Comics for Girls: Modeling isn't a real job! But adhere to model body standards!

[greenmask]

Forget Marvel's lady blah-ing. What we need is more Bunty! Bunty annual 1976.

So I've brought some. If you remember my posts of ages ago or have the knowledge already, you'll be aware that Bunty was a British Girls' comic that ran weekly from '58 to '01 full of stories about girls doing stuff. Usually wacky stuff. Bunty was pretty huge and it was the first comics experience for a lot of girls, myself included. It's interesting to look at the "life lessons" in it's many varied stories.. they do progressive-seeming stories, and then they do completely awful screwed up rubbish. And then a story about how it would be useful to have a robo-pet. What am I supposed to have learnt from you, Bunty? Other than that comics are awesome?

After the cut: One very truncated story about a reluctant model, and a lot of first panels from a couple of my annuals. They introduce the premise of what'll be a two to eight page story, and go a little bit like "Tessa Worth had an unusual toy rabbit named Flopear which was really a highly-powered space craft in which she could travel. However, on the day before Christmas Eve, Tessa wanted to go no further than the highstreet!"

ACTUAL QUOTE. I'm saving that strip up, though.

If you want to hear more of any of these stories, let me know. I just got around to "scanning" (photographing..) Super Lamb today, after being asked to back on insanejournal.

Warning: '70s fatphobia within.



"Freda's in Fashion" is about Freda Prince, who is an officially HOT BABE. But she doesn't care! She just wants to be a trick druver or something, and makes mockery of her roommate, an aspiring model. Unfortunately, Freda has been "discovered", and is forced (forced!) into meeting with a famous model coach for model grooming. Freda's not keen.



Don't be tricked by the fashion media, girls! Do you OWN THANG!

Thank you Bunty, we will.

But then.. Freda is allowed to drive the dress truck for a week, and then asked to "just try this on whilst I pin the hem"



Wot an arsehole!

But Freda has done "so well" that she gets a reward, and is allowed to drive the truck again. Good.. I guess..?

And eventually a scout turns up at the Flat Freda and Rhoda share, asking for the professional model for a show (Rhoda), and he gives Freda a free ticket to watch as she yells at him to MIND YOU FEET because she is vacuuming.

Which leads to this amazing bitchface.



Rhoda does terribly of course, because she is the comedic supporting character.



What's that, Freda? Your sassy furniture moving skills and model physique have been a smash hit and been your sister's comeuppance again?



I don't know what I am supposed to take away from this at all.


And then I read this:



Whaaaaaat. NO BUNTY NO. It's "good" to know that body shaming was being given to our girls in their first weekly comics.

At least it shows that nagging your family about their weight won't make them love being around you?



..



On to the crack.





A youth club. THAT'S ALL. What a great comic!



Magical Hippy Comics





Silly Nazis! So sexist!



Bunty is still trend-relevant!



Real heroines!



Disguises.



MEN NAMED SNAPE ARE UNREASONABLY MEAN.



Britain + magic school = £££



Most blatant use of "this is hard to draw, I will make it invisible for extra plot"?






Fun page! Hurray!

Comments

[whitesycamore]

Holy shit, I used to read this when I was super young! It actually carried on until '01? Unbelievable. It seemed incredibly dated even in the 90's. I remember one recurring strip about a bunch of really self-righteous chicks who were all called Mary and went to a fancy girls' boarding school (of course). It's weird how much of presence boarding schools have in British consciousness even now, considering how few kids actually go to one. What's with that?

Also - "Maisie Moss had a pet duck, Quackers, who had become a national celebrity through his work in television commercials and other ventures". Maybe it's just me, but that REALLY isn't enough contextual information for that premise to pass unquestioned.

Thanks for posting this. It's... quite a thing, isn't it?

[icon_uk]

The Four Mary's ran in "Bunty" from 1958 until it folded in 2001, which is quite an achievement.

[greenmask]

I was reading in the 90s, too, I started juuust after they changed the cover images to models in hats instead of artwork. I felt so grown up, probably because it was so dated. Which, by the way, was likely because they re-did stories over and over. I have the same hairdresser heroine origin in two different seventies annuals, and possibly again in the 90s.

That said, if you are not down with the Four Marys, I may have to frown at you quite hard. }:[

Boarding schools handily get rid of parents without need for personal tragedy, I think.

And about the duck - I knowww. IT IS RIDICULOUS.

[whitesycamore]

But the Four Mary's were so wholesome! I was a bad child, I totally identified with villains.

