Bananaman
 |
- For the performer, see Banana Man (performer). For the emoticon, see Dancing Banana.
| Bananaman | |
|---|---|
| File:Bananaman john geering.jpg Bananaman as depicted by John Geering | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | D. C. Thomson & Co. Ltd |
| First appearance | Nutty #1 (16 February 1980) |
| Created by | Writer: Steve Bright Artist: John Geering |
| In-story information | |
| Alter ego | Eric Wimp (later Eric Twinge but usually referred to as simply 'Little Eric') |
| Team affiliations | Chief O'Reilly |
| Abilities | Super strength (smashing through steel, fighting, etc.) "the muscles of 20 men, and the brains of 20 mussels", Flight Invulnerability Breathing in space Helium-boosted heat finger Intense stupidity Also equipped with gadgets: Thermal Banana, Banana Laser Gun, electronic thermal underwear. |
Bananaman is a British comic book fictional character. He originally appeared in Nutty as the backpage strip in Issue 1, dated 16 February 1980. Becoming the comic's most popular strip, Bananaman was promoted to a three-page colour strip on Nutty's front and middle pages, and subsequently a two-page colour strip when Nutty merged with The Dandy comic in 1985. The strip has appeared intermittently since, and is running as of 2005, now a three/four page colour strip drawn by Steve Bright (and before that Tom Paterson and Barry Applesby).
Original strip
The original strip, written by Steve Bright and mostly drawn by John Geering until his death in 1999, is essentially a parody of Superman with shades of Captain Marvel and his British twin, Marvelman and occasionally other Silver Age characters, whilst also combining comic slapstick with a heavy dose of eccentric British humour similar to Alan Moore's contemporary work on Captain Britain. Eric Wimp, an ordinary schoolboy, living at 29 Acacia Road, Nuttytown, eats a banana to transform into Bananaman, a lantern-jawed adult superhero, sporting a distinctive cowled blue and yellow outfit complete with a yellow two-tailed cape resembling a banana skin. His superpowers include the ability to fly, superhuman strength (often quoted as "twenty men... twenty big men" but sometimes limitless, with "nerks", "women" and "snowmen" all being used in place of "men"), and seeming invulnerability.
Eric was rocketed to Earth from the moon as a baby, and gained his powers because the crescent moon resembles a banana. He has a kryptonite-style weakness to mouldy bananas, and at one point even a Fortress of Solitude-style building at the North Pole, made out of a giant banana.
Bananaman is still a star of the modern Dandy comic, although recently Eric has been phased out.
If Bananaman needs extra power, bananas can be eaten for strength boosts, provided by his faithful pet crow; if he does not have enough strength to shatter an ice block, for example, after eating a banana, he will have enough. If he eats lots of bananas in one sitting, he quickly becomes obese in his transformation; if he eats bananas that are not full, he transforms with extra weight in the lower part of his body. There have also been comics where he has eaten a variant on normal bananas, and transforms differently, reflecting the difference in that banana.
Alternative origins
In the 1991 Dandy Annual, Bananaman's origin was changed to that of being a normal Earth baby in a maternity hospital, who obtained his powers after unintentionally eating a banana in which General Blight had hidden a stolen supply of Saturnium (presumably similar to uranium, neptunium or plutonium), and accidentally left it next to Eric. However, later issues referred to the first origin as the real one.
Bananaman initially faced a different pastiche supervillain each week, who were often lampoons of the kind of single-issue, uncreatively-named villains that heroes fought during the Silver Age, or tips-of-the-hat to famous supervillains.
Enemies include:
- Syndney aka Toymaster 10 year old parody of Toyman
- Witchy Woman parody of Scarlet Witch
- Doctor Gloom, a Doctor Doom homage, Blight's sidekick
- Appleman, Bananaman's arch-enemy in the early strip,parody of Bizarro,created by Dr Gloom
- General Blight Banaman's current arch enemy, parody of Adolf Hitler
- Weatherman works for General Blight
- Clayman parody of Clayface
- The Heavy Mob, a group of thieves led by Eddie the Gent
- Auntie, a nanny with remote control-led balls of knitting wool as weapons
- Impossible Man, complete with a quiff who performs impossible things such as hopping at 100mph
- Foul Five parody of Fantastic Four
- Scotsman, who controls haggis with a set of bagpipes
- The Nerks, an alien race bent on conquering Earth, led by King Zorg
- Bubblegum Bert
- Skunk Woman, an homage to Catwoman
- Captain Cream
- Mouseman, a gigantic mouse
- Lasseaux Man, a womanizing Frenchman whose stealth and power come from his pungent garlic breath Speedos
- Ecomcbean, a hard nosed environmental ecologist bent on world domination through beaver re-introduction
- Dave the Transporter, a famous transport modeler set to destroy Bananaman with his fleet of remote control robin reliants and sinclair C5s. Dave is well known for his cheeky antics, lack of fashion sense and love of rings :)
- Deadly Dinnet, a straight talking geologist set on world domination through the creation of a super atom from the earths crust a zillion times deadlier than the atom bomb.
