UPDATED: Robin comic merchandise - an incomplete visual guide

Robin comic was one of the companion titles to the original Eagle comic (along with Girl and Swift) - Robin was aimed at the youngest demographic of the 4 titles. I don't collect Robin material but I thought I should try and record what sort of spin-off ephemera, games etc. exist for Robin.

The main problem with this is that is you google "Robin comic merchandise" you get an awful lot of stuff relating to Batman's young assistant, grrr.

Spin-off books are here

The 1st birthday book is here

The 2nd birthday book is here

The 3rd birthday book is here

The 4th birthday book is here

The 5th birthday book is here

The 10th birthday book is here

The 13th birthday book is here

New additions are highlighted in red

Editorial letter recently up for sale from ace ebayer philcomics

Robin branded envelope

A slightly different 'welcome' card - different editor signature, different address and the Robin now faces the other way

A card welcoming a new member to the Robin club

A letter welcoming a new member to the Robin club

The Robin book of pets

sold by COMPAL at lot 89 in there Summer 2012 (British section) and described thus Robin (1953) 1 13-16 39 Robin Metal Club badge Swift Club badge 2 Robin Birthday Club Cards Robin Birthday Postcard Odeon Film Club postcard. With Boy's World (1963) Vol 1: No 5 and free gift Olympic Medal Ranger 18 June 1966 Victor Summer Special (1968) and Robin 1 (1986) Robin 1 (1953) [fn-] balance [vg/fn] (17) Winning bid incl. 10% Buyer's Premium: £134. No idea what the Robin book of pets is. 

This image is taken from here

and looks a lot like a simpler version of the Swift birthday books that I covered here

A Robin birthday postcard (front and back)...  

...including nice Swift 'stamp' - Swift had launched on 20th March 1954 and this was sent on 20th July 1954 - so exactly 4 months later. 

In the tradition of Eagle / Girl / Swift there were spin-off jigsaws, here's one that I've found so far...

And here's a money box...

I'm sure there must be more stuff out there - can you help?

UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE

I've been pointed in the direction of the 'Dan Dare info' website (here) for some rare Robin merchandise - so here are 5 cards (presumably of set of 6)…

Number 1 - Richard Lion, Peggy, Henry and Pug

Number 2 - Dumpy, Golly and Honeybun

Number 3 - Woppit, Mokey and Tiptop 

Number 4 - Johnny Bull, Woppit, Mokey, Tiptop and Bingo, Bango and Bongo

Number 5 - Johnny Bull, Woppit, Mokey, Tiptop and Bingo, Bango and Bongo

Phil Shrimpton was also kind enough to share some picture of Robin items he's sold on ebay…

Not sure if this is the 6th book they produced or a book for a child's birthday - anyway, it's good to know it exists...now I just need ot find book 4 and 5 and add them in

There was a Robin club (just as there was an Eagle club, a Girl club and a Swift club), in the Eagle club if you were a member for more than a year you got a star to dangle from the hoop on the badge, presumably this was true of Robin as well (even if the symbol may not have been a star)

Not really merchandise but for the die-hard Robin collector out there...

Further images c/o friend of the blog Jeremy Briggs...here's a Robin club badge with a leaf (I think) denoting that the member has re-subscribed to the club...

Jigsaw #3 'At the zoo', now I just need to find images on jigsaw numbers 1, 2 and 4

UPDATED: Celebrity comics - Rupert

I've occasionally looked at publisher Celebrity / Clearmark comics in the past...

Count Duckula is here

The wisdom of gnomes is here

Wanted is here

Popular fairy tales here

Were Bears here

The world of Wym here

Tom and Jerry here 

Cookie here

Henry's cat here

Summer specials here

Ovide here

And there may be other titles out there just waiting to be discovered. One such title that was new to me was their Rupert comic from 1989/90. There are a LOT of Rupert comics out there so I'm currently parking this in the 'too difficult' to deal with category. I'll return to it at some point I'm sure. In the meantime if you can help with any details do just get in touch.

I recently spotted an auction lot on eBay for these comics - so I've clipped a few images from the listing for my covers gallery below. 

UPDATE: covers for issues 4 & 6 now added

FURTHER UPDATE: I've now added cover for the summer special

UPDATE: We now know that the title lasted 20 issues. All new images highlighted in red. Interestingly issue 10 has the publisher recorded as Celebrity but by issue 12 the publisher has been amended to Clearmark.

Celebrity comic, Rupert, issue 1, 18th October 1989, 50p

Celebrity comic, Rupert, issue 2, 1st November 1989, 50p

Celebrity comic, Rupert, issue 3, 15th November 1989, 50p

Celebrity comic, Rupert, issue 4, 29th November 1989, 50p

Celebrity comic, Rupert, issue 5, 13th December 1989, 50p

Celebrity comic, Rupert, issue 6, 27th December 1989, 50p

Celebrity comic, Rupert, issue 7, 10th January 1990, 50p

Celebrity comic, Rupert, issue 8, 24th January 1990, 50p

Celebrity comic, Rupert, issue 10, 21st February 1990, 50p

Clearmark comic, Rupert, issue 12, 21st March 1990, 50p

Clearmark comic, Rupert, issue 13, 4th April 1990, 50p

Clearmark comic, Rupert monthly, issue 15, May 1990, 80p

Clearmark comic, Rupert monthly, issue 18, August 1990, 80p

Clearmark comic, Rupert monthly, issue 19, September 1990, 80p

Clearmark comic, Rupert monthly, issue 20, October 1990, 80p

A very useful overview of the series here...

Fleetway prints from 1988

A recent discovery (for me anyway) were this set of limited edition prints that Fleetway publications produced in 1988. These were in limited editions of 500 and were signed by the relevant artist. Check out this ebay seller for the chance to buy 'em.

There were 9 prints produced in total, again thanks to ebay seller deedee234

UPDATE: Bulldog Empire - Neill Cameron & Jason Cobley

I've now added (at the bottom of this post) more details about where you can find reprints of this strip...

After nearly 2,000 posts its seems hard to believe that I could have someone making their first appearance on the blog but it happens. In fact today we have two people on their blog debut - artist Neil 'Mega Robo Brothers' Cameron and author Jason Cobley.

They owe their appearance today to my recent purchase of these two comics from the estate of the friend of the blog, the much missed Colin Noble.

First up is Bulldog Empire #1 - this was produced in 2005 (priced at £2.95) and was a limited run of 200 copies. This particular copy is numbered 73. Cover (and interior) art is by Neill Cameron. Classic US comic size, black & white interior art, 32 pages (including covers). 

You get 20 pages of Bulldog empire and then 6 pages of Brittany Bell and her brilliant Bimech (by Neill Cameron & Stu Perrins). 

...it's a wraparound cover & here's the back 

Here's issue 2 (front cover), this is from 2006 and was a limited print run of 150 copies (of which this is numbered 4). £3.95 for 44 pages of comics (black & white art by Neill Cameron throughout)

and the rear cover

The cover of issue 2 was re-used as the cover to 'The mammoth book of best new manga' in 2006. In fact that book reprinted all the Bulldog Empire material that had appeared in the standalone comics.

Barney also tells me that there were 8 pages of Bulldog empire in Judge Dredd megazine #253 (cover dated 9th January 2007)

I've also discovered that Paragon #35 (from Davey Candlish) also featured the first 7 page strip from Bulldog Empire #1