Tag Archives: revenge

The Change in Claire

Bunty, ,
  • The Change in Claire –  Bunty:  #1697 (21 Jul. 1990)  – #1708 (06 Oct. 1990)
  • Reprinted: Bunty #2165 (10 July 1999) – #2176, (25 September 1999)
  • Artist: Matías Alonso

Plot/Thoughts

Jane Cook is happy when she finds out her friend Claire is moving back to the neighbourhood, but Claire seems to have changed in her time away and has it out for Jane’s family. She starts out with small things, such as knocking over Jane’s books so Jane misses the bus, of course she acts all nice afterwards claiming it was accidental. It’s not just Jane she’s making trouble for though, Jane’s Dad’s car gets scratched and Claire causes Jane to break her Mum’s favourite teapot. After Claire turns the class against Jane, Jane is determined not to get tricked again and also get to the bottom of why Claire has changed.

When Jane’s cousin Andy comes to stay, his dog goes missing, Jane believes Claire has something to do with it she confronts Claire. It seems Claire has mistook Andy for Jane’s brother Mike. Jane begins to wonder if Claire has something against Mike in particular. After a trip to a funfair, Claire appears to be getting more dangerous, nearly pushing Claire’s Mum out of a ferris wheel carriage, while pretending to have vertigo.

Claire’s little tricks have now become more psychotic as she actually tries to injure some of Jane’s family. While out riding with her cousin Jenny, Claire startles the horse causing Jenny to fall off and get injured. She reveals to Jane that her change seems to be something to do with her sister Sara/Fay. ( It seems the writer/editors, had a hard time keeping track of Claire’s sister’s name. In issue 1697 it is Sarah, then in issue 1704, she is called Fay and in 1707-1708 she is back to being called Sara, though without a h!)

Continuing on the road of nearly killing the Cooks, Claire invites them over to the house while her parents are out. She acts all nice for a while, then pops out. She leaves the central heating on full blast, then locks all the doors and windows so they can’t escape.

Luckily Claire’s parents come home in time. Meanwhile Jane has discovered that Claire’s room is covered with pictures of Sara. (Jane describes it as a shrine, creepy much!?) Later Claire confirms that she is making the Cooks pay for what they did to her sister. Jane not having any idea what that could be, is happy that her brother Mike is coming home from college so she can talk about Claire with him.

Claire is excited her sister Sara is coming home too, she boasts a lot about her. Mike goes cycling on his new bike but Claire cuts the breaks, even though Jane can’t prove it. So another kill attempt, the girl is seeming like potential bunny boiler material!  After the accident Jane remembers  that Mike and Sara had been on an adventure holiday together a few years ago. Mike is reluctant to tell her the story, but does eventually.

His version of the story is that him and Sara were friends, but then she started to tell everyone  they were engaged and Mike didn’t know how to handle it.  (So I wonder how much of a casual “friendship” this was, either way Sara is delusional to announce their engagement. Seems this family is full of issues! ) So Mike not wanting to embarrass her waited til he was home and wrote to her saying he wasn’t ready for that sort of thing. I would think so, as Mike is just in college now and the holiday was a a year ago how old were they when Sara created this engagement? I’m guessing way too young to be planning a wedding.

So Jane tells Mike what has been happening. They go to see Claire. Sara is home and they are surprised to see her in a wheelchair. Turns out Sara had an accident on her horse a couple of weeks after Mike’s letter and Claire has blamed Mike  and hated his family since, because its rational to hold a vendetta against the entire family over what she perceived Mike did wrong. Anyway Sara knows it was just bad luck, and she was over the Mike break-up at that stage (would have been nice if she told Claire that!) Claire’s upset at this revelation.

In a few weeks everyone’s feeling better and apparently there are hints of Sara and Mike getting together, yep because nothing is  more attractive than a delusional girl and her psychotic sister, that nearly killed you and your family. Seriously hope Claire got some professional help, her obsession with her sister and basically attempts to kill people isn’t something that should be that easy to get over in a few weeks….in the real world at least!

 

Letters of Hate

Bunty, , ,
  • Letters of Hate –  Bunty: #1678 (10 March 1990) – #1686 (5 May 1990)
  • Artist: Tom Hurst

Plot/Thoughts

This story is narrated by Gemma, her life isn’t going so well, these days, her boyfriend Mike dumped her and her father has lost a job.  So she isn’t having a great time, but she still seems surprisingly upbeat. She brushes off Mike having a new girlfriend as no big deal and encourages her father to keep going for interviews. Then people in her school start getting poison pen letters. Janice is called out for being spotty, Ben and Abigail break up after he gets a note that Abigail spent evening with another guy. Gemma and her friends Cathy and Laura decide to play detective and find out who is sending the letters.

