Minnie the Minx
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Minnie the Minx is a fictional character in a comic strip in the UK comic The Beano. Created and originally drawn by Leo Baxendale, she first appeared in issue 596, dated 19 December 1953.
A world champion "minx", she would seem to be a female counterpart to Dennis the Menace on the surface, even wearing a similar red-and-black jumper. However, as David Law's Beryl the Peril had already taken on the role of a female Dennis, Baxendale imagined Minnie with the ferocity and strength of an Amazon warrior - naturally, she is tougher than most boys.
Like Desperate Dan from The Dandy, she has a statue in Dundee.
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[edit] Character
Minnie is mischievous and impudent, but needless to say absolutely not flirtatious, though the more normal usage of "minx" would be applied to a flirty, slutty woman. In many strips, it is implied she fancies Dennis the Menace. She also took Dennis to a Valentines Day party at her School in the 1960s.
Minnie has had a problem with many of her neighbours. Two examples are a baby called Delilah, who had a snob of a mother. She got Minnie plenty of punishments, including extra baths.Minnie defeated her by tricking her into eating a frighteningly hot curry and embarrassing her mother. The mother had just entered Delilah in a baby contest. The curry effect on Delilah happened at the time her boastful mother had arranged for a journalist to take her photo. Her mother was similar to another mother called "Mrs Proudpants" who was boasting about her baby who she said was sure to win the contest, just like Delilah's mother. Another was a complete snob as well. A girl called "Chavette Bling." She had a motorised skateboard, a global positioning gadget, a "Nukia Slimline Camera phone" many super friends, a cool iPod, a lot of goodies from her phone and a letter. Minnie envied her so much, especially seeing as her own parents are misers sometimes and don't normally buy her so much stuff, she had phone that weighed a ton and was rarely used and hardly ever got mail, and threw insults at Chavette, but stopped when the letter Chavette Bling got was a mega-long phone bill that, in the strip, was folded in sixteen places to fit the envelope. Chavette probably had to pay it herself and it probably climbed as high as 6 thousand pounds, which really infuriated her father. Minnie was delighted at seeing her suffer a huge phone bill, as her own phone bill was a couple of pounds (as her phone is never even used often).
Minnie has a cat called Chester, whose rival is Bonzo (a dog) from number 12. Chester has occasionally been seen in separate strips alongside fellow feline Beano characters Dodgecat (Roger the Dodger's pet cat) and Winston (from the Bash Street Kids). Other characters in the strip include PC Justin Thyme, Soppy Susan and Fatty Fudge. Generally these characters are the butt of Minnie's pranks, but Fatty Fudge particularly is also sometimes called upon to assist Minnie in a particularly elaborate plot, since his services can always be bought with a bag of sweets.
Fatty Fudge himself was briefly the subject of a spin-off strip in the early 1990s that parodied famous films, usually in ways involving the character's love of food (examples including 'You Only Eat Rice' and 20,000 Leeks Under The Sea.
Like most DC Thomson characters, Minnie's parents are never mentioned by name; and are referred to simply as 'Min's dad' and 'Min's mum'. However, in issue 2258 (dated 26 October 1985), her dad reveals that his name is 'Victor'. It is unlikely this is any kind of official name, however. In the Beano videostars DVD it is said by his Boss Minnie's Dad's name is George, but once again it's unlikely it's an official name.
Jim Petrie took over drawing when Baxendale left DC Thomson, Petrie drawing exactly 2000 strips (source The Beano issue 3435, dated 7 June 2008) from June 1961 to issue 3052 (dated 13 January 2001) after which he retired. The artist since then has been Tom Paterson, although in 2006, Alexander Bar tried drawing her to ease the workload of Tom Paterson, who was also drawing Calamity James, Brain Duane from the Dandy, and had just started drawing the comeback of "Hyde and Shriek" who has been around since 1992. However, Tom Paterson came back in late 2006, drawing in a noticeably different style to before. Minnie's parents now looked rather more like Ed's (from The Numskulls) parents. However, when the Beano was re-vamped in 2007, Minnie was drawn in the same style as in 2001-6 she also is now wearing a red and yellow stiped top , and her parents were reverted back to normal, although Tom Paterson's "features" have almost all gone. As of the 15th March 2008 issue, the artist is ex-Desperate Dan artist Ken Harrison. Minnie's clothes have reverted to red and black.
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