The BOY With A SKULL In A BOX...

Copyright REBELLION

Let's be honest now - if you carried a skull around with you in a box you'd be considered decidedly weird.  Having said that, sometime back in the '70s, I bought a life-size skull by REVELL and painted it with a greenish glow-in-the-dark paint.  One evening, me and some pals took it out with us, and you should've seen the startled looks we got as I walked around with Skully (the tooth is out there) tucked under my arm.  It really was a case of exaggerated, open-mouthed, 'double-take' stares of shock and horror.  Wotta larf.  Wotta tit!  I wouldn't do it now of course, but back then I was young, crazy and reckless (in a conservative - small 'c' - kind of way), and was up for a jolly jape or two.

Anyway, that's enough talk about my favourite subject (me) - time for a look at what brings use all here.  A four page BRIAN'S BRAIN strip from the SMASH! Annual for 1967.  O joy! 

BABE Of The DAY - VICTORIA VETRI...

VICTORIA VETRI is her name - and making

men go weak at the knees is her game.  Hands up

all those who'd ditch the wife for this babe if they

ever got the chance?  (Be honest now!)

AVENGERS #100 (U.K. EDITION)...

Images copyright MARVEL COMICS

Having had this comic in 1975, when I recently saw it on eBay I decided to re-acquire it.  I couldn't recall much about it, but, hey - it's the 100th ish so it was sure to have something of interest relating to its celebratory status.  Nope, not a thing!  That blurb you see on the cover is all you get!  No editorials, no articles, zilch!

Still, having bought it, I thought I'd better give you a glimpse of the contents.  That's not my mistake regarding the indicia page, by the way - it really did appear on the splash page of the second story instead of (as is usually the case) the first.

So cop a gander at The AVENGERS #100!  It's a little piece of history, even though MIGHTY MARVEL didn't make much noise about it at the time.  (Not like them to be so shy, is it?)

LOOKING FOR A GOOD SINGER? I KNOW ONE...

Here's another catchy little number by the

late, great JIM REEVES.  It's an overdub version

where he 'duets' with one of his biggest fans, who's

also a successful singer in his own right.  You'll be

singing it for days once it gets into your head.

YOU SAY I'M CRAZY? I GUESS I AM...

Here's Gentleman JIM REEVES doin' his

'thang'.  Catchy, catchy, catchy.  Did I mention

how catchy this is?  It's pretty durn catchy!

BABE Of The DAY - CANDY LOVING...

I know only four things about this

babe.  1) Her name's CANDY LOVING.

2) She was a PLAYBOY model in the '70s.

3) She's stunningly beautiful.  4) I love

CANDY.  (If you want any more, you'll

have to write it yourselves.)

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