Topics

Omnivistascope has again broken through into your reality just in time For Bristol!
Scientists are still pondering on this cosmic coincidence, but let's not look a gift horse on the mouth!

If you are at Bristol this weekend, you can get your mitts on the shiney new OVS that continues the Grand tradition:

Inside you'll find (if my maths hasn't failed me) 80 pages of strips: more Rathbone, Misfits,  Keegan Jask, Quisling and Dirk Despair than you can shake a stick at!
See Solar Wind refugee Warlock Holmes double dipping in two incredible adventures!

Many of your small press favourites continue to infest OVS - Matt Herbert, Bryan Coyle, Chris Geary, and many others that even I'm not aware of (I have only come to pimp it, I've tried to keep it as much a surprise for myself as I can!), all wrapped in another fantastic Paul McCaffrey cover

All this, plus articles on The Prisoner and War of The Worlds, laced with the patented Paul Von Scott brand of comics based madness.

If you are NOT at Bristol (*sob*) all is not lost - You can follow the link below and get hold of the latest (and not so latest) Omnivistascopes! 

http://www.omnivistascope.com/shop2.html

Not much to commetn on... Nice to see Kev Walker on the Dredd, though sad to see Robbie Morrison on there too, as its a sequel to a previous tael that I found pretyy uninvolving, and doestn seem to fit into current conituity (or previous continutity for that matter!)

The Black Museum is a bit too obvious a riff on Innsmouth.. Frankly, I'm tired of Lovecraft robbing in most of its forms - dont mind if its doing something with it, but here we just get a mostly straight transplant - Does HP get half the writer droids oil?

Interesting Smith second part, though need to read it thoroughly to make sense of some bits - something that might be of interest given Smiths comments re Wagner about the Arkensword interview in 85... I dont think he actually calls RD Lowe Mr. shitface... but maybe thats my reading of it - the full quote:


"A lot of us naturally became very anti-DC Thomson so we joined the NUJ.  We had union membership forms sent to every employee whose address we could get hold of, and we recruited something like 17 members. When this came out there was a meeting of the editorial board, with all the Thomsons there. Mr. Derek and Mr. Brian and Mr Shiteface and all the editors including R.D. Lowe, who was the managing editor of all the comics (beano,Dandy, Hotspur)
someone said, "what are we going to do about the union?". A minor editor was foolish enough to reply, "why dont we just let them join it?"  R. D. Lowe turned red and bellowed : "take-that-man'-s name!"  That's DC Thomsoon.

Strontium Dog continues to shine - shame Sniffer Martinez wasn't on the list, but otherwise, this more than makes up for the oddity that is Grey suit, my lack of interest in Red Seas and the annoyance of Marauders revcycled plot devices from DAnte meet completely wrong MegaCity - (her dad is a mutie now?)

Of course, the problems will start for me once Stront finishes...

Dredd by Mills and Locke.  Its an interesting one so far - multiparter and much more conventional than Pats previous oddity.  could be good, though the idea of a perp released who has been cubed up since before the Judges came to power seems perhaps too good in and of itself to be attached to the other intrigues going on in this one - one to watch

Stalag 666: Not doing anything to win heart or mind.  The bomb thing is all a bit of a tangent, and the one potentially good scene is fluffed - not sure if tis the art or the dialogue, but [spoiler]when Holland kills Mother, its a nice touch - the whole "You dont deserve to die - actually, thingking about it..." bit is a nice gag, but soemthing about it falls flat[/spoiler]

ABC:  Graffiti, its a laff aint it (but lets not go there again!).  Pats ideas are nice hre, but its all a bit unwieldy and the art is doing less favours than it could with the material.

Ampney Crucis: not really grabbed me yet - as others ahve said, the LOEG lite bits last week just grated, but one to watch, wait and see.

Dante: stil havent read

Thargnote tells us about prog 2009:
Greysuit by Mills and Higgins
Dredd by Wagner and FLint
Sin Dex by Abnett and Williams
Stickleback by Edgington and I.N.J. Culbard, whoever that might be.

Wrap around Clint Langley cover is an oddity - good to see all that material from the ABC Warriors novels seems to be permeating the strip, as it is enjoyably bonkers Mills at his finest.

Dredd is not, as I suspected a Wagner mutie storyline, but happily, it is an Al Ewing mutie storyline, and so far (this being a multi-parter) a very intriguing one with a nice twist applied.

Nick Dyer returns on the future shock

Havent read Ampney Crucis or the ABCs, but looking nice artwise.

Al Ewing and David Roach are the culprits behind Crimes against fashion, a refreshingly wacky old school Dredd that pushes the right buttons for me.  Good stuff, and a welcome respite from a series of unsatisfying Dredd shorts from the non-Wagner drawer.

Theres a future shock that I have havent read that has nice art.

Stalag continues, Lob ends in a doouble parter, and next week

Mutopia is the Dredd story - which suggest more from the Mutant Rights storyline - yay!

