David Cassidy's Comic Book Career

In 1972, when I was 11 years old, David Cassidy was everywhere.

On tv, as Keith Partridge on The Partridge Family.  On Saturday morning cartoons. 

On the radio, where the Partridge Family was still cracking the Top 40, and his own singles were cracking the Top 10.

In 17 paperback novels (The Ghost of Graveyard Hill, Terror By Night, Marked for Terror).

In every teen magazine on the newsstand.

So it made sense that he would push into comic books.  The bargain-basement Charleton Comics, which specialized in cannibalizing other properties, published 14 issues of David Cassidy (1972-73), most with photographs of David on the cover.

Yes, I bought them.

The stories inside were banal, mostly involving David helping a fan, or getting into humorous misadventures on the way to a concert. His fans were portrayed as 100% female.  Men were competitors for girls, manipulating agents, scheming managers, 100% bad guys.

But at least most issues found a way to get David out of his clothes.

By 1973, when David's star was in decline, apparently stories about meeting fans or trying to seduce the one girl in the world who wasn't into him weren't selling well, so the plots moved toward action-adventure, with David meeting spies and pirates.  This says "Outlaws, groovy chicks, and a fiddle bit keep David busy."

A few years later, when his songs were no longer charting, the real-life David also tried to re-invent himself as an action-adventure star with David Cassidy, Man Undercover (1973)..

See also: David Cassidy, Man Undercover; Charlton Comics