The original Dinah Mo (initially called Dinah Mite in her early strips in the 1970s) was a boisterous girl who always landed in trouble but the new version is an inventive eco warrior who tries to put things right. Her name is Dinah Modose and she was created by the D.C. Thomson staff who then assigned me to write and draw the stories.
Obviously the key is to be entertaining rather than preachy about environmental issues so the usual Dandy fun will still be to the forefront!
The new Dinah Mo makes her debut in a two page story in The Dandy Summer Special 2024, published next month, and she'll also appear in four new stories in The Dandy Annual 2025, out in August. I'm currently plotting three Dinah Mo stories for The Dandy Annual 2026 to be published in Autumn 2025!
The Dandy Summer Special 2024 should be available in WH Smiths in mid-May. You can see a preview of page one of the first Dinah Mo story at the D.C. Thomson online shop, where you can pre-order the upcoming special, at this link...
https://www.dcthomsonshop.co.uk/dandy-summer-special-comic
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| Cover art by NIGEL PARKINSON. |
18 comments:
Always good to see your work out there, Lew. Thanks for the heads up
Thanks old friend. Much appreciated.
From memory, Dinah Mite and Dinah Mo were both drawn by Ron Spencer (although Mo was later drawn by Pete Moonie) but I see from Comics UK there was a gap of over 10 years between the end of Mite and the start of Mo who also looked very different.
I can't get near my copy of the Art and History of the Dandy at the moment to check dates!
Yes, Dinah Mite debuted in The Dandy No.1508 in 1970, drawn by Ron Spencer. The strip only lasted until issue 1539. She returned as Dinah Mo in No.2149, in 1983, again drawn by Ron Spencer initially. I've always wondered if the change was because Fleetway already had a Dinah Mite character established in Buster in 1965.
She looks nothing like the real Dinah Mo!
Dinah Mo isn't real, and this is a completely different character anyway.
Then again the first Dinah Mo looked nothing like Dinah Mite either! D Mite was marked by being short with a big chin and odd hairstyle which had a bit of the dreadlocks about it, but D Mo was taller with a simple ponytail and had far more in common with Dennis and Minnie.
The Dandy had three Jaks in the 90s and 2000s, drawn by Jimmy Hansen, Dave Sutherland and Wayne Thomson and they had little in common other than their hair. Angel Face in the Beano recycled the name of an angelic Ken Reid creation from 60 years earlier. Stevie Starr bears no resemblance at all to his Nutty predecesor.
TL;DR character names get recycled in new contexts, usually when the only people who really remember them first time round are parents and grandparents to the target audience.
Cool looking character very nicely drawn, great stuff Lew.
Thanks Paul.
I've been reliably informed that there was an even earlier Dinah Mite by Leo Baxendale in the 1957 Dandy Book!
Hi Andy, Dinak Mite looks very similar to the old Dinah Mo to me; big jaw, pony tail, Popeye-like arms. Admittedly she became even more exaggerated as Mo but I think that was just Ron Spencer evolving the character?
And then Fleetway renamed their Dinah Mite to Belle Tent.
Yes, when they reprinted it. It always bemused me that IPC would go to the trouble to rename strips when they reprinted them. Older readers wouldn't be fooled by that and new readers wouldn't even know about the old name so the changes were irrelevant.
Doesn't surprise me that Dinah Mo's name has now been used for a different concept. The 80s version became kind of redundant when the similar Beryl the Peril joined the Dandy when Topper folded (they're both also similar to Minnie the Minx), so there's no reason for that version of Dinah Mo to return.
That's good Lew. But even though I read The Beano Summer Specials & The Dandy Annuals, I have no interest in reading The Dandy Summer Specials, but it's nice to write about a character about saving the planet. I'm looking forward to seeing Dinah Mo in The Dandy Annual in the next coming months!
Hmm. Very interesting Lew. Just curious why DC thomson are looking to create new versions of Dandy Characters? I could understand if they were looking to launch a new weekly or monthly, but with only 2 Dandy releases per year re the special and annual, I'm not sure what they're hoping to achieve?
I'm also not sure if this new eco warrior character fits in with the spirit of the Dandy, although sure they had a eco type strip back in the 90s (Billy Green and his sister Jean) so maybe it will turn out ok, but I can't see it really appealing to new or older readers tbh. With only the limited new releases I can't help think what is the point as that space filled for this new incarnation could go to the much missed classic characters like the Smasher, unless (hopefully) DC are looking to release more Dandys within the year? Who knows...
Just my 2 cents
Best Oliver
I think the idea is to freshen up the annual and special with some new characters for the readers of today, and add some diversity to the line up. Much as I've always loved The Dandy (the first comic I had regularly 60 years ago) it was often a bit behind the times. In some ways that was its charm, but as the years go on that has become even more noticable.
A lot of the old characters will still be around. The Summer Special is, I presume, still mostly reprint, so the newer characters will balance things out a bit. The Annual continues to be all new, and it'll be a mixture of new characters and new stories of older characters.
Hello. We are putting a comic together for a top UK publisher and we are looking for writer artists in the humour style of comics. We wondered if you could suggest artists who draw in the Lew Stringer style (Beano, that kind of thing)? Not Stringer but someone who can draw in that way?
Or you could just commission me rather than use an imitator? Sheesh.
Wowser. Some people
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