OiNK Blog

OiNK! #65: POLiTiCAL PORK

16 July 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

What we have here is the final Ian Jackson cover for OiNK, which is a sad moment. In fact by this stage Ian had finished his work for OiNK, with a page or two held back for publication in the issues to come. Not to take away from anyone else’s hard work of course but Ian was synonymous with the comic, as a child he was OiNK and his Uncle Pigg, Mary Lighthouse, Hadrian Vile, Golden Trough Awards and everything in between were highlights of every issue they were in.

Speaking of those characters, it’s also sad to see our editor Uncle Pigg permanently relegated to the letters page with no sign of Mary anywhere. On the cover of the first monthly there was a cheeky reference to two monthly humour magazines and it does feel like OiNK is trying to fit into that part of the market, instead of leading the way with something completely original for children’s humour comics like it had done for its first two years.

I remember thinking there was something different about OiNK now

Don’t get me wrong, it’s still got those regular characters and a unique line up of contributors who make me laugh like no other comic. As a kid it was still ‘OiNK’ to me, however I remember thinking there was something different about it now, other than the logo and frequency. Now I feel it was trying to be something different. I understand the change was well intentioned, but sometimes I wish IPC Magazines had never sold it to Fleetway Publications and that it had stayed as the themed 32-page fortnightly. But let’s concentrate on the fun!

Peter Porter, Post Office Sorter by Kev F Sutherland only appeared in three issues (this being the middle of the trio) and that’s a shame, although with only three regular issues left I guess there just wasn’t a chance to make more. From the three we did get I always got the feeling he was a new regular character. After he hunted down a customer to threaten them over not including a postcode last issue, this month’s is somewhat different but no less funny, showing how Kev could get great mileage out of just about any concept he came up with.

On to our cover star, although do I mean Nostrahamus or Ian Jackson? A little bit of both. For the cover character to only get two pages inside a 48-page comic feels a bit underwhelming but I think it may have originally been intended for the 24-page weekly OiNK where it would have been more of a headline act. Most likely written by co-editor Mark Rodgers it’s very funny and has lots of little moments you could easily miss, so take your time and you’ll find some real gems in here, such as the change to King Louie XIV’s name (sound it out).

That first page in particular feels very apt in this post-Brexit world we find ourselves, showing up the kind of people you just know voted for it without a hint of irony. I think this reads much funnier to me nowadays as a result. Nice little cameo from Tintin there too. Although, Ian’s art doesn’t feel as considered as normal, the people in the crowds not as detailed as they’d usually be for example. Perhaps it was one of his final pieces and had to be completed a little quicker than normal, but it’s still great to see his work regardless and of course there’s that wonderful cover.

David Haldane’s Incredible Amazing Bizarre World was a new addition to OiNK when it became weekly and has been an increasingly bizarre (it’s in the name after all) and random part of the comic with a handful of usually unconnected examples of David’s wild imagination. This issue the title is shrunk and on this half-page there’s just the one example of the crazy nature of our world, it needs the space all to itself to really get across the gag.

In fact there are three instalments this issue, although two of them are for competition winning entries from readers who wrote in and told David what they saw outside their window after he asked them to do so way back at the start of the year. Below, Richard Howard of Dublin’s entry was a particularly crazy entry, which David then had to draw of course! Another reader highlight can be found on the letters page with a particularly classic OiNK-like joke from Allan Maxwell of Cardross, perfect for Nasty Laffs and Specs.

Marc Riley brings us a rather morbid instalment for one of his long-running characters called Less than 101 Uses for a Dead Harry the Head! No, really. I mean, just look at that shoe! Lew Stringer’s Pete and his Pimple and Tom Thug both enjoy double-page spreads and will be able to stretch out further in the months ahead. Pete’s strip has an amusing opening that plays against the expectations of readers when a magical cure is suggested by a pig pal and Tom does something a humour comics character never did before.

*David* *Haldane’*s Incredible Amazing Bizarre World
Letters page compiled by *Patrick Gallagher*
**Harry the Head** by *Marc Riley*
**Pete and his Pimple** and **Tom Thug** by *Lew Stringer*

I remember those final panels and reciting Tom’s chant for years when school holidays rolled around, but little did I know how ground-breaking this strip was. Tom actually left school here, an idea Lew tells me was originally Mark Rodgers’. Humour comics characters are usually stuck in time, rarely developing beyond their original premise. OiNK had already played against type by having Hadrian Vile age along with the comic and seeing his mum’s pregnancy play out over months, but this was on another level. Next month Tom even signs on! I’ll definitely be including that as a highlight.

“Punk rock saved our bacon!”
Dirty Harry

We’re on to our final strip for the issue already and the reason has nothing to do with a lack of quality content, it’s because this final strip takes up no less than 13 pages. Originally created as a six-part serial for the weekly, The Street-Hogs’ return is included in its entirety in this one issue, spread out throughout in its requisite parts. (They really should’ve been the cover stars.)

Their previous serial ended way back in #35 and told us Emma Pig, Dirty Harry and Hi-Fat would return in Malice in Underland and finally that story is here. While the title is the one mentioned almost a year ago I wonder how much the story was developed in that time because this is very much a political satire and seems more suited for the older teen audience the comic was now trying to attract. As an adult it’s much funnier than I found it at the time and makes this issue worth tracking down on eBay if you can. It kicks off with the first ‘mixed school’, something that would’ve been very topical for my fellow Northern Ireland readers back then.

The name of the giant butcher is a bit risqué for a comic I was buying at ten-years-of-age.

While not as long as their original 12-part story it’s longer than their first sequel but there’s a certain something missing. Or rather I should say someone. There’s no sign of Hoggy Bear who, given the fact he was a spoof of the pimp character from Starsky & Hutch I thought would’ve been perfect for OiNK’s new older target audience. The tone of the story certainly is. I can remember J.T. Dogg‘s beautiful, vivid artwork as a kid and loving certain aspects of it, even the renderings of politicians who I only knew from Spitting Image rather than the news.

However, having read OiNK all the way through in real time to this point it seems a bit out of place, despite the reboot with #63. The comedic references to the names and characteristics of 80s politicians seem ill-suited to the comic we’ve come to know and love and I doubt they had much of an impact on my funny bone at the time. Thank goodness for our three heroes and their special brand of silliness (see Harry’s secret body language below) and the return of their arch-nemesis Don Poloney the mafia butcher!

Despite The Street-Hogs strips usually being just plain silly randomness I love the fact there’s actually a bit of continuation from the previous serial here, with Poloney’s appearance explained as being linked to one of the Triffics who ate him last year. The seeds of that particular plant were brushed down a drain and into the sewers, his brain living on in one of the seeds, from which he grew himself a new body. This could only have come from the mind of writer Mark Rodgers! Discovering underground caves with primitive creatures he brainwashed them with stolen videos from the surface of news and the aforementioned puppet show.

Moments like these remind us this is still very much an OiNK strip at its heart, even with the sometimes overbearing references to the politics of the day. As an adult reading this I find it all very amusing but I can’t help remembering my disappointment in it as a ten-year-old boy when so much of it flew over my head. Back to the story and the crazed god-like leader grabs the ‘Hogs with his vines and decides there’ll be no fancy schemes or death traps, just simple strangulation! That’s the cliffhanger leading into our three-page climax.

These final parts don’t have that big bold logo, just a photocopied name in the corner, but what the finale does have is a cameo from some former OiNK stars and it suits the comic perfectly that punk is the answer. It’s an enjoyable strip and funny today even if it doesn’t seem as wild as the Street-Hogs’ previous stories, lacking the wonderfully ridiculous cliffhanger solutions and basically having the one joke to play with (the political lookalikes) until Poloney shows up. But once he does it becomes classic Street-Hogs again. The back page of the whole comic was certainly memorable too. Such a shame that named fourth instalment never materialised.

There are no OiNK Superstar Poster reprints this month but there are half a dozen other repeated pages from earlier issues, albeit absolute classics. Seeing #6’s Fish Theatre with its page overloaded with puns always brings a smile to my face no matter how many times I read it. This issue was originally the first time I read these particular strips so they actually added a lot to the issue for the young version of me and even now, as a little selection of ‘Best of’ strips, their older (as in original, younger target audience) OiNK humour helps make this issue a great overall package.

The Next Month promo promises the return of a certain mechanical porker and from memory it’s a huge multipage strip, another originally meant as a serial but which actually ended up created specifically for the new format. That should be an exciting enough prospect to lure any pig pal, so make sure you come back on Sunday 20th August 2023. OiNK Monthly was released on the third Saturday of each month so we’ve five weeks to wait this time instead of four. Boo!

CRACKLiNG TALES BOOKS < > iSSUE 66

OiNK! #64: WAKA-WAKA-WiT

18 June 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

The second of our monthly OiNKs brings a surprise cover star in the shape of Police Vet, a character who had appeared before in The OiNK! Book 1988 in a funny take on 70s police dramas, with a pre-Ace Ventura slant of an officer who only investigates missing pets etc. While it’s easy for us to look back on the 80s and have a well meaning giggle, here we have the 80s and its excesses taking the hand out of the decade that preceded them. So it’s a retro look at a different retro time and I think it’s great fun.

