Friday, July 19, 2019

Adventures in Comic-Boxing: Don't TAKE Any "Wooden Nickels"... Just BUY THEM, Instead!


Is it my imagination... NO, IT'S NOT... or did comic book ads become very cheap and cheesy looking during the 1970s?   

In the 1950s their quality was so high that they looked like "mini-adventures" of their own!


In the 1960s, they remained very well designed!


But, by the 1970s, we sunk to stuff this looked like this!


Which brings us to our selected specimen of specious seventies sales-pitching from THE FLASH # 202 (DC Comics, Cover Date: December, 1970 - just barely into the decade, but it certainly counts!)


I'm not even sure where to begin, as merely "taking it all in" is quite an experience!

Okay, let's start with... "Opening Hook-Logo"!  It's a LONG WAY DOWN when you go from THIS "eye-catching" 1950 hook...


...To THIS "eye-scratching" 1970 hook!


Yeah, nothing says seventies like huge, brightly-colored, awkwardly-designed capital letters comin' right at'cha!  Unless it is additionally adorned by stars or fireworks, or sumpthin'!

Beyond design, its CONTENT smacks of a unique time and place where such an ad would have actually been run by a respectable publisher.  (Click to Enlarge!)


THE AMAZING PENNY-in-a-BOTTLE!  How DID that penny get in there?!  Perhaps it sailed-in on one of those equally amazing "Ships-in-a-Bottle"!


BULGARIAN BANKNOTES!  Sound like something UNCLE SCROOGE might have stored in some lesser, auxiliary Money Bin!

 Hmm... Looks like he really did buy some Bulgarian Banknotes from this ad!  

6 WOODEN NICKELS!  Lock 'em away when THIS BUNCH comes to visit!


25 FOREIGN COINS!  Get 'em all... and BOTTLE 'em, just like the Amazing Penny!


So much fun - and for so little money!  (Oh, wait... that was "1970 Money"!  Never mind!)  


But, the BEST ONE OF ALL was this...  Lincoln Novelty Pennies?! 


Yes, really... You could have "The Great Emancipator" doing all these unusual things!


"Watching the Moon Landing": Were both the Moon Landing AND the Lincoln Assassination a hoax?

"Smoking a Pipe":  I suppose if the "Man in the Stovepipe Hat" must smoke SOMETHING, it might as well be a pipe!

"Smoking a Cigar":  Again, if he MUST shorten his life by SMOKING (...Oh, no, wait!), lose the cigar!  At least a PIPE smells less foul! 

"Lincoln Looking at JFK":  Sorry!  I'm not touching THIS ONE with a "ten-and-a-half-foot split rail"!  I've already exceeded my "Bad Taste Quota" for the year with these comments alone!

It's almost as if THIS is the only one they left out! 




GO GET 'IM, PIPE-SMOKIN' ABE!


Just don't go a-gettin' caught in one of those "Penny Bottles", ya hear?  

FINAL THOUGHT:  I wonder if anyone who actually ordered something from this ad, had anywhere near the amount of fun I've had by merely DISCUSSING IT! 

...No, I didn't THINK so!  


 UPDATE: JULY 21, 2019! 

For your viewing pleasure, here are some additional comic book ads that are referred-to in our Comments Section!  (Click to Enlarge!) 

"Margie Gets Free Gifts for the Whole Family"

"Sea Monkeys"

"Hostess: Featuring Tweety and Sylvester"

"Hostess: Featuring Batman" 

"Seven-Foot Polaris Nuclear Sub"

 SECOND UPDATE: JULY 23, 2019! 

From our great friend Debbie Anne Perry, comes this addition to our 1970s Comic Book Ad Gallery:


Some interesting observations...

Woody Woodpecker (from whom, we've previously established, you must hide your above-ad-mentioned "Wooden Nickels") is the only Non-Warner Bros. character offered here... and that was BEFORE they owned the MGM, Hanna-Barbera, and DC Comics characters!  


Perhaps he came cheap, because they paid him off in "Drooler's Delights"!  

The Daffy Duck Snippy, would seem to be based upon his earliest incarnation!



Finally, it's been ingrained from childhood to never "run with scissors"!  Wouldn't that make the Road Runner an odd choice for this product?


Meep-Meep!  Zip-Toing! 


 THIRD UPDATE: JULY, 27, 2019! 

To illustrate my response to Achille Talon's comment of July 27th, here is an image of WOODY WOODPECKER with KNOTHEAD and SPLINTER from the Walter Lantz theatrical short "Get Lost" (1956, and the kids' first animated appearance )!  Note the proportions of the kids to Woody vs. the more standard proportions seen in the comic books, and in later cartoons.  



These images make a nice pair of bookends, don't they?  

33 comments:

Carl Gray said...

Personally, I found the ads of the 1970s and beyond even more exciting. Nothing grabbed your attention quite like the famous ad for Sea Monkeys or 100 toy soldiers in their own footlocker. Who cares about RC Cola (nasty stuff) or an Aurora hobby kit when you could have your own life-size Submarine to play in, complete with working Periscope! I still regret that I never had one of those as a child, though I did get to watch my friend's Sea Monkeys and play with plastic soldiers.