ABC Warriors makes a quick return

And Ampney Crucis starts - could go either way for me - will Lovecraft this be the final straw that has Lovecraft spinning OUT of his grave, such must be the centrifugal forces on his poor wee remains nowadays?  Or will it be worthy of the great man, or at least a lot of fun?  It's Edgington, so it could go either way for this reader!

Yeowell Red Seas cover to commemorate the double length end of this Red Seas

Dredd by Pat Mills(!) and Smudge.  I imagine this wont have anyone eating thier words with regards BOS III - on odd one.

Stalag 666 and Lobster are also present - make of them what you will.

Not a full review, as I only read the bits that interested me in Nostalgia - gone are the days when I would have bought this and the new Meg that they also had there (another Rufus Tank Girl cover) in full knowledge that postie would bring a duplicate tomorrow.....though I'm itching to see how Ratfink finishes!


Cover - Lobster random by Critchlow

Dredd - to all those looking forward to a return of an old friend, he is indeed here - with Cliff Robinson on the art, making it two old friends.  Thank Grud for Wagner I says, as this really saves the prog for me after a couple of issues that I actually forgot I'd partially read!

Terror Tale - art looks pretty nice - reminds me of staz Johnson IIRC.  didnt get chance to read it though!

Lobster - Maybe if I was taking teh ssame exposition drugs as Lob I'd be enjoying this, but I've lost track of it again - Not that I dont mind having to work at a comic strip if its grabbed my attention, but Random seems too concerned with its own backstory too often.  I dont really care about his demon derived lobster claws tbh - that was the point where i kinda switched off from the strip

Stalag  -some backgrounds!  Well, some trees.  Theres a big monster too and various not very unexpected revelations.  The artist really needs to buy a cheap digital camra and go and look how Chris Weston uses phot ref to create a story that doesnt look particularly overly reffed.

Presumably theres a 5th story... erm... maybe I should have bought it after all!

Overall,  a weak prog for me, hence an appropriately weak standard of reviewing!

Mongoose Publishing are the latest acquisition.

Hopefully, this will see more 2000Ad games on the cards, but probably not!

The owner of our local games shop is always griping about Mongoose whenever I venture in tehre - hopefully that might change too

http://blog.mongoosepublishing.co.uk/

Surprised to find a paperback version fo teh two prose Marshal Law 'novels' - Including Day Of The Dead and Cloak Of Evil, the two stories written for the abortive Cool Beans internet site .  I know Day fo the Dead came out and Cloak of Evil was due to, but I've never seen it before today, so, although not printed in full colour like Day of the Dead, good to get hold of finally!

what constitutes a new post in terms of what clicking on "list new posts" will return?  Can't quite work it out - is it time based?

May as well grab this one -

Great prog!
Thargs picked a good jumping on point for the Asda/SFX alliance methinks with this lineup.

I was in Waterstones yesterday lunchtime, and witnessed a woman go up to a shop assistant near the grpahic novel section and ask him if the comics were suitable for children or teenagers.

He replied "Oh no.  These comics are all intended for adults.  They are 'Graphic' novels, as the name implies, they contain 'graphic' content"

Stunned by the madness, I was just wondering if I should step in, pick up a Strontium dog vol 1 and beat him around the head, when she picked up some Vertigo style book and proved his point.  I slunk off defeated.

Is it any wonder comics are a dying art in this country? Should I have put him right?  

Ok, so Vol 4 says its the final volume and all, but wouldnt it make more sense, given how vol 4 ends with a "coming soon" cliffhanger to include it as part of the run, rather than publish it as stand alone?

Also, there are still 2 missing stories from the first 4 volumes - "Incident at the birth of the universe" and "incident at the back o beyond" - both great tales.  Couldnt these be included to make sure its a complete collection.  Arguably, you could throw in the two text stories and "Top Dog" to create a volume very similar to the Nemesis Vol 3 thats due.

To have 4 volumes of SD case files, incomplete by just two short tales that ends on a cliffhanger that requires you read The Final Solution to resolve seems a wasted opportunity.  Or is it just me?

If so, for me at least, its good news!

Link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/dec/11/bbc.television" target="_blank">Happy days?

Waterstones are doing all GNs, including all Rebellion GNs, in their 3 for 2 offer.

If I wasn't so broke, I'd be right in there!

Postie may have failed me, but Nostalgia and Comics haven't!

Cabs finishes and Stone Island and ABC are finished next week.

Dredd and ABCs good (but a couple of missed oppos and clunkers in ABCs I felt), Cabs middling, Button Man not working for me, and Stone Island a good way down from there.

Prog 2008 details in the new Previews

Stront is back in the Glum Affair -yay! Alpha has to spring Billy Glum from prison?

Stickleback gets an offer he cant refuse

Shakara is back

Dante

Kingdom

all listed, but memory hasnt held much more than that.

Armitage is back in the Meg.... why, Lord, why!?

Picked up a copy of total:spec magazine with an interesting 2000Ad article

talk with Matt Smith, Frazer Irving, Alan Grant and Brett ewins as far as I can see.  

Wonder if this is related to the chap who popped up a while back?

No mention of 2000AD there, but hopefully...

Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6940239.stm" target="_blank">maybe...