On the inside cover is the most blatant example of how OiNK had been rebooted for an older teen audience. Mark Rodgers’ script for the latest Rotten Rhymes completely baffled me at the time. I was only ten-years-old and firmly inside the original target bracket for the comic. Reading this now, as funny as it is it would suit another publication more, inside OiNK it just feels out of place. I know that’s the way the comic was heading but it’s jarring after 63 issues of hilarious children’s comics. They had been suitable for all but now this was aimed way over the heads of the loyal fans who’d been pig pals since the start, for the first time excluding a part of the audience.

It reads like a cross between Austin Powers and Ace Ventura which is quite the feat when neither existed yet, with a liberal sprinkling of Starsky and Hutch thrown in for good measure

The rest off the issue is more like the OiNK we knew and loved. The main event is the six-page Police Vet story written by Mark and drawn by cover artist Eric ‘Wilkie’ Wilkinson. Beginning with its own version of a Shaft-like theme tune we soon shift to some pretty awful (read: funny) puns as our hero gets his assignment. This reads like a complete strip and not a serial originally meant for several weeklies pasted together. The monthlies will have a mixture of these kinds of larger strips (edited serials and tailor-made). This could also have been made for a future special or annual and brought forward for the new format. As such it changes the pacing of this particular story and is all the better for it.

It reads like a cross between Austin Powers and the aforementioned Jim Carrey movies which is quite the feat when neither existed yet, with a liberal sprinkling of Starsky and Hutch thrown in for good measure, particularly in Police Vet’s nonchalance of being in an exciting car chase. The best bit for me is how he deduces Foxy isn’t a real woman because she was too much of a bad stereotype, only for the culprit to be the most stereotypical French person imaginable. Brilliance.

We even have an example of the 70s laughing at the fashion of the 80s! It’s a shame we never got to see the character return, as after this he’d hang up his platforms for good. Maybe it was for the best before the joke wore thin. To perk me up from knowing that was the end of Police Vet is Misplaced in Space on the very next page with a very surprising special guest artist, following the likes of Dave Gibbons in #49 and Kevin O’Neill in the first special and book. Pencilling Davy Francis’ script here is none other than John McCrea (Hitman, The Boys: Herogasm, 2000AD).

Another local (to me) talent like Davy and OiNK’s Ian Knox, John was born in Belfast and good pals with Davy, who approached him about contributing to the comic. Renowned for his 2000AD strips in particular his body of work is quite staggering and in 1988 he added a page of OiNK to that list. Written and then inked by Davy, John brings a unique look to the strip. Especially unique because he didn’t normally do humour comics work. What a treat to see these two completely different talents combine their styles inside my favourite comic. OiNK really was one of a kind.

I have a vague recollection of news bulletins in the 80s being filled with something every night that seemed to unite mainland Britain in anger, and which Spitting Image took great delight in poking fun at. It didn’t affect the populace of Northern Ireland but that didn’t stop me from knowing just enough to enjoy this next piece written by Howard Osborn. I am of course talking about the Poll Tax. OiNK taking its role as a children’s comic very seriously for a moment here to educate us on the latest piece of legislation.

As I mentioned in the preview for this issue there’s a page in here that would end up being read out in the House of Commons. No piggy prizes for guessing correctly this was it. OiNK would actually tell its readers about this in a future issue so we’ll check back in on what happened when we get there. I wonder what Howard thought of that! It feels very current too, especially the digs it takes with points five, six, seven and the final sentence. Unfortunately some things just don’t change, eh?

A couple of quick Lew Stringer highlights next. A quite monumental moment was approaching for Tom Thug, something that had never happened before in children’s funny comics. Reminding me somewhat of how The Sekret Diary ov Hadrian Vile saw his mum go through an actual pregnancy before his new baby sister appeared in the story, Tom would actually leave school and go out into the adult world. But he still has to finish his final year of course. Then in Pete and his Pimple, with the Zitbusters from #41 back a lucky reader got to see themselves as the person who saves the day! Sort of. Well, basically how Lew imagined they might look anyway.

**Tom Thug** and **Pete and his Pimple** by *Lew Stringer*

This issue leans more towards the text-heavy pages than normal and there are more examples of the partnership that seems to have blossomed between young writer Charlie Brooker and the unique art of Steve Gibson on these pages, specifically Doctor Jonathan Swiller’s Home Health Check-Up. The character is a parody of Dr Jonathan Miller, a physician who also happened to be a director, author and actor, and was well known in the 1980s.

The following self-diagnosis test asks the readers to answer honestly so they can get a free and easy assessment of their overall health. With only eight questions in total, to get the thorough diagnosis we’re expecting surely these questions will really probe deep, right? Not quite, no. Starting with the insanely easy and making its way to the ludicrous in no time at all, this is genuinely very funny and, even though I never knew the person this was based on, I remember finding it just as funny as a child. Sometimes the silliest ideas just work.

Charlie’s work as both cartoonist and writer in OiNK is a highlight of the whole run for me. He contributed a lot for still being at school, appearing on no less than five pages out of the 42 pages of new content here (#6’s Watery Down and two of the OiNK Superstar Posters are reprinted). Speaking previously with co-editors Patrick Gallagher and Tony Husband on separate occasions both praised Charlie’s work, remembering how the amount of his contributions kept rising, so impressed were they with what he was producing.

Before I show you a handful of the issue’s great mini-strips we’re off to the sunny climes of the Bahamas once more after we visited there in #61 for the GBH Desert Island Survival Kit. Clearly co-editor Mark Rodgers, his partner Helen Jones and writer Graham Exton felt the gorgeous setting and opportunities it provided were ripe for more than one OiNK moment. This issue we find ourselves on a golden beach (albeit in black and white) as bored Robina finally finds what’s been missing in her life in Castaway, a “Heart-Wrenching Photo-Story”.

I think this is all the funnier knowing now that’s real-life partners Helen and Mark. Playing on the expectations of those typical love photo-stories found in women’s weekly magazines (which have been a target since the very beginning of OiNK) I love how Helen’s acting is deemed to need a large arrow telling the reader what she’s portraying, plus her goofy look in the panel below. This must’ve been so much fun to produce.

The characters of When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth sign off with one of their best entries

While the issue has its fair share of text-heavy pages and the like it’s also got a particularly good selection of mini-strips sprinkled throughout. Below are the best of the crop. A recent addition to the regular OiNK team that’s becoming just as prolific as Charlie is Kev F Sutherland whose Rotten Rhymes version of Polly Put the Kettle On is classic OiNK. Marc Riley’s Harry the Head is still in mini-strip form from the weeklies and appears to be staying that way with this acknowledgement of the new look.

Davy Francis’ Doctor Mad-Starkraving (a spin-off from Davy’s Greedy Gorb) tells a great gag that in hindsight is actually the most obvious time travel joke! It’s just that no one had thought it up yet. An instant classic gag from Davy then. Finally, Marc’s zany characters in When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth make their final appearance in a new strip (they’d return next issue but as a reprint before disappearing) and they sign off with one of their best entries.

There’s one more page I’ll show in a special post next week. It’s a competition to win a couple of books of particular interest to pig pals and I’ve been able to procure them in time to have a closer look at, so watch out for that post.

While OiNK would take another issue or two to truly settle into its new guise this issue has still been a belter. As more and more gets created with the new look in mind we’d see bigger and better strips from all of our favourites and some truly memorable moments that are among the very best OiNK produced. The Next Issue promo in this issue elicited real excitement too when it signalled the return of The Street-Hogs at last in ‘Malice in Underland!’ You’ll see that promo in the preview post on Thursday 13th July 2023, swiftly followed by the review of #65 itself on Sunday 16th.

iSSUE 63 < > CRACKLiNG TALES BOOKS

OiNK! #63: NEW PiG ON THE BLOCK

21 May 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

That looks a bit different, doesn’t it? While OiNK did change a little for the weeklies this was a complete transformation. As I said previously I liked the funky new logo as a kid but nowadays I already miss the original. Note how it promotes itself as a “magazine” now too. It’s thicker, glossy (again) and monthly, but its contents is that of a pure comic. Mad and Cracked were marketed as magazines and you may spot a little in-joke there on the cover, but this was a rebranding based solely on its new physical form. There was no such thing as monthly children’s humour comics at the time.

Lew Stringer made a good point about the younger audience not having the patience to wait a month between issues

Inside it was our OiNK but ramped up to Holiday Special levels. 48 pages in total and back to the paper it was printed on for its first 35 issues. As such it feels very special when you first get your trotters on it. Later monthlies would benefit from content created specifically for the format (just like the weeklies eventually did), for now it feels a bit like two weeklies stapled together and with good reason, the change had happened suddenly. Over the next six months you’ll spot a shift, not only in the size of some of the strips but also their tone, as OiNK repositioned itself into the teen market, which I feel was a mistake as I mentioned back in #61‘s review.

