Chicago Spanking Review

A Spanking for Suzie

Artist unknown. © Archie Comics. Posted by the Web-Ed on 09/03/2010.

Archie Comics has featured a lot of characters over the years other than Archie himself and the more familiar members of his gang. One of these was Suzie, who for a while had her own comic book but earlier was a back-up feature in PEP Comics, which starred Archie. Because Suzie was perhaps a year older than the Archie gang, on the surface it would seem less likely that we would find her getting spanked than, say, Betty or Veronica, who were still subject to parental discipline (as we have previously seen here and here).

Luckily for us, Suzie did indeed get spanked in PEP Comics #59 (December 1946). As usual, we've a few things to say about it, so let's get started by taking a look at the spanking panel. The spanking is given special prominence by having it take place within the splash panel (for more on why this is important, refer to Will Eisner's comments on his own much more famous Spirit spanking Ellen splash panel). Unlike that example, this is the only place in the story that we actually get to see Suzie OTK.

© Archie Comics.

© Archie Comics.

We see Archie and Veronica on the cover, since Archie is the star of the book. (Notice how different they and Miss Grundy appear compared to the Dan DeCarlo models we're more familiar with).

Probably not coincidentally, Suzie is a whole lot like Bill Ward's Torchy, often lolling around in her lingerie when she isn't starting a new job, which happens about every issue. This time, she's embarking on a new career as governess to a rich family.

We have the entire story, but it's not really worth reproducing here. Suffice it to say that young Fauntleroy is a monster, the butler takes a beating, the stuffy society matron has her party ruined, and Suzie gets fired. Nowhere does she get spanked except in the splash panel, its placement there a testament to the power of a spanking image.

© Archie Comics.

Here is the spanking panel as retouched by Spiritworks Studio. The OTK positioning isn't as good as we might like, and we don't care for Fauntleroy holding Suzie's hair instead of placing his left hand on her waist or using it to pin her right arm, but the idea of a boy spanking his governess is certainly appealing. (For a detailed examination of the "child spanks adult" role reversal, see the Spanka Interview.)

There was one spanking we know of years later in Suzie Comics #92, but we don't plan to post it because it involves a child being spanked (refer to The Comics Spanking Data Base for details). As of this writing, our searches of Suzie and PEP are incomplete, so we may yet turn something else up.