Saturday, October 15, 2016

Retro Foreign

French TELEJunior #3

The first TELEJunior series ran for 42 issues from September 1977 to October 1980.  This full colored magazine lives up to its billing as le magazine de bandes dessinées et de la télévision or the magazine of comic strips and television.  The comic strips feature characters from Hanna-Barbera and Marvel as well as the Japanese Goldorak or Grendizer among other license properties.  Interspersed with the comic strips are articles about television shows, movies, music stars, and other pop culture that appealed to young kids.

TELEJunior #3a - TELEJunior, France (November 1977)
TELEJunior #3 has two short 2-page Star Wars articles titled les Etranges Robots de la Guerre des Etoiles or The Strange Robots from Star Wars and le Western de L'Espace or The Space Western which show several photos from the movie.  Stapled to the center of the magazine is a small 16-page black and white supplement which is the interesting content to Star Wars comic fans.  The 16 pages are from Star Wars #1 and measures 5 1/2" x 8".

TELEJunior #3a - TELEJunior, France (November 1977)
16-page insert Star Wars #1
TELEJunior #3a - TELEJunior, France (November 1977)
16-page insert Star Wars #1 back cover
In order to fit the 17 pages from the U.S. Star Wars #1 into 16 pages, pages 15 and 16 from the U.S. comic are combined to make one page in this supplement.  To do this, they took the first two panels from page 15 and added the first and last panel from page 16.  Missing are the panels where the Tusken Raiders spot Luke Skywalker's Landspeeder and mount their Banthas as well as R2-D2 warning Luke of the Sandpeople approaching.  It is also worth pointing out the supplement does not have a cover.

TELEJunior #3a - TELEJunior, France (November 1977)
back cover
The back cover of the magazine has a cool ad for 6 Million Dollar Man toys from Meccano, the licensee of Kenner toys in France.  The Steve Austin doll is the 3rd version of the character released which has a bionic grip.  Instead of costing 6 million dollars however, the French version of the Bionic Man is a mere 3 million dollars as is shown in the text l’homme qui valait 3 millions or the 3 million dollar man.  Other dolls shown are the Bionic Woman, Maskatron, and Oscar Goldman.  Maskatron served as Steve Austin's sole enemy until the introduction of the Bionic Bigfoot doll.  Early solicitations of the 15" Chewbacca doll in 1978 show a painted Bionic Bigfoot inside the box!

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