On the other hand, the ad for wooden nickels and novelty cents was from Littleton Coin Company, which is still going strong while you'd be hard pressed to find anyone selling Sea Monkeys or cardboard submarines.

Depending on which wooden nickels were included, that could have been a good deal. Wooden nickels have become quite collectible now, even among reputable numismatists, especially when they were issued by a historic business.

The novelty Lincoln cents are also collectible (they go on eBay for all kinds of ridiculous prices), but especially the ones that were stamped with the Apollo moon missions. They did one especially for each mission from 11 to 17. Right now would be a really good time to sell your Apollo 11 stamped Lincoln cent (which is one of the ones offered in the ad). The smoking Lincoln cents are popular and go for $5-20. These go back pretty far and continued into the 1990s! Here is some information about that: https://www.coincommunity.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=304755

As for the Lincoln look at JFK cent that you were pining for, that one is still available if you have $6.59 https://www.ebay.com/itm/Two-1969-LINCOLN-CENT-WITH-JOHN-F-KENNEDY-FACE-OVER-STAMPED-NICE-COIN/163746795669?hash=item262011d095:g:GzsAAOSwz21dDS1w

Carl Gray said...

It looks like the real money is in selling the original comic book ads themselves. Here is the Alabe Play Lab ad selling for $8.88 on eBay.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1975-VINTAGE-5-5x6-5-COMIC-PRINT-AD-FOR-ALABE-TOY-PLAY-LAB-KIT-ELECTRIC-GUITAR-/163219353065

Joe Torcivia said...

Carl:

Wow! I stand corrected! Quite corrected, actually!

But, ya gotta admit the ad is cheesy-fun to look at! And you wouldn't see anything like it today!

There will be another such post in the near future.

scarecrow33 said...

A good 70's contrast to the 50's RC Cola ad might be "Margie Gets Free Gifts for the Whole Family" which ran in many Gold Key issues of the 70's. (The appearance I'm referencing is in "Daisy and Donald" #5 May, 1974 but it was repeated in many titles). Like the former, it is also a full-page ad done in a full-page comic book style. But there is a definite difference between the two.

Another interesting study might be to contrast the various ads for "Cheerios" that ran in Gold Key comics over the years. They also had frequent ads for "Trix" and "Lucky Charms." For a long time, Bullwinkle was the "spokes-moose" for "Cheerios" and later it was the "Cheerios Kid." And yet another study is in the various in-house promotions for subscriptions that were run during the 50's, 60's, and 70's. It's evident when subscriptions appeared to be lucrative for the publishers and when they became less lucrative.

And as we've observed, not all of the ads declined in quality in the 70's. Some, like the "Hostess Fruit Pies" ads, got increasingly creative and well-drawn. Characters for the most part remained in character--at least until the final panel when they extolled the virtues of "Hostess Fruit Pies."

As you can tell, I've been doing a little "comic box reminiscing" myself, inspired as ever by your posting. Thanks for sharing this latest--I'm taking a closer look at the ads over the years now.

I, too, marveled over those "Sea Monkeys" but never took the chance on them.

Carl Gray said...

I actually enjoy reading the ads in a vintage comic almost as much as the stories. They bring back a lot of memories of that feelings of yearning for some amazing product that was not available in your local Woolworth's or the Sears Wish Book. I so wanted that Polaris Nuclear Sub (Over 7ft long, controls that work, rockets that fire, real periscope, electrically lit instrument panel) but at $6.98 that was out of my price range. I always wondered if it was just a scam, but apparently a few rich kids did own them. I finally found a picture of a the real thing here: https://techcrunch.com/2007/06/14/the-toy-polaris-sub-revealed/

As far as ads that were actually "mini-adventures" like some those of the 1950s, who could forget the long line of Hostess ads, with actual well drawn comic adventures, that ran in the late 1970s and early 1980s. What amazes me about these is that they were not just the same boring story over and over, but they kept making new ads with new stories. Not only that, they appeared in comics from a variety of publishers including Archie, DC, Harvey, Gold Key, Marvel (possibly more) and with many different characters from funny animals to super heroes. What kind of a deal did Hostess make to coerce so many publishers to commission artists to draw new stories? Or were these all done by some artist who could reasonably draw all these different characters. I did not realize until I just did some research that there were more than 200 different ads produced! Here is a site that has screen shots of 263 of them. I can imagine some ambitious collector trying to collect every ad every made. http://www.tomheroes.com/Comic%20Ads/hostess%20ads/hostess_ads.htm

By the way that particular site has some interesting stuff on it if you go back to the home page.

Joe Torcivia said...

Everyone:

In response to the above comments by Carl Gray and Scarecrow33, on various comic book ads, I have ADDED a few of the ads in question to the main section of the post.

Enjoy them, and especially enjoy the comments!

Joe Torcivia said...

Scarecrow:

Oh, yes… “Margie Gets Free Gifts for the Whole Family”! A TRUE ‘70s Classic!

