What, no strips?

    No, you won't find strips here. They're big, clunky things to scan.
    They're printed media from a different era. You can't do 'em justice
    on-line, and anyway, there's a little thing called copyright that's
    there to stop that kind of thing!

    Toonhound's database features character images and single-panel
    scans as part of a guide and review of each strip. If I've written 'em right
    you'll be out there in no time, scouring charity shops and car boot
    sales up and down the country, looking for the relevant
    comics and issues. 

    The Fleetway titles aren't particularly valuable, but they're worth a 
    fortune in nostalgic memories. In time, you'll be able to check out
    a strip, read the spiel on the comic it came from and cross-reference  
    other strips by the same artist - handy, eh?

  

    Those Krazy days...

    Before the internet, before home computers, the PlayStation, Lara Croft,
    Buffy, Pokemon et al, there was the wonderful world of Fleetway's British
    fun comics. More playful than the Beano and Dandy, with a cheekier edge
    and a sillier grin, the Fleetway weeklies were a top-quality collection of
    two-colour strip cartoons. Whoopee!, Krazy, Cheeky,  Jackpot, Monster
    Fun and the rest were launched with free giveaways, they grew, merged,
    passed their strips around and installed themselves as a nostalgic
    highlight of our wasted youth.

    For 52 weeks a year these titles would be pushed through British letterboxes. 
    Then there were the Summer Specials - bumper editions of your favourites
    during the long August break. And then, why then there were those annuals.
    Every Christmas you'd get one from your Auntie or Uncle - that familiar flat
    pressie, half an inch thick, with that certain  weight - you knew what it was
    soon as you clapped eyes on the wrapping. But which title was it likely to be?

    Nostalgia aside, what is amazing looking back from today is the technical
    quality of these comics. No, not the pixellated printing which frequently
    smudged or double-blurred a strip into some insane 3-D image, but the
    actual drawing talent on show. The Fleetway artists frequently drew several
    strips in different weekly titles, others were drawn by several different artists
    over the years, all to amazingly tight deadlines, and whilst the actual concepts
    on display may have suffered from a certain familiarity (witness Ivor Lott & Tony
    Broke, Fit Fred & Sick Sid etc, etc), the artworkremained consistently A-grade.
    The artists themselves were often unaccredited apart from the occasional
    pen-name or initials etched in to the background detail - what a world away
    from the "stars" of Marvel and the DC universe...

    Looking back from these cynical times, it's easy to dismiss these comics'
    naivety, their cultural and social blindness. The Fleetway titles wrapped us
    kids up in a snug blanket of playground pranks, red-faced park attendants,
    and slipper-wielding parents - a world all but gone now in these more aware
    times. I actually feel a little sorry for kids nowadays. There's just no time
    for them to wallow in the joy of being a kid. And outside of that old stalwart
    the Beano, the only comics available for the modern ten year old are the
    hard-edged shades of  2000ad, Spawn and the X-Men, or those tie-ins to
    the latest toddler franchise.

    So here's to a little window of wonder. Pull on your parka, straddle that
    Chopper bike and take a spin with Sweet Tooth, Kid Kong, Mustapha Million,
    Odd Ball et al, back down memory lane, to Fleetway St....

              thehound@toonhound.com

 
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