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| Copyright REBELLION |
From the pulsating pages of POW! #8 (March 11th 1967), comes KEN REID at his brain-blasting best with DARE-A-DAY DAVY. Were readers' dares genuine? Well, I wouldn't bet DONALD TRUMP's hair on it (mainly because there's some doubt about that too), but who cared? This was comic strip mayhem at its lunatic finest, and whether you've read Davy before or not, you're sure to find something in this page to enjoy or my name isn't FRED FLINTSTONE. (What's that you say? My name isn't Fred Flintstone? Well, whatddya know?!) Trust me anyway - you'll still enjoy this palpitating page.
I think Dare-A-Day Davy (great title) is my favourite Ken Reid strip (ok apart from Frankie Stein) he seemed to just go wild on this strip, and whilst famously, one of his "Davy" strips was pulled (the Frankenstein story) I think a few others must have come close to getting pulled as well with their comic violence etc (all brilliantly done) - I would have loved to have seen Ken Reid doing a DC or Marvel character in his style imagine his dark numerous take on Deadman , Spectre or Morbius a lot of others were cl- I have this one somewhere but wasn't it printed in full colour?
ReplyDeleteI'm not convinced his style would have suited a 'straight' superhero strip, PM, but he was certainly a master at what he did. (Crammed panels.) I believe this strip was originally in colour, but rather than dig out my Pows to scan the pages, I'm using a b&w collection of Davy I have in a book. You can actually see the detail a bit clearer than in the colour versions.
ReplyDeleteSorry I meant if Ken did his take on Deadman etc as a humour strip in his style like they have done recently especially at Marvel, with artists like Pete Bagge doing Hulk. Spderman etc etc
ReplyDeleteAh, right, got you now, PM. I haven't seen those strips, so thought you meant 'ordinary' superhero ones.
ReplyDeleteAh yes, Ken Reid at his finest. Such chaos, such detail, such insanity, such crazy and descriptive character names. Ken must have come close to a bout of RSI (Repetitive Strain Injury) from drawing all of those bubbles! Of all of the Ken Reid that I have managed to clap my eyes on over the years, a feat made much easier with the internet as samples were pretty thin on the ground over here in Aus, I think that Davy is the strip that I have seen the least of so good to feast on such a prime example. (Feast for the eyes, mind and funnybone that is). Very meta for it's day, acknowledging that Davy is a character in a comic strip, though the Warner cartoon characters used to regularly break the 'fourth wall' years earlier now that I think of it. Thanks for posting!
ReplyDeleteAnd thanks for reading, enjoying, and commenting, PC. I'm not usually a fan of comic strips breaking the fourth wall, but Ken's strips were so surreal that it didn't seem out of place. I think I've got collected editions (as well as loads of the original comics) of just about every strip Ken Reid drew for Odhams and IPC/Fleetway.
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