The Banana Bunch

Special thanks to KLAKADAK-PLOOBADOOF and Peter Gray for kindy providing these sterling visuals that so enhance this entry.

THE BANANA BUNCH were an anarchic ragtag of working-class ruffians who resided in their home-made but spacious BUNCH HUT, often under siege from rival gang, the all-out nasty MULLIGAN'S MOB, an underclass of juvenile villains who have much in common with the GASWORKS GANG out of BEANO'S LORD SNOOTY.

This strip debuted in Beezer of 1956, and was of course originated by Bash Street Kids renderer Leo Baxendale''. The very early strips were often masterpieces of 'busy' setpieces, especially the larger-frame 'epic' scenarios, that evidently took much inspiration from CARL GILES of the DAILY EXPRESS' ''overflowing visual tableaux.

Centre of Operations was the Bunch Hut, a spacious and sparse home-built gang-hut complete with archaic stove, seemingly jumble-sale-originated furniture and bare floorboards: the Bunch also owned a streetwise mutt by name of Fifi.