Month: February 2025

Baghdad on the Subway

The tale continues…

The action is very reminiscent of mid-period KEVIN THE BOLD, and is a welcome sight among comparatively more tepid UP ANCHOR! episodes.

The tale ends abruptly and the focus shifts back to “present-day” family life aboard a schooner.

The episode ends and would be a fitting finale for UP ANCHOR! But there were two more chapters to follow, told over the course of 22 weeks, before the strip ended, and Collins retired.

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For more information on the career of Kreigh Collins, visit his page on Facebook.

Flashing Back Further

In this 1971 episode, part of an UP ANCHOR! flashback to KEVIN THE BOLD, Kevin, Pedro, and Carmelita become trapped in a cave. To remedy the situation, Kreigh Collins flashes back even further, to the August 7, 1949 episode of MITZI McCOY.

It features an underwater cave in a very similar scene. The original took place in Lake Michigan, where sharks and barracuda weren’t a concern.

What results is a case of out of the frying pan and into the (line of) fire!

Kevin’s solution, muffling the oars, sounds fanciful but is a real thing. But will it be effective?

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For more information on the career of Kreigh Collins, visit his page on Facebook.

Some Days You Just Can’t Get Rid of a Bomb

The pirates’ mortar ball hits its target… but its fuse hasn’t yet detonated the bomb.

This episode has always reminded me of the Batman meme.

(Not the first time Collins’ artwork has reminded me of Batman).

Quick thinking by Balador, and the fortuitous location of a low stone wall, allow him to survive the explosion—and he takes several prisoners.

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For more information on the career of Kreigh Collins, visit his page on Facebook.

Carmelita

A tense moment is quickly diffused, and pretty Carmelita introduces herself. Her appearance is familiar, which seems appropriate for a story arc so close to UP ANCHOR!’s swan song. Carmelita has the svelte build of many of Collins’ female characters—characters whose poses were originally modeled by Kreigh’s wife, Theresa. At this point in his career, however, it’s doubtful the artist employed his 65-year-old wife as a model.

As this chapter set sail, there might have been some confusion as to what the sequence was called. The first two episodes carried the line “The Adventures of Pedro and Kevin” but the third one, from August 15, 1971, reversed the characters’ order—”The Adventures of Kevin and Pedro”. Most likely it was a mistake made by the NEA artist that handled the lettering.

Kevin’s resourcefulness with the old culverin goes to no avail, and the pirates return fire.

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For more information on the career of Kreigh Collins, visit his page on Facebook.