When discussing these last six issues with Lew Stringer he made a good point about the younger audience not having the patience to wait a month between issues. I did because I had a regular order and other comics to fill the gaps by this stage. However, at such a young age that long wait was the reason I never collected new comics such as Death’s Head even though I enjoyed the first issue, because by the time the next one came along my attention span had forgotten all about it! This could’ve contributed to OiNK’s sales falling. But we’ll get to that later, there are six big porkers to enjoy first. Let’s begin this one with Cowpat County.

Davy Francis’ strip of “The Everyday Lives of Country Folk” was the very first to appear in OiNK, in the preview issue no less. A fan favourite, it was strange to learn it was only a regular for 14 issues before appearing sporadically from then on. This is actually the penultimate outing for this daft lot. They’ll be missed but Davy’s contributions will continue in different forms, no fear.

This was possibly intended to sit comfortably both on the regular comics shelves and those higher ones W.H.Smith had banished it to

Elsewhere Grunts is renamed simply ‘OiNK’s Piggin’ Crazy Readers’ and Uncle Pigg introduces us to the ‘new’ publication and the characters within, even though many are long-established strips. This was clearly intended as a kind of reboot for the comic for a different audience than originally intended, possibly to sit comfortably both on the regular comics shelves (as it did in my newsagent) and those higher ones W.H.Smith had already banished it to.

Something the teen audience would definitely have appreciated (or rather, not appreciated) was acne. Pete and his Pimple had always been a popular addition ever since he first appeared up in #15. Here we’re treated to two strips for Lew Stringer’s character, originally intended for #63 and #64. We kick off (no pun intended) with this memorable one about the flying naked rugby players. It’s silly and immature fun and we loved it! Heck, I still do, it’s just so ludicrous (or Lewdicrous I should say).

Did you spot (no pun intended) the little mention of Cowpat County’s cartoonist there?

As you can see in the second strip the ongoing tale of Pete and Spotless Suzie comes to an early close. While she was perfectly fine with his huge zit (due to her Y.T.S. course on compost analysis) she also understood Pete’s desire to see the back of it and would help out with the reader suggestions coming in thick and fast. After all of the elaborate suggestions comes a very simple one from Glasgow’s Stephen Donnelly. Bribery. We even end up with a brand new strip.

I was surprised to see just how much of a thug Pete turns into so quickly, but I did enjoy seeing Lew depict himself throughout and what pig pal doesn’t want to get their hands on some Uncle Pigg notes? Of course Pete gets his comeuppance and loses everything in the end. A harsh lesson for young Mr. Throb but a necessary and ultimately funny one. There’s a lesson for the readers here too about hubris when we overcome challenges in our lives that others still face, of not pulling the ladder up behind us so to speak, all told through humour and it’s just as relevant today.

Written by Charlie Brooker and (I’m going to assume) assembled by co-editor Patrick Gallagher, this GBH Video Madvertisement not only fits their usual M.O. perfectly, it also reminds me of all the awful low-budget knock-off movies that pop up when big blockbusters are released. I’ve seen some of those horrible Transformers and War of the Worlds copies on the SciFi Channel and these GBH ones sound better than all of them! Speaking of Transformers, The Transformoids make another appearance in this issue but it’s not a sequel to the brilliant strip in #3, it is the strip from #3.

Yes, the dreaded reprints have begun. By 1989 and into the early 90s some of my other comics would also begin doing this, although OiNK was the first as far as I was concerned. At the time I wasn’t aware until a later monthly issue, as the ones used here were from before I discovered the comic, but unfortunately the much hyped ‘bigger’ OiNK wasn’t all new material despite it being just two-years-old. It’s only six pages (Transformoids and the first two Superstar Posters) but you can’t help feel a bit cheated. Within the next year or so reprints became a regular thing across the UK comics market.

Fleetway published two very lucrative fortnightly comics based solely around the idea of reprints

As the UK market became saturated sales of individual titles fell (much like the videogame crash earlier in the decade) so cutbacks had to be made and “classic” tales would return to fill out page counts for cheap. Fleetway even published two very lucrative fortnightly comics based solely around the idea, namely Big Comic Fortnightly and Funny Fortnightly, which Marvel UK then copied with its Marvel Bumper Comic. While reprints were great for newer readers (I personally liked catching up on older Transformers stories I’d missed, for example) it was a sticking point for long-time fans and I could see why.

OiNK had always been a little more expensive than its contemporaries, a result of the earlier gloss paper, its fortnightly schedule (thus less issues to make money on) and being produced independently. Now, with the return of higher quality paper and a much higher page count a few reprints would help keep costs manageable without increasing the cover price even higher. It still contained 42 pages of all new material, including many choice highlights such as these below.

Neighbours of the Dallasenders Hotel
Tom Thug by *Lew Stringer*
**Batbottom + Bobbins** by an unknown dynamic duo
**Arnold Schwarzenhogger** by *Simon Thorp*

Dallasenders Motel had been a story in #23 made up of six photo-mini-strips, but this one (renamed ‘Neighbours of the Dallasenders Motel’) was brand new, made up of seven full-page episodes originally intended to run across multiple weekly issues. Elsewhere, Tom Thug’s constant truancy comes to an end and he faces a reading and comprehension test, Batbottom and Bobbins continue their takeover of Frank’s page and cover star Arnold Schwarzenhogger gave us his Guide to [Ham] Acting.

Back in 1988 I was so excited to see the next strip, the return at last of The Sekret Diary ov Hadrian Vile Aged 8 5/8 (yearƨ). The last entry of his diary was back in #50, then his mini-series about television took over the back pages from #56 to #61. As a child I’d always assumed the diary would return and this appeared to be the case here. Unfortunately not. No more diaries would appear in the regular comic, just the one in The OiNK! Book 1989 released later in the year. Despite that, this issue’s strip shows the potential for future storylines involving his baby sister who we first met in #37.

While Ian Jackson‘s art is as brilliantly funny as ever (so is Mark Rodgers‘ script), the typed sentences aren’t as chaotic as usual, making me think this part of the page was finished in a bit of a hurry. I’d guess this strip was originally planned for the weeklies when the diary was due to return after the aforementioned Vidiots series but, as previously mentioned by Patrick Gallagher, Ian was now busy on work outside of OiNK.

This suggests the diary wasn’t coming back for quite some time, but instead of holding this completed page of artwork back indefinitely it may have been quickly finished off to help make up the larger page count. It’s still a delight to have him back even if it is a one-off. It just makes the issue that little bit more special.

Ed McHenry’s gorgeous full-page mini-strips (as I called them) were a delight in the later weekly issues and we’ve two here. One is actually a Wally of the West but I found this one funnier. As someone who used to jog in Saturday morning Park Runs where there were always those in the crowd who took the fun activity far too seriously, I found this particularly funny.

Kev F Sutherland’s contributions to the monthly OiNKs is staggering, quickly becoming one of the comic’s most prolific cartoonists. His Meanwhile… series was always a highlight and this issue’s two entries are no exception. Sometimes it’s the simplest ideas, the silliest little strips, the best puns that stick in our memories the most. Meanwhile, At The Fishmarket… checks all of those boxes.

There are many common misconceptions about OiNK. Two of the most prolific being it was a children’s version of Viz and that it was cancelled because of the Janice & John strip, which was actually published all the way back in #7. Another is that it went monthly because it was on its way out, that it was an admission from Fleetway the comic was failing. Co-editor Patrick previously confirmed for the blog, “I think it was Fleetway‘s intention to go monthly as it had been to go weekly, from what I can remember, which I didn’t mind – though I can’t remember at the time thinking the writing was on the wall. I think sales were down across the board but OiNK’s figures weren’t the worst – it was the other comic’s figures that dragged it down.”

There was definitely no intention to cancel the comic at this stage

The survey question in #54 which asked readers if they wanted it to go monthly was genuine, to see if the majority were behind the idea, and as it turned out they were. “I think it was more a case of Fleetway considering going monthly and in the meantime checking the audiences’ opinions, which may have had some sway,” Patrick continued in that issue’s review. He has elaborated further since, saying, “However, if something else financially detrimental occurred within Fleetway, unconnected to OiNK, that alone may have forced the decision to go monthly if it saved money – so that’s the only scenario I could imagine where OiNK might have gone monthly ‘regardless’. Hope that makes sense – it wasn’t always exactly black and white!”

Over the course of the years some fans have since written off the monthlies in the same way some complained about the weeklies. (Some people just don’t like change, which can be understandable.) I hope I’ve been able to correct these assumptions and show the weekly comic settled into its format and became the excellent OiNK we’d all known and loved. Let’s see what the monthlies have in store for us over the next five months. There was definitely no intention to cancel the comic at this stage, merely reboot it as I mentioned above. It’ll be interesting to see it develop and settle into its third format now. The next issue’s review isn’t until Sunday 18th June 2023, we’ll find out then if it’s worth the wait!

iSSUE 62 < > iSSUE 64

OiNK! #62: HELLO TO THE GOODBYES

5 May 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

For the last time in the regular comic let’s take a look at that classic logo.

