Something for the girls
Something for the girls |
|
Page 7 of 17  Girl (Hulton Press, 1952) With sales of over a million per issue by the early 1970s, Jackie's place in the market was unassailable: it became the natural 'next step' for girls who had previously read Bunty and its like. However, its dominance was challenged in the 1980s by the appearance of much more uninhibited publications for young women such as My Guy, Oh Boy and Blue Jeans. These were more magazines than comics, and included subject matter including rape, AIDS and how to put on a condom. They made Jackie look very old hat indeed, and when the comic finally folded in 1993 the then-Managing Editor of DC Thomson commented with some understatement: 'Girls today are that bit more sophisticated, the questions they ask are more informed ... Jackie has become an old lady. Jackie was the final major success of the British boom. Why girls' comics should have declined after this point is a moot point. We shall see that the rise of television was doubtlessly a factor. However, it was also an unrewarding environment for the creators. Increasingly it became the norm for talented writers and artists to move over into boys' comics, simply because here at least there might be a possibility of being head-hunted by the American companies, which paid better and allowed credits. Those creators that did stay with girls' titles thus tended to be second-rate, and unable to live up to the expectations of the 1960s and early 1970s. |