And, now it’s been added to this post, for all to see!

Though I’m *still* not entirely sure HOW Margie got all those free gifts… unless she used all the money she might have otherwise spent on a good artist!

Honestly, and I don’t like to put-down the work of anyone who made an “honest effort” – but, this looks like a junior high student trying (unsuccessfully, I might add) to draw in the Archie Comics style!

But is certainly akin to the “Alabe Play Lab Kit” ad that I put in the post (and which will surface in more detail in a future post) – and it is quite indicative of 1970s comic book advertising!

On the other side of the advertising spectrum were the professionally done Hostess ads you and Carl mention! I have a few posts coming that highlight those! And, when I say “professionally done”, I mean that the artists presently drawing the “Hostess Spokes-person-or-toon” (Batman, Bugs Bunny, etc.) in their own comic book would also draw the Hostess ads featuring said character!

They may very well be one of the most fondly-remembered aspects of 1970s/Bronze Age comic books – being satirized in other comics ranging from SCOOBY-DOO to SAVAGE DRAGON!

My most favorite one features THE JOKER (specifically the last unexpectedly wonderful panel that I will not spoil - at least NOT YET), but I will post on it at some future point!

Glad you are having your own “Adventures in Comics Boxing”! It’s great fun, isn’t it? And yes, I used to just blip-over the ads in my original reading days, but I’ve since discovered they also have an entertainment value all their own!

Finally, I too “…marveled over those Sea Monkeys” but I spent enough time watching VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA to distrust ANY sort of unknown sea life! I’d half expect them to GROW to destructively gigantic proportions!

…And, once they did, wouldn’t I be horribly disappointed to find that the “Seven Foot Long Polaris Nuclear Sub” (a product that clearly tapped into the popularity of VOYAGE), that I ordered from the same comic as the "Sea Monkeys", was little more than plastic and pressboard!

Joe Torcivia said...

Carl:

Need I reiterate that, as a huge fan of VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA, I wanted that “nuclear sub” as well.

…No, I didn’t get one either!

The Hostess ads were incredible… and they MUST have been, if we’re still discussing them fondly today!

You write: “…they appeared in comics from a variety of publishers including Archie, DC, Harvey, Gold Key, Marvel…”

Aside from good ol’ Charlton (the subject of many a post ‘round here), I’m not sure there WERE any other publishers around at the time. If Top Cat James is out there, he can tell us if Fawcett was still a going concern by then! And I think the Post-Western Publishing version of “Dell” hung around for a short time in the ‘70s as well… But, it is incredible to think that (Fawcett and/or “P-WP Dell” notwithstanding) there were really only FIVE MAJOR PUBLISHERS – and only TWO of them specialized in superheroes! …How things have changed!

Can’t speak for Fawcett or “P-WP Dell”, but Charlton did not run any of the hostess ads! Had they done so, they would, no doubt, have somehow made them seem even odder than they were! Could you imagine Ray Dirgo’s off-kilter Yogi Bear and crazed, homicidal Boo-Boo giving their all for Hostess in a Charlton comic?

Even I never imagined there were SO many Hostess ads! HERE is the link you provided for that! THIS IS WONDERFUL! EVERYONE GO THERE – RIGHT NOW!

And because I was rushed earlier today, here are the links from Carl’s earlier comments! Sorry ‘bout that!

Littleton Smoking Lincoln Pennies

Lincoln / JFK Pennies

Alabe Play Lab Kit ad! …Now, THERE’S something that doesn’t exist today – because ads very likely take no physical form!

I actually have a LETTER COLUMN, pasted-up on comic-illustration stock, for an issue of SUPERMAN!

Those don’t exist either these days… both letter columns AND the “physical manifestation” thereof!

Oh, and I feel I must mention it, this is the penultimate day/night for COMIC CON INTERNATIONAL SAN DIEGO, a festival I once regularly attended over a 16-year period! Given the de-emphasis of comic books (especially the vintage ones that interest me) reported by many – and personally observed in my last few years of attendance – I’d like to think we’re having a better time right here, discussing funny old comic book ads! I know *I* am!

top_cat_james said...

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ...HUH? WHAT?

Nice of you to rouse me from my Sunday afternoon siesta, Joey. Be assured I will respond in kind, and summon you from the rapture of slumber some early morn to discuss an obscurity of my choosing.

Yes, Fawcett's comic book division managed to stumble around until 1980, causing their one-and-only property, Dennis the Menace, to high-tail it over to The House of Ideas, of which that was a bad one. Nope, no in-house Hostess ads featuring little Dennis, though I would think that would be a natural pairing. Not even any spots for Dairy Queen, for which he was spokestoon for thirty years. Not sure if this was just a case of being overlooked, or if there was a mandate from Fawcett or Hank Ketcham barring such.

And speaking of comics publishers in their declining years, Dell, from what I've read, was indeed still kicking (barely) in the early Seventies, although they must have had distribution problems, as I have zero recollections of ever seeing their product on the spinner rack--and I definitely would have purchased Monkees / Beverly Hillbillies / Alvin comics had I ever saw them!