Looking a lot like the cover to Shoot! magazine or Roy of the Rovers comic, probably deliberately spoofing them, comes our last weekly OiNK and this front page starring Horace (Ugly Face) Watkins by Tony Husband. Inside, Horace’s strip would run to a whopping four pages in our final 24-page issue, rounding up his football drama with a happy ending and the promise of “Great new adventures of the ugly boy wonder in OiNK! Monthly”. Yep, we’ve reached that time in OiNK’s real time read through.

There’s no indication on the cover of any “great news for all readers” inside, although Uncle Pigg does hint that there’s something big, fat and glossy coming up and, if readers hadn’t already scanned through the comic to the back page they’d have assumed he just meant something along the lines of another Holiday Special. In fact, if readers did read the comic from beginning to end without looking at the rear page that final panel in Horace’s strip may have made for quite the shock.

Back to the rest of the issue for now though and our final regular Burp (sounds like something we’d see our doctors about.)

As good as ever and that rat-like creature in the final panel had me in stitches reading this today, however as the final Burp I think last week’s reads better, what with it being a double-page strip and leaving him (and all of us) stranded in the 50s and having to live life out to the 80s again. (Maybe it was created as the last one?) Yes, Burp and his cartoonist Jeremy Banx do return with a mammoth story in The OiNK! Book 1989 but that would’ve been created long before this point, so as far as Jeremy was concerned this was his final OiNK page.

As a child it sounded like we were essentially going to get a huge Holiday Special every single month!

I asked co-editor Patrick Gallagher about Jeremy’s absence from the monthlies and Ian Jackson’s reduced contributions by this stage too. “Ian and Jeremy were also very busy on their other work outside of OiNK and since we had a healthy stockpile of other artists’ material building up, we were never short to allow them a break,” he told me. “Also, at that time, we had no idea that OiNK was going to fold, so always expected [Jeremy’s characters] might return later on.”

So long Burp and thank you for all of the laughs Jeremy! As I’ve mentioned before on the blog his Burp strip in the second annual ended up teaching me a thing or two about growing up as I headed towards my teen years. You’ll have to wait until Christmas to find out what that’s all about. For now, from one long-term regular bidding adieu to one of the newer characters also making her final appearance and she’s saved her best for last. It’s Charlie Brooker’s Transmogrifying Tracey.

What’s so brilliant about this for me are the reader voices, especially when one of them questions the gaping plot hole I’d spotted too. This may be Tracey’s final appearance but it wasn’t Charlie’s. Mr. Brooker’s OiNK career would go from strength-to-strength in the months to come, his name popping up on more pages than ever. We definitely have that to look forward to. Being able to transform into anything may sound like Tracey’s strip had limitless potential but Charlie brings her time to an end and we’re left with fond memories of her time in the comic.

Looking over some of the other highlights of the issue you can see how Uncle Pigg’s announcement in Grunts on page two may have had readers thinking something different than what actually happened. GBH takes the marketing slogan of Allison’s bread adverts in the 80s to the extreme and after all the drama of memory loss, stalkers and nuclear monsters Horace (Ugly face) Watkins‘ football serial comes to its conclusion with something even more horrific. Then, Lew Stringer answers a question we really should’ve asked by now.

**Grunts** compiled by *Patrick Gallagher*
**GBH Health Foods** written by *Charlie Brooker*, drawn by *Wilkie*
**Horace Watkins** by *Tony Husband*
**Pete and his Pimple** by *Lew Stringer*

Pete and his Pimple has been with us since #15 but not once have we considered the ramifications of his existence on the wider world. Sounds very serious, doesn’t it? Who cares about the clean up, the putrid mess left behind on the streets of Oinktown and the health hazard of having large amounts of greasy, slimy pus all over the pavements? As it turns out Albert Piles cares. He follows Pete around, shovelling up all the pus as Pete dances away spot-free without a care in the world, then he takes it to become glue for holding pages together at… well, I’m sure you can work it out.

There’s no Frank Sidebottom strip or showbiz gossip column this issue, what we get instead is a page I can remember seeing for the very first time 35 years ago. This superb full-page mini-poster of Batbottom and Bobbins (that latter name being his go-to phrase for anything he found to be a bit rubbish) is completely charming and completed using Chris Sievey’s usual felt-tip pens. Oh, I mean, it’s not Chris at all, nor is it Frank and Little Frank, the identities of those responsible for this page are clearly a secret.

Lovely stuff. I love the sheer silliness on display here and not just the main picture. The fact the pin-up being on page 17 is deemed important enough to mention, making sure the reader knows they’re not from Timperley, and the knowingness of the captions on the bottom-left. Frank would of course continue with his crazy, random OiNK pages all the way to the very end. In fact, he’d be the cover star of that fateful, final issue.

One of my favourite additions to the weeklies has been the inclusion of some lovely full-page strips containing no dialogue and very few panels, like large mini-strips if you’ll pardon the contradiction. These started off with co-editor Tony Husband’s very funny series but as the Horace Watkins strip started to take up more space and more of Tony’s time another cartoonist stepped in. That person was Ed McHenry with such creations as Ringo Pig in #50 and of course the return of Eric Plinge seven days ago in #61.

This one has got to be my favourite of Ed’s. It’s a gorgeous page too and beautifully coloured, especially when you see it on the printed page. It has such character in every panel and a genuinely funny surprise. These simple strips became a fixture in the weeklies and I think being in a slightly smaller comic made them stand out all the more. No other humour comic would’ve dedicated such space to what is essentially a quick gag in a 24-page comic.

Of course with double the amount of pages from next issue onwards will we see a plethora of these? Or will we be treated to new and exciting variations of OiNK content that we haven’t seen before? Some of the OiNK team really do take advantage of the larger canvas, as you’ll see in the months ahead. Let’s wrap up this issue first though with a Madvertisement from Kev F Sutherland featuring a jingle that’s used to this day for Fairy Liquid, although not quite like this.

Well here we are at page 24 and the shape of things to come. You’ll remember in #54 Uncle Pigg ran a reader’s survey and the change from next issue came off the back of that. As co-editor Patrick Gallagher told me in that issue’s review, Fleetway were making enquiries about turning OiNK monthly already and the aim of the survey was to see if the readers liked the idea. Clearly they did. As a child this back page did excite me, but then again I always liked ‘new looks’ in my comics and it sounded like we were essentially going to get a huge Holiday Special every single month!

At the time I liked the new logo (just like the original it was also designed by Patrick) but as an adult I do wish they’d kept the one we’d had since the beginning, it had more character to it and felt like it summed up the feel of OiNK more than the new one. But that’s just a bit of a quibble, I’ll leave my opinions about the monthlies until I actually read and review them. I do remember from childhood that after a couple of issues they’d really take advantage of the page count, a bit like how it took a little while for the team to settle into the weeklies.

So Uncle Pigg gets the final word in the final weekly. It’s all change next issue but at least we haven’t got a full month to wait for that huge porker of an issue. Each of the following OiNKs would go on sale on the third Saturday of every month in 1988, beginning in May. This means we’ve only 16 days to wait for a month’s worth of fun! I’ll see you back here for OiNK #63 on Sunday 21st may 2023 for all of those “sophisticated” smelly jokes.

iSSUE 61 < > iSSUE 63

OiNK iSSUE PROMOS MENU

OiNK! #58: JUDGED TO BE FUNNY

7 April 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

I have distinct memories of showing this issue of OiNK to some friends of mine a few years after its publication when I’d moved on to grammar school and met some huge 2000AD fans. Their reaction to the cover and the strip inside was one of laughter, naturally. One of them had also collected OiNK, for the others it was something new and they were gutted not only at the fact Judge Pigg wasn’t a regular strip, but also that the comic itself was no longer being produced.

The lack of colour on the cover is a bit of a disappointment. The strip suits being in black and white as it’s a spoof of the earlier days of Judge Dredd when the majority of 2000AD also lacked colour, but I can’t help wonder how much better the cover could’ve looked. Interesting to note the comic is committing to ‘satire’ now too, after writer Graham Exton previously went to lengths to explain OiNK focussed on parody instead of satire and the difference between them . Perhaps this was another sign of the changing age of the audience mentioned in #51.

Steve Gibson is the perfect artist to parody the hard-edged style of classic Judge Dredd, making the joke of the whole thing even more reminiscent of what inspired it. In fact, I’d go so far as to say there’s something quite Brian Bolland about it, like Steve was spoofing that particular Dredd artist. It’s written by Mark Rodgers (of course it would be), someone who had worked for IPC Magazine’s humour comics for many years and who would’ve been very familiar with their stablemate sci-fi comic.

