Chicago Spanking Review

Just Married #58

Click to enlarge. © Charlton. Posted by the Web-Ed on 10/08/2010.

The conclusion of our new series of three spankings from Charlton Romance comics takes place five issues later in the same book as the previous one. On the cover of Just Married #58 (June 1968) we see what looks like sufficient cause for a spanking, but once again, the cover story is not the one with the OTK action. Also once again, we think we detect the hand of Dick Giordano in the cover art. This and the other scans on this page were taken from our own copy of the book.

Our story is called "Johnny's Friendly Wife", but the problem is that Edna is a little too friendly a wife for Johnny's liking. Before we get into the story, let's take a sneak peek at our spankee-to-be Edna Loomis, who's way too fond of showing off her bikini bod. This isn't the outfit she gets spanked in, by the way, as many of us would have liked, but as we'll see the spanking is still a good one.

On the splash page, we see Edna turning on the charm as she tries to butter up an executive at her husband's company. His wife is none too pleased, leaving Johnny in a socially awkward situation.

© Charlton. From the author's collection.

Next thing you know, Johnny gets transferred to some far-distant sales territory. Edna denies all responsibility and refuses to listen to him.

She even taunts him: "Where are you going? Running home to mother?" Troubled, he smokes a cigarette and thinks to himself, "What can I do?"

When he comes back inside, she asks him "What are you going to do?" He will only tell her, "You'll find out when the time comes." One of the most fascinating aspects of this story is just how premeditated the spanking is - Johnny makes up his mind several days before he's finally forced to take action. He even warns his new boss, who's just invited them to a company party, without going into specifics: "I hope everything turns out all right ... but if it doesn't ... I apologize in advance for something that just has to be done." That "something" is nothing less than a public spanking!

Now if she had an ounce of sense, she'd realize he's already made up his mind to spank her if she acts up again, but she doesn't. Instead, she insists on behaving like a perfect brat. When he tells her, "No flirting, Edna," her response is "You know very well I'll do exactly as I please!" And when she does, ignoring his warnings, Johnny thinks, "It's got to be done." How right he is!

She had every opportunity to avoid getting spanked, but she wouldn't listen, and for her willful brattiness, Edna must now finally pay the price! Turning her over his knee, Johnny administers "an old-fashioned spanking complete with screams, squeals, and then heartfelt sobs!" And for good measure, he tosses her into the country club's pool to cool her off!

The reactions of the other partygoers are excellent: "Way to go, Johnny!" a man calls out. "He's an adorable brute!" is one woman's verdict. Another woman is smiling, and the boss congratulates Edna for being married to (translation: spanked by) "a very decisive man!"

Finally, the narration in the last panel tells us, "She's learned her lesson - and she loved it!" Thus our story is complete: A willful wife who refuses to listen to her husband gets taken down a peg with a public spanking, learns to respect her masterful husband, and they live happily ever after - now, that's our idea of a happy ending!

Let's review the spanking panels themselves, which have appeared previously elsewhere on the Web but in low-resolution scans. First we have Edna being positioned OTK, which is done pretty well although her buttocks should be rounder and better-defined, and the artist (uncredited but obviously Vince Colletta) also had some trouble getting her neck right.

Once again, we have the compositional error of spanking with the wrong hand, probably the result of wanting to do a close-up on our spankee's face while still showing the spanker's hand. It would have been better if Colletta had used a very similar camera angle to the preceding panel to accomplish this, while having Johnny spank with his left hand. The spanking results in tears, something we don't often see in comic books.

The script, like the art, is uncredited, but we think it's Joe Gill, who also teamed up with Colletta for Just Married #53 as we saw last time. Both script and art show signs of being rushed, and Charlton had the reputation of cranking the stuff out as quickly as possible. We don't think it's fair to single Charlton out, though - the truth is, low page rates and (until fairly recent years) the lack of royalties made it very difficult for comics creators to take their time in doing the best possible work.