The only strip I can really remember is one about an antiques fair. The comically inadequate evil girl was boasting about her silver spoon that was a family heirloom. Naturally the strip ended with the antiques expert telling her it was junk and totally humiliating her. I just felt it was a bit unfair how all the Mary's and the mysterious narrator who controlled her fictional universe seemed to be conspiring against her.

To be fair, I felt that sense of injustice a lot though. (Stupid children's' fiction with its stupidly predictable moral lessons and karma!)

[icon_uk]

Fabulous stuff there! Must see if I can dig out the reprint of Misty, a 1970's "weird and occult" comic for girls that they reprinted last year..

[greenmask]

There were reprints of Misty??

I looked for old copies on ebay, but none were to be found!

[icon_uk]

One issue reprint is all they did, I found it last year (or the year before) in WH Smith

[valtyr]

OMG yes. I was thinking about that just the other day. I am Misty, girl of the mist, sister to shadows, daughter of darkness, she who treads the untrodden ways on the wilder shores of midnight.

So very earnestly dark and spooky, I loved it. There was this story about a girl who was the chosen of Bast, and gave up diving and fought snakes - I forget. It was great.

[whitesycamore]

Please post scans if you do find it! I'm fascinated by supernatural stories aimed at girls. I loved creepy stuff as a kid, and I find it disheartening how modern horror has become pigeon-holed as a male genre. Just like comics. And superheroes. And almost everything which is fun and cool.

[crinos]

I would have liked it better if Think Thin Thelma ended with Thelma learning to accept her family and eventually joining them herself when she stops obsessing over her looks and learns to enjoy life.

Could have been like "Etta Candy Begins".

[greenmask]

Would be nice, wouldn't it?

I'll make a note, for when I win the lottery and revive Bunty for a modern audience.

[skjam]

Which reminds me, I should dig out the remainder of my British comics and post some more of that. I'm saving the story of why Hitler hates Christmas for the holiday season, though.

[greenmask]

Oh, do. Hitler Hates Christmas will go nicely with the giant toy bunny/spaceship/what IS christmas tale.

[lilacsigil]

Man, I loved these comics in the 70s and 80s! Some newsagents in Australia had them, but mostly I had to find annuals in second-hand shops. They were very cheap!

[nevermore999]

That.... guy looks exactly like Severus Snape too. But with shorter hair!

So either Snape managed to escape death and became a Mean Hotel Manager, or this was his Dad back in the 70's, and that's where he learned it from.

Either way, a really freaky coinkydink.

[greenmask]

It could be his dad

It did say he was a muggle! :O!

[gehayi]

I say that it's Severus Snape's Muggle father, Tobias.

[psychopathicus_rex]

I think the message is that Freda has no desire to be a model, and that's fine, but she COULD be one if she wanted to. In short, 'you can do anything you want in life if you put your mind to it - never hurts if you're pretty, though'.
To be fair, Think Thin Thelma's sister does look like she could stand to lose a pound or two, at least in that first panel. Her mom and dad look perfectly fine, though.
What is the point, I wonder, of making Griff a griffin if he's INVISIBLE? Why not just make him an invisible dog or something - why make him a nifty-looking critter like a griffin if you can't damn well SEE him?
Also, since when have there been hillbillies in Britain?

[greenmask]

OK, firstly, no that's not fair - no-one gets to decide who could lose a pound or two except oneself, and even if it was mandateable, someone who could stand to lose a bit of weight could also stand to keep it around. But let's move on.

The griffin does actually appear in a panel or two, after he gets soaked with water. They don't bother to colour him, of course. So cheap!

Since never. Hillbillies were exotic creatures from great fabled America that we were just fascinated by, which is why it was so easy for them to have pop star adventures with their Grannies, I guess.

[mab_browne]

I didn't read Bunty. Our local shop instead stocked 'Tammy' later known as 'Tammy and June'. I can still remember Bella at the Bar (she was a gymnast, okay?), and her Dursley type foster-parents

[greenmask]

Hahaha, I would love to see old girl-comic titles made into new lady-comics. Bella at the Bar! Excellent.

Mmm though, all the gymnastics etc. I've been saving up all my ballet strips for a megapost..

[jogadoresesquecidos.blogspot.com]

I enjoyed seeing these a lot. But Quackers, specially... that one made me laugh out loud. Well done! :D

[greenmask]

He manages to upstage and humiliate a self-important young actress whilst keeping his ducky dignity. :D

[red_cyclone]

There is somewhere in the boxes of photos in my house a picture of me surrounded by all my back copies of Bunty, just like in every letters page ever, I think I was born about 20 years too late as I never even realised it was dated in the 90's. <3 Bunty

[greenmask]

It was dated in a nice way, like Enid Blyton minus most of the racial sketchiness.

I am very jealous of how many issues you must have had!