The CRUNCH COVER GALLERY - PART THREE...

All images copyright D.C. THOMSON & Co., Ltd

When you think about it, it at first seems strange that one of the staple features of British comics for boys in the 1960s and '70s were stories about the Second World War.  However, to many of the writers who penned these adventures and who'd experienced the conflict firsthand, that period must've seemed like fairly recent history.  After all, it was closer in time to them than my own teenage years are to me - and that feels like only yesterday.

The CRUNCH included a story called HITLER LIVES, but that was set in the present day (after recapping events at war's end in early episodes) and wasn't really a war story in the traditional sense.  I suppose kids of the time enjoyed war stories though, otherwise, despite the predilections of the writers, they wouldn't have appeared for as long as they did.  Neither would comics like The HOTSPUR, WARLORD or BATTLE have had such long runs - unless, of course, it was mainly World War II veterans who were buying them.

So, full marks to The Crunch for trying something at least slightly different.  Not that the difference was radical, because, whatever the setting, most adventure stories are either war, sport or cowboy stories at heart - even science-fiction ones.  Think I'm talking nonsense?  Well, consider this - 2000 A.D.'s HARLEM'S HEROES was a sports story, bounty-hunter STRONTIUM DOG (first seen in STARLORD) was a cowboy story, and ROGUE TROOPER was a war story.

It's a bit like STAR TREK.  My father could never get into the programme because of its SF trappings, but, essentially, Star Trek is not too dissimilar to a World War II story set aboard a submarine.  KLINGONS and ROMULANS are the Nazis, KIRK, SPOCK and the rest of the crew are the good guys, and the ENTERPRISE is a submarine, but travelling up in outer space instead of down in the depths of the sea.  You'd be surprised (or maybe not) at how many Star Trek plots could be transferred directly into a Second World War setting.

However, that's more than enough padding from me.  Now you can get on with what you came here for.  Namely, ogle these fantastic front and back covers from The Crunch - a comic that surely deserved a longer life than it had.     

The COMPLETE X-MEN POCKET BOOK COVER GALLERY...

Images copyright MARVEL COMICS

I never bought the first nine issues of STAR HEROES Pocket Book - if indeed I even saw them!  I think I did see the first issue (or an ad for it), but decided against buying it because I wasn't really into science fiction comics.  At the beginning of 1981, walking from Southsea into Portsmouth town centre, I spied the tenth issue in a newsagent's and bought it (two copies actually) immediately.  The reason?  See for yourself - the original X-MEN!  As with some of the other pocket books, it was just like reading '60s comic FANTASTIC all over again, and my then-youthful little heart skipped a beat in anticipation of reliving my childhood.

I've now got all these stories in full-colour MARVEL MASTERWORKS and OMNIBUS volumes, as well as various other reprints, but I couldn't part with my PBs because of the particular time in my life that they represent to me.   Madness I know, but they've got a charm of their own, even though they were far from perfect in their reproduction of these classic strips.  I also acquired the next two or three issues in Southsea/Portsmouth, and that's where I tend to think of whenever I look at these cracking covers from a long-gone era.

The very same covers that you're now about to savour, O dribbling Crivvies, so I won't hold you back any longer - go to it, frantic ones!  And be sure to let me know what you think of them in the comments section!  Lines are now open!

Okay, okay, chill out!  There's no need to shout.  Here, for your viewing pleasure, are the first nine issues of the title to complete the set.

PART FOUR Of The COMPLETE DENNIS The MENACE BOOK COVER GALLERY...

Images copyright D.C. THOMSON & Co., Ltd

There are two menaces called DENNIS in the world, as I'm sure most of you know.  There's the real one - ours - who lives up to his esteemed name with gusto - and there's the cutesy American version who doesn't really fulfil his anarchic designation in quite the way that the British one does.  There's no way of knowing which of them was created first, but ours saw publication before his State-side counterpart.  U.S. Dennis debuted in sixteen newspapers on March 12th, 1951, whereas U.K. Dennis appeared in The BEANO, cover-dated March 17th, but on sale several days before that date (amazingly, probably also the 12th) and actually published on the 7th.

Anyway, here are the covers of another six DENNIS The MENACE Books (which became an Annual with the edition for 1987) to remind you that when it comes to menacing, nobody does it better than our striped, spiky-haired little 'hooligan'.

The back cover is the same as the front, folks

I must confess that things like the 'Menace-Mobile' leave me cold.  I prefer Dennis strips set in
realistic situations that readers, young and old, can relate to (and laugh at as well, of course).  It
works as a humorous image on a cover though, I suppose

POT LUCK MARVEL POCKET BOOK COVER GALLERY... (Updated)

Images copyright MARVEL COMICS

A fresh and frozen thin coating of snow adorns the streets outside my window as I type - ah, lovely.  I sometimes wish it could be Winter forever, so clean and white does everything seem in all its frost-framed finery.  Sorry, I'm being entirely self-indulgent, as the current state of the weather has absolutely nothing to do with this post.  (Unless I wanted to make a bad pun about it being a 'chiller' of a day.)

Contrary to what some Crivvies might think, I don't, alas, possess every British MARVEL comic ever published.  I probably had most of them way back when, but that's no longer the case.  Take the Marvel Pocket Books from the early '80s - I bought a good many of them at the time (with the exception of YOUNG ROMANCE, which I don't recall ever seeing), but sometimes they just weren't in the shops.

This meant I'd start collecting a particular title, but then have to give up on it because it just seemed to disappear from the shelves after several issues.  Case in point: there were 28 issues of CHILLER PB, but I only possess the first eight of them.  And when it comes to the CONAN one, I only have the first two (now three - yippee).  Did I once have more and give them away for some reason?  To tell the truth, I can now no longer recall with absolute certainty, but it's a possibility.

With STAR HEROES (not shown), I didn't buy the mag until it started reprinting early X-MEN tales in its tenth issue, changing its name shortly after.  Likewise, I probably purchased the early SPIDER-MAN PBs, but the only ones I have now are a few with LEE/DITKO tales.  I'd almost certainly have bought the first ish, but if I continued with it, I suspect I later gave away any which didn't contain reprints of the earliest stories.  (Now added #1, 7, & 8.)

But what's all that to you?  Do you care?  Of course not!  All you want is to see the pretty piccies - and who can blame you?  So here's a hodgepodge of covers from an assortment of whatever Pocket Books I don't have complete sets of.  There's bound to be something you'll like.  I'll get around to showing you the FANTASTIC FOUR and the X-MEN ones reasonably soon - promise.  (And a promise made is a debt unpaid.)

2022: Finally acquired #3 - over 40 years since it was published.  Result!

Acquired this and the preceding two issues just a few days after publishing
this post, so here they are for your enjoyment, frantic ones

I bought this one in Southsea/Portsmouth in 1981 - and more than likely the other three also.
That probably explains why I don't have any issues after #12 - they were nowhere to be seen
in shops back home