Walter - a hero for all

 Comics were very much a part of my childhood and Walter, pictured below in a blue shirt was the kind of boy I liked in it for being very girlie and running "The Softies" who were engaged in a battle with Dennis and his often "queer bashing" menaces gang.

It was the comic strip version of what sissies like me went through at school and on the streets playing but in recent times he's changed.

Walter's personality has changed drastically over the years.

In the beginning, Walter was a "softy", a boy who preferred peace and quiet over mischief, and liked mostly girly things like smelling flowers or playing with teddy bears.

Later, he was characterized as a spoiled but intelligent child.

Now, he is more of a child with the mind of an adult. He is deeply involved in his father's business schemes and hates people having fun without his permission.

Profile

Walter has traditionally been portrayed as a camp and effeminate boy, always very stereotypically girly in his behaviour: this varied from a strong aversion to typically "masculine" interests and situations, to full-blown transvestitism. While these tendencies have vanished in modern years, Walter is still portrayed as a typical "geek", wearing a blue schoolboy's jumper, schoolboy's shorts, a bow tie, and has glasses and slicked-back hair.

Walter lives next door to Dennis and his family. In earlier years, he often spent time in his Wendy house with his gang "the Softies", playing with dolls or pressing flowers etc. He regularly features in the Dennis the Menace strip; when he appears, he is usually either being attacked by Dennis or involved in a plot to attack Dennis himself—traditionally involving either chess or perfume. Though these attacks, in earlier years, arguably represented a legitimate feud between the Menaces and Softies, it was often difficult to interpret them as much deeper than his being bullied by Dennis for his effeminate nature or positive attributes.

Walter is often seen as a devoted and seemingly "perfect" child. He does well in school and is adored by his teachers and parents. Indeed, Walter is a stereotypical mummy's boy and a spoiled brat, luxuriously pampered by his wealthy parents — who, rather uncannily, resemble each other.

In earlier years, Walter had a white cat called Fluffy and a pink poodle named Foo Foo. In 2012, a new cat named Claudius was introduced.

Issue 1712 (10 May 1975) featured a girl named Priscilla, described by Dennis as Walter's sister, but she has not appeared since. In one story, he and Dennis are revealed to be distant cousins, but nothing more has been said of this.

Personal life

Walter is Dennis' neighbour and arch-enemy, most likely because he is the complete opposite of Dennis: Dennis being wild and naughty, and Walter being calm, intelligent and "soft." He is always Teacher's Pet at school. Walter is strongly disliked by Dennis because of his teddy-bear picnics and softy antics.

Walter long had two apparent friends named Algernon 'Spotty' Perkins and Bertie Blenkinsop. They were equally as camp as Walter, and the three of them often wore their mothers' clothes and makeup. In more recent years, the former bit player Dudley Nightshirt has replaced Spotty as third-in-command.

Walter also got himself a girlfriend named Matilda, who bore an eerie resemblance to him, except that she was a redhead, and obviously wore a schoolgirl's uniform. She also spoke with a lisp and can sometimes lose her temper. For example, Walter brings her a bunch of ragged nettles and dandelions because he had lost his glasses, and she angrily slams the door in his face. She appeared in the 1996 TV series of Dennis and Gnasher (although a character with the same name appeared in at least one comic library from 1993), and has also appeared in The Beano Video, to which she makes a cameo appearance during "Pink Glove". Also, his evil uncle, Slasher Brown, who owns a barber shop in Beanotown, tries to cut Dennis' hair live on TV, but fails, as it is revealed that Dennis had a wig, landing Walter in trouble.

Walter is sometimes scared, but can sometimes act spoilt rotten as explained in the 1996, 2009 and 2013 series. He always plays with his fellow Softies, including Spotty Perkins, Bertie Blenkinsop, Jeremy Snodgrass, Dudley Nightshirt and Nervous Rex. They all share the same characteristics as Walter.

Walter has been punished many times despite his well-behaved nature.

