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General Chat => Books & Comics => Topic started by: JayzusB.Christ on 09 January, 2019, 10:07:29 PM

Title: Toxic
Post by: JayzusB.Christ on 09 January, 2019, 10:07:29 PM
Only managed to read one back when it came out (which, I'm afraid to say,  I shoplifted).  Reading them now,  though,  I realise I'd been missing some really good stuff.  Loved the editorial style too, somewhere between Tharg and Uncle Pigg.

Pure punk rock comics at its finest.  No wonder Tharg was getting worried. Shame so many of its creators were stiffed.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Professor Bear on 09 January, 2019, 10:29:49 PM
Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 09 January, 2019, 10:07:29 PM(which, I'm afraid to say,  I shoplifted).

It's what they would have wanted.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: GordonR on 09 January, 2019, 10:51:43 PM
Yeah.  "Pure punk rock comics"....in 1991.

tbh, in long-distance retrospect, it's just kinda embarrassing dad comix put together by ageing enfants terrible; a comedy editor called Doc Toxx and a letters column called Dump Your Load, because that's what they thought the kidz were into.

The background financial shennigans, friendships trashed and some induvuals' very flexible definition of  creator rights is Toxic's best story.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: maryanddavid on 09 January, 2019, 11:01:50 PM
Interesting series of articles here https://g1rm.wordpress.com/2014/12/09/the-rise-and-fall-of-neptune-comic-distributors-part-seven/ (https://g1rm.wordpress.com/2014/12/09/the-rise-and-fall-of-neptune-comic-distributors-part-seven/)

It's a funny one Toxic, some bits were great, but it never lived up to the potential of the creators involved. The best thing about Toxic was the Button Man :lol:
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Funt Solo on 10 January, 2019, 01:14:51 AM
I had to go rummaging around in ... The Cavern ... because I knew I had something in there with Toxic! written on it, and I found my copy of Toxic! presents: Marshal Law - Kingdom of the Blind.

I don't remember much about Toxic!, but this is absurdly wonderful comic stuff from Mills and O'Neill (and the letterers of course - don't forget the letterers - Felix and O'Grady).

I don't recall if it was shoplifted.  There was a time in the late 80s / early 90s comic's boom that my poor unemployed wallet could not possibly manage the burden of titles that were weighing down the shelves at the local news mart without a little bit of ... non-financial consumption.

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-m1ha05bMHzk/VmYeBlMWJeI/AAAAAAAAD34/gvVZ8LQ9F4o/s1600/marshallawblindcover.jpg)
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JayzusB.Christ on 10 January, 2019, 06:50:48 AM
Quote from: GordonR on 09 January, 2019, 10:51:43 PM
Yeah.  "Pure punk rock comics"....in 1991.
Quote

Ah well, it's more punk than Grant Morrison says he was back then.


Quote
I don't recall if it was shoplifted.  There was a time in the late 80s / early 90s comic's boom that my poor unemployed wallet could not possibly manage the burden of titles that were weighing down the shelves at the local news mart without a little bit of ... non-financial consumption.

This was my problem too, and why I missed the first few years of the Megazine. I always paid the green lad though.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Bad City Blue on 10 January, 2019, 09:17:55 AM
I remember enjoying Toxic to a point. It did seem very juvenile which was at odds with the adult strip content.

Bit of a clusterfuck all round, but we did at least get some good stuff out of it
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: CalHab on 10 January, 2019, 09:44:19 AM
I enjoyed it, or rather I enjoyed Marshall Law and Accident Man. It might have been juvenile, but so was I.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: sheridan on 10 January, 2019, 12:25:45 PM
Maturity-wise I found most of it to be around the level of early 2000AD (before it was growing up with its readership) and 1980s Eagle, but with added swear words and nudity, so children wouldn't actually be able to buy it (not if the newsagent was paying attention, anyway).  No idea how true this is, but I got the impression at the time that (alleged) increased creative freedoms meant creators were free to wander off before completing work...
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Fungus on 10 January, 2019, 05:09:08 PM
Quote from: sheridan on 10 January, 2019, 12:25:45 PM
Maturity-wise I found most of it to be around the level of early 2000AD (before it was growing up with its readership) and 1980s Eagle, but with added swear words and nudity, so children wouldn't actually be able to buy it (not if the newsagent was paying attention, anyway).  No idea how true this is, but I got the impression at the time that (alleged) increased creative freedoms meant creators were free to wander off before completing work...

