One of the strangest, if not the strangest, digests DC ever published--the Super Jrs. Holiday Special, an all-new sixty-five page story aimed directly at young kids!It's a fanciful Xmas tale that features five little kids who get transformed into pint-size versions of Superman, Batman, Robin, Wonder Woman, and...Flash(you all know what I'm thinking).
There's no writing credit, but the art is by Vince Squeglia, someone I've never heard of before and as far as I know this is his only comic-book credit.
The story is wonderfully told and Squeglia's art is beautiful, and the whole piece has a definite Sheldon Mayer-esque feeling to it. It's a really great kids comic, and again all credit to DC for commissioning it. I'm betting this didn't sell very well, because A)you never saw Squeglia's art in another DC comic, and B)this is one of the hardest digests to find--if not the hardest--on ebay, since I bet not many copies gor saved over the years.
There's also three Sugar & Spike tales thrown in: "Spike's Big Problem", "Cowboy Santa Claus", and "A New Adventure With the Genius", making for an excellent kids and/or Christmas comic.
I would love to know the origins of this book's creation, whether it made especially for the digest or for something else(an abandoned children's book, possibly?). It's a wonderful anomaly.
Update: Since writing the above, I did a little research and found an entry for this book in Scott Shaw!'s Oddball Comics column. Apparently, the Super Jrs. was a merchandising concept used overseas, and this story was originally done for a Mexican comic, and then translated into English for this American digest version.
And of course, now we know from our interview with Nick Cuti that importing this story was his idea. It may not have sold well at the time, but speaking for this longtime comics reader, I'm really glad he did it!
2 comments:
There was Super Jrs. merchandise over here as well, my wife and I collect it! We decorated our son's nursery in Super Jrs. wallpaper and curtains, that we found on ebay, 25 years after they were produced!
There was quite a bit of foreign only stuff. I always wondered if this wasn't an older story. Wonder Tot has the "WW" symbol on the covers, but the old Wonder Woman eagle on her chest inside, indicating the story came before 1982. Scott Shaw finally confirmed it for me!
Chris
Mr Squeglia has been a commercial artist for over over thirty-five years. His work has been published in the United States and Europe. He serves as Art Director for the Greenpoint Cultural Society of New York City.
Vincent Squeglia's address: 58 Conselyea Street, Brooklyn, New York, 11211.
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