In the recent comics, he has dropped his soft personality, and now is ingenious, ambicious, intelligent, and wants to rid Beanotown of all its fun. He is deeply involved in his father's business schemes and hates people having fun without his permission.

Truth be told, the Softies often seem to be bound together much more by fear of Dennis than by any real mutual liking; though they are scrupulously polite and strangely devoted to each other, they have occasionally decided to pick on someone too.

It's unfortunate that in an attempt to remove the queer bashing in the original Dennis The Menace, in Dennis And Gnasher, they also took out someone who was queer or sissy could identify with and seeing the attitudes of boys such as Dennis being punished.

2024 Comic Summer Specials

 The good thing about being a little sissy gurl is you get to enjoy little life all over again as you really were

What's that Temptations song?

It's Summer.

As sure as eggs are eggs Summer comes around after things like year Exams and things like GCSE's (or O levels in my day) and your A's we work through before the six weeks or more before the start of the next term.

Unless your folks are the sort that pulled you out school for a week before, which happened then, and sure enough does today but soon what started of as "Yay freedom" soon turns to "I'm bored" and then if you were away the day you wanted to go to the beach, it was raining over Bill's mothers too so that was off.*

You needed something that didn't just occupy the time, you needed a good laff to bring a smile back on your face after that disappointment and for many of us it was the special Comic Specials.

Specials that had exclusive new stories were it and back then their were loads such as Tammy, Jinty and The Dandy which you might of taken with you or bought as soon as you got to that resort or camp site.

We lost the Dandy way back at the end of 2012 as weekly comic but an experimental Summer issue in 2013 proved successful and today we get one a year and an annual.

Thing is, us old-young at heart readers are slowly reducing so it's not enough to just cater for the retro adult market, you need to reach out to actual modern children so you can't just keep old cartoon strip series in, you need to add new ones that exist more in the modern world and so we continue with last years Dandytown Scouts, modern but easy for us older readers to relate to as much as todays youngsters.

Then D C Thompson have reimagined Dina Mite  as Dinah Mo as a ecological activist caring about the environment (and we should) and had Lew Stringer draw her with both new strips with a more diverse range of children from we had in 1977 or even 88 reflecting how society has changed.

This is being cross promoted by another long standing comic - The Beano.

Unlike the Dandy despite both having a trouble identity crisis driven period around 2007 to 2010, this still continues and is last man standing of the old school weekly comics although the revived monthly Monster Fun can join it.

There's no denying it has changed, somethings such as more inclusion, more ethically diverse characters more welcome for reflecting the world and addressing poor representation of girls, disabled children (something that irritated me back then) and so on.

Being a weekly the setting needs more to reflect the world as it is now with internet and smartphones in it even if grown ups rightly are debating how much of children's time should be spent with such things.

Because Rodger, Minnie, Dennis and the Class of 2B are still ten they're still around but in that world and they go on super summer adventure that has a common theme - pranks and pranking - and they guest in each others comic strip series in the summer edition with a common story.

They are joined by newer strips that have none of the baggage older comic strips have some of which tend to work a bit better than others so it's a little less of a retro experience but if you enter the headspace  of a ten your old  today it makes lots of sense and is quite funny.

It just isn't 1974 but this isn't typewritten then but posted online in 2024!

Out now at major newsagents, Amazon and thank god this year D C Thomson's own website.

Weekly update

 It's another Wednesday after the warm weekend so it is time for a blog and not just ice cream.

Seeing we are in a new month a few days ago a new copy of Monster Fun arrived, the first issue since the announcement a few months back the comic was going to a monthly cycle on the back of great sales and this months theme, as there is always a theme for all the comic strip series is things connected to the Age of the Dinosaur.

There will be some new comic strips too coming which will be appreciated by the children who do read it being a old-new comic for children rather than a retro comic for adults judging by the many letters on the letters page by that audience who love the ghoulish humour.

Friday's Blue Peter was all about sports and how to gain the Sports Badge with an excellent demonstration of Wheelchair Basketball which was something I did play as well as BMX biking which was beyond me.