It did that thing of being an immature-for-mature-readers comic, so I never really warmed to it. Have the first couple of issues (and Marshal Law and Bogie Man 'Apocalyse Presents' editions. Collected reprints?). I was drifting from the prog too, so maybe just me. BTW always loved The Bogie Man, a great strip....

Don't know about 'wander off before completing work...'. Wasn't the enterprise poorly managed, with creators not getting paid? I might be wrong there. If so, kind of sadly ironic that some big names left the prog and found the grass wasn't in fact any greener...
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: GordonR on 10 January, 2019, 05:50:50 PM
Yeah, there's no great mystery about it. People 'wandered off' without completing work because they weren't getting paid, or because promises to them had been broken.

Compounding Toxic's problems, it basically didn't have an editor for much of its short history. Marvel US editor Margaret Clark signed up for the job - and that's a weird fit right there for a UK weekly newssstand anthology title - but backed out late in the day,  strangely preferring Manhattan to a move to Leicester.

Alan Grant and Pat Mills kind of unhappily oversaw things for a while, and a young Dan Abnett became official editor just in time for the whole thing to fold.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: sheridan on 10 January, 2019, 08:45:57 PM
Quote from: Fungus on 10 January, 2019, 05:09:08 PM
Quote from: sheridan on 10 January, 2019, 12:25:45 PM
Maturity-wise I found most of it to be around the level of early 2000AD (before it was growing up with its readership) and 1980s Eagle, but with added swear words and nudity, so children wouldn't actually be able to buy it (not if the newsagent was paying attention, anyway).  No idea how true this is, but I got the impression at the time that (alleged) increased creative freedoms meant creators were free to wander off before completing work...

Don't know about 'wander off before completing work...'. Wasn't the enterprise poorly managed, with creators not getting paid? I might be wrong there. If so, kind of sadly ironic that some big names left the prog and found the grass wasn't in fact any greener...


Well, I did say my impression at the time - being a child in a provincial town before the internet age meant information was very limited - I don't even know how I knew to look out for Toxic!
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JayzusB.Christ on 10 January, 2019, 10:29:23 PM
 Pat Mills' workload must have been huge at the time.  And yet he was still producing quality stuff at that stage of his career. 

(It was before his preachy phase, I think. Glad that didn't last.)
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JamesC on 10 January, 2019, 11:20:55 PM
I thought Toxic was really cool at the time. I remember seeing the cinema ad and thinking it looked amazing and then seeing issue 1 in WHSmith (and being a bit confused that a super-heroic dinosaur wasn't a main character).
I still think the design is really cool - all those waste-spill title bars etc.
It went down hill pretty fast. It's a shame Muto Maniac didn't go anywhere and Bogie Man didn't conclude. I really hated The Driver too - something about that strip really rubbed me up the wrong way.
Those Apocalypse specials were fucking great though. Kingdom of the Blind is one of Marshall Law's high points and I remember poring over the Accident Man one on the coach ride home from a school camping trip.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JayzusB.Christ on 10 January, 2019, 11:47:48 PM
I loved Kingdom of the Blind, the first Marshal Law story I ever read. I seem to remember it coming out before Toxic, would that be right?
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: rogue69 on 11 January, 2019, 01:33:16 AM
"kingdom of the blind" came out in 1990 through Apocalypse Comics, then they started "The Hateful Dead" in toxic! issues 1-8 in 1991 with the collected edition coming out shortly afterwards. Also toxic! issues 14-15 reprinted the prologue from Fear and Loathing with new framing sequences
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JayzusB.Christ on 14 January, 2019, 07:19:49 PM
Cheers.  I notice with Toxic too the kind of schizophrenic editorial attitude towards adult content that Tharg had for a long time  with no shortage of blood, sex, nudity and swearing (just one f- bomb ever, though, just like the prog), and yet a sort of pretence in the editorial pages that it wasn't really happening (including a section for 'signature of parent or guardian' on the reservation coupon).
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JOE SOAP on 14 January, 2019, 07:41:07 PM
Like Kingdom of the Blind, the Marvel piss-take was also a one-shot.