Also, as a regular cat sitter myself and someone who can’t walk past a kitty without trying to befriend them I just love that ending. This is one OiNK strip that’s even more enjoyable to me nowadays than it was when I was a mere ten-years-old. Not just because of the cat though. I think I appreciate the work Steve has put into the style of the strip overall because I’ve read a good bit of Dredd in the intervening years, whereas originally I don’t think I even knew the character.

Frank makes tabloid headlines the butt of his jokes with the actual story being very different to the assumption the headline produces

Since going weekly co-editor Tony Husband has contributed a hybrid full-page/mini-strip to each issue. Containing only two or three panels each but taking up a full page, there’s a chance those unfamiliar with OiNK and the freestyle drawings of Tony might initially think these pages are light on content, maybe even rushed as one friend put it at the time. Not true of course and when each and every one of them produces a good laugh who cares anyway?

Those of us used to two years of Tony’s award-winning style and his Horace (Ugly Face) Watkins strips enjoyed these bold full-page gags every week and they were a defining part of OiNK’s short but memorable 18-issue stint as a weekly comic. Tony also created one of my favourite non-regular characters, the multi-named Wonder Pig who this issue goes by the name Lazzie. They were getting a four-issue run (quickly followed up by one more in the first monthly) and the repetition of the predicament that would befall his owner continued to raise giggles.

Other highlights of #58 include Frank Sidebottom’s Little Bit of Show-biz (sic) Gossip at the bottom of his page. As per usual Frank makes tabloid headlines the butt of his jokes with the actual story being very different to the assumption the headline produces. Also, Hieronymous Van Hellsong is in the pits of hell looking for the soul of singer Raoul McCurtney and it appears even in that dark place there’s always that one person.

**Lazzie** written by *Tony Husband*, drawn by *Chas Sinclair*
**Hieronymous Van Hellsong** by *Jeremy Banx*
**Frank Sidebottom** by *Chris Sievey*

I’ve mentioned before I’ve been surprised at how infrequently certain characters actually appeared in OiNK, simply because they’d formed such a strong part of my memories of the comic from childhood. Perhaps the very fact some of my favourites weren’t in every issue helped make their appearances all that more memorable and I think this applies to the following series as well, which I’m very surprised to discover had only six episodes.

Charlie Brooker’s The Swinelight Zone popped up in #44 as a one-off strip and then reappeared three weeks ago in #55. It’s been in each issue since as well as the recent Holiday Special but it disappears after this, never to return. I’d thought it was a regular fixture all the way through to the last issue. What a shame, but at least they go out on a high. Quite literally in this case.

One strip which would remain with us until the very end was Kev F Sutherland’s Meanwhile… series. Each had a completely different scenario with nothing to link them other than the title and the cartoonist’s unique sense of humour. Kev would take a seemingly trivial locale or event and create a guaranteed laugh from it in his own unique way, such as ‘Meanwhile at the Fun Fair…’ back in #49. That was a properly funny mini-strip and I’m very happy to see the return of the series for the first time since gets a full page.

There’d be at least one in each of the monthlies and they really were a constant defining highlight of those later issues. The Meanwhile… in this issue is the perfect example of what we could expect so much of. It takes a simple idea, a simple joke that could’ve worked in a smaller capacity and takes it to another level, making it as crazy and as funny as possible before the pay off. So, after Kev’s pun-packed March of the Killer Breakfasts last week comes something completely diffferent.

That was the beauty of the Meanwhile… series; on the surface they were more like a series of one-offs by the same talented cartoonist, every single one felt completely different, yet that idea of taking a joke and getting as much value out of it as possible was key. The example above still pops into my head today whenever I hear someone utter those words, and I have a little chuckle to myself every time.

From strips I thought were regulars but weren’t, to one I thought was a tiny little one-off when it appeared in the previous Christmas issue but then was delighted to see return just a few weeks ago. It’s The Kingdom of Trump. This is another last appearance unfortunately, but then again I didn’t expect more than one in the first place so I’m just happy to see it. This is also the most memorable of the trilogy.

I’d loved to have seen what else Davey could’ve come up with

Davey Jones’ King isn’t the main character in this one but the silliness of his kingdom and all those who dwell within is very much front and centre. Davey’s sense of humour is completely insane; go and have a look at #20’s war spoof Bridge Over the River Septic if you need any more proof of that! He’d later become a hit in the pages of Viz and you can clearly see why in his OiNK work.

From the wooden stick masquerading as a horse to the dragon living in a cave right next to the throne with a polite little doorbell, there’s so much that made me laugh on this half-page. Funniest of all is that silent penultimate panel with that facial expression! The Kingdom of Trump really should’ve been a regular, the three examples we got were so funny, each one better than what came before. I’d loved to have seen what else Davey could’ve come up with.

On that note we come to the end of another review. We of course finish with co-editor Patrick Gallagher’s newsagent reservation coupon as per usual, moving from the already random Great Moments in History to the completely daft Great Moments in the Height of Good Manners (number 76 no less). April is the last month full of weekly issues so make sure to come back next Friday 14th April 2023 for #59 as we inch closer to the next big evolution in the life of OiNK.

iSSUE 57 < > iSSUE 59

OiNK! #57: ROLL ON EASTER

31 March 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

This issue’s cover is one of my favourites from all of OiNK’s issues for two reasons. It’s a Jeremy Banx cover featuring Jimmy ’The Cleaver’ Smith, the comic’s villainous butcher baddie in a pool of glistening blood on a splattered background. You wouldn’t have got this in other humour comics, that’s for sure. The second reason is the audacity that the issue’s cover, its selling point on the shelves, states clearly it has absolutely nothing to do with the contents inside.

This is actually a bit of a sticking point with me as far as some modern American comics go. They can have lovely elaborate covers, yes, but they don’t always relate to the story inside. If this issue of OiNK was released today I’d swear they were taking a shot at those. Inside, it’s also the Easter issue, with Uncle Pigg chowing down on a mountain of chocolate eggs while he cracks (sorry) puns, but apart from Lew Stringer’s two strips no others shell out (sorry again) on eggy scripts. Tom Thug’s title panel also seems to follow the theme from the cover.

The fact the egg (or rather Tom) appears to be asking for “Ralph” or “Hughie” is a great gag; we know exactly what’s happening to the dim-witted one inside and the panel showing us the results is convincingly disgusting! Having once stupidly gone on an amusement ride after eating ice cream and the result of that I almost feel sorry for the dolt. Almost. The limited colours given to the page really help highlight the main plot device (the egg) and the one splash of green makes for a funny moment in itself.

Did you also spot the ‘School Rules’ on the wall? At the time of the comic’s release I could definitely empathise with the kids at Tom’s school with that, finding it very funny in the process. This and Pete’s strip (a highlight is further below) being Easter themed makes the whole issue feel extra special in 2023 too, what with the Easter holidays happening almost at the same time as in 1988. With this quality no wonder Tom carried on for so many years in Buster comic.

This particular issue contains something of Kev F Sutherland’s that I’ve been looking forward to for a long time

Kev F Sutherland first contributed to an issue of OiNK in #38. Having proven himself with that mini-strip his work has finally become a regular fixture and this particular issue contains something of his that I’ve been looking forward to for a long time in this read through, March of the Killer Breakfasts! As a kid I loved my various cereals and their advertisements on TV promising toys and surprises. I can understand why things have changed (for the better) today, but this next strip takes me back to that time and laughing at all of the references to those adverts, never mind the onslaught of over-the-top puns.

There’s something quite genius right there on page one, when Kev perfectly lays down two future jokes when he names his protagonist. To the reader it’s initially just a funny name tied in with the cereal theme, but later two perfectly timed puns in the same caption tell us why ‘Dr Brek Sugar’ was really given that name. This is one of Kev’s best and one of the funniest strips in OiNK. Out of all of his contributions I think it’s tied for first place with his time travelling professors we’ll meet in a monthly later in the year. It’s comedic genius and it’s inside a children’s comic.

Right from the start OiNK wanted to give a chance to young, new talent in the world of children’s comics and hired accordingly. This commitment rubbed some long-time professionals up the wrong way but the comic stuck to its guns. Now, with Kev centre stage in each issue and the likes of young Charlie Brooker producing so much material, OiNK had evolved a lot since its early days and it makes me wonder what other new talent it could’ve discovered if it had continued for longer than the two-and-a-half years it ran for.

**Pete and his Pimple** by *Lew Stringer*
**Laffie** written by *Tony Husband*, drawn by *Chas Sinclair*
**Burp** by *Jeremy Banx*

There’s the Pete and his Pimple strip I mentioned earlier, when Pete eats too many Easter Eggs and discovers his pimple’s pus takes like delicious milk chocolate. Of course it runs out just as he tries to impress Lovely Lucy. The Wonder Pig (this time called Laffie) is back in the first of a series of weekly adventures with the usual predicament, and then on Mercury a rather familiar looking royal family have summoned Burp to help with the sweltering heat on the first planet next to the sun. This leads nicely on to one of two GBH Madvertisements in this issue.