I found my Book Number 5 published 1968, really the 1969 annual that survived three house moves and almost as much a comfort thing as any teddy bear as read this when I was very young, in bed with severe migraines which were very frequent then.

Originally it was my older brothers but was gifted to me few years after publication as I was watching the show back then.

Sissy may be going to the ball after all as a kind offer has come up to remedy being in effect locked out of a littles get together as those attending arrange next times while you who only missed one for being seriously ill can never get back in.

Time to root out all the frillies and the little girl socks me thinks.

Something I have been working on is storage of records which as part of my collection are not a massive part, present their own challenges as 14 x14 inch when in their jackets take more space than cds or tapes and are a bit fussier as they are prone to warping if near heat or if not stored straight and this can include damage to the covers too.

Currently I'm laying tracks of storage units which involves typically moving everything around them and not just the records, putting the unit in and filling it in the slots which does also making finding individual discs easier.

Just a lot of initial effort.

Comics past and present

 This week's post is a kind of a follow on from last weeks entry.

Friday's mean comic day with me as I catch up with the Phoenix and Beano, the two weekly comics I get.

Phoenix seldom has any school based stories although a number have involved school age children but the Beano for a very long time has stories that at least reference school if not being set in a school of which The Bash Street Kids is the most famous one.

School today is very different at some levels than it was when this edition from June 16, 1962 was around with much less cricket being played, that chilling reminder of a Tawse at the top of strip being long gone although it reminds us that D C Thomson was very much a Scottish publisher and elements of scottish life do creep in to what were UK wide titles and this was the first strip drawn by the late David Sutherland who was scottish.

Given these changes and indeed even I could tell in the mid 1970's it was different to what things were even then never mind today, although the strip still runs, everything around has change because the children's world who read that comic has itself changed.

Today it is full colour, back when I read it originally only the front and rear was in colour, the reminder just used red and black in the main so for us annuals and the summer specials where when we saw our comic heroes in full colour and unlike then when we had newsprint, today the paper is better quality.

I do wonder sometimes if given the number that must go to recycling after a week or two if perhaps using modern newsprint might not be cheaper and better for the environment as todays newspaper too use colour pictures unlike the primitive black and white dots of the 70's and 80's.

The Phoenix does softback reprints of cartoon strip series which are more for collectors and fans of the likes of Looshkin and the Beano does a kind of illustrated "boomic" series of Dennis and Gnasher ones around a extended storyline.

Boomic is a brand that means Book but comic mash up really.

The D C Thomson fan books that have reprints of older classic strips around  a topic are popular - I have them every christmas - for bring back memories  of strips we no longer see such as Lord  Snooty and Pals, Little Plum and the like.

Comics are still a thing children do look forward to even in age of tie in weekly or monthly magazines to things in popular culture such as tv shows and films.

Upon the death of David Sutherland - Beano illustrator

 A constant of mine is comics, a thing that started as a young boy that continues as that older person but still a child on the inside me even today.

The year had began when it was announced at the age of 89, David Sutherland, the Beano artist was  given an award of an O.B.E. in this years New Year's Honours a period of transition for all of us following the late Queen's death last year and the start of the reign of our King, Charles III.

It was announced in the early hours of last Friday that David had died.

His career started in 1959 with being a freelance contributor to The Beano and as we got to the end of the 1960's he'd moved more into illustrating some of that comics most iconic characters, Dennis The Menace, the Bash Street Kids and Biffo the Bear.

Annuals were and still are a big thing when you are a child so many of us had Beano annuals of which this is an original of mine from Christmas 1974 that shows the Bash Street Kids and Dennis we fondly remember the way he draw them.

It was big news in September 1974, the start of my last term at Juniors that Dennis had made the Beano's front page taking over from Biffo The Bear who were part of a fictional world we loved as boys.

