Links: London calling

The 2012 London Games may be over, but fear not — this week’s round-up focuses on kids’ comic news from the U.K., offering you yet another chance to indulge your Anglophilia!

Beano has gotten a makeover. The newly revamped magazine now prominently features the names of its marquee strips, Dennis the Menace and The Gnasher, and boasts a snazzier cover design.

Speaking of Dennis the Menace, eight-year-old Jacob Rush wrote to the editors of Beano to ask why his hero was less mischievous. “I don’t like the new Dennis because he doesn’t have his catapult or water pistol any more and he’s not menacing enough. I want to see the old Dennis back,” Rush told editors. Their response: the strip had been redesigned to match the animated CBBC program, and since Dennis wasn’t allowed to use his slingshot on the air, he wouldn’t be doing it in the strip, either.

Long-running cartoon mag The Dandy, home to such beloved characters as Desperate Dan and Korky the Cat, is being cancelled after 75 years. In its heyday, The Dandy reached two million readers per week; recent print runs have been as low as 8,000.

British cartoonist Jim Medway compiles a list of his five favorite kids’ comics, from Tintin to Fungus the Boogeyman.

Reviews: Over at No Flying No Tights, librarian Jennifer W. looks at Marvel’s World of Reading series, a new collection of easy readers featuring Spider-Man and The Avengers.

Greg McElhatton on Adventure Time: Marcelline and the Scream Queens #2 (Comic Book Resources)
Jennifer W. on The Boy Who Cried Alien (No Flying No Tights)
Anna Neatrour on vol. 5 of Dawn of the Arcana (Manga Report)
Traci on Drama (No Flying No Tights)
Johanna Draper Carlson on Geronimo Stilton Saves the Olympics (Comics Should Be Good)
Sheena McNeil on Mouse Guard: The Black Axe #4 (Sequential Tart)
Kelly Thompson on Mouse Guard: The Black Axe #5 (Comic Book Resources)
Tanya on Nathan Hale’s Hazardous Tales (books4yourkids)
Lori Henderson on vols. 1-10 of RG Veda (Manga Xanadu)
Mai on Xoc: The Journey of a Great White (Second Bookshelf on the Right)

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