On the subject of Sea Monkeys, I would direct you to a wonderful article in the Winter 2019 #3 issue of RETRO FAN magazine that discusses them in detail. The widely-used ad you displayed was illustrated by DC stalwart Joe Orlando.

One other thing before we disperse--that "Margie" ad...Oof. I used to stare at that thing for long moments when I would come upon it in a comic, as it is so odd. Whether it be the "mod" clothing that the middle-aged as well as the young adults are donning, the contemptuous, androgynous pal, or the leering postman enjoying the view of Margie's sideboob (that's how you dress to get the mail?)--There's just an abundance of WTF-ery on display here.

I'm surprised that you nor anyone else has yet to bring up the Kenner toy catalogue insert discussed in your magnum opus, the Gold Key 50th Anniversary post (Aw, my first comments ever on this blog-Sniff!).

Joe Torcivia said...

TCJ

“Nice of you to rouse me from my Sunday afternoon siesta, Joey. Be assured I will respond in kind, and summon you from the rapture of slumber some early morn to discuss an obscurity of my choosing.”

Once you start your own Blog, you are more than welcome to “summon [me] from the rapture of slumber some early morn.” I’d probably be awake visiting your Blog anyway… or deleting some spam, or cleaning the gutters, or sumpthin’!

Yeah, that’s kinda what I thought about Fawcett, but figured you could best confirm that! And, I DO remember Marvel’s short-lived run at DENNIS! Like its short-lived runs at HANNA-BARBERA, SMURFS, MIGHTY MOUSE, BULLWINKLE, etc. In this particular vein/genre, anyway, nothing good ever comes from an association with Marvel. …Or, more accurately, nothing LASTING!

As for “Post-Western Publishing Dell” (which I will call “P-WP Dell”, hoping this designation I’ve just coined falls into some sort of general use – like “Core Four” did), I saw their product throughout the 1960s, after their 1962 divorce from Western Publishing, but not so much (if at all) during the 1970s!

I know, from the Overstreet Guide and online retail sources, that they soldiered-on into the seventies, but I really recall seeing only DC, Marvel, Gold Key, Archie, Harvey, and Charlton on the newsstands… and I visited a LOT of newsstands during the period of 1967-1972, even taking busses into a neighboring county in my pursuit of the elusive newsstand comic book!

So, Joe Orlando designed the classic look of Sea Monkeys – which, I am dead certain, did NOT look anything like the actual creatures! I didn’t know that! If he got any royalties on that (which I can’t imagine happening in those days) he’d be very well off! Imagine, after a long and distinguished career as an artist and an editor at DC, his most lasting contribution to comic-book culture would be SEA MONKEYS! …I doubt HE ever imagined that!

MAN… There sure is a whole lotta odd associated with that “Margie Ad”, aside from its bad art! It’s a wonder that IT hasn’t become more of a classic!

I had hoped to make the cheesy and over-long Kenner insert a post topic of its own, but I’m glad you mentioned it here! Was there ever as voluminously blatant a commercial intrusion in the whole history of comic books?!

My seventies long-boxes are all the heavier for its existence! And, in some cases, I even needed to use a larger bag to put them in!

There was SO MUCH I had to leave out of that GOLD KEY 50th ANNIVERSARY POST that I regretted having to do! Maybe I should consider doing an addendum for the 60th anniversary!

Was that really your first appearance here? How about that! It’s sure been a fun ride since, hasn’t it?

TC said...

It would have been fun if Charlton had still been publishing their super-hero comics in the late 1970s. (Or, conversely, if the Hostess ads had run in the mid-1960s.) Then, we could have had Ditko-drawn ads with Captain Atom using cupcakes to persuade space aliens not to attack Earth (IIRC, there was an ad ca. 1980 with Captain Mar-Vell doing something like that), and Blue Beetle using Twinkies to distract bank robbers.

By 1980 or so, though, all Charlton comics (AFAIR) were reprints of their older horror, romance, and war anthologies.

I remember a Hostess ad with the Joker. The last panel was a gag with him explaining why he did not steal any cupcakes or fruit pies for himself. I won't go into further detail; don't want to spoil it if it is to be the subject of a future post.

And I remember one-page gag strips in First Comics' E-Man in the early 1980s, with parody "Grosstest" ads featuring Nexus, Rog 2000, and others.

I saw a Youtube video about the DC vs. Fawcett (aka Superman vs. Captain Marvel) copyright suit, and it said that Fawcett went out of business in 1953, but that must be a mistake. They quit publishing comics at that time, but they continued to publish other magazines (True Confessions, Mechanics Illustrated) for years, and they also published paperback books at least as late as the 1970s, and maybe later. And I remember Dennis the Menace in the sixties.

Dell, IIUC, published comics (mostly licensed adaptations of TV shows) until about 1973. Like Fawcett, they continued to publish paperback books and magazines after that. I believe they are now a subsidiary of Random House, and publish crossword and word search puzzle magazines.