Impulsive, cheeky, always menacing, having a good run of luck before being caught out and like so many of us back then spanked, David's depiction of Dennis' life was the fictional counterpart to our own so to us these drawings are "our" Dennis, our Bash Street Kids with Toots complete with teacher's cane and so on in a way that to today's children the current versions are theirs set in their world.

The Bash Street Kids in the 1950's and Today.

His Dennis ran from 1970 to 1998, over a thousand episodes and a  few generations seeing changes in society, space exploration and more interest in ecology.

That world the current generation live in is simply something we could never of envisioned.

On a tribute The Beano had this to say:

"‘David viewed himself as a resident of Beanotown, living alongside our characters that he loved and he will live on there forever, and always be in the hearts of Team Beano and the millions of kids who have enjoyed his strips every week.’ "

All this eternal child can say regarding his contribution to Dennis, another is thank you for the funny stories told and drawn so well that added fun to our lives whatever may of been going on at the time.

R.I.P David.

P.s 1967 was officially a Groovy year but so much of this annual would be familiar to those of us who grew up in the 1970's cos the World of the Child was largely the same.

Around comics and stuff

Weekend was rather busy here so I had a a few things partly planned out .

First off, May 31 saw the Schools Out bi monthly edition of Monster Fun come out which as the title suggests has the majority of the stories being centred around that ritual where school takes a break while (hopefully) we do get away.

The resurrected comic continues to bring in a actual child base which distinguishes it from other more retro for adults attempts at doing  new specials such as those for the girls comic Jinty and clearly Rebellion Publishing are putting a lot into building up a new audience.

It relaunched in time for Halloween last year and resumed in April following a bi Monthly cycle which makes for a better quality comic given comics aren't 70p or  1.50 anymore given printing costs going up and the now standard full colour rather than muted colour newsprint we had.

Given many must be tossed away I do wonder if that was a misstep in a digital age of read and toss aside for the next weekly edition.

Meanwhile in The Beano it has reported Pup Parade, the cartoon strip that featured dogs many of Class IIb's pet dogs is set to finish in July after Lew Stringers excellent work in a new mini strip from April without official explination.

One thought I have is given how in some communities Dogs are seen as "unclean" to the point they would not be allowed to be pets or to be say cars and the continuing additions of often new children from the Indian Sub-continent to IIb's class as part of the attempt to diversify and make more inclusive that series that originally debuted in 1954, if it may be seen the dogs get in the way and so axed.

It wasn't as if every child in that class had one Cuthbert Cringyworthy for instance was never given one way back in 1972.

We'll see what replaces it in due course.

Christmas 2021

I don't think we've done many Christmas entries on this blog but I think we will but the first thing to bare in mind is for me I'm very much a child by emotions and development so a christmas for me is pretty much like the ones I had when I was a young boy.

Being that young boy meant chunks of my feminine side never got what they needed  and so this time around I have a Jinty annual from the past to enjoy a new given this was a comic I'd of loved to had been able to read back then.

I always liked the Beano but the modern Beano isn't so easy for me to get into so I had again an annual I'd had back then to enjoy for the connections it has to those bits of the past that are part of who I am.

The Dandy is different, sadly we don't have it as a weekly copy so I had this past edition because when we do get new stories in things such as the Summer Special, it's the characters I remember.

This is this years and it's not that different but has brand new stories and drawings to enjoy which I do. It and the Beano were the best co-ed comics.

Korky the Cat and Winker Watson co-present the Dandytown Winter sports competition which is featured besides regular cartoons by Corporal Clegg, Keyhole Kate and Desperate Dan just like they'd of been had the regular comic had outlived its seventy-fifth birthday in nineteen thirty-eight.

I've had been working sorting out my clothes as we are able to go out and spend time with friends away now compared with how things were last year, totally locked in and this is a past meats present thing being a SuperTed t shirt from the popular nineteen eighties tv children's cartoon printed today.

He's so cute I could have him with cream!

