The 1975 TV Comic Annual
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Polystyle Publications Ltd The 1975 TV Comic Annual |
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| Published | 1974 |  |
| SBN (not ISBN) | 85096 048 1 |
| Starring the third Doctor |
A Review by Finn Clark 27/8/04
What a load of rubbish. I like 1960s-era TV Comic, which blended adventure strips with its funnies, but by 1975 it seems to have degenerated into non-stop kiddie stuff. Doctor Who doesn't belong here. I guess there's also Tarzan, but he's only in a text story.
Even the stuff I once liked has gone downhill. Bugs Bunny has plummetted to unbelievable depths, the TV Terrors seem to have lost their snap and even Tom and Jerry don't quite have it any more. Basil Brush and Popeye were never any good in the first place. The only pleasant surprise was Mighty Moth, who suddenly becomes rather readable if you expand his one-page throwaways into two-pagers. Those chunkier stories actually have a little meat on their bones.
New characters have come along since Doctor Who was last here. There's Road Runner and his three offspring (huh? what?), who talk in rhyme. That's actually quite cool, but Texas Ted is actually offensive in its invitation to laugh at the loudmouth American. Barney Bear is pointless. The Pink Panther isn't bollocks, so by default it's one of the better strips in this book. Finally there's Nelly and her Telly, in which a cartoonishly drawn ugly eight-year-old has silly fantasies and wears a short dress that twice shows her arse. Eurrrgh. That I didn't need. At least she seems to be wearing knickers on p71.
Is there any good stuff? Well, Dad's Army has come across from TV Action. I approve. Tom and Jerry are still ultra-violent. Oh, and Hoppit in TV Terrors has now named his boots: Fred and Charlie. He talks to them, like Sledge Hammer talking to his gun. He has a relationship with them, tucking them up in their own boot-sized beds and trying to give them an equal share of happy sadistic Terror-whomping. This strip may be dumb kiddie fun like everything else in TV Comic, but Hoppit is one of the stranger and more fucked-up characters I can think of in comics.
The Doctor Who story is fairly dull. It's a duotone five-pager drawn by Gerry Haylock, in which the 3rd Doctor defeats the Groobs who have invaded Zenos and petrified its people. And then, after outwitting them, he blows 'em up anyway. Hmmm. Not very nice of him. There are some nice visuals, but nothing on a par with the painting of Countdown and TV Action. It didn't even entertain me on a 'so bad it's good' level o' goofiness, except for the following exchange:
"Wait! Take me to your leader!"What an interesting set of deductions. Was the Doctor speaking in Ancient High Gallifreyan, or is the TV Comic universe populated entirely by inbred banjo-plucking retards who can't even manage five-word sentences? [This space has been left blank for you to insert your own joke.] Things I learned from reading this book:"Only the Time Lords know such words as he spoke! The great Parada will decide!"
"So they are terrifyingly intelligent and their leader is one Parada."