(https://static.comicvine.com/uploads/scale_small/11112/111127013/4121563-takes-manhattan--mag-uk.jpg)
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Hawkmumbler on 14 January, 2019, 09:21:13 PM
Kingdom of the Blind is Mills and O'Neil at their most biting and sadistic and I love every panel of it.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: rogue69 on 14 January, 2019, 09:49:00 PM
someone made a video out of the story The Driver back in 2009
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-PjNLRUdw8
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: tonyf33 on 15 January, 2019, 01:54:36 PM
Read the Toxic story in ComicScene - part one here https://issuu.com/comicsflix/docs/comic-scene-issue-0/40
and part two here https://issuu.com/comicsflix/docs/comic_scene_with_slaine_pull_out_is
In Issue 1 you can also read a chapter from Pat Mills book on Slaine.
In Volume 2 Issue 1 of ComicScene, on sale 21st Feb, you can read about Marshal Law and Pat Mills goes into more depth on the character.  You can pre order or subscribe to the magazine at www.comicscene.tictail.com
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Blue Cactus on 15 January, 2019, 09:29:01 PM
I was ten or eleven when that Toxic: Kingdom of the Blind comic came out. I was off school ill for a couple of days, and my dad very kindly stopped off on his way home from work to buy me a comic as a wee treat.

Well. That was an eye-opener for ten-year old me.

'Rubber Johnny'... Suicida attacking people with a giant spiked dildo thing... Even just the dude being stabbed to death by scalpels attached to the underside of Private Eye's car... The final battle in the boiling pit... 'HAPPY ANNIVERSARY SHITHEAD!!!' [spoiler]The death of Kilotin[/spoiler]... So many images and bits of dialogue ingrained onto my prepubescent brain.

I was mildly unsettled, but I bloody loved it! Thanks Dad/Pat/Kevin!
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JayzusB.Christ on 15 January, 2019, 11:17:11 PM
Quote from: Blue Cactus on 15 January, 2019, 09:29:01 PM
I was ten or eleven when that Toxic: Kingdom of the Blind comic came out. I was off school ill for a couple of days, and my dad very kindly stopped off on his way home from work to buy me a comic as a wee treat.

Well. That was an eye-opener for ten-year old me.

'Rubber Johnny'... Suicida attacking people with a giant spiked dildo thing... Even just the dude being stabbed to death by scalpels attached to the underside of Private Eye's car... The final battle in the boiling pit... 'HAPPY ANNIVERSARY SHITHEAD!!!' [spoiler]The death of Kilotin[/spoiler]... So many images and bits of dialogue ingrained onto my prepubescent brain.

I was mildly unsettled, but I bloody loved it! Thanks Dad/Pat/Kevin!

I'm guessing your old man hadn't  flicked through the contents first.  (Think I was about twelve before I realised that a rubber Johnny wasn't just another word for a willy,  and about 14 when I discovered that dildo didn't mean something like dumbo.)

Think I may have been 15 or 16 when I read it,  and I was somewhat windblown too.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Blue Cactus on 16 January, 2019, 09:22:31 PM
Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 15 January, 2019, 11:17:11 PM
Quote from: Blue Cactus on 15 January, 2019, 09:29:01 PM
I was ten or eleven when that Toxic: Kingdom of the Blind comic came out. I was off school ill for a couple of days, and my dad very kindly stopped off on his way home from work to buy me a comic as a wee treat.

Well. That was an eye-opener for ten-year old me.

'Rubber Johnny'... Suicida attacking people with a giant spiked dildo thing... Even just the dude being stabbed to death by scalpels attached to the underside of Private Eye's car... The final battle in the boiling pit... 'HAPPY ANNIVERSARY SHITHEAD!!!' [spoiler]The death of Kilotin[/spoiler]... So many images and bits of dialogue ingrained onto my prepubescent brain.

I was mildly unsettled, but I bloody loved it! Thanks Dad/Pat/Kevin!

I'm guessing your old man hadn't  flicked through the contents first.  (Think I was about twelve before I realised that a rubber Johnny wasn't just another word for a willy,  and about 14 when I discovered that dildo didn't mean something like dumbo.)

Think I may have been 15 or 16 when I read it,  and I was somewhat windblown too.