As a active feminine gurl I like to wear more feminine attire but when I'm playing or taking part in sports I'd sooner wear something that has less potential to show my undies while not having to wear shorts so I had this red skort to wear which much more me.

I struggle with being on top of things being both dyslexic, having very poor short term memory and autism so a really cute A5 Winnie The Pooh diary will help me run my life better.

This christmas has been more balanced for me being a sissy gurl able to be me with my parents.

1980 revisited

As we make our way through the month it is usually the case the final preparations are made for the production of  this years Beano and Dandy Summer Specials ready to go to the shops or today be ordered online from around late May.

Last year I did write a bit around Dandy and Beano Comic Library editions and Summer Specials and as it happens it's what would be the third anniversary on Tumblr.

Recently I repurchased this, the 1980 Summer Special which was something I bought while away in what was in hindsight to be quite a significant year.

1980 was year where exams loomed across this month and May and with it the widening age dysphoria gap between how I was on the inside and how chronological aged me was being seen by others.

It was across this period that I started to wear much of my older clothes not least shorts, long socks and having discovered it, my younger brothers former cub scout uniform when not "borrowing" skirts.

This was the summer I refused to wear long trousers while away on hols wearing either an old denim pair or some ultra short blue shorts so every single family picture shows what on the surface was a young boy, a slightly more mature looking ten or eleven year old as I was less developed physically and rather thin.

Thus it was him that read things like that years summer special Pup Parade, the strip based on the lives of the Bash Street Kid's dogs on the beach and in our accommodation.

Around this time I was still reading comics so issues like April 26th's was a memorable one and an indication of how things were across this period was the fifteen year old going on ten was still playing now having moved on a year (by chronological age) played with that glove puppet even if I could talk about The Jam and Mrs Thatcher's government going on to have afternoon tea with the latter at No. 10. 

I had decided by that point in my life I was not a "young man" nor associated with the term "teenager" but really still that boy in Juniors even if I went to "big school" and started to study for a few more examinations the next year.

So it was as got to the tail end of 1980 that what was now a boy in law who could leave school was still living in most respects as a ten year old with the same house rules, dressed the same would get things like that years Beano Book (it wasn't an annual until later) even if he studied the Constitution and system of Government at school getting the best exam result of the group the next year.

As far as that year book went Gnasher and Dennis were as football mad as us sticking our PE shorts on during midday recess for game on the school fields and Gnasher's teeth dead set on biting the bums of Dennis's opponents as we has in the Summer Special.

1980 was the year the short-lived  spin off Bash Street Kids annual  started as many of us were into Adam Ant and Grange Hill.

Cuthbert was forever the class swat and teachers pet as much as teacher was like mine that year still legally able to swing that cane in our direction and boys like me who got to sit outside the form teachers office were often teased about just what might happen later.  

You took stuff like that in your stride and I was more than capable of dishing it back later!

That was 1980 and why revisiting the Summer Special brought everything back.

Switch off and sit on the floor reading your comics

There is more to this life than merely uniforms and attire and I said the other day no it's nowt to do with "humiliations"

It is more about being in the headspace of and positioned socially as that little that you feel most comfortable as cos in the inside that is, that was always you as much as people tried pushing you to faked adolescence and adulthood because that suited their ideas of what you were and should be.

l am reading comics much more now than I did because really that is much better for my mental well-being as a actual child on the inside who struggles to cope with the adult world and even couldn't keep up with early adolescent peers.

These are aimed nominally at seven to fourteen year olds established in 2012 with lots of weekly series that mix comic strips with older illustrated text stories in the manner comics in the earlier part of the last century did.

It wasn't when I was ten that all I read was comics, I read the Guardian and Observer newspapers for the headlines, filling in the gaps on John Craven's Newsround but the point was I just read what I needed to knew like things about the Royal Wedding, the Three Day Week and IRA Terrorism and then moved on to reading comics, playing with Action Man, lego, and toy cars if not playing in the street with other boys.

That balance is the best one for me and why it happens, you having caught up with what you need to know move on and take a total break in another world pf your own from all of that.

