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description= Posts about Eric Wilkinson (Wilkie) written by Phil Boyce;
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was whoever it was takes the opportunity to bring us up to date on some of our favourite characters lives since oink was cancelled alongside the examples below the torture twins have also been employed in schools as a replacement for the cane mary lighthouse is happy editing all of our kids tv shows until they re unrecognisable and cowpat county has been concreted over and turned into the patworld theme park as a child i loved seeing some old faves all together again but now it s clear these are recycled panels from previous strips even the picture of uncle pigg is from a newsagent reservation coupon a strip by patrick follows this in which our porcine editor makes an appeal to his readers for financial aid telling us of all the woes that s befallen him and his staff since oink ended most horrifying of all being those that now had to work for buster comic in the end it s all a con and as the readers throw their money to help uncle pigg he summons his private helicopter to whisk him back off to those tropical islands he told us about when he signed off in 68 i have to say that while it s funny and as a kid i hoped the bit about having an appeal every year meant there d be yearly specials forever for young me it seemed out of character while he loved his money uncle pigg always put his readers first and here he was grifting them instead nowadays though it s just silly fun and i suppose it s in keeping with the likes of gbh speaking of which they may not have been a one hit wonder but bros did seem to be here one second and then gone the next i remember some friends being obsessed and i even bought the terrible marvel uk special here gbh took advantage of the teen crazes of the time and then the comic tested fans to see if they were as obsessed as they d made themselves out to be with a brill wilkie mini strip underneath i love the gros logo spoof of the real one and i wonder if had oink continued would the band have been a regular target looks that way rick astley is still going strong though which i was pleasantly surprised to find out a couple of years back when he popped up on jools holland s hootenanny can t keep a good 80s icon down the next page is by an artist who makes his sole contribution in this issue and that s a shame because if this is anything to go by i d loved to have seen more from him josé luis prats cruz is a cartoonist from southern spain and has continued to work in the industry ever since although his work has eluded me until now signing as ozeluí if you search online you ll find most of his cartoons have no speech just like this instant oink classic you can check out his most recent work on his instagram account what a shame he never got to create anything else for us pig pals in the final issue a strip called the pigpen of fear presents the spine tingling tale of the house at no 13 veryscary avenue was billed as the first in a new series by davey jones it didn t feel odd to have it billed as such even when no more would be coming because oink was always doing things like that well as it turns out it was intended to be a series after all not only that but the second strip is one of my very favourite oink strips of all time the pop up toaster of doom sees jim and peggy watkins meet their comeuppance when they cross the wrong shop keeper complete with the scary pig character as the narrator it s a perfect spoof of tv shows such as tales from the crypt right from the off it pokes fun at the conventions of such shows like the name of the shopkeeper being so obvious and of course since this is by davey there are a ton of background jokes to spot too the main gag here is that there s nothing sinister or evil happening at all but it s still dressed up as a horror story everything is completely ordinary even the shop itself is a red herring and in the end the horrible outcome for the couple is that they ll just take the toaster back to the shop it s ingenious ludicrousness by davey as per usual and one that had me roaring as a kid it s one of those occasions when it makes me laugh even more so as an adult too it s the funniest strip in the issue and one of the funniest oink produced unfortunately just like the monthlies there are reprints here too five pages in total in fact the final three pages of the comic are ones we ve seen before which ends things on a bit of a downer for regular readers but just before those is a new four page horace ugly face watkins strip which finally concludes his long running story with the happy ending he always deserved it s his and mandy s wedding day horace may have evolved completely from those early joke strips to an ongoing serial about the difficulties he faced thanks to his looks but co editor tony husband never forgot it was meant to be daft too horace s ongoing football soap opera was wonderfully random and he faced everything from a stalker to a radioactive monster in fact they were both the same person however his strips taught us much along the way about never judging others based on their looks and that we shouldn t let others who judge us unfairly hold us back yes oink was a daft comic but horace s strip sat comfortably alongside the non smoking anti bullying and anti bigotry messages to teach its young readers the right lessons in life without us ever being aware that s what they were doing three months was a long time to wait for new oink material however the next issue wouldn t be released for another six the holiday special 1989 may have been an additional monthly issue of oink rather than a summery feast but it was no less fun to take another bite of that pork pie i never saw any adverts for the oink winter special because i wasn t collecting any of the comics it would ve appeared in so it was a wonderful surprise when it popped up in november 1989 i can t wait to read it for the first time since that next crackling issue will be here on saturday 2nd november 2024 oink book 1989 winter special oink read through menu oink specials books menu main oink menu davey jones eric wilkinson wilkie j t dogg lew stringer ozeluí patrick gallagher tony husband annuals christmas oink comic reviews the oink book 1989 short but oh so sweet 25 december 2023 phil boyce leave a comment released towards the end of the summer in 1988 and advertised in the final two issues of oink after the comic s cancellation it felt like a long time coming for the oink book 1989 to finally fall into my trotters on christmas day that year as i mentioned in the preview post with a reduction in pages from the previous annual and a thinner paper stock it really does feel a lot smaller this time around but it s still 68 pages including cover of prime pork that s got to be reason enough to celebrate surely the cover by acclaimed oink illustrator j t dogg real name malcolm douglas is equal parts gorgeous and gruesome with some little icky details for kids to pour over it s bold and brash and certainly stood out amongst the other children s annuals just like oink always had in fact it stood out even more than it had in the adverts because they decided to swap the colours of the logo around possibly because it would work better against that dark brown background i think it works much better this way and we still get the pink regardless that background gives a hint as to what was on the back cover i remember seeing it in the shop and half expecting it to be the rear of the butcher