Preview: Take A Bite Into More Brilliant Brit Comics With ‘Classic Gums’

Another great Treasury of British Comics release for you now, Classic Gums, a mainstay of Monster Fun for many years.

Created by Bob Paynter, Roy Davis and artist Robert Nixon in 1976 as an obvious nod to the most definitely not for children Jaws, Gums was an instant success, featuring a false teeth-wearing Shark desperate to capture his prey, the Australian surf kid, Bluey. Yet every time, it’s Bluey who comes out on top and Gums who ends up searching for his falsies.

This simple and ridiculous play on Jaws ran in the short-lived Monster Fun comic, usually taking the prestigious front-page strip position. Sure, it was a one-gag idea but that’s unimportant when you have the great cartooning of Nixon involved and when Paynter and Davis could seemingly milk the idea for all it was worth.

Later on, Alf Saporto took over on art of the hapless but loveable shark – loveable even though Gums does has a habit of pressuring his pals into helping him – and brought a slightly different style to things even as the writers opened things up to focus less on the Gums-Bluey dynamic but to include more of a cast of characters.

Gums

Written by Roy Davis

Art by Robert Nixon, Alf Saporito, Les Barton, Terry Bave, John Geerling, Tom Williams, and Ian Knox.

Classic Gums is released by the Treasury of British Comics on 22 November.

Includes the strips originally serialised in Monster Fun from February to October 1976 and Monster Fun Annuals 1977-1985.

Now, preview time – starting with the very first Robert Nixon years…

And now a couple with art by Alf Saporito…