Dennis the Menace (UK comic strip)



One of two Comic Book characters known as Dennis the Menace, both being primary school-age boys who frequently get into trouble and make mischief, aided by a pet dog, that were first published in March 1951. This page is about the British version as published in the Anthology Comic The Beano.

This Dennis has no known surname and is slightly older than the Dennis from across the Atlantic, 10 years old rather than 6 (though at times he has been portrayed as slightly older again). He also has dark spiky hair and an iconic black-and-red horizontal-striped jumper, and he is joined by his similarly drawn spiky-haired dog, Gnasher. He truly revels in doing naughty or mischievous things and is at odds with his parents, the local police, his neighbors and the "softies" of his neighborhood.

Unlike the U.S. Dennis, he is more actively malicious than simply mischievous. If you look at it the right way, it is not hard to interpret his actions toward the so-called "softies" as bullying based merely on the fact that those boys are more effeminate and quiet than he is. This has meant that a manipulative and calculating streak has been given to Dennis' main rival, Walter, in hope of balancing this out.

Provides examples of:

 * Adults Are Useless: They never are able to stop Dennis' mischief.
 * Alpha Bitch: Athena Kane in the 2009 cartoon. Sometimes slipping into Lovable Alpha Bitch depending on the situation.
 * Ambiguously Brown: Athena in the new animated series. It's hard to tell whether she's half-caste or heavily tanned. All we know for sure about her ethnicity is her father is white.
 * Animated Adaptation: A couple, the most memorable being The BBC's 1996 two-season series Dennis the Menace, or Dennis and Gnasher internationally. Though the same character, more or less, this Dennis managed to have random bouts of heroism here and there.
 * The new 2009 animated series, on the other hand, has Dennis' character completely re-written from the ground up, as the BBC decided that they do not wish to teach young children how to be troublemakers. Why did they commission the series then?
 * Anti-Hero/ Villain Protagonist: Dennis is a bully who lives mainly to create chaos. The cartoons at times try to portray him as more Chaotic Neutral (or even Chaotic Good).
 * Bowdlerize: In the series' early days, Dennis getting paddled was one of the running gags. However, as paddling children began to be seen as abuse rather than discipline, it was phased out of the comic.
 * Brats With Catapults
 * Canine Companion: Oh so much.
 * Captain Color Beard
 * Cool Old Lady: Granny, who is just a mischievous as her grandson, much to the dismay of her son and daughter-in-law.
 * Crappy Carnival: In the animated series, Dennis visits a fair where all of the rides have been nerfed because of the havoc Dennis and his cronies wreaked the previous year.
 * Crossover: One episode of the animated series had Dennis enter a contest on Blue Peter, complete with the animated presenters being voiced by the actual (at the time) presenters of the show.
 * Elmuh Fudd Syndwome: Walter in the new animated series.
 * Sometimes slipped into it in the old ones too, but it wasn't as noticeable.
 * Goggles Do Nothing: Sugar wears Cool Shades that she never puts over her eyes.
 * A Good Old-Fashioned Paint-Watching
 * Gray and Grey Morality: Walter was already a bit of a jerk at the beginning, but ever since the cartoon (or earlier) he's arguably become just as bad as Dennis.
 * Great White Hunter: Dennis' neighbor Stanley Livingston is a subversion, having the look of the trope but actually being very friendly with jungle animals and filling his house with them - a sort of proto-Steve Irwin.
 * Hero with Bad Publicity: Dennis, in the rare cases he isn't being the bad guy, usually in the animated series. His opponents, conversely, are often...
 * Villain with Good Publicity: Walter is unscrupulous enough to usurp the Tooth Fairy. Also a pair of very good and popular dog trainers.
 * Jerkass: Considering the kid's name is legally "Menace", he'd be hard pressed to NOT be one.
 * Land of My Fathers and Their Sheep: Mrs. Creecher from the new series is Welsh.
 * Lighter and Softer: The new series makes Dennis much more goody-goody. He's still a menace, but he has been softened up a lot.
 * Meaningful Name: His surname is actually The Menace.
 * Morality Pet: Gnasher to Dennis, and one of the few times Dennis is truly upset is when Gnasher goes missing.
 * More Dakka: In one episode of The Nineties cartoon, Dennis and Gnasher got a pair of Humongous Mecha which happened to look like them; Gnasher's had an enormous gun pop out of its "nose". Then more guns. Then some more. Then some more.
 * Nephewism: Notably averted (often cited as being a prominent aversion in Conversational Troping in the UK) with Gnasher being the father of Gnipper. This was dealt with in-comic by having Gnasher vanish for weeks in one of the strip's rare long-running arcs, "Gnasher Come Home", after which he returned with his children.
 * Newspaper-Thin Disguise: Used in addition to the Totem Pole Trench below to trick Athena into thinking they're her dad Ratbucket. She sees through it when she begs them for money and they don't give it to her.
 * Nice to the Waiter: Sugar isn't just Athena's assistant. She's also her best friend.
 * Off-Model: In the 2009 animated series' "Dance of the Seven Pies" when Dennis is trying to convince Athena that an itchy Pie-Face is actually dancing, her character model is flipped, making her belt face the wrong way.
 * Only Known by Their Nickname: Curly and Pie-Face. Well... they're probably nicknames.
 * Averted Trope: One episode of the 90s series revealed Pie-Face's real name is Kevin.
 * Also, Curly's name was revealed in one old strip to be Crispin, which means "Curly haired" in Latin. Curly seemed rather embarrassed when he revealed it.
 * A Pirate 400 Years Too Late: One episode of the cartoon has a group of actors turn out to be real pirates.
 * Power Trio: It depends on the period, but the Menaces and Softies are often seen in groups of three: Dennis, Curly and Pie-face for the Menaces and Walter, Bertie Blenkinsop and Spotty Perkins for the Softies. The Softies were sometimes expanded to four with the addition of Nervous Rex.
 * Professional Butt-Kisser: Sugar to Athena.
 * Proper Tights with a Skirt: Athena Kane
 * Shell-Shocked Veteran: Dennis' other neighbor The Colonel.
 * Super Dickery: Inverted.
 * Theme Naming: In addition to Gnasher the dog, he also had a pig named Rasher, a spider named Dasher, and a fish named Splasher.
 * Gnasher's children are named Gnipper, Gnora, Gnancy, Gnatasha, and Gniamh.
 * Totally Radical: An extremely Egregious example, in that the characters talked in 1950s slang, "chortling" away at "corking" things and saying "What a swizz!" well into the 2000s!
 * Totem Pole Trench: In "Dennis V.I.P." Dennis and his friends use this to get into a Ratbucket concert with one ticket.
 * Trademark Favourite Food: Pie-face and, well, pies.
 * Uncanny Family Resemblance: Denise the Menace and his female cousin Denise the Menace.
 * Unnamed Parents: Dennis' parents are known as Dennis' Mum and Dennis' Dad, they call each other Mum and Dad. One comic even reveals that those are their actual names.