Not to derail the thread, but I thought a rubber johnny was a condom, not a willy???
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Colin YNWA on 16 January, 2019, 09:24:12 PM
Quote from: Blue Cactus on 16 January, 2019, 09:22:31 PM

Not to derail the thread, but I thought a rubber johnny was a condom, not a willy???

I mean I shouldn't continue such things but yeah defo.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JayzusB.Christ on 17 January, 2019, 07:16:01 AM
If you'll read my post again, you'll note that I said that I realised a rubber johnny WASN'T a willy when I was about 12.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Blue Cactus on 19 January, 2019, 12:59:39 PM
Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 17 January, 2019, 07:16:01 AM
If you'll read my post again, you'll note that I said that I realised a rubber johnny WASN'T a willy when I was about 12.

So you did, my apologies!
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Colin YNWA on 19 January, 2019, 05:04:51 PM
Quote from: Colin YNWA on 16 January, 2019, 09:24:12 PM
Quote from: Blue Cactus on 16 January, 2019, 09:22:31 PM

Not to derail the thread, but I thought a rubber johnny was a condom, not a willy???

I mean I shouldn't continue such things but yeah defo.

I however refuse to change my mind whatever new information I'm supplied with. I said 2 years ago a few days ago that a rubber johnny is a condom and I don't care if I was mislead and didn't bother to check my fact I stand firm even as the clear evidence of economic ruin and chaos build around me of my mistake gather. I'll just find another (ill informed and probably dishonest) reason to restate in the ignorant pap I've stated already FOR I'M A PATRIOT and anything else is a betrayal of...

... or to put it another ways...

...whoops sorry - can I vote post again now I understand.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JayzusB.Christ on 19 January, 2019, 06:23:35 PM
Quote from: Blue Cactus on 19 January, 2019, 12:59:39 PM
Quote from: JayzusB.Christ on 17 January, 2019, 07:16:01 AM
If you'll read my post again, you'll note that I said that I realised a rubber johnny WASN'T a willy when I was about 12.

So you did, my apologies!

Way too late for that, bub  ;)
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JayzusB.Christ on 19 January, 2019, 08:16:10 PM
PS I know what you're up to, young Mr YNWA...
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: JimmyNailz on 23 January, 2019, 03:54:14 PM
I still have the first 10 or so issues of TOXIC!  There are some great stories in there (Accident Man, Bogie Man, Marshall Law) and some not so great ones (I really couldn't get behind "The Driver").

It's a real shame the experiment didn't work out.  I'd happily buy another few weekly or monthly British comic anthologies alongside my Prog and Meg.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Bolt-01 on 24 January, 2019, 10:44:00 AM
Jimmy- if you are looking for extra anthologies suited to 2000 AD, you need look no further than FQP.

https://www.futurequake.co.uk/ (https://www.futurequake.co.uk/)

Shameless pimping I know, but so many of the latest crop of prog regulars cut their circuits working for me.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Funt Solo on 24 January, 2019, 03:59:07 PM
Wasn't Professor Grabblefax a character in FutureQuake?  I liked him so much I use him in my math questions quite a lot.  For example:

Professor Grabblefax has a collection of mutagens, which he has labelled Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta & Epsilon.  If the professor picks one mutagen at random, then changes his mind, replaces it and picks another: what is the probability that he chose the same mutagen both times?
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Trout on 25 January, 2019, 02:23:14 AM
Zero. He replaced it and chose another.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Funt Solo on 25 January, 2019, 03:30:51 AM
Nice try, yer majesty, but no banana.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Lobo Baggins on 25 January, 2019, 10:10:26 AM
No, Trout is correct - it's zero. Interacting with the mutagen changed the mutagen's status thus making it impossible to pick the same one twice.

Or it's 50/50 - he'll either pick the same one again or he won't.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Funt Solo on 25 January, 2019, 03:34:48 PM
On topic: Toxic.  Had it's ups and downs.

