Comics UK

django wrote:Great to see more Beano and Dandy specials in the shops, but seriously...Christmas Crackers!!...in October!!!!.

They're not the only ones. Titan just brought out The Simpsons Futurama Winter Bumper Pack (comprising back issues of Simpsons Comics, Futurama Comics and The Best of Bart Simpson from around 9-10 months ago). I was surprised to see that today, I expected the previous Autumn one to still be out for another month.

SID wrote:

Peter Gray wrote:The Dandy one is a lot better!!

Of course, The Dandy was always the Superior Comic.

Thanks for the heads up, guys. Will keep an eye out.

Bought my copies today and seriously have to admit that The Dandy's is the better cracker.

Digifiend wrote:

django wrote:Great to see more Beano and Dandy specials in the shops, but seriously...Christmas Crackers!!...in October!!!!.

They're not the only ones. Titan just brought out The Simpsons Futurama Winter Bumper Pack (comprising back issues of Simpsons Comics, Futurama Comics and The Best of Bart Simpson from around 9-10 months ago). I was surprised to see that today, I expected the previous Autumn one to still be out for another month.

Christmas gets earlier every year....or perhaps I'm just getting old and cynical:). My copies of the Dandy and Beano Christmas Crackers are filed away until December!!.

The Christmas Crackers were next to the Dandy Summer Special in Nottingham. Says it all really.

Doesn't surprise me - Beano Ultimate Summer Special 2 was still out after 3 came out a few months later last year. I would've bought the Crackers yesterday from WHSmith, but the Hull Kingswood branch didn't have them, they only had the Beano 75th Anniversary and Dandy Summer specials.

Have been bad this year, I have read both my Dandy Christmas Cracker and Annual well before Christmas.

...Naughty, naughty Sid!

Expect a lump of coal from Santa then, lol.

The Christmas Crackers are Bookazines rather than annuals though. Unlike the annuals, I'll have no problem reading the Crackers immediately as soon as I get them.

Normally, I would wait until Christmas to ready my Dandy annual which is sometimes bought by my father (as he used to many years ago when I was a child).

Unfortunately, my father died a few weeks ago and I just happened to buy and read the annual.

I'm so sorry to hear that Sid. The thought of him buying your Dandy annual is a good memory however, and it's nice to know that they will always be there to remind you of him in the years to come.

- Phil R.

philcom55 wrote:I'm so sorry to hear that Sid. The thought of him buying your Dandy annual is a good memory however, and it's nice to know that they will always be there to remind you of him in the years to come.

- Phil R.

Thanks, Phil. It is a good memory.

Having seen these now, the quality of strip reproduction is so terrible - in some cases, almost unreadable - there's no way I'd buy them. They look like premium priced items that have had minimum effort spent on them (it looks like a dusty, vintage photocopier was used - with a gauze over its scanner!). If you're going to reproduce it in that quality, you might as well do it on cheap pulp paper and sell it cheaply.

Maybe the old comic strips are supposed to look so faded and dull for some kind of vintage effect, but it's a pity they've chosen not to reprint this old material looking sharp and clear and at its best, as in the past.

Yes it was obvioulsy a bad idea so how did it get past all those in the production of it? Were they too afarid to pooh-pooh some bigwig's idea?

Its like those really irritating adverts on commercial radio - I sometimes hear one and think "What made them think this annoying advert was going to help sell any product?"

Ooh, I know how you must be feeling SID, having lost my Dad a few years ago. Sorry to hear about your loss.

And on topic, WHSmith Hull Prospect Centre also hasn't put the Crackers out yet, so I still haven't bought them. No rush though.

Digifiend wrote:Ooh, I know how you must be feeling SID, having lost my Dad a few years ago. Sorry to hear about your loss.

Thanks, Digi.

Back on topic: looking at the Crackers, it is obvious (at least in some strips) that they have rescanned the original comic back in. Puzzling as I thought that DCT kept all their original art boards (at least digitally) or would that be unrealistic?