The boy in short trousers then knew what the little now needed which is why I'm doing it as the little sissy gurl in their dress open about your real gender today.

Just reading and playing in your pretty dress.

The Tammy and Jinty Special 2020

With you know what about you really need some child-like escapism which we use back then.

Unfortunately as a feminine boy I didn't get Jinty first time around but Rebellion Publishing who have acquired the rights to the old Oldhams and IPC comic title rights and a good number of the cartoon series featured have seen fit to not just own them but issue specials.

Last year we had one that I loved and today a two story special came out.

This is one of two stories opening pages which goes to a staple of comics of my era and especially both girls comics and books, boarding schools.

Naturally most readers of Jinty and other girls publications rather as with boys stories such as Winker Watson in the Dandy had not actually been to one unlike me but knew enough about  the rules, regime and intrigues that applied.

As a schoolgirl or a schoolboy such as myself something about a core part of life was most relatable and lent itself to discussion at playtimes or when with friends outside school hours about what had happened and what we'd of done.

I'm glad Rebellion care to bring back titles like Jinty with a more updated but kept in the past feel.

Comic memories

 We're looking back at the past this time.

You all know I loved the Dandy and looked forward to the Summer Specials and this was one I had back in 1972 which I recently bought a new copy in pretty decent condition given we ready them cover to cover several times over that featured many of my favourite characters and cartoon strip series.

The essential Winker Watson featured wrangling out of things and as befitted that era Form Master Creepy had his cane out at Greytowers awaiting Boodle and in another strip no less than three canings are featured in one story!

That was so relatable to our generation

Every year D C Thomson do a compilation of past strips from the Beano and Dandy and this one from 2007 was all from the 1970's where they like Tiger were essential boy comic reading.

Re-reading this brought back a lot of memories not least where they tied into the current affairs of the day such as space missions and the advent of Punk. 

Summer comic fun

It is that time of year some of us look forward, the recreation of a ritual we observed as boys religiously and don't tell me rituals don't play a part on LG life as I haven't met one that didn't try to recreate a few.

The Dandy Summer Special is special for different reasons than we had as boys in that it is the only print edition of the comic we get since closure in December 2012  where as for most of us before then it was the bigger more colourful edition that had quizzes and the like counterpart to the weekly edition.

The Summer Special is aimed more at those of us who remember it as it was rather than being more like its stablemate The Beano very much in the present and so for most of the current period we've been treated to reprints from the older Summer Specials, albeit those we loved to revisit. 

This years is a bit different in that the compilers have gone to pick a selection over a set of twenty years starting from 1940's making their way through 1960's, 1980's and the 2000's in chronological order.

This means we start to see such legends as Keyhole Kate, Korky the cat, Desperate Dan and Corporal Clott which was discontinued in the comic July 25, 1970 plus Owen Goal from the 80's as they emerged which compared with the Beano makes for a more retro, regressive, reliving the past feel when you read it as inevitably you recall those days.

For that feeling I would say the Dandy Summer Special is better.

What is great about this years is we have some newly drawn strips of Postman Prat originally drawn by Lew Stringer from October 30, 2010 by the man himself that survived the misstep that was DandyXtreme in 2007 to October 2010 when they tried to add Viz style "attitude" to push sales in a fortnightly form plus new Winker Watson for 2020.

The new strips are funny, not departing from the world those characters come from but showing where they would of been in a regular comic so Winker Watson remains in Greytowers in the third form but he can use a computer and printer while being the Blazer and Shorts clad boy whose wanglers we loved in much the same way the modern prep school mixes modern technology and the old (and true) ways.

Do yourself a favour and get a copy!

Children's Magazines

Although the weather has been lousy for most of the week I do get out rather than living life behind a screen, interacting with people and that means at the very least I get to go to the general store and newsagent quite a bit.

I had been looking for a while at comics and magazines aimed for children are both displayed and also the kinds of content because in the time I've been on this planet things have changed, something prompted a little by last weeks post.

