Dandy & Beano on Radio Scotland

[paw broon]

Good Morning Scotland featured, this morning, an interview with the editors of Beano and Dandy about the big fight for supremacy between Desperate Dan and Dennis the Menace. Mention was also made of whether the two of them ever appeared together. Seems there was only an illo. of that event, not a story. Don't know if you will find the interview on IPlayer but you might want to have a look. Fair cheered me up this morning.

[-MikeD-]

This...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... 4_02_2011/

Although I haven't listened yet..thx for the heads up...

[Kashgar]

The cover of the 1963 Dandy-Beano Summer Special with Dennis crowning Dan with a banjo comes immediately to mind.

[Digifiend]

One of the 60 Years books has on the inside covers a Dennis story in which Desperate Dan sleepwalks all the way from Cactusville and The Dandy to Beanotown and The Beano. Which leaves Dennis's Dad with a Dan shaped hole in the wall to repair! There was also the Beanotown Racing promotional strips, where Beano characters appeared in a Dandy strip specifically created to promote it, while Dandy's characters randomly appeared in Beano strips. Arena of Awesome was the first time they'd met though since their personalities were altered in their last redesigns.

Mike, welcome to Comics UK. Do I know you? I'm from Hull too.

[paw broon]

Interesting, you guys know about meetings between the characters whereas, the editors only seemed to know about one. And that was just an illo. Perhaps a wee email to them would improve their knowledge of their own comics histories?

[Peter Gray]

I'm sure there was an april fool joke once as well..
Dennis was the new replacement for Desperate Dan on The Dandy cover..
all revealed on the back it was all an April Fool joke......something like that..

[DandyEd]

Interesting, you guys know about meetings between the characters whereas, the editors only seemed to know about one. And that was just an illo. Perhaps a wee email to them would improve their knowledge of their own comics histories?

I will fully admit to not knowing of these instances - however, I plead lack of time to trawl through almost 7000 issues of Dandy and Beano + annuals + summer specials + whatever else to find them. Besides, I'm only young!

Still enjoying the new Dandy? Things you'd change? etc. etc. Comments welcome, always like to hear opinions, even if (as you all know) the good folks on here are not our target readership.

I'm happy to answer such questions as I can, but please understand some topics will be inappropriate for me to comment upon.

Craig

[Spencer]

Hi Craig,

I haven't posted on here for a while as I have been really busy at work but your request made me realise I had never really shared my (and my family's views) since the relaunch. This was a bit amiss of me really as we ALL love it!!

What I think you might find interesting is that my 12 1/2-year-old (who I had bought the Beano for until he was about 11 1/2 when he said that the new Dennis was too baby-ish) absolutely loves it.
He loves the humour in both the scripts and the art (particularly with Jamie Smart's little extras here and there!). So it is possible that you are extending your reach to a relatively un-catered-for 'older kids' market with The Dandy.

I have bought The Dandy for my youngest (now 10 1/2) for 6 years now (yes, I stuck with it through the dark Xtreme days!) and he has never liked it more. The only things he misses from Xtreme are Cuddles And Dimples and Game cheats. He has just completed the survey and found it REALLY hard to narrow down to just 5 favourite strips - this has also got to be a good sign!

As a young lad of 40, I also enjoy reading it and generally sneak a read of one of their copies before I give it to them

What DON'T they like? They think the Bananaman stories are "too short for anything much to happen" , they're not really fussed with Mr Meecher the Uncool Teacher, and (sadly as I liked it) they were not too keen on Robot On The Run. Some of the puzzles (particularly the dot-to-dots) they said were "way too easy and should be in Cbeebies comic!". They really didn't like Shao Lin Punks either.

Their favourites? Desperate Dan, Arena of Awesome, Harry Hill, George Vs Dragon, The Bogies. They also love the Madvertisements - always raise a chuckle.


Hope this is of some use to you. Overall, I hope that sales have picked up since Xtreme-era (can you share any information on this?), and would like to thank you and the team for making such a great comics that (at least in my house) appears to be relevant and 'cool' for the kids (and the 'big' kid!)

Footnote - after having read the first page of the Etherington Brothers strip, Yore, I can't help thinking it might need a 2-page per week to capture the imagination more... imho!

[DandyEd]

Thanks for the feedback, always valuable.

We've really focussed on single pages to inject as much variety as we can, and also to keep the pace up, which is why only one or two stories stretch to more than that. However, look out for Feb 19 and 26 (Feb 19 on sale tomorrow), which both feature 2-page Bananaman stories. These issues have 44 pages so we have much more freedom to give a little extra in some areas.

Craig

[AndyB]

Ring upstairs to Morris, Craig

The question is who would win a rematch on neutral ground, eg the Weekly News or the Sunday Post!

[Raven]

We've really focussed on single pages to inject as much variety as we can, and also to keep the pace up, which is why only one or two stories stretch to more than that.
Craig

I do think Jamie Smart's at his best when he's given at least a couple of pages for his stories. His two page+ Desperate Dans I thought were better than the single page ones: they're still often good, but his ideas seem to really flourish given more space, and bigger sets to stretch out across.