On this day, 25 November 1978: Cheeky
Cover artwork: Mike Lacey (Disaster Des), Frank McDiarmid (Cheeky’s Week)
While each week's issue of Cheeky was based on the exploits of Cheeky himself and a large cast of the residents of Krazy Town, it contained a good number of standalone stories that we would read through Cheeky’s eyes as he encountered them through the course of his week.
6 Million Dollar Gran, drawn here as most weeks by Ian Knox, was Cheeky’s regular Sunday-evening TV viewing. Skateboard Squad usually followed on the Tuesday, and was one of the few standalone strips that seemed to be set within Cheeky’s own world.
The Mystery Comic was Cheeky’s comic-within-a-comic at this point in time. It was an 8-page publication with an apparent circulation of one, which Cheeky would discover each week through some piece of luck. Tub, Elephant on the Run and Mustapha Million were regular strips in The Mystery Comic, along with this week’s cover star, the catastrophic Disaster Des, and adventure serial Mystery Boy (a reprint of Whizzer and Chips’ Who is Sandy? from 1970).
Calculator Kid came next - this was very much a strip of its time, although there’s something rather familiar about a kid walking about staring at his handheld device. And Cheeky’s week ended with a trip to the Saturday morning movies, and a double bill of a licensed Loony Tunes cartoon and an adventure story, The Terrible Trail to Taggart’s Treasure, drawn by Eric Bradbury, originally for Shiver and Shake.
6 Million Dollar Gran: Ian Knox (artist)
6 Million Dollar Gran: Ian Knox (artist)
Skateboard Squad: Jimmy Hansen (artist)
Tub: Nigel Edwards (artist)
Mystery Boy: artist unknown
Elephant on the Run: Robert Nixon (artist)
Elephant on the Run: Robert Nixon (artist)
Mustapha Million: Reg Parlett (artist)
Disaster Des: Mike Lacey (artist)
Disaster Des: Mike Lacey (artist)
Calculator Kid: Terry Bave (artist)
Tweety and Sylvester: artist unknown
The Terrible Trail to Taggart’s Treasure: Eric Bradbury (artist)
Cheeky back page: Frank McDiarmid (artist)
