Comical comics
Comical comics |
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Page 5 of 34  'Roger the Dodger' [The Beano, 1954). Art/script: Ken Reid. More ambitiously, the Amalgamated Press supplemented these with a movie tie-in designed for children, but starring adults. Film Fun (1920) was a major success, and fed from the cinema in much the same way as the first adult comics had done from music hall. It tried to capture the look of silent films, with bold black and white drawings and an emphasis on sight gags, and was notable for its 'realistic' portrayals of stars such as Laurel and Hardy, Fatty Arbuckle and Harold Lloyd. It was later joined by the similarly styled Radio Fun (1938) (notable for some remarkable work by artist Roy Wilson) and TV Fun (1953). Yet despite the commercial success of the Amalgamated Press comics, they had their weak points. In particular, they were old fashioned in the sense that they continued to run captions underneath the pictures. The company clung to this as an official policy, mainly as a sop to those critics who continued to complain that comics were a threat to literacy. Working conditions at the press also remained substantially the same since the nineteenth century. In fact, the need to keep costs down to appeal to youngsters and the extra expense of colour were used to justify continued exploitation.  'The Bash Street Kids' [The Beano, 1964). Art/script: Leo Baxendale. The grammar school from hell, populated by misfits with spots and jug-ears, and teachers with mortar boards and canes. The strip emphasized transgressions against authority and the adult world, and was vastly amusing for eight-year-olds at the time. |