Saturday Nite Flier!

Here is the other flier I referred to in my last post. Looking at it today, within the context of what we know about Beanworld continuity, you might find it as odd as I do. I reprinted it in the trade paperback Larry Marder's Beanworld:Book One but really have never discussed it much before.

As you may recall, the purpose of this handbill was to pique retailer interest in a Beanworld comic that was (hopefully) coming through the distribution pipeline sometime in an ill-defined near future.

First oddity is the reference to "Saturday Nite." As we all know now, the Beans only have two designation of days--Sprout-Butt Day and Goof-Off Day. But at the time the potential reader had absolutely no idea of any of that!

Lead Guitar Boom'r is missing in action. I have no idea why. Maybe for the room.

Professor Garbanzo is there but not Mr. Spook. An odd choice because Mr. Spook always gets a lot of attention. Maybe I wasn't quite aware of that yet.

Beanish, however, is there...that's peculiar because he doesn't appear in Beanworld until issue 4!

And the joke. The lima bean with a TM next to it actually was my comic book trademark in 1984. At the time, I was a fairly well known letter hack to comic book letter columns. I always did two things: I signed all my mail with the signature Larry "Beanworld" Marder and I always adorned any and all correspondence with everyone in the comic book field with a hand drawn bean with a TM in the lower left hand corner like the one on the left here.

The joke itself--the transformation of a Bean into a bean--goes back a long way. I probably drew that the first time as early as 1973 or so. Now that I think about it, this might have actually been the last time I drew it.

It certainly prefigures Beanworld action figures and foreshadows the cover of Beanworld #1.