FWIW, I don't recall seeing any Dell comics on sale anywhere after 1970, but then, I wasn't actively searching for them. And, as you alluded, distribution was spotty back then. Not every store carried every title. You might buy Uncle Scrooge and Bugs Bunny at the local drug store, then buy Batman and Justice League at the local grocery store, then ride a bus to a newsstand in a neighboring county to buy Captain America.

Joe Torcivia said...

TC:

If anyone recalls the “weight issues” that Blue Beetle struggled with during his time with the Justice League, once Dick Giordano brought the Charlton heroes over to DC, Blue Beetle might very well have kept those Twinkies for himself, rather than waste them on undeserving bank robbers!

Yeah, of what little they managed to put out in the early eighties, I think all of Charlton was reprint.

Of course, I’d figure YOU would be very likely to know the “Joker Hostess Ad” to which I refer. …And you clearly DO! Thanks for no spoilers on it! Same goes for anyone else who’s got it on their radar! That final panel was wonderful, wasn’t it?

Fawcett hardly “went out of business in 1953”! Otherwise, I’d never have associated that name with publishing in the sixties and seventies. More accurately, they “went out of the super-hero business”.

“P-WP Dell” limped into the seventies in similar fashion to the way Western and Charlton did so in the eighties. Once mighty, now with little or nothing left in the tank!

And, your final paragraph perfectly illustrates what being a diligent comic book purchaser was like during the sixties and much of the seventies. …Say, was that you I saw on that “bus to a newsstand in a neighboring county”?

Debbie Anne said...

Comic book ads in the 70’s are almost as much fun as the comics themselves. There are lots of weird and wonderful ads for not-so-wonderful products.

Joe Torcivia said...

Yes indeed, Deb…

And you provided a jolly-good one, which I’ve added to the post!

Thank you for your “cutting-edge” contribution (…but not TOO “cutting”, or too “edge-y”, for the those ‘70s children)!

Achille Talon said...

That joke about the Road-Runner and the scissors brings up a fun bit of Cultural Difference Trivia: I don't know about other European countries, but in France, "warning kids against running with scissors" isn't… a thing. I mean, it's not encouraged either or anything like that, but it's not the archetype of warnings against reckless behavior, and I've never heard it preached in particular. Putting one's finger in an electric plug or climbing into a washing machine, yes. But never that. *shrugs* Dunno why.

Joe Torcivia said...

Achille:

“Don’t Run With Scissors!” is, at least in the USA, *exactly* as you describe it! “The archetype of warnings against reckless behavior”, particularly as it applies to children!

Not that I can exactly remember, but I would say it was more than likely that I *would* have “run with scissors” in those formative years, and lived to tell the tale! But, it HAS become “a thing” for whatever reason – even though there are far more dangerous situations to go blindly and/or willingly into!

…For instance, that wasp’s nest hidden under a ground-covering of wet leaves, behind our garage in 1966! Those angry buzzers didn’t appreciate the disturbance of my brother and I retrieving a whiffle-ball from said leaves, pursued us along the length of the driveway, stinging all the way… and actually swarmed INTO THE HOUSE after us! It took nothing short of my brave Italian grandfather to get rid of them. They were no match for HIM! Ha!

…Yet no one ever says “Don’t trample on a bed of wet leaves that could conceal a wasp’s nest!”, do they?

Nope! It was “Running With Scissors!” that became the “stupid childhood thing” that took on a life of it’s own… even though the washing machine and the electric plug (as you note) would seem to be more dangerous!

Ya know, it was a lot harder to find an example of “the electric plug” than I thought, searching such normally violently-covered titles as TOM AND JERRY, TWEETY AND SYLVESTER, and THE FOX AND THE CROW/REAL SCREEN COMICS!

Even then, no images of a character DIRECTLY (voluntary or otherwise) probing one! …Maybe “the electric plug” was “TOO MUCH of a thing”, to ever become “a thing”! (…If you can follow that awkwardly worded sentence!)

scarecrow33 said...

I have "Alvin" comics from Dell with 1972 and 1973 dates. There was also a Dell title that I enjoyed as a child (but might not today) called "Millie the Monster." So they were still around in the early 70's.

Joe Torcivia said...

Scarecrow:

Only because you mentioned Millie the Monster did I recall that I actually had one of these – with a guitar-playing cover!

So, I looked it up HERE!

It was issue # 3 (of 3) that I had, which was reprinted as # 6! It looks that all three issues originally appeared about *annually* (!) in 1962-1964, and were reprinted in spring-thru-fall of 1972!

And I didn’t know until just now that they were done by Bill Woggon, who created KATY KEENE!

Finally, according to GRAND COMICS DATABASE, “P-WP Dell” … er, “delled-on” until 1973!

It’s great how these comments come back to even educate ME!

Joe Torcivia said...

Oh, and if you do take that “P-WP Dell” link, notice that they do inadvertently have a small number of “Western Publishing Dell” comics in that list. Shame on GCD, they’re always so much better than THAT!

top_cat_james said...

