Monday, June 27, 2022

Postwar Cheesecake

Katy Keene in her "undies." Despite its squeaky-clean reputation, Archie Publications could get pretty steamy during the pre-code era. While the character was aimed at a predominately female audience, most stories contained a generous amount of cheesecake, usually in the form of Katy getting changed. Readers often submitted designs for the characters' clothing; evidently the strip had a devoted male following as well.

Eight years before Marilyn Monroe's iconic scene in The Seven Year Itch, Katy Keene found herself fighting the gale for close on six pages. The strip's creator, Bill Woggon, frequently "spiced up" the action with pin up pages and mild innuendo here and there (well, practically every issue TBH). 

"Fanservice" elements were less common in other titles, though they managed to sneak in under the radar from time to time. Billed as "America's Typical Teenaged Girl," Ginger Snapp was a female version of Archie Andrews, complete with bright red hair and oddball supporting cast - although the similarities seem to have ended there. Unlike her better-known counterpart, Ginger occasionally treated her readers to gratuitous lingerie shots, complete with lacy black underwear and thigh-length suspender stockings.

Last (and quite possibly least) we have Owen Fizgerald's Moronica. Published by AGC in the early 50s, Moronica (yes, that was apparently her real name) was portrayed as ditzy, naive and accident-prone, ie a stereotypical "Dumb Dora" played exclusively for laughs. Appearing mainly in the back pages of Dizzy Dames (a more subtle title cannot be conceived), the strip ran for less than a year before its cancellation in June 1953. Strangely enough, the idea of an airhead blonde losing her clothes at the drop of a hat didn't catch on too well at the time. Guess there's just no accounting for taste.

Friday, June 24, 2022

2D to 3D Conversion

OK, so let's see if this AI program works on a hand-drawn image we found on the web...

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Actually...not too bad at all for a free online converter...

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Seems to work best at smaller sizes, but it definitely has great potential for  the future...

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And yeah, it appears to work just as well with screencaps too. If you'd like to try it out, the program's called Leiapix. Enjoy :) 

Thursday, June 16, 2022

Jane Revisited

Following Jane's phenomenonally successful run in the 1940s, the Daily Mirror attempted two revivals of the character over the next three decades, first with the short-lived Jane, Daughter of Jane in the 1960s (Alfred Mazure, 1961-1963):

...followed by a mid-eighties reboot which updated the original heroine for a contemporary audience (1985-1990). Veteran cartoonist John M. Burns added an espionage parody recalling Jane's homefront adventures of the war years:

 

While both strips were initially well-received , neither managed to recapture the charm of Norman Pett's wide-eyed ingenue. Despite some truly knockout artwork from Burns and Mazure, the revivals simply couldn't match the patriotic fervor of their predecessor. Apparently, the key to success involves more than just a pretty blonde running around in her lingerie :)

See also this post for more of the same. 

Saturday, June 11, 2022

Benny Hill: Garters Galore!

And now for another (in)famous chase scene from The Benny Hill Show! By the end of the eighties, the starring cast must have been stripped down to their underwear in every manner humanly possible, but apparently, the Old Reprobate still had a few tricks up his sleeve.

 
 

 
 
This 1986 closing sketch has Benny fleeing through the Dimpton countryside with the obligatory Traffic Wardens in hot pursuit. Inevitably, a chance encounter with a barbed wire fence leaves the girls in nothing but their bras and knickers, at which point the tables abruptly turn and the WPCs find themselves sprinting half-naked through the woods.
 
 

On the run again...
 
The skit appears to have been a fun shoot for everybody concerned; evidently the girls found running around in their stockings and garters as much of a thrill as we do. Interestingly, the scene posted above originally had the closing credits rolling over the action. We'd be very interested to know how they removed the titles for this animated gif. It seems to have been lifted from an old video compilation (as opposed to DVD), maybe there's an alternate source concealed somewhere on the net :)

Wednesday, June 8, 2022

Cynosure: Selected Briefs

This special illustrated edition features eight brief vignettes covering a wide range of transgendered themes. Written in the racy, fast-paced style of the classic pulp era, Cynosure Illustrated Fiction is an eclectic blend of whimsy, pathos, humor and fantasy.

Friday, June 3, 2022

Tiffany Jones

More gratuitous lingerie scenes from Pat Tourret's Tiffany Jones. Initially published in London's Daily Sketch, this beautifully illustrated British 'strip' followed the time-honoured tradition established by Norman Pett's Jane (ie featuring the title character in her underwear as often as possible). Strangely enough, cheesecake shots from the strip are somewhat rare on the internet, though they occasionally turn up on Ebay and similar auction sites. 

See also this post for more of the same.

Thursday, June 2, 2022

Club Dance


Rule number one: you DON'T talk about Club Dance!!

Well...actually, you do. We came across these clips during a routine Youtube search; they seem to date from the mid 90s, featuring a troupe of 'urban cowboy' line-dancers. The venue was most probably the Wild Horse Saloon (the eponymous Club Dance of the title).


Youtuber Dave Anderson appears to have uploaded hundreds of short videos to his YT channel, ranging in length from 13 seconds to three minutes. The resolution isn't too bad considering the source material is well over twenty years old. Our thanks to the inimitable Mr Anderson for his painstaking efforts - by our count, he must've edited well over 500 individual vidclips so far!

Dave's Club Dance Channel.

The Wages of Sin



...are a nice, long spanking on the panties (needless to say, the debt seems to have been paid in full). Despite the low resolution and amateur production values, the performances are surprisingly naturalistic; both actors 'sell' their roles as angry parent and remorseful daughter to near-perfection.

Watch the video here :)