With a cover date of the 4th February 1978, the mists parted and Misty introduced us to her self-titled weekly horror comic initially aimed at young girls. Presenting a crop of stories very unusual to that of other titles of the era, “Misty” told the tales of very different girls:
-
“The Cult of the Cat” told the tale of Nicola Scott’s destiny to become a member of the Egyptian Bast. -
“The Sentinels” took us on a journey to the parallel worlds of 1978 and 1940 linked through time via two empty tower blocks.
-
In “Paint it Black” Maggie Laker discovered a very special box of paints that had a tale to tell.
-
“Moonchild” was about a very special girl with telekinetic powers.
During her time with us, she teased as to who she was and what her purpose was, as well as allowing us to join her in the “Cavern of Dreams” through a game presented in issues 30, 31, 32 and 33; “Play...Misty”.
After nearly 2 years, it was time for Misty to leave us and return to the mists to fight the forces of evil that were starting to rise there.
Rather than leave us without our weekly dose of mystery, Misty left us in the hands of “The Mystery Storyteller” from “Tammy” from the 19th January 1980, some weeks greeting us in person. The first joint issue (with “Tammy” being the dominant cover title) featured the return of the ‘Black Widow’ in the “Spider Woman”, the one off weekly mystery tale and the humor of Miss T.
The 'spooky' serials did not quite have the edge of those presented in the parent magazine and after 34 issues (4th October 1980) the “Misty” logo was reduced to an eight of that of “Tammy" (No issues were published on the 17 / 24 and 31 May, plus June 1980 carried an issue with the dates of both the 21st and 28th). All that remained of the once great title was the weekly horror tale, Miss T and Misty's image in the "Starry Eyed" horoscope feature.
After a further 51 issues (26th September 1981) the "Misty" logo was removed completely from the front cover, along with the "from the Mists" tag-line from the "Strange Story".
"Jinty" joined "Tammy" 9 weeks later (28th November 1981), which spelt the end for "The Mystery Storyteller" and "Gypsy Rose" - "Jinty's" teller of spooky tales. Miss T and Edie from "Tammy" became "The Crayzees" and were joined by Snoopa the mouse from the "Jinty" merger (who incidentally had joined "Jinty" from a merger with "Penny").
The "Jinty" logo lasted for nearly 8 months, until it was dropped from the cover on the 17th July 1982, along with the "Strange Story" and Misty's regular horoscope feature.
"Princess" merged with "Tammy" on the 7th April 1984, with "The Crayzees" being replaced by "Sadie In Waiting" from "Princess". (After the "Princess" merger, "Tammy" carried on till the 23rd June 1984 when it was apparently cancelled at such short notice that no merger announcement was ever made in "Tammy" or its future parent magazine “Girl”, and “Tammy” just disappeared.
Apparently when “Tammy” ceased publication after the 23rd June 1984 issue, the logo didn't immediately appear on the “Girl” masthead - about two months went by with no Tammy at all until suddenly the logo appeared on the issue dated 25 August 1985 with no fanfare or explanation or indeed reference to it at all, where apparently it stayed for four or five weeks until “Girl” was re-launched with a new look and then it vanished. (The same thing happened with “Scream”, which apparently ended suddenly in July and whose logo appeared on the masthead of “Eagle” in September). I can only assume by this that there were issues planned for the weeks it disappeared, but never actually put in the shops - working in publishing, I can see that if the title was cancelled after the 23 June issue then there must have been others in the pipeline; similarly, all issues of “Girl” until 25 August must have been either printed or designed before “Tammy” was cancelled, hence the fact that the logo never appeared on the front until then - i.e. this was the first issue it could have been featured as all the others were already ready to go into the shops before the cancellation. Which suggests to me that there were several “Tammys” in the pipeline too, but none ever reached the public!
: Source Mark Peters
For a comic that absorbed so many great titles in its time, this was rather an ignoble end !!
After 316 issues - 4th February 1978 through to 31st March 1984 / 101 stand alone issues, 85 merger issues and 130 "Tammy" issues - any element of "Misty" in a weekly format was no more .
In addition to the weekly comic, we were also treated to 3 Holiday Specials spanning 1978 – 1980 (the ’78 issue providing us with the first full colour Misty poster), the Annuals covering 1979 – 1986 and the "The Best Of.." title which surfaced in 1986 for 8 issues, running from February to September. After which, like the parting of the mists, the comic was no more.
"Misty" was not the only publication to suffer the fate of a declining market. Like many of its counterparts, sales fell on all girls' titles over a period of time and once these figures started to plummet, the end was in sight. John Freeman wrote an article in 2002 on British girls comics and his understanding of exactly what happened. Let's Here It For The Girls was first published in the now defunct "Memorabilia Magazine" which was published by Titan.