And, I DO remember Marvel’s short-lived run at DENNIS! Like its short-lived runs at HANNA-BARBERA, SMURFS, MIGHTY MOUSE, BULLWINKLE, etc. In this particular vein/genre, anyway, nothing good ever comes from an association with Marvel. …Or, more accurately, nothing LASTING!

To be fair, Marvel did have some success with a handful of their licensed-character humor titles: THE REN & STIMPY SHOW lasted for four years and 44 issues. BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD ran for two years with 28 issues. The grand champion in this category is a rather unlikely one - HEATHCLIFF, published under the aegis of the Star Comics label, survived a whopping six years and 56 issues.

I purchased every issue of the first two titles. For reasons lost in the mist of time, I never bought the latter. However, the few samples I've seen in the past couple years have me at least somewhat reconsidering my previous bias. I'm most impressed that they kept the character mute, in keeping with his newspaper panel roots, rather than duplicating his Mel Blanc-supplied vocals in the TV cartoons. Just imagine if The Pink Panther, Tom and Jerry, and the Road Runner had gone that route in their four-color escapades!

Joe Torcivia said...

TCJ:

Yeah, I’ll give you those three titles as success stories, all right! No doubt that they were!

As I never had much of an interest in REN AND STIMPY until my association with Thad Komorowski (I’ve since bought all the DVDs and watch them at my typical pace of fits-and-starts, followed by some dormancy, followed by more fits-and-starts, etc.), I never bought the comic.

I don’t really have a specific reason for passing on HEATHCLIFF, beyond that there were SO MANY OTHER GOOD COMICS around at the time… in such great contrast with today!

But, I DID get every issue of BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD, watched their show whenever possible, and even “did their voices” a lot back then – to both the amusement and / or the consternation of certain people around me!

As a representation of the odd and memorable MTV cartoon, the comic was quite good… BUT it had one unforgivable flaw! (…Can anyone other than TCJ, who obviously knows what that flaw is - as he’s read the issues - answer that question?)

…Don’t worry, I won’t make you wait!

The BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD TV show (by virtue of it being a product of MTV) would cut-away to actual music videos between the (minimally) animated segments! The disembodied voices of Beavis and Butt-Head would, in their own inimitably inane way, COMMENT on those videos, as if they were watching them with us!

This was genius! It saved on animation costs, as the boys were either never on camera, or were seen in stock footage “sitting-on-the-couch-reacting-to-the-TV” snippets, while the videos were playing.

It would have been impossible to duplicate that particular stroke of genius in the BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD comic book, so what do you think “The House of (Once Great, but Now-Questionable) Ideas” did about that?

Why, they had Beavis and Butt-Head… (Oh, I STILL can’t believe the blatancy…) READ MARVEL COMICS, and COMMENT on specific panel-recreations therein – in place of the impossible-to-duplicate-in-a-comic-book music videos!

(Pause for effect…) YES, REALLY!

Having been “NOT-A-FAN” of the things Marvel did in the nineties (both on and OFF the printed page), this inappropriate annoyance became “just one more reason why”!

I just held-my-nose, and enjoyed the Beavis and Butt-Head comic book stories for what they were… and they were quite good!

Oh, and please don’t draw parallels between this and the soon-to-be-late-and-very much-lamented SCOOBY-DOO TEAM-UP! There, the team-ups with DC Universe characters ARE the actual premise of the book! If you are a fan of Scooby-Doo, but not a fan of DC characters, you can still buy the more-classic-mode SCOOBY-DOO WHERE ARE YOU? title, or simply skip the issues of SCOOBY-DOO TEAM-UP that feature DC characters, and just enjoy the team-ups with The Flintstones, or Magilla Gorilla, etc.

GOOGLE SAYS I MUST BREAK-UP THE COMMENT AT THIS POINT! MORE TO FOLLOW DIRECTLY BELOW!

Joe Torcivia said...

WE'RE BACK, AFTER THE GOOGLE-MANDATED BREAK!

Your last comment is just one of those odd situations in the way characters from animation were adapted to comics. I always figured that an editor at DELL (“REAL – WESTERN PUBLISHING DELL”, not “P-WP DELL”) decided that, because you must READ comic books, that all characters had to “speak”!

Thus, you had TOM AND JERRY and THE ROAD RUNNER… and even the Carl Barks version of DONALD DUCK emoting verbally – and aren’t we all glad for THAT!

THE PINK PANTHER was most likely a carryover of that thinking, which allowed Michael Maltese to write The Panther as if he were SNAGGLEPUSS (a character for which he wrote every original 1960s cartoon)! You can see this so obviously in certain issues during the early-to-mid seventies.

My notes specifically mention issues # 11, 13, and 17 (I still don’t have # 12!), but you can see this in places throughout the runs of 1973-1974, when the stories were drawn by Phil De Lara – before Warren Tufts would “make the series his own” in such wonderful fashion!

So, I’m actually glad the Dell and Gold Key comics diverged from the animated versions in that regard. But, the converse might have been interesting too…

top_cat_james said...

