambitious and fantastically illustrated comic strip. The strips I remember were drawn by Oliver Frey, who went on to produce the covers for computer magazines Crash! and Zzap64! in the mid-80's.

The rights to the magazine are now owned by Look And Learn Ltd, and they have a comprehensive website here.

Who doesn't remember Desperate Dan and his cowpies, or Korky the Cat, or even Bully Beef and Chips? Did you know that The Dandy is the world's longest running comic, and still exists today? Bet it costs more than 4p though!

Between this and The Beano, there were always chortles to be had. Now, where did the chortles go? Sometimes, I feel like I'm a frickin' pensioner, man. What do six year old boys read these days? Maybe it was a British thing. Anyone else care to comment on what they read when they were kids?

Some basic Dandy information here, and the official website is here.

I've run out of steam for now. Next week In eight years' time I'll post Part 2.

2 comments:

Rissan said...

The Trigan Empire, drawed by Don Lawrence, was one of my favourites also. I became a big fan of the art of Don Lawrence. It's successor Storm became a hugh hit in the Netherlands.

Kippers said...

Beano, Dandy, Beezer, Whizzer & Chips, Cheeky, Roy of the Rovers. I was something of a comics junkie as a nipper!