The Buytonic Boy
   
                             
    Or, as he was officially known, The 12 1/2p Buytonic Boy.
    A take on the mega-successful tv series "6 Million Dollar Man",
    Krazy's alternative tale starred a young lad, Steve Ford, who
    crashed his go-kart in to a lamp-post and purchased a strange
    bottle of vitamin tonic pick-me-up from a whiskery gent called     Professor Nutz. "It's yours for just half a dollar" says the
    Professor "That's twelve and a half pence in decimal money!".

     

    The Professor's' tonic gives our Steve super-strength, speed,
    and agility. But, alas, no super-wits. Firstly, he talks to leering
    old men on the street. Then he buys unlabelled bottles from
    them and gulps down their contents - Crikey, if you did that
    round my way now, you'd cop it! - Anyways, Steve at least had
    the sense to put his powers to good use. For the first few
    weekly strips he operated independently, sorting our trouble
    and aiding folk he stumbled upon.

    Later on, the concept was taken further and Steve was hired
    as an agency super-spy for the Ever-So-Secret Service and
    sent out to catch an array of NME spies and mega-bullies for
    Queen and Country. Each strip now began with a similar
    introductory panel as Steve rushed to HQ to be debriefed
    by the Chief:

    
     
    *Sigh* - That 1/2p reference really dates the strip, doesn't it?
    Well Fleetway obviously thought so too. The monetary
    reference was later dropped and the strip retitled simply
    as the Buytonic Boy. Then, in later Whizzer & Chips
    appearances, the strip lost its Buytonic reference altogether
    and changed to the far-less-flashy title of  Super Steve.
    Later again, in 1985, it was expanded to Super Steve Vs
    NME Nasties. Funnily enough, the title changes eventually 
    went full circle. In the Best of Whizzer & Chips Monthly
    published in the late 80s, the strip regained its complete
    original title once more - 1/2p and all!

    As for Annual appearances, the Buytomic Boy starred in both
    Krazy and Whizzer & Chips editions - although I've yet to
    establish if he appeared in the entire Krazy run...

    99.9% of the Buytonic strips were drawn by Robert Nixon,
    but Trivia Hounds may like to note that "cheeky" chappie
    Frank McDiarmid picked up the pen for the last two weeks
    of that ten year run. That's Frank's version of Steve, below.

         

    Steve's last ever weekly appearance was in Whizzer & Chips,
    dated 8th Feb 1986. He was replaced by another super
    young hero, Town Tarzan...