‘Dennis the Menace’ set for a makeover

London: The popular cartoon character Dennis the Menace will no longer be seen wielding his traditional catapult as the creators have admitted it is being redrawn to appear less violent.An eight-year-old boy named Jacob Rush, of Ipswich, Suffolk, wrote to DC Thomson complaining that his favourite comic strip character had become "boring".

However, the Beano execs said that the new version would not use his catapult or peashooter in a destructive way "to comply with the rules of broadcasting". Last year rumours were abuzz that character of Dennis and his faithful dog Gnasher were being "toned down" in the cartoon. However, staff at the Beano dismissed the reports calling it "another political correctness gone mad" myth. Beano features editor Claire Bartlett said in her letter to Jacob that changes had been made to the comic Dennis to match the Dennis and Gnasher cartoon. "The main reason that Dennis looks different is because of the new animation series on CBBC," the Telegraph quoted Bartlett as saying. "It was felt we should have Dennis looking the same in the comic as he does on TV to stop people getting confused. "We thought that a lot of people might not have seen Denis before seeing him on TV and if he looked different in the Beano comic then they might not realise it was the same," she added. Beano editor Alan Digby said that the changes meant Dennis was no longer able to use his catapult or peashooter in a destructive way. "Dennis has had to comply with the rules of broadcasting and he is more creative in the tricks he gets up to now," he said. "He is certainly not allowed to fire his catapult directly at someone any more - but he would be allowed to use it creatively. He is far more creative in the tricks that he gets up to now. "There were scenes in the 1960s when he would walk down the street with windows that he smashed in buildings alongside him. He would not do that now. "It is the same with his pea shooter. He might use one for target practice or to set off a game of some sort - but he would never fire it at anyone," Digby added. ANI