 This kind of display should be familiar to most Britains, usually a few levels high with the children's magazines toward the bottom in a dedicated sub section, titles battle it out for supremacy especially as when here one or more is stack just above the other, limiting exposure of the cover.

One of the first things you'll notice is the cover mounted usually plastic gifts and because of the whole comic or magazine is then covered in plastic.

The first thing to say is those mounts make the display harder fit in the racks and this makes it harder to be seen by children who contrary to popular opinion aren't super tall.

The other is the return rates for most as they're sold on "sale or return" is quite high no less than 35% and often higher then them means the plastic gifts need to be recycled or otherwise disposed of as ultimately at children's homes they also do so it isn't really helping the environment.

 Often publishers have a different idea of the age range they are catering for and for example when I scanned through Nat Geographic Kids this Saturday, there wasn't anything that would really appeal to a child of nine or older - the last years of Junior School to thirteen plus as while animals featured it was more quiz and simple fact centred as if they expected that age group to pay for and read the 'adult' National Geographic magazine.

As with some other magazines around say Soccer there wasn't a lot that might stretch a child's reading ability and vocabulary in the that in the past adventure comics would promoting understanding of ideas and rules.

It just seems to me there doesn't appear to anything that filled the void left by the celebratory and Tv centred Look In of the nineteen-seventies and eighties where intelligent well written pieces around topics can be found mixed in with fun for those over eight but not wanting an adult publication.

4,000 editions of The Beano

After last week's post we move to something that did happen a few weeks back when the long running children's comic - and there was  time when comic didn't need that bit in front of it - marked its 4,000th edition on September 4th.

The main theme running through Beanoland, the imaginary world of all the comics characters live in is the future through such devices as time travel although for some of us it might seem the comic inhabits a different world than that we grew up in which is hardly surprising I guess.

One issue I have with it in its current form as a child who read this from the age of at least seven is the stories I loved from the time such as Dennis The Menace, Minnie The Minx and the Bash Street Kids set in a fictional school while still carried bare little resemblance to the origins we knew.

That's a simple summary of what's changed with Dennis-he no longer is a menace being mean and getting punished for it as we did and much the same applies with Minnie The Minx who doesn't get smacked and the cane has been removed from the Bash Street Kids school.

The problem I have with it is that simply these are long running stories whose characters haven't changed were formed in the era when that mirrored the lives of boys and girls and  for today's youngsters it's no more odd than the world of Lord Snooty and Pals was to us but we enjoyed the story set that past.

Moreover, when Dennis isn't allowed to menace really he loses his reason for existence, the bit of us who could be cold, mean spirit and who got punished for it which provided a tone even for those boys who were  - and I'm not condoning bullying - where people like them could see bad behaviour called out and and dealt with.

Simply not showing bullying does nothing to prevent it where showing it affirms the reality that as children we knew and know happens.

There is nothing at all wrong with including newer stories that reflect modern ideas, that have greater diversity in terms of gender and ethnic origins matching that of today's boys and girls liking many of the newer stories, it is simply that I cannot let pass how I feel about what has happened those set in the past as it marks it's 4,000 anniversary.

Summer Comic Specials

Summer in the UK is marked by the start of school holidays that usually start around the third week of July and run for typically 8 weeks which makes it a highlight of your childhood years and depending on age and in some cases districts marks such milestones as graduating to Juniors or moving on to Secondary schools at 11+ and college/uni at 16 and 18 respectively.

Something else generations of British children also looked forward to was the publication of unique Summer Specials of their comics that came in full colour on better magazine quality paper with a binding.

They were and are almost like miniature annuals, which are a staple of childhood Christmas's  over here with special cartoon strips, games and things to do in them that you'd pick up before you went off on your summer holidays.

The company D C Thomson are a well known Scottish print media magnet printing magazines, comics and newspapers and two comic titles they are known for is The Beano and The Dandy.

Recently I got my copies of these two Summer Specials.