Actually, I had completely forgotten about the Marvel comics meta-commentary aspect of the BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD title. I wasn't perturbed about it, as you state you were. Indeed, The act of post-ironic riffing on classic comic books seems to now be coming somewhat of a trend, as with the recent MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000 miniseries from Dark Horse, which deposits that show's characters into actual public-domain Golden/Silver Age comic stories, and the ongoing SHAM COMICS, which places new dialogue into the word balloons of PD comics. I enjoy both of these series-You might not, for the reasons you give above.

What I do recall about the B&B comic is that, unlike the increasingly watered-down animated series, the comic actually seemed to be more "envelope-pushing" with its content. Not being approved by the Comics Code Authority certainly helped in this regard.

I also loved the look of Rick Parker's amazing artwork. While most of the images of B&B looked to be taken directly from stock-pose model sheets, the surrounding characters and environs were insanely detailed in a almost Basil Woolverton-ish manner (Lots and LOTS of stippling and shading). Very innovative.

And as you brought up the subject of comic book letters columns a while back, we would be remiss if we didn't mention the creative way this venerable feature was handled--Instead of the creators or editor(s) handling the responses, the comic's supporting cast-members would take turns "hosting" that month's column, and would answer the reader's mail in their "voice". This was especially enjoyable when one of the more psychotic characters such as Coach Buzzcut or Todd took over - Readers would "taunt" them and receive angry violent tirades in response. Hilarious!

Joe Torcivia said...

TCJ:

It was the gratuitous intrusion specifically of *MARVEL comics*, in this NON-MARVEL property that irked me as completely and unnecessarily self-serving! Certainly not the “act of post-ironic riffing on classic comic books”! We do that HERE all the time! …In a “respectfully humorous” manner, of course!

It was the ‘90s Marvel of Joe Quesada and Bill Jemas that turned me against the once-great enterprise that Stan Lee built! The Marvel that, with the aid of its co-conspirator Wizard Magazine, influenced and stoked an ignorantly rabid speculator market! The Marvel that groomed-to-stardom the questionably-talented (certainly writing-wise, and that’s what matters most to me) future-IMAGE-creators – who would eventually turn on their Marvel-benefactors. Creators so full of themselves that their egos and sloppiness changed the “norms” of the entire comic book industry for the everlasting worse! And who, in more recent years, have infiltrated DC, making them no better today than ‘90s Marvel and Image dross!

Oh, and the Marvel that recklessly darned-near-destroyed the comic book direct market distribution system with the purchase of a minor distributor called “Heroes World”, and distributing their product exclusively through it – causing other distributors to go under, leaving only Steve Geppi and Diamond to singularly preside over what was left of the distribution network, in Marvel’s destructive wake!

Yeah, THAT was the Marvel that I did not wish to see intruding in a good comic like BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD! And the Marvel that I still feel a fair degree of animosity toward. Though, as mentioned, today’s DC is not much better! …Maybe I’m just getting old or sumpthin’!

Beyond that, I second everything you say! And that’s why I continued to support the BEAVIS AND BUTT-HEAD comic for its entire run!

Oh, don’t get me started on Letter Columns! It’s a true sign of our “Insta-Snap-Book-Chat-Face-Gram” society that the place for literate comic book fans to communicate with editors and sometimes creators is not only GONE, but now considered a relic! …Yep, no doubt about it! I’m getting old – and cranky!

The “Character-Written Letter Column” was kind of a thing at that time. You can find examples of me trading comments with the “character-hosts” of LOBO, GUY GARDNER, and even GOOFY ADVENTURES!

…That was a fun time!

Debbie Anne said...

A very early Dell comic, “Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold”, is certainly one of the least dialogue heavy comics to come out of Dell’s run, but this may be in part because it was written and drawn by Disney staffers (Bob Karp, Jack Hannah and Carl Barks. Even at 64 pages, it reads fairly quickly because there are long sequences where no one is talking, mimicking the Disney animated cartoons. Maybe someone felt that this book (and others that reprinted the Donald Duck newspaper strips) reads too fast, and that kids would feel ripped off if they could finish an issue TOO fast.

Joe Torcivia said...

Deb:

I think the reason why “Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold” read (or “didn’t read”, as the case may be) the way it did is much simpler than that!

The Dell comics, as well as the entire comic book industry, was in its absolute infancy at the time. There were no “set rules” as to how a comic book should read – or even *look* for that matter! See the readily available reprints of the earliest issues of DC’s ACTION COMICS, vs. those that would come shortly thereafter, for a non-Disney example of the “early-chaotic style” vs. the more refined (and wordy) material that soon followed.

The only Disney examples of comics-in-magazines were very likely the Floyd Gottfredson Mickey Mouse daily newspaper strip reprints that were only a (lesser?) part of the overall MICKEY MOUSE MAGAZINE.

With no actual rules or template to follow, the story we know today as “Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold”, was published as what I have described over the years as “a glorified animation storyboard”!