---

It takes me while to think things through, but it's slowly dawning on me that the His Royal Fishiness may have a point.  Let me reword the problem in an attempt to remove ambiguity:

Professor Grabblefax has a collection of mutagens, which he has labelled Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta & Epsilon.  If the professor picks one mutagen at random, then changes his mind, replaces it and picks another again: what is the probability that he chose the same mutagen both times?
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Bolt-01 on 25 January, 2019, 03:50:16 PM
Grabblefax- maybe I'm wrong but the closest I remember to that is Brabblepap from Omnivistascope... of course I could be wrong.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Funt Solo on 25 January, 2019, 03:53:24 PM
That's the fella!  Omnivistascope, it was.  My brain did a backflip and converted *Brabblepap* to Grabblefax somehow.

I got my fanzines muddled.

Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Pyroxian on 25 January, 2019, 03:53:39 PM
Quote from: Funt Solo on 25 January, 2019, 03:34:48 PM
Professor Grabblefax has a collection of mutagens, which he has labelled Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta & Epsilon.  If the professor picks one mutagen at random, then changes his mind, replaces it and picks another again: what is the probability that he chose the same mutagen both times?

1 in 5, or 20%.
As far as I understand it, it's the equivalent of rolling a 5 sided dice and getting the same number twice.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: M.I.K. on 25 January, 2019, 04:06:37 PM
Quote from: Funt Solo on 25 January, 2019, 03:34:48 PM
Professor Grabblefax has a collection of mutagens, which he has labelled Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta & Epsilon.  If the professor picks one mutagen at random, then changes his mind, replaces it and picks another again: what is the probability that he chose the same mutagen both times?

Need more info. Is he looking at the labels after he picks them? Are the individual containers of mutagen labelled or is it one big label on the entire collection? How many individual containers are there? Are Delta and Episilon on the same label / in the same container? Has some of the mutagen leaked out causing his hands to immediately mutate into cactussy things like that bloke out of The Quatermass Experiment, thus making it near impossible to pick any subsequent items?
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Fungus on 25 January, 2019, 05:20:29 PM
So many variables, it's an exercise in pedantry...  :)

So there are 5 labels. Maybe it's one mutagen and a set of misleading labels. All bets are off.

If you returned a mutagen and placed it on the left-end, you wouldn't pick that obviously-the-same-one back up if you changed your mind. Unless you're nuts. Maybe you're nuts.

So: what's up with this question anyway? Do tell.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Lobo Baggins on 25 January, 2019, 05:28:22 PM
Quote from: M.I.K. on 25 January, 2019, 04:06:37 PM
Quote from: Funt Solo on 25 January, 2019, 03:34:48 PM
Professor Grabblefax has a collection of mutagens, which he has labelled Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta & Epsilon.  If the professor picks one mutagen at random, then changes his mind, replaces it and picks another again: what is the probability that he chose the same mutagen both times?

Need more info. Is he looking at the labels after he picks them? Are the individual containers of mutagen labelled or is it one big label on the entire collection? How many individual containers are there? Are Delta and Episilon on the same label / in the same container? Has some of the mutagen leaked out causing his hands to immediately mutate into cactussy things like that bloke out of The Quatermass Experiment, thus making it near impossible to pick any subsequent items?

Of course, only some sort of boring Sensible Scientist wouldn't include the dreaded Omega Mutagen in the selection. Any proper Comics Based Scientist would automatically pick that one and say it was a random choice, no matter what the options.

Or Pi, of course. No one's going to turn down Pi...
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Funt Solo on 25 January, 2019, 06:11:08 PM
MIK, Lobo & Fungus get points for artistic creativity, His Royal Trout gets point for grammar.

Pyroxian gets points for mathematical correctness.

It's 5/5 * 1/5 = 1/5 = 20%


Designer Notes:

Professor Grabblefax is insane, yes.  This neatly explains his random, haphazard selection of mutagens, his omission of the dreaded Omega Mutagen (and Pi, which he turned down), and his rather odd single-labeling system which (as rightly pointed out) is simply a bizarre, wrong-headed way to label a mutagen collection.
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Trout on 25 January, 2019, 11:14:44 PM
Grammar is more important than mathematical correctness. We should have a riddles thread so I can annoy people there, too.  :D
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Bolt-01 on 28 January, 2019, 08:23:02 AM
Just give me the PI!
Title: Re: Toxic
Post by: Lobo Baggins on 28 January, 2019, 10:26:58 AM
Quote from: Bolt-01 on 28 January, 2019, 08:23:02 AM
Just give me the PI!

Sorry, Bolt, Alpha eta pi so there's no pi left. Not one iota.