Are you sick and tired of your job? Don’t you just wish you had the ability to leave it, perhaps by winning the lottery and not needing the money anymore? Well GBH has just the thing for you. Their special offer of two free (not free) books will teach you everything you need to know to do just that. In fact, all you need is a lot of privilege and being born into the right family. Surely this isn’t something you can teach, right? Well that kind of detail never stopped these gangsters from trying to hock their latest scam.

While OiNK’s humour for the most part has not aged, when it spoofs celebrities of the 80s it’s inevitable that kids reading it today (as some blog readers have told me their own kids do) may not appreciate those particular strips as much as us who grew up with them. This particular Madvertisement has aged but for a whole other reason, however let’s not shut down the whole country again and just move on, shall we? I do like Steve Gibson’s very Spitting Image-esque drawings too.

A couple of mini-strips before we round off this week’s review and Ed McHenry’s Wally of the West continues to entertain. This week it’s not Wally himself that’s acting on the silly side, he’s actually the innocent victim of someone else’s ridiculousness. Then Marc Riley’s Doctor Mooney He’s Completely Looney has two scriptwriters this week, Marc himself and Michael Peek. It’s silly, gross-out humour and one which made me chuckle because I’m still a big child.

That’s us at the rear end of another issue. Just time to ensure the young readers reserved their copies at their local newsagent’s with co-editor Patrick Gallagher’s usual weekly nonsense in the Great Moments in History coupon. To paraphrase it, I’m hoping the blog is still to all of your tastes and in case you missed it (somehow) make sure you check out the extra review we had this past week for the OiNK! Holiday Special #2! When you’re all caught up make sure you’re back here next week on Friday 7th April 2023 for #58 and have a Happy Easter (even though the next issue will be out by then).

HOLiDAY SPECiAL 2 < > iSSUE 58

OiNK! HOLiDAY SPECiAL #2: BEACH READY

29 March 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

This gorgeous cover by renowned illustrator Paul Sample is sadly his only contribution to OiNK but what a contribution it is. There are a lot of intricate details my young eyes loved pouring over when this came with me on an Easter family trip to the Scottish highlands in 1988, whiling away the long train journey from the Stranraer ferry. Among the sea and adoring OiNK fans look harder and there’s a ‘Porkman’ instead of a Walkman, Crackling Oil and a rather dark strip on the OiNK Uncle Pigg is reading. It looks extra gorgeous on the large, glossy paper after the comic moved to matt with #36 last autumn and then to thinner matt with #45.

This is also a wraparound cover poster and I’ll show you rest of it, complete with another comical shark, Icarus and even the sun itself getting in on the OiNK sensation at the end of the review. The way the crowds are swarming the comic’s logo adds to the feeling of a Holiday Special crammed full to bursting. Inside, the first half in particular is stuffed full of reading material, really giving us superb value for money for a measly 70p. This would actually be the last special of any type with no reprints, so let’s enjoy it.

We get introduced to the comic with a big Uncle Pigg panel written by co-editor Mark Rodgers and drawn as ever by Ian Jackson. While it’s nice to see such an introduction again I can’t help but be disappointed that there’s no strip featuring him and Mary Lighthouse (critic) like we had last year, but then again they stopped a while back in the regular comic. Beneath this is a funny little one-off strip written by Howard Osborn and drawn by Mike Green and thus the tone is set for the special.

I was very happy to see Hadrian Vile’s Hollydaye Albumm here

I’m going to dedicate a full post to one of the main highlights of this issue later in the year. There are lots of little artists’ profiles, each taking up a quarter of a page. They’re created by each individual cartoonist and the information in them isn’t exactly reliable, let’s just put it that way and it’s so much fun to see how they draw themselves. There are ten altogether and I simply couldn’t have choosen which ones to leave out if I was going to select some for this review. So I think that could make for a nice additional post later in the summer.

In the previous OiNK review (#56) I lamented the fact Hadrian Vile’s diary had more or less come to an end by this point in the comic’s lifetime so I was very happy to see his Hollydaye Albumm here. It’s not a full diary, however it’s a special version for the holiday issue and a fun read. His long suffering dad is front and centre and again is Hadrian’s unintended victim over and over as they set off on their trip to France. A trip we end up seeing nothing of in the end. As always he’s written by Mark Rodgers and drawn by Ian Jackson.

The best thing about this is there’ll be aspects of it I’m sure will feel familiar to most readers, even if it’s exaggerated somewhat. Although I’m not sure how many families would’ve taken photos of these incidents back in the 1980s. Not when we had a limited number of photographs we could take on our cameras, paying to get them developed. Today it’d be much more likely, with the photos likely ending up on social media. Maybe Hadrian was just a trailblazer.

Weedy Willy began life in OiNK as a regular character in the earliest issues, however after several months he would only pop up every few issues or so and even then as mini-strips most of the time. You wouldn’t know he’d been reduced to semi-regular status here though with two strips only a few pages apart. The first is a full page while the second, funnier one is this half-page, the winning joke coming from a cowpat!

Written by Keith Forrest and drawn by the master of the thin ink nib Mike Green, this issue really brings Willy back to his former glory. In the first strip (written by Vaughan Brunt) we even find out Mandy and Willy are now a couple! In that first story he gets the upper hand thanks to his weediness while above the joke is on him but just in a silly way, not a cruel way. That cowpat being so particularly chuffed in the third panel genuinely made me laugh out loud too.

The biggest highlight of this issue has to be Frank Sidebottom’s board game, Frank’s Timperley Bike Racing Game. The board takes up the centre pages but several pages earlier up pops two pages rammed with rules, player pieces and cut out cards. As always Chris Sievey has clearly put a lot of thought and work into his latest creation. The game is well thought out, unlike a lot of games in comics which usually feel like filler. This one is suitably special.

I actually like the sound of the game, with the players speeding back and forth across the board trying to hit a specific selection of squares given to them by the random shuffling of the shopping list cards. There’s a good bit of strategy to go along with the luck of the dice rolls, players choosing the order in which they’ll attend to their list and the routes they’ll take. Chris’ attention to detail even stretches to telling the kids plain card backs should be used to ensure there can be no cheating.

I do have one complaint though. Surely buying a copy of that week’s OiNK should’ve been on every list? Oh well, you can always make more or make that part of the rules yourselves. It might just be me, but some of these (rather random) shopping list items bring back some happy childhood memories. No, I never had to phone Paul McCartney but bike clips, puncture kits and returning videos? Yes. Just remember to rewind those tapes first. The board itself has had just as much attention paid to it.

From the train to the sunbather on the barge, from people hanging their washing up to the roads having drains, Chris has clearly poured over every inch of these pages as he usually does, adding in as many tiny little details to capture the imaginations of the young readers as possible. Also, you just know that lots of things on this board will have been based on actual buildings Chris knew from his real life. You can see why I think this is the “fantastic” headline feature of this OiNK.

Let’s take a quick snack break, shall we? The snacks this next Madvert is aiming its sights at were a childhood favourite, but it’s been proven that our tastebuds change over time and mine appear to have turned against these little pillows of… well, I’ll let this describe them to you.

Honestly, I don’t know what I ever saw in them! (Nothing apparently, according to Kev F Sutherland.)

Jimmy Flynn (the boy who “Jumps Out of his Skin”) had a mini-series at one point in the comic and gets an origin story here over a few pages here, yet main character Horace (Ugly Face) Watkins only gets one page and it’s a simple three-panel gag strip rather than what we’re used to. Other highlights (below) are better, such as Moth Person in Hijack at 2000 Feet, 13 1/2 Inches taking pot shots at people I’m sure a lot of us really can’t stand on public transport, followed by Tom Thug living up to the clichéd English holiday maker I’m sure we also all can’t stand.

Charlie Brooker brings us the multi-part Sam Mackay Private Eye, the first part of which is full of visual gags based on typical private eye story wordplay. Billy Bang gets his one and only full-page strip and his one and only in full colour. Finally, David Haldane’s regular look at the strange world we live in takes on Strange Bizarre Folks Customs of our Funny Old World and it’s some of his funniest yet.

**Tom Thug** by *Lew Stringer*
**Moth Person** by *Davey Jones*
**Sam Mackay** by *Charlie Brooker*
**Billy Bang** by *Wilkie*
**Funny Old World** by *David Haldane*

When we went on long family trips there were always puzzle magazines brought along to kill time on various planes, trains and automobiles. At such a young age very few of them kept my attention for long, unlike OiNK. Luckily OiNK had its own puzzle master in the form of Ed McHenry, who’d contributed many a puzzle to the regular comic by this stage. Here we get a larger than normal selection, a full double-page spread of impossible conundrums.

As ever, everything looks incredibly easy on the surface. The reality of course is that the actual answers are not what you’d expect. The fun with these became trying to work out what the completely ridiculous correct solution actually was. I don’t think I ever got one of them right. This particular spread starts off strong with The Sea Wall conundrum, while my favourite is number seven because given time you might just be able to work it out, depending on how loony you are I guess.