- The Ginger Rascal, Robert Beck, a quavering ginger, pent on chasing skirt and drinking like a girl. His idol is Lasseauxman on whom he models his every move. his pungent ginger hair is 10 times deadlier to girls than a praying mantus.
The strip's medium-subverting elements became toned down as the strip gained in popularity, becoming more simplistic to appeal to the supposed audience. Bananaman gained a talking crow sidekick called simply Crow, and he became so stupid he often forgot how to fly or to use the door. Eventually, Bananaman even began to go to school despite being an adult. General Blight, a generic criminal mastermind, largely replaced the inventive criminal-of-the-week.
Bananaman is allied with Chief O'Reilly, a stereotyped Irish policeman (apparently an homage to Batman's James Gordon or the equally stereotyped Chief O'Hara in the 1960s Batman TV series). He used to wear an Indian feather headdress as a visual pun on Chief, and in later strips wore a hat with a flashing blue light on the top. Chief works in a police station shaped like a giant police helmet, which frequently has to be rebuilt after Bananaman accidentally destroys it. O'Reilly rings up Eric to get him to talk to Bananaman, presumably thinking Eric is Bananaman's assistant of some kind, as in the cartoon series it is made clear that the Chief is not aware of Eric being the big blue superhero.
Cartoon series
| Bananaman | |
|---|---|
| Starring | Tim Brooke-Taylor Graeme Garden Bill Oddie Jill Shilling |
| Theme music composer | Dave Cooke |
| Country of origin |  United Kingdom |
| No. of series | 3 |
| No. of episodes | 40 |
| Production | |
| Producer | Trevor Bond |
| Running time | 5 min |
| Original release | |
| Network | BBC |
| Release | 3 October, 1983 – 15 April, 1986 |
In 1983, the BBC made a cartoon series which included a catchy theme tune and featured the voices of The Goodies. It was produced by Flicks Films for Chatsworth TV and in association with Tellytales Enterprises. Parts of the character were changed for the series: he was now called Eric Twinge, had a distinctive banana-shaped hairstyle rather than punk stubble, and had a love interest (only when transformed) in the form of Fiona, a newsreader based on Selina Scott.
Graeme Garden voiced the characters of Bananaman, General Blight and Maurice of The Heavy Mob, Bill Oddie voiced the characters of Crow, Chief O'Reilly, Doctor Gloom and the Weatherman, and Tim Brooke-Taylor voiced the characters of Eric, King Zorg of the Nurks, Eddie the Gent, Auntie and Appleman, as well as narrating the episodes. Jill Shilling voiced Fiona and any additional female characters, including Eric's cousin Samantha (but not Auntie). It lasted for forty episodes between 3 October 1983 and 15 April 1986.
Bananaman was aired in the United States by the Nickelodeon cable network as a companion piece to Dangermouse, but Bananaman never came close to reaching that series' American popularity.
Some of these episodes would eventually re-appear in print form in The Dandy in 1998, coinciding with the BBC repeating the series in that year. Each episode was roughly five minutes from start to end. Phrases from the show, "20 big men" and "ever alert for the call to action", are still used in the comic today.
Credits
- Written by: Terry Ward
- Music: Dave Cooke
- Animation: Richard Cox, Joan Garrick, Geoff Loynes, Janet Nunn
- Backgrounds: Russell Peerman
- Layout: Gil Potter
- Checking: Katherine R. Cowan
- Trace & Paint: Janine Arthy, Jacqueline Miller, Olive Scott, Phillis Vince, Anna Ward
- Color Stylists: Richard Adams, Jane Beecham, Marianne Coldner, Paul Heyward, John Tillet, Anne Whitford
- Rostrum Camera: Stephen Williams
- Film Editors: Morgan Daniels, Jim Hubbard, Jean Morrice
- Production Assistant: Tracy Dean
- Production Coordinators: Thomas Barker, Pat C. Morton
- Assistant Director: Andy Dixon
- Produced by: Trevor Bond
- Directed by: Terry Ward