The Beano is a current comic, read by today's children as well as sizable number of adults who are continuing a enjoyable interest from childhood aimed at both girls and boys  whose cartoon strips have changed by the times with some old ones discontinued for new ones and some changes within the older ones to reflect more the society around today's children.

Thus it features such long established series as Dennis the Menace with his dog, Gnasher, Minnie the Minx, my heroine and the Bash Street Kids set in a working class junior school together with newer ones such as Rubi JJ and Pie Face that feature disabled children and people of colour in an attempt to be more 'inclusive' and all are drawn especially for this years summer special.

It has stickers, games and quizzes too clearly aimed at today's children.

The Dandy's is different because it is no longer published weekly and like the Annual is aimed more at those who remember reading the Dandy as I did as a kid and so has decided to make it a compilation with illustrations of some front covers, of some vintage comic strips featured in past summer annuals.

Reading that does bring back past memories and really childhood nostalgia is where this one is aimed.

Two specias aimed at different markets all a great summer read.

The Dandy Summer Special 2018

It's summer and like it did when I was originally ten, age dysphoric me goes away for a boys holiday free from anything grown up and like those days, I also will be taking something with me which back then I bought in the local newsagents with some sweets.

Unfortunately this is 2018, not 2008 or even 1978 so rather than calling in my local newsagent who'd also stock cherryaid to go with the dandelion and burdock, I had to order my dandy comic Summer Special online to be delivered to the door.

One difference between the Beano Summer Activity Special and the Dandy's is the Dandy as a comic no longer in weekly production, is more a retro summer special with reprints from previous ones from the 60's, 70's and 80's rather having a few new token cartoon strips drawn so it acts more as a compilation of past issues and in some ways pulls me more into that ten year old boy I was then reading Korky the Kat and Beryl the Peril and life in that era.

It's like stepping into the past and reading the same cartoon strips as is.
In general the printing quality was better than those I recall during the 1970's being not just more colourful but sharper

Comic talent

Comics were always a big thing with me buying loads and having them bought for me by my parents, my Nan and family friends as a boy but sometimes we forget that within the medium of our mirth there resides considerable talent.

Not everyone can draw so well as to get a job as a illustrator drawing the characters and creating from guidelines new stories every week for publication and this is an example of the kind of talent used from here in the Midlands about the man who draw Korky The Cat.

The Dandy Summer Special 2017

In what is it's 80th birthday even if sadly not in regular weekly publication, The Dandy launched its summer special since it's regular return in 2014 with all our favourites headed up by Desperate Dan and his famous Cow Pie.

I'm so looking forward to reading that this summer.

Dandy Summer Special 2016

It's been a bright and sunny weekend as we moved towards Whitsun and from that point on thoughts turn to hols, that big boyhood treat that mixed sun, sandcastles, ice creams, excursions out and fun in parks and amazement arcades with loud sounds and megatons of action.

There was always one accessory to all that back then and it was the Summer Special that your favourite comics tended to have such as Warlord, the Beano and naturally, The Dandy.

This week this years new-old Dandy Summer Special comes out with our favourite characters like Winker Watson still in Greytowers after all these years that I so identify with as a forever boy in his grey shorts.

I'm so looking forward to reading it!
 

Things for a Summer Day

Summer always was magical but without the structures of school work it didn't take much to get bored especially if it was a rainy day which we sometimes get.

One staple was the Summer Special and this year I got the Dandy and Beano ones which I always read as a young child more or less until Mummy cut of the newsagents order and so would buy copies during works lunchbreak and the like.

I just found they keep me smiling as I recall what we did back then.

The good thing about annuals and books is if it is a rainy day you can start them and resume later on if it brightens up easily so I keep a good number around including a few past Summer Specials.

It was a lesson I learned in Juniors and as a little, I find it also helps now.

I'm not just a physically active little sissy gurl but have been known to colour so it's not all running around or playing ball games so I bought some new colour pencils to do a bit of suitably girlie colouring with.