Spoilers! In the end the shocking twist is  that Gemma is the  culprit herself! Having protagonists be the person behind nasty tricks was one of those plots that would pop up sometimes. The story tries to steer towards other suspects, even in the first issue two girls Babs and Josie are highlighted to be mean gossips, so later on they become suspects. In the second issue Gemma herself gets a nasty letter. Again this was common to have the supposed victim be behind everything.

The letters are written in different methods, so these clues to lead them to new suspects. In one instance a letter is typed right after girl bragging about new typewriter. Conveniently Gemma always is on her own when a letter arrives. When  Gemma and Laura decide to hide in the classroom waiting for the writer, Gemma goes to tuck shop and it turns out a letter appears in another class. Next a letter is sent with cut out comic bookletters (Bab and Josie are suspects). Later Gemma and Laura find spare letters in cloakroom they are surprised that they are beside best friends Cathy’s peg. When Cathy is off sick the next day the rule her out,

Throughout the story Gemma’s ex Mike and his new girlfriend Dawn pop up. Her thought bubbles reveal she still wants him back even though she says she she doesn’t mind outwardly.

Mike and Dawn both become suspects, when they find a typed list of names including most of the victims. It is actually a party list and typewriter doesn’t match.

Cathy meanwhile has figured out why the crooked M on typewritten note looked so familiar, it’s Gemma’s. So Laura and her confronts Gemma and yes she did it because she was having a miserable time. Some people who got notes was just to make them miserable too, others like a girl Tania got a note because she disliked her for beating her in a race. Of course Gemma loses all her friends after everyone knows what she has done. She seems quite surprised by this.

Again its not breaking any new ground, but at least some of the suspects like Cathy, Mike and Dawn seem possible and less obvious than earlier suspects. Gemma seems a bit oblivious to the consequences but her motivation is plausible.  She is not an overly vicious character, she did a terrible thoughtless things, more because misery likes company than any real spite. But in the end its good to see her get what she deserves. The art is solid. Some stories have settings that gives the artist lots to explore with like old style Victorian, or futuristic sci-fi, or even having crazy pets but with stories set in a modern era schools, there can seem to be less to play around with.  Still the expressions are subtle, characters are distinctive and while there isn’t lots of action it is still nice nice and consistent.

Wheels of Misfortune

Judy, , ,

Plot

Ann Jones was taken to live with the Bennets when her widowed mother died after crashing her car. Ann was now  confined to a wheelchair. June Bennet became the victim of a serious hate campaign and was sent away to stay with an aunt. No-one saw the out-of-date diary, kept by Ann’s mother before her death, that Ann always carried with her and read in secret.

Notes

  • Artist: Bert Hill

Appeared

  •   Wheels of Misfortune – Judy: #1290 (29 September 1984) – #1301 (15 December 1984)

The Girl with the Golden Smile [1975]

Mandy,

Plot

Vicki Yates was traveling around the country entering beauty contests, sponsored by Elaine Larner, a former beauty queen. But Vicki discovered that Elaine was using her in an evil plot against other ex-beauty queens.

Notes

Appeared

  • The Girl with the Golden Smile – Mandy: #454 (27 September 1975) – #463 (29 November 1975)
  • Reprinted –  Mandy: #1075 (22 August 1987) – #1084 (24 October 1987)

“It’s All Your Fault!”

Nikki, ,

Plot

When she was five years old, Judy Smith unintentionally caused an accident which crippled her younger sister, Audrey. Years later, Audrey could only walk with the aid of a stick, and Judy still felt guilty about causing the accident. Secretly, Audrey had never forgiven Judy and was determined to make her suffer too.

its-all-your-fault

Notes

  • Artist: Guy Peeters

Appeared

  • “It’s All Your Fault!” – Nikki: #58 (29 March 1986) – #67 (31 May 1986)

Revenge of the Dancing Doll

Suzy, , ,

Plot

In 1789 the French Revolution  was tearing France apart. Using the widespread disorder to their advantage, Paul Martin and his friends had doll-maker Rene Philipe executed in order to take over his business. Rene’s daughter, Estelle, planned to avenge her father’s death using an amazing, life-size, clockwork doll to terrorise Martin’s gang. The doll, however, seemed to be taking its own revenge…

revenge-of-dancing-doll

Notes

Appeared

  • Revenge of the Dancing Doll – Suzy: #223 (13 December 1986) – #229 (24 January 1987)

Enemy of the School

Nikki, , , ,

Plot:

When Emmeline Hart’s father died leaving huge debts, she and her mother had to leave their beautiful manor and move into a small flat. Emmeline was horrified when she discovered that her new school, Deansbury Memorial, to which she had ; won a scholarship, was housed in her former home! Bitterly resentful of the other girls using what was once hers alone, Emmeline vowed to take her revenge.

enemy-of-the-school

Notes:

  • Writer: Marion Turner (under pen-name: Fiona Turner)
  • Artist: Claude Berridge

Appeared:

  • Enemy of the School – Nikki: #52 (15 February 1986) – #63 (3 May 1986)