Wednesday 21 March 2018

Flintstones Weekend Comics, March 1968

My favourite Flintstones episode is centred around Dino and his love for TV character Sassy. I wish the series would have used Dino more to drive the main plot. Well, the writer of one of the Flintstones weekend comics 50 years ago this month did. And it’s an amusing one.

There were five Sundays in March 1968 and Richard Holliss has colour comics from all of them. He’s supplied one that he thought he had sent earlier so we have amended the post with it (the copy is smaller than the others).


Wilma gets even with the slobby Fred in the March 3rd comic. Why Fred is fishing in the living room, I’m not sure. Gene Hazelton and his artist avoid backgrounds in a number of the panels, including the second one where there’s no grass or sky, just the Rubbles’ house almost floating in space.


Pebbles is sadistic in the March 10th comic. She knows full-well she’s hurting people (and dinosaurs) by hammering them on the foot. We again have panels with no backgrounds. Note how Dino’s hiding behind the sign in the opening panel.


That poor bird with the record player beak. Every time niece Annie came over, all she did was listen to music. Oh, well. “It’s a groovy living,” I guess. Some good poses on dancing Fred in the March 17th comic. It would have blown Bill Hanna’s budget to have done that scene in animation.


Gleef! Here’s Dino in the spotlight in the March 24th comic. Richard’s colour versions come from England; whether the North American comic had Dino all in purple, I don’t know, but it looks odd that his snout isn’t white. We get a silhouette panel in the top row and a good use of perspective in the first panel, second row. See the crushed Viking under car in the last panel.


See the grinning Fred in the middle row of the March 31st comic. Snow golf? In bare feet? A hardy breed, those cave men (who don’t actually live in caves in Bedrock). Hey, Barney, if Fred has “mastered old number seven hole,” how come he hasn’t sunk anything? I suppose the “green” should be renamed the “white.” The silhouette panel in the first row includes the words “Yabba Dabba Doo.” I don’t believe Fred actually used the correct phrase in the Sunday comics until this one.

Click on each for a bigger view.

11 comments:

  1. Did Dino hear his name (deeno (actually dino))?

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  2. I agree Yowp. The scene in the Flintstones episode when Dino sees Sassy as she really is when she removes her fake eyelashes was priceless. Also the "Star" attitude of the rest of the cast when the cameras weren't rolling. That was a good episode.

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    1. It sure was..and it opened Season 3.:) And a well done sad moment right before Dino returns.SC

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  3. Between Annie with her records, Pebbles with her hammer, and Rodney Rocktop with his bongos, the Flintstones must have treasured any moments of peace and quiet they ever got.

    "Dino Disappears" is another great Dino-centric episode.

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  4. The Flintstones Sunday page from March 10, 1968 (drawn by Gene Hazelton) - that one which brings the Pebbles' physical facts -, is included in the Comicrazys blog (http://comicrazys.wordpress.com/2008/10/13/the-flintstones-sundays-1965-1970-gene-hazelton-unknown).

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  5. And in the Flintstones Sunday page from March 31, 1968 (drawn by Gene Hazelton), we see a British-styled Fred playing golf in the middle of the snow...


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  6. Do you remember of a Flintstones Sunday page from September 4, 1966 (drawn by Gene Hazelton), where Fred, Wilma & Pebbles was going to see the Holiday on Ice, and that pranky Dino ended following them?
    Very well. The hysteria repeats at the Flintstones Sunday page from March 24, 1968 (also drawn by Gene Hazelton), with Fred & Wilma going to the opera, and that mischevous Dino following them!

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  7. Any idea why Hazleton and company abandoned the model-sheet orange tunic for Fred in favor of the blue one? When the blue shirt first showed up, I figured it was just to spell the sameness built up after six or seven years of orange, but apprently, the change was permanent--odd, because he never wore it anywehere else. Seems to me as the years went by H-B took less and less notice or care in the strips he was doing. By the early '70s, Hazleton's Fred and Barney lost their beard lines, making them look less like themselves than they should have. Someone is licensing was falling down on the job.

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  8. Yowp, I know your favorite Flintstones episode is "Dino Goes Hollyrock", so here's a comic I think you'll enjoy, although you probably won't like the references to...that other purple dinosaur. *shudders*

    The pages are out of order; the correct order should be: 1, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 2, 3, 4.

    https://www.wbkidsgo.com/the-flintstones/comic/name/the-first-purple-dinosaur-on-tv

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    1. Thanks, Karen. Is that from the '90s or newer?

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    2. It's from the '90s; you have to look very closely at the copyright. It's very tiny print so you have to zoom in on it.

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