There have been a few occasions over the past year when Jeremy Banx has taken the random and often surreal nature of his Burp strips and given us more wordy, narrated instalments. These heightened the alienness of his existence and the unpredictability of his pages, adding in the vast unknowable universe and the apparently untamed imagination of the OiNK cartoonist. Told solely through elaborate narrative captions rather than speech bubbles and slapstick (along with unique visuals), check out Burp’s vacation planet from #41 as the perfect example.

The strip in this edition gives us the best of both worlds, the first page playing out like a typical Burp strip for the most part. Not that there’s anything like a ‘typical Burp strip’ but you know what I mean. Then from the final panel on that page we see it change into something else entirely, somewhat like the creatures at the heart of the tale. Just like the example I gave above the wonders of the universe are laid out and then suddenly juxtaposed against the silly alien we’ve come to know and love.

While this issue isn’t quite as full of classic strips as the first Holiday Special it’s a very worthy follow-up and I can remember being very entertained by it on that family trip all those years ago. It feels extra special now we’re used to reading the 24-page weeklies. Although, in a couple of months the regular comic basically becomes a monthly Holiday Special so I wonder if these extra editions would’ve become bigger too if the comic had continued. As it stands, the two Holiday Specials so far are among the best examples of OiNK the comic had to offer.

To round off I just have to show you that wonderful wraparound cover poster by Paul Sample. My copy has curled a little at the spine over the years since it was first printed but you can still get a sense of the lovely image as it continues over the staples and on to the back page, where you can see those extra details I mentioned at the top.

That blurb on the rear perfectly sums things up.

iSSUE 56 < > iSSUE 57

OiNK SPECiALS & BOOKS MENU

OiNK! #56: TRiP OF A LiFETiME

24 March 2023 Phil Boyce 1 Comment

Lew Stringer brings us what would ultimately be his final OiNK cover, not that anyone knew this at the time of course. Tom Thug’s threat has the shine wiped off by a good dog, which could take our attention away from the fact the comic had gone back up to its pre-weekly (and pre-page reduction) price of 35p. This made OiNK 7p more expensive than its Fleetway Publication peers, who also had 8 more pages. Today, I know this all sounds like it shouldn’t matter but back when most of us received 50p-£1 pocket money a week this could make all the difference.

But inside OiNK had plenty of content and to me it still truly felt like better value for money. There’s a wealth of reading material in this issue, including the conclusion to Tom’s Crude Crew story which began in Whizzer and Chips and carried on into the two previous issues of OiNK, a superb middle page spread for Dibney World by Simon Thorp, a gorgeous Dead Fred strip (no really) and the return of a favourite character, albeit not in the form I was expecting. First up though, Hieronymous Van Hellsong’s prequel by Jeremy Banx steps up a gear.

As always with this character it’s deliciously dark humour at it finest. Beginning with the nameless executive to whom death is just a hurdle to overcome, and then to see Van Hellsong kill himself in order to go to hell to chase down his contract is a bit of a shock. A silly shock. However, all of this dark, twisted humour is perfectly offset by that last panel and his funny realisation, taking us from the dark to the daft in an instant. It’s classic Banx.

“Dibney characters act out historical highlights of US history [such as] The Slave Trade, The Bay of Pigs Crisis [and] Watergate!”
Ron Dibney World, Simon Thorp

Dark humour was something we weren’t normally exposed to as kids and OiNK revelled in it. Jeremy Banx in particular, with some hilarious moments in his Burp strips that involved over-the-top gore that was just so ridiculous we never saw it as gore in the first place. His first Van Hellsong mini-series finished with our hero being killed by a notorious butcher villain and turned into a string of linked sausages and used to swing away from the authorities. These were the perfect introduction to black humour for me and many pig pals.

Back in #53 future Viz editor Simon Thorp wrote and drew Outlet-by-the-Sea, a Madvertisement of a shockingly poor holiday destination that poked fun at English seaside resorts. Now he’s back for another, this time a collaboration between GBH and Thomas Crook and it’s bigger and better. Not only is it a double-page spread in the middle of the issue, Simon also takes aim at the biggest and grandest of holiday resorts, Walt Disney World.

The rickety British Rail train is back from Outlet-by-the-Sea too. It must’ve been a favourite of Simon’s. I love the way the ‘Animation Complex’ is the smallest, least impressive building in the whole park which is a dig at Disney World’s priorities. Then we have the large golf ball-like Epcot spoof called ‘Mom’s Apple Pie World’ apparently made in Taiwan, which could either be a silly joke or could very well be making a statement for the older readers, take your pick.

It’s what’s inside this building that I find the funniest and most cutting. We live in the modern world of 2023 where American politicians of a certain type are trying to whitewash (literally) the teaching of American history, so to have something with such a wholesome name as ‘Mom’s Apple Pie World Heritage Trail’ have that list of attractions feels like a particularly contemporary joke. You can clearly see Simon’s later Viz work in its early stages here. I just love this.

Now it’s time to conclude one of our mini-series.

Of course Tom’s scheme had to backfire in spectacular fashion, he’s a bully and bullies always lose after all. So we begin this final episode of Tom Thug and his Crude Crew with the gang all assembled and ready for bovver for the first time, but by the end of the page it’s already fallen apart and Tom ends up in a very familiar state. The key joke here, played out more than once, is how bullies are all essentially cowards and will always ensure they’re only picking on those they believe are less capable of fighting back.

This backfires throughout and each time shows us why everyone loved Tom’s strip, especially when you’re a kid and may have had to deal with bullies yourself. From Braddock trying to steal some grub while Tom and Daisy panic because he hasn’t picked a “wimp” (guest starring Mauler Morrison from #54), to the crew deciding an infant school is the perfect target, the message is clear. Finally, it’s probably a coincidence but that verbal noise “OWK!” Tom makes when he’s trampled on caught my eye because I see it alternatively as ‘OWK!’ and ‘OINK’!

Whatever name Charlie Brooker gave his chain-smoking victim of The Swinelight Zone has been changed to a more familiar one

This has been a simply brilliant series and I’m sad it’s over but there are plenty of laughs to come from Tom in future issues, particularly in the monthlies if memory serves. Sticking with this issue for now, in The Life and Times of Harry the Head (his first full-page since the weeklies began) we get a little behind-the-scenes look at the making of The OiNK! 45 record and whatever name Charlie Brooker gave his chain-smoking victim of The Swinelight Zone has been changed to a more familiar one.

**Harry the Head** by *Marc Riley*
**The Swinelight Zone** by *Charlie Brooker*

You can see here that Steve Gibson’s name has been pasted in after the strip was completed. I asked Steve about this and he tells me he used to smoke at the time and fellow cartoonist Marc Riley (Harry the Head‘s creator and star of Snatcher Sam) hated that, so while he was doing some pasting work with the editors he changed this character’s name as a joke. Last week we learned how the OiNK editors played a little joke on Lew too. I love little in-jokes like these. It all adds to the OiNK anarchy.

A humour strip about a zombie and his undead friends isn’t something you’d imagine having gorgeous artwork but Eric ‘Wilkie’ Wilkinson really delivers this week with his latest Dead Fred. Written by Kev F Sutherland, like Harry above it’s not often we’d see Fred get so much space. This page shows he really was capable of carrying the larger format. Unfortunately though, instead of more full-page strips for the character this would actually be his penultimate story! One more in the second monthly issue to come and then he’d finally rest in peace.

Certainly the last thing I expected from a Dead Fred strip was what on the surface looks like a moving war story regarding the Battle of the Somme.

Of course we know all of this wartime storytelling, complete with art that in some panels wouldn’t look out of place in Commando, must be leading to a joke and we’re not let down. In fact, I think the serious nature of the majority of the strip makes the opening and closing panels all the more silly by comparison and, I’ll say it again, I think it’s gorgeous. Just a few pages later we reach the back cover and some more unique art that you would only have seen in OiNK, with the return (at last) of Hadrian Vile.

We’ve had some special pages from the character elsewhere, such as guides to everything from orchestras to babies, holiday photo albums, school magazines, letters to Santa and even a map of Scotland. But for almost all of the first 50 issues we enjoyed his Sekret Diary entries and this was what he was known for. Now, after a five issue hiatus he’s back with Mark Rodgers writing and Ian Jackson drawing but the diary has been dropped in favour of a new series, Vidiots – or Hadrian Vile’s Interleckshual guide to Tellyvision (a one-off of which had appeared in #23).

Love those little caricatures of Mark and Ian! It’s great to see Ian back after he also seemed to take a break lately (apart from a couple of mini-strips). But knowing what’s to come it’s sad to know that apart from one monthly entry and another in the second OiNK Book, the diary series was for all intents and purposes finished. If OiNK had remained weekly and survived perhaps we’d have seen it return as co-editor Patrick Gallagher explained to us when other characters had left us.