s head this cover clearly being a riff on the piggy face from the oink book 1988 and i laughed quite loud when i turned it over that first time we ll get to that at the end we ve the insides to cover first beginning with the obligatory welcome page with something you d only see in oink at the time credits genius scriptwriting from lew after he was told by co editor mark rodgers only the first two pages would be printed in colour uncle pigg may be relying on more easily managed cards rather than an artist chiselling the names into stone like last year but this bright and colourful welcome was just what the piggy ordered when i opened it on christmas morning even today it feels like reuniting with old friends yes the comic may have only ended two months ago but ian jackson s contributions were becoming rarer so this is a wonderful return to form it s great to see certain names back too especially jeremy banx who had left when the comic went monthly halfway through reading the book it was clear to me what i was going to highlight first and it s more gorgeousness from j t dogg this time written by lew stringer that combination can only mean one thing it s ham dare pig of the future last seen in the oink book 1988 i d always remembered ham and pigby in serialised stories yet only their first one was published that way here they get a three page tale with a genius piece of scriptwriting from lew after he was told by co editor mark rodgers that only the first two would be printed in colour normally a comic would just carry on regardless on to the black and white page but if something is normally done then we should really know by now that s not what oink would do actually having it referred to is genuinely funny and malcolm s work is no less lovely the third and fourth panels of that page in particular had me roaring between the name of the weapon beam and the reason for it and the name of the weakun s henchman ham dare would return in the oink holiday special 1989 the following year and make the cover for the only time with a story originally written as his second serial and i for one can t wait there s another serial of sorts in here a set of four mini posters based on jeremy banx s original butcherwatch idea however this time each one is drawn by a different artist eric wilkie wilkinson mike higgs les lezz barton and banx himself what a team of course jeremy has to have the last word right at the very end of the book we just never knew when jimmy the cleaver smith would pop up did we while there are still three special editions of oink to come between now and april 2025 this book feels like an end to the regular comic yes this was already in the shops and santa already had it saved for me but with jimmy bursting through to threaten pig pals at the end it felt like the perfect way to wrap things up it was like he was telling us he was always going to be about even if the comic wasn t obviously what he says about oink was no longer going to be the case but that s because this page was created a long time before the book was published long before the comic even went monthly back when jeremy was still contributing someone else from back in those mists of time who makes a rather brief return here courtesy of ian jackson again written by mark rodgers was hadrian vile and his diary it may only be half a page and the captions aren t typed out but boy was i happy to see him again no matter how briefly way back in the preview issue s review i mentioned how burp s story in oink would culminate in an epic tale that taught a very young me about puberty you may have thought i was joking well maybe it was a slight exaggeration raging puberty is a huge eight page burp strip from banx set in the far future and recounting an ancient rite of passage amongst the alien species using our pal their lost son as an example i read and enjoyed this strip during christmas 1988 particularly the daft fight that takes place the imaginative weaponry and the funny designs however skip forward a few years and a young teenage me decided to reread the book for the first time since i saw this next strip in a completely different light i thought how did they get away with this on more than one occasion while outrageously laughing before taking it to school to show to all my friends obviously straight away the descriptive captions are classic banx reminiscent of some absolutely brilliant burp strips in the later fortnightlies when he was often given a double page spread to fill with his unique style of storytelling even though this is a comic strip the words alone paint such a picture that the images are barely needed but what on earth or elsewhere has this got to do with the title and the reason i found it so funny a few years later the answer is found on the next page not exactly subtle and that s why i couldn t believe oink a children s comic got away with this but even beyond the round furry things there s so much to laugh along with here such as the grizzled old warrior who was tired of being a boy and burp s innocence at what he thought being a grown up was all about then there s the dramatic change in angle with the lone caption and burp had a very sweet tooth it reminds me of that famous and the dolphin s name was keith moment from jeremy s mr big nose in 22 i ve really missed his work in the comic i m not sure if it s just a good gag or if jeremy was making a bit of a point with the first panel on the fifth page but i think it s both funny and poignant that battle cries and fear sound exactly the same then the story takes a brief break to detail gunk s weapon of choice the mauser only jeremy could come up with a gun that feeds electricity to a small rodent s fear receptors to provoke it to do a literal death stare the silencer is just the icing on the cake arguably the next page is even funnier the fight escalates burp using his unique bodily functions we ve all come to know and love and be grossed out by then as it s all building to a climax the story casually breaks again to have a closer look at another animal based weapon burp is usually a pacifist but it suits him doesn t it we even get a bit of marlon brando from on the waterfront although that would definitely have gone over my head in 1988 it all has to end in an even sillier manner and it does so with aplomb as a fan it s fun to see the insides of burp s body again and how the little fellas do all their hard work for nothing on the final page is a message that as a kid i took to mean we should never want to grow up that adults are just silly so why would we want to be them as an adult now and looking around at the world today i think that message is pretty much on point jeremy banx was both shocked and dismayed joking about how concerned he was for my wellbeing so anyway a few years later i hit that time when things start to change and life can feel very confusing it wasn t something we talked with our friends about we didn t realise what was going on after all but then i happened to read this again i m not going to say things suddenly made sense did you read it but it was enough for me to realise i wasn t alone and it could be something to look back on and have a giggle about so it couldn t be all that bad i once mentioned to jeremy how a young and impressionable me viewed this strip in my early teenage years and he was both shock and dismayed joking about how concerned he was for my wellbeing typical jeremy response so having been mentioned in the very first oink review on the blog we ve n...
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