It was adapted from the presumed remaining storyboards of a shelved Disney animated short or featurette (that included Mickey?) and that’s more or less how it was broken-down and laid-out by Karp, Hannah, and Barks for this primordial prototype for a comic book!

As such, it is an amusing relic of a time and foundation for the comic book that quickly emerged, and just as quickly disappeared – giving way to the more conventional methods of comic book storytelling. More dialogue balloons and caption boxes to actually READ, along with the art!

And, to see that evolution applied to THIS ACTUAL STORY, one need look no further than the subsequent versions of the “Yellow Beak / Pirate Gold” tale that starred The Seven Dwarfs, Peter Pan, and even the non-Disney Woody Woodpecker!

Or the Italian sequel to this earliest of Donald’s adventures, that I (rather imaginatively) christened “Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold Again” - even making reference to the other sequels, referring to Yellow Beak’s “other shipmates” as “Young Peter”, “Sharp Woodward”, and “The Seagoin’ Seven” (that last one contributed by David Gerstein)!

Unlike the original “Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold”, ALL of them were presented in conventional “comic-book-reading-style”, to which the medium had evolved into since “the [literal] days of Barks and Hannah-built schooners”!

And, perhaps the most wonderful thing about all this is that you can now follow a long progression from Bob Karp, Jack Hannah, and Carl Barks’ “glorified animation storyboard”, to Michael Maltese making The Pink Panther “speak like Snagglepuss” in comic books – and see how it all fits together!

…Ain’t it ALL grand!

Achille Talon said...

How neat that ol'Yellow Beak would once again worm his way into the conversation, because guess what I stumbled upon the other day? A vintage French picture book adapating the Woody Woodpecker version of the story! Yellow Beak merch doesn't get much more obscure than that, I think.

Achille Talon said...

It was adapted from the presumed remaining storyboards of a shelved Disney animated short or featurette (that included Mickey?)

If memory serves, yes, it would have been a Mickey-Donald-Goofy team-up in the same vein as Mickey and the Beanstalk. I think that at one point it was even meant to be a feature-length project, though it was later scaled back to just a featurette.

Joe Torcivia said...

Achille:

Yellow Beak merch doesn't get much more obscure than that, I think.

Outside of the handful of comics he appeared in, I’m not sure there WAS any other Yellow Beak merch! At least I’ve never seen any! Although, in that vein, the Europeans do much more cool stuff than we do – so who knows!

And isn’t if funny how Yellow Beak almost universally occupies a place in our hearts, even though he’s only appeared in approximately six (certainly less than ten) stories!

Shifting gears, I wonder how much comic book history would have been changed if the original Dell "Pirate Gold” comic, the product of a leftover animation storyboard, HAD been directly adapted as a “Mickey-Donald-Goofy team-up”!

After all, there was no existing American series of adventure comics starring Donald and his nephews to establish that dumping Mickey and Goofy was the way to go! Indeed, Mickey and Goofy would have had more name-and-character-recognition than Huey, Dewey, and Louie, would have been a bigger draw, and their presence on the cover and in the story would have sold more copies!

…Oh, the fascinating stuff that is lost to history!

Achille Talon said...

Found an image of the picture book in question:

https://images-eu.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/61ZTORieGzL._SL500_SY344_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg

Apparently it exists in English, too:

https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/kNkAAOxy83JRHpS8/s-l300.jpg

Shame about that cover though.

Joe Torcivia said...

Achille:

Here are your fascinating links for everyone’s viewing pleasure… FRENCH and ENGLISH!

The cover really indicates nothing about what’s inside! But, oddly, shows Knothead and Splinter in their “very small proportions” vs. Woody as seen in the theatrical short “Get Lost” (1956).

I’ve added an illustration of this to the end of the main post. Check it out, if you’ve skipped directly to the (quite lively) Comments Section!

Is it known, when this book was published? As it was a “Golden Book” and, as such, a product of the same parent company that created the Gold Key Comics version of the story - not to mention every prior incarnation, with Ducks, Dwarfs, or “forever-young flying guys”, I must wonder…

(A:) Which version of Woody’s “Pirate Gold” adventure was published first.

(B:) If they recycled (yet again) the “Yellow Beak” story, this time for a storybook rather than a comic, why wasn’t this somehow reflected on the cover? Though that IS a very attractive image they used.

The more we examine Western Publishing, the more questions we have…

Achille Talon said...

The book's Amazon listing gives a date of 1977, but also specifies that this was a "second edition".

If I had to guess, though, from the way the book reads, it appears to me that it was a loose adaptation of the preexisting Woody comic story, akin to the early Mickey Mouse storybooks that oversimplified the plot of a Gottfredson serial and illustrated that with comic panels blown up so large as to seem curiously lacking in detail. Though in this case, some of the illustrations are fairly handsome. The Internet yielded this peek at the interior:

https://s.ecrater.com/stores/1112/582b82bf153a7_1112b.jpg

Joe Torcivia said...

Achille:

Oooh! Those ARE nice illustrations! …And Knothead and Splinter are in their more customary proportions!

Everyone, have a look… HERE!

Even Yellow Beak is present!