Unfortunately, Ian seems to have begun moving on too because his artwork doesn’t feature as prolifically after this series, so let’s enjoy it while we can. The TV guide would remain on the back page for six issues altogether, finishing in #61. I did miss the insights into his family life and these were a much quicker read than a full strip, but at the time I figured it was just a temporary series and the diary would return straight after. So I really enjoyed having something different from one of my very favourite comics characters ever to finish off each issue with. I intend to enjoy them all over again and this first one is a very promising start.

Another daft newsagent reservation coupon by Patrick rounds off our review and looking at the most recent weekly OiNKs you can see, even with eight pages less, how much more rammed with content they were compared to others, and just how varied that content could be from page to page, issue to issue. A recipe for success if ever there was one, surely. I’m really enjoying my weekly trip down memory lane.

But we’ve more to come before #57! Regular readers will remember we used to have ‘Coming Up’ posts before each issue back when OiNK had actual Next Issue promos. Since turning weekly these were dropped (the comic didn’t have themes to promote after all) but in three days on Monday 27th March 2023 you’ll see their return. Well, for one edition anyway, the second OiNK Holiday Special. Its review will then be up on Wednesday 29th March. After that, #57 will be here on Friday 31st. A busy week ahead. Great, isn’t it?

iSSUE 55 < > HOLiDAY SPECiAL 2

OiNK! #53: FiT TO BURST

3 March 2023 Phil Boyce Leave a comment

Comic covers don’t come much more creative than this. Lew Stringer’s latest OiNK cover is definitely one of my favourites, right up there with those from #6 and #43 by Ian Jackson. The OiNK logo being pushed off the page was all Lew’s idea, who pencilled out a rough of the whole cover for approval by the comic’s editors. After it was approved he then drew the Pete part of the design, leaving the logo for Patrick.

Co-editor Patrick Gallagher was the famous logo’s original creator and told me he thought Lew’s cover was a “swell” idea, pun very obviously intended, and that it was a doddle for him to rejig the letters and complete this eye-catching front page, a highlight of the issue for sure and really makes the issue stand out in the collection. Just as well the inside is as good then. The first interior highlight comes from Davy Francis and Greedy Gorb, along with a special guest star.

Although he goes unnamed, that’s Doctor Madstarkraving (“He’s Bonkers”) who has appeared in his own strip a couple of times (#27 being one example) with more to come later in the run. Showing how uncontrollable his appetite is, Gorb shoots himself in the foot by eating the doc’s inventions when they could’ve fed him even more food! I particularly like the name of the shop, a little dig at how other comics seemed to have sweet shops on every street corner, a hang up from their more traditional (read: old-fashioned) days that OiNK liked to rib.

Speaking of old-fashioned tales, James Bond author Ian Fleming’s Chitty Chitty Bang Bang wasn’t a film I loved as much as my friends seemed to. However, I certainly knew enough of its story that the following spoof by ‘Ian Phlegming’ (Simon Thorp) was very funny indeed. It starts off silly and quickly escalates, culminating in an over-the-top ending that couldn’t be further away from the original saccharin tale. Then again, that’s the whole idea.

Spoofs were something unique to OiNK in the children’s comic market at the time, yet in the case of Twitty Twitty Bang Bang this wasn’t the only thing that set it apart. While comics such as Beano and Buster did have text adventure serials in their early days, it wasn’t something humour comics had any more, or any children’s comics outside of the nursery and very young children’s market. Later on in this year (1988) other comics such as The Real Ghostbusters and Thundercats would bring back the prose story, but for the time being pages like this really stood out.

Simon’s other contribution to the issue has plenty of panels of text packed with gags, this time as part of a full-page illustration in his usual entertaining style, with a rather more dreary colour palette than usual which is all part of the joke. This time of the year family holidays would be planned and paid for; I remember the TV listings magazines being full of them the first few months of the year. These were just ripe for a makeover, selling trips to the Porkshire Riviera’s Outlet-By-The-Sea.

While it’s not a GBH Madvertisement their presence is still very much felt with their Spamtins Holiday Camp and Multi-storey Caravan Park. Growing up in the 80s and 90s I really found the caption for the Top Class Variety Acts very funny, even as a fan of the person at the butt of the joke. In the image itself there are so many funny little details, such as the quick sand, the periscope, a pair of socks that seem to have survived beyond their owner and the rigid man who I don’t think is sunbathing anymore.

This wasn’t the only time Simon would try to entice us away to sunnier climbs. Watch out for his special cruise ship cutaway later in the year. That particular contribution will definitely be featured in the highlights to come. This issue’s highlights are particularly good too, beginning with Invisible Charlie (who appeared in three issues) and Davy Francis’ trademark background gags. (Check out the posters in this example.)

“Baby George! The Beastie Babies! And Paul Extremely Young!
Tiny Tots TV, Vaughan Brunt

On the Grunts page a reader must’ve had the fright of their lives on their high street, Tiny Tots TV suggests some more baby based television hits after the success of Muppet Babies and Frank Sidebottom has two colourful pages this week. One is a competition, the other is his recurring Frank Sidebottom and his Fantastic Showbiz Gossip column which incudes his diary and, while he slips in a couple of joke entries, it’s an interesting look into the busy life of the man behind the mask, Chris Sievey.

**Invisible Charlie** by *Davy Francis*
**Grunts** compiled by *Patrick Gallagher*
**Tiny Tots TV** written by *Vaughan Brunt*, drawn by *Mike Green*
**Frank Sidebottom** by *Chris Sievey*

The life of a superstar, eh?

There are a ton of mini-strips in here, including two full pages of them. Over these two pages alone we have the return of Uncle Pigg and Mary Lighthouse to strip form, Zootown, Harry the Head, Doctor Mooney He’s Completely Looney, a GBH Madvertisement, a one-off strip by Charlie Brooker called A Day in the Life of a Typical Schoolboy and the first strip of a perennial favourite, Wally of the West. Oh, plus the weekly funny newsagent coupon.

I want to show you a few of these in quick succession and it’s been difficult to decide which ones to pick out from this brilliant selection. I’ll begin with Charlie’s Typical Schoolboy, simply because it’s so daft.

GBH returns with a tiny madvert with big prices. Their special modelling clay promises plenty of “steaming” fun from the offset, so I’m sure you can draw your own correct conclusions as to what the product actually is. There are so many jokes following on from the theme of that ‘clay’, including the variety of colour schemes and even a special free gift and another dig at radio DJ Gary Davies (also see Outlet-By-The-Sea).

I’m not sure who wrote it but the couple of tiny illustrations are by Steve Gibson, so given past examples in the weeklies of his work with Charlie on quizzes and the like I’m going to assume Brooker wrote this one too.

My eyes lit up and I’m sure I had a great big grin across my face when I saw our next mini-strip, the first appearance of Ed McHenry’s Wally of the West. The character would appear in 12 OiNKs altogether, sometimes more than once in an issue and was a main staple during this final year of the comic. Often accompanied by his long-suffering friend Fungus, the strips were a series of short gags about a very dimwitted cowboy set in the American Wild West of the past.

The jokes revolved around his stupidity which might not sound that original but Wally had two things going for him. The first was the setting which gave it a unique feel and opened it up to new ideas. The second was the most important though, Ed himself. Creator of many quizzes and one-off strips, Ed was now beginning to move into his own serials having also recently created Igor and the Doctor which was an exciting prospect for any fans of his work so far in OiNK.

Back in 1988 Beano reached its 50th anniversary, after The Dandy had the previous year and the first combined celebratory book had been released in 1987. I actually received that book myself for that Christmas, when I also got the first OiNK! Book, although I do think the Dandy/Beano tome was originally for my brother but he’d grown out of comics by the time Santa came to town (as a lot of us mistakenly do at some point before correcting course again). In fact, at the same time I was reading DC Thomson’s book my other annual was making lots of jokes at its expense!

This wasn’t going to stop anytime soon by the looks of this week’s newsagent reservation coupon by Patrick Gallagher.

I’ve one more little mini-strip I want to show you but I’ll finish with it after I round up this review. From the brilliant front cover which showed right there on the shelf OiNK didn’t follow any of the traditional comic rules, to its huge array of mini-strips and strong one-offs, this is by far the best of the weekly editions so far! In fact, it could easily be one of the best issues of the whole run up to this point. I remember being very excited at getting OiNK every single week from issue 50 onwards as a child and that remains true today.

Even though I know there are only nine weeklies left until we have to wait much longer between issues I’m still just as excited at the prospect of those to come as I was 35 years ago. To wrap up this excellent issue we even get a tiny little Uncle Pigg and Mary Lighthouse strip, something we haven’t seen in the regular comic in a long time. They used to introduce every issue, or would pop up in multi-page strips now and again but for a long time now have been relegated to the Grunts page so it’s nice to see Ian Jackson bring them to life again. This time they’re not written by Mark Rodgers as they usual are, but Kev F Sutherland instead. Thanks for bringing them back, Kev.

OiNK #54’s review will be here on Saturday 11th March 2023.

iSSUE 52 < > iSSUE 54