Magnum Mania!

Did you know that there was a MPI comic strip? I sure didn't! Early 80s, UK, "Look In" Magazine:





British Magnum fan Christopher Keating sent me a complete serialized adventure from the comic strip, which ran from January 16th to March 6th in 1982. I hope to have it up on the site soon. Much thanks Chris!

Chris also has scans of other MPI comic strip adventures, available at UK eBay:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... &rd=1&rd=1

Spread the word. These are rare, indeed!

Ok, the complete comic strip adventure ("Searching For Roushi Tanaka", as I call it) is up on the site: http://magnum-mania.com/Pics/Look-in_Comic_Strip_1.html .

This ran from Jan. 16th to Mar. 6th, 1982 in the UK magazine Look-in. Illustrated by John M. Burns.

It's fun to see a Magnum story in comic form. The illustrations are great and the story isn't half bad either. The Ferrari takes another plunge over a cliff (again with Magnum in it). Rick sort of looks like Willem Dafoe.

And then there is this exchange between Magnum and Fujita, a large Japanese crime boss:

Magnum: They warned me off, too. Told me to keep my nose out of federal affairs.

Fujita: That is good! I like it! Your nose will therefore
become a symbol ... I will personally cut it off - and send it
to them!

Magnum: Now hold on a minute! I happen to care about the way
I look ...



According to Chris, the Magnum strip only ran from Jan. 1982 to July 1982. Enjoy!

T.C. looks REALLY goofy in here.

But I guess we're used to Roger E. Mosely and not some stringy looking guy.

Oh well, not a bad story!

That rules. Thanks for sharing it.

Excellent, thanks James.

I dunno how I missed these as I was an ardent MPI fan right about the time those were out.

I was just going to mention these - good job I decided to check the old threads list first! =)

I collect old Look-Ins and TV Times (which listed ITV and Channel 4 programmes; MPI was originally shown on ITV), so have quite a few MPI strips, though I don't think any complete stories.

Look-In was a sort of junior TV mag, running features on current TV, music and sports stars, and as well as an MPI strip, also ran similar for 'Knight Rider', 'The A-Team', 'Airwolf', etc.

Them were the days!

James J. Walters wrote:Ok, the complete comic strip adventure ("Searching For Roushi Tanaka", as I call it) is up on the site: http://magnum-mania.com/Pics/Look-in_Comic_Strip_1.html .

Seems to have vanished from the site... Anyone know if it's still available?

I can't find it either.

I'm thinking a copyright issue arose? Reprinting without permission or some-such?

Sorry guys. A while back I changed the name (and URLs) of the 'Photos' section to 'Pics'. I've updated the link in my earlier (2007) post.

James J. Walters wrote:According to Chris, the Magnum strip only ran from Jan. 1982 to July 1982. Enjoy!

That sounds about right - it didn't run for as long as many of the other American-TV adaptations for the magazine.

It's place was taken by 'Knight Rider', although there may have been another title inbetween, as KR didn't start until September in the US, and reached UK shores a couple of months later *

(* - In the good old days before $ky were around to buy up everything... sorry, another rant for another site! )

Holy BAM POW ZING Batman!

Neat strip. Sometimes TS looks pretty realistic. At other times he bears no resemblance at all. I assume they may have had multiple artists cranking this out. Not quite Stan Lee material, but very interesting.

Pretty cool stuff. TC looks awful, though.

Higgy_baby wrote:Holy BAM POW ZING Batman!

Neat strip. Sometimes TS looks pretty realistic. At other times he bears no resemblance at all. I assume they may have had multiple artists cranking this out. Not quite Stan Lee material, but very interesting.

The artwork in Look-In's strips did vary quite a bit. Sometimes they would look really good, other times pretty sloopy and 'rushed' looking.
I think it was due to the comic being produced